To start this lesson off, let’s take a look some sentences:

(1) 술을 마셨어요. (술 = alcohol. 을 = object marking particle. 마셨어요 = past tense of 마시다 = to drink)

(2) 술만 마쎴어요. (술 = alcohol. 만 = only. 마쎴어요 = drank)

The first sentence can be interpreted as, “[I] drank alcohol” while the second sentence can be interpreted as, “[I] only drank alcohol”. The particle that provides the meaning “only” is 만.

Let’s look at another example:

(1) 학생들이 공부했어요.

(학생 = student. 들 = plural marker. 이 = subject marker. 공부했어요 = past tense of 공부하다 = to study)

(2) 핵생들만 공부했어요.

(핵생 = student. 들 = plural marker. 만 = only. 공부했어요 = studied)

The first sentence means, “The students studied” while the second sentence means, “Only the students studied”. In this set, the subject of the sentence, (the students) have the 만 particle attached, but in the previous sentence the object of the sentence, (the alcohol) has the 만 attached. From this, you can conclude that the attachment of 만 is very flexible.

Now let’s look at slightly different but related construction:

(1) 어제는 운동만 했어요.

(어제 = yesterday. 는 = topic marking particle. 운동 = exercise/work out. 만 = only. 했어요 = past tense of 하다 = to do)

(2) 어제는 운동하기만 했어요.

(어제 = yesterday. 는 = topic marking particle. 운동하기만 했어요 = nothing but exercise)

The first sentence would mean something like “Yesterday, I only worked out” while the second sentence would mean something like, “I did nothing but work out”. The second sentence has the ending ~기만 했다 which gives off a more extreme meaning than the first sentence. Also to form the 기만 했다 ending, drop the 다 of the infinitive of the verb and add it to 기만 했다. So If you want to say, “I did nothing but play” it would be 놀기만 했다. The 다 of 놀다 was dropped and added to 기만 했다, and that’s all there is to it!