The study deals with the historical background of foreign language teaching and pays special attention to the development of Hungarian as foreign language teaching especially in Transcarpathia. It gives explanations to the reasons of foreign language learning and the significance of motivation when a language is chosen to be learned. Greek and Latin were dominant in ancient times. Today English is learned everywhere as a foreign language. Nevertheless, there are other modern languages to be taught like Hungarian. The study also emphasizes the language teaching methods used throughout centuries. They have effects on the way of teaching Hungarian as a foreign language.