What does 'Regő Rejtem' mean?

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xBlackHeartx
What does 'Regő Rejtem' mean?

Postby xBlackHeartx » 2018-12-17, 23:14

Note that I don't know Hungarian, even though I obviously listen to The Moon and the Nightspirit.

Anyway, wikipedia claims that it means 'I conjure magic', but using a dictionary I don't get the same result. I can't find regő, but I have found rejtem. My dictionary claims it can mean either 'I hide' or '(self)hidden'. I don't get either result if I look up 'conjure' or 'magic'.

So what does this phrase actually mean? And yes, I have thought about learning Hungarian, but I haven't had much luck with learning languages in the past, because I never use them. And I'm fairly certain that I'll never make use of Hungarian. I don't even use what little Spanish I know.

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Re: What does 'Regő Rejtem' mean?

Postby france-eesti » 2018-12-18, 14:48

Szia! :)
Well I am not Hungarian but I am studying the language (and have been for nearly 2 years).
And I don't know "Regő" either :para:
If it was the object of "rejtem", then it would end with a -t, for accusative... But there is no "t".
I can ask one of my Hungarian teachers, because I'm also quite curious about it :) and I will let you know! :partyhat:
(fr) Native - (en) Fluentish - (pt) Fluentish when I was younger - (hu) Can sustain a conversation with a patient and kind magyar or order some beer and lecsó in Budapest - (it) On Duolingo ma posso ordinare uno Spritz ed antipasti in un ristorante :blush:

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Re: What does 'Regő Rejtem' mean?

Postby Linguaphile » 2022-02-06, 16:41

It's related to a winter tradition in Transdanubia (western Hungary) of minstrels/mummers going from house to house singing songs in exchange for gifts. It's called regölés, you can find more info with google if anyone is still interested. It seems like the meaning of hej regő rejtem is not known but the gist of it is something like "hey, I'm doing regölés", used as an introduction or refrain in the songs sung during this time, sometimes as "hej regő rejtem" as in the song by Moon and the Nightspirit, sometimes as "ej regörejtem" or "haj regö rejtem" or "haj regörejtem" and so on. Sometimes it is written as one word (regörejtem), sometimes with ő and sometimes with ö.
My guess, but it's just a guess, is that regő is not the object of rejtem (therefore no accusative -t) but instead the whole phrase was originally a single word, a verb like *regörejt or something like that, with a meaning specific to the tradition ("to go from house to house singing regölés songs in winter" or something along those lines).
The tradition dates back to pre-Christian times when it was associated with magic and thought to bring luck in the coming year, but in the Christian era was integrated into Christmas celebrations and practiced between Christmas day and Epiphany. So based on the pre-Christian idea of bringing good luck, I guess "I conjure magic" is as good a translation as any, but not exactly a literal one.

(I know this is a really old post, but maybe one of the people who posted in this thread is still reading posts here, or someone else will come here looking for an answer to the same question.)


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