maga alatt vágja a fát

Hungarian

Etymology

maga (“oneself”) +‎ alatt (“under”) +‎ vág (“to cut”) +‎ -ja (personal suffix) +‎ a (“the”) +‎ fa (“tree”) +‎ -t (accusative suffix), literally “to cut the tree under oneself”

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [ˈmɒɡɒɒlɒtː ˈvaːɡjɒ ɒ ˈfaːt]

Verb

maga alatt vágja a fát

1. (idiomatic) to saw off the branch one is sitting on, to shoot oneself in the foot (to act against one's own interests, to act self-destructively)

Conjugation

• For the verb, see the definite conjugation of vág.
• The inflected noun fát remains unchanged.
• The postpositional phrase maga alatt takes the appropriate personal suffix according to the subject of the sentence: magam alatt, magad alatt, maga alatt, magunk alatt, magatok alatt, maguk alatt.