Persian
Persian may refer to:
* People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language
** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples
** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...
alef
Aleph (or alef or alif, transliterated ʾ) is the first letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician , Hebrew , Aramaic , Syriac , Arabic ʾ and North Arabian 𐪑. It also appears as South Arabian 𐩱 and Ge'ez .
These letter ...
or ye, forming the combination of or , in which the ''vāv'' is silenced. It is always written but not typically spoken, except for in certain eastern Persian dialects wherein it is pronounced. If not followed by a long vowel, the ''vāv'' following a ''khe'' sometimes adopts the sound of the short vowel Zamme/Pish.
History
Historical development
The silent ''vāv'' occurs only in words of
Iranian
Iranian may refer to:
* Iran, a sovereign state
* Iranian peoples, the speakers of the Iranian languages. The term Iranic peoples is also used for this term to distinguish the pan ethnic term from Iranian, used for the people of Iran
* Iranian lan ...
Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic languages, Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C ...
loanwords that entered the language. Words in
Middle Persian
Middle Persian or Pahlavi, also known by its endonym Pārsīk or Pārsīg () in its later form, is a Western Middle Iranian language which became the literary language of the Sasanian Empire. For some time after the Sasanian collapse, Middle Per ...
voiceless velar fricative
The voiceless velar fricative is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. It was part of the consonant inventory of Old English and can still be found in some dialects of English, most notably in Scottish English, e.g. in ''loc ...
preceding a long vowel developed such that the sound underwent delabialization and simply became the voiceless velar fricative . In cases where it preceded the short
near-open front unrounded vowel
The near-open front unrounded vowel, or near-low front unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , a lowercase of the ligature. Bot ...
it delabialized and took on the sound of the close-mid back rounded vowel , evolving from to . Despite this, the written language continues to reflect the old standards of pronunciation, hence the silent ''vāv'' remains written. These linguistic evolutions did not take place in certain areas of
Greater Iran
Greater Iran ( fa, ایران بزرگ, translit=Irān-e Bozorg) refers to a region covering parts of Western Asia, Central Asia, South Asia, Xinjiang, and the Caucasus, where both Culture of Iran, Iranian culture and Iranian langua ...
, and thus certain dialects do not have the silent ''vāv'' as a feature.
In poetry
Historically, sometimes poetic usages of the silent ''vāv'' did not follow the traditional literary rules and guidelines. This can be seen in the following poem by Sa'adi in his Bustan book:Phonetic transcription:
According to the Persian literary rules, should be pronounced as ; however, as is visible in this poem, it atypically takes on the sound of and rhymes with / in the verse following it. This silent ''vāv'' taking on the Fathe/Zebar sound of rather than of Zamme/Pish is a very common feature in classical Persian poetry, also seen, for example, in the works of
Ferdowsi
Abul-Qâsem Ferdowsi Tusi ( fa, ; 940 – 1019/1025 CE), also Firdawsi or Ferdowsi (), was a Persians, Persian poet and the author of ''Shahnameh'' ("Book of Kings"), which is one of the world's longest epic poetry, epic poems created by a sin ...
Historically, the silent ''vāv'' was marked in some manuscripts by replacing the in the combination with the 3-dotted variant, , to form . This is no longer a feature of Persian orthography in any manner, with the modified letter having no presence in the modern alphabet.
Geographical distribution.
The standard forms of both
Persian
Persian may refer to:
* People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language
** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples
** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...
Tajiki
Tajik (Tajik: , , ), also called Tajiki Persian (Tajik: , , ) or Tajiki, is the variety of Persian spoken in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan by Tajiks. It is closely related to neighbouring Dari with which it forms a continuum of mutually intelligible ...
, as well as the Persian dialects of Kashan and some other regions of
Iran
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
, continue to pronounce a /w/ sound, meaning that the silent ''vāv'' is not a feature of the orthography of their dialects.