századba

Századba is the illative singular form of the Hungarian noun század, meaning century. The illative case expresses movement toward or into something, so századba literally means “into the century.” It can be used in temporal contexts to indicate entering a new century, as well as in metaphorical expressions that describe transition into a new era. In historical contexts, század can also refer to a military unit of roughly a hundred soldiers; in such uses the illative form would likewise indicate movement into or within that unit, though this sense is rare in modern Hungarian.

Morphology and usage: századba is formed by adding the illative suffix -ba to the stem század. The suffix -ba (vs. -be) follows Hungarian vowel harmony rules. Like other illative forms, századba signals direction into the referenced domain.

Typical usage tends to favor phrases about time periods with compounds such as évszázad or évszázadba. For example, az új évszázadba lépünk would be rendered in English as “we are entering the new century.” When used with csak század alone, the sense is more literary or context-dependent.

See also: Hungarian grammar, Illative case, Század, Évszázad.