Persian/Lesson 1

Shirin sees her friend Arash in passing and greets him:

The dialogues in lessons 1 through 3 are shown in UniPers, a system of writing the Persian language in the Latin alphabet. In later lessons, the native Persian script is shown along with a transcription.

Shirin :	‹salâm, âraš!› (help·info) “Hello Arash!”
Arash :	‹salâm, širin! cetori?› (help·info) “Hello, Shirin! How are you?”
Shirin :	‹mersi, xubam. tow cetori?› (help·info) “Thank you, I’m fine. How are you?”
Arash :	‹man xubam.› (help·info) “I'm fine.”

Explanation

Arash and Shirin are using a casual style of speech typically among friends. Later lessons will use various styles of speech, including some for more formal situations.

Vocabulary

• ‹salâm›    IPA:   /sæˈlɒːm/ — “peace” a common greeting like “hello” in English

• ‹cetori›      /t͡ʃeˈtoɾiː/ — “how are (you)” (informal, used among friends)
• ‹tow›      /tow/ — “you” (informal)
• ‹mersi›      /'meɾsiː/ — “thanks”
• ‹man›      /mæn — “I, me”
• ‹xubam›      /ˈxuːbæm/ — “(I) am fine/well/good”

The Persian language has six vowel sounds and twenty-three consonant sounds. Old Persian was written using its own cuneiform alphabet. Other scripts were used in later stages of the language, and eventually the Arabic alphabet was adopted. The sounds of Persian are different from Arabic, though, so four letters were added for Persian sounds that do not exist in Arabic ( پ   ‹pe›, چ   ‹ce›, ژ   ‹že›, and گ   ‹gâf›), and letters for several foreign Arabic sounds are pronounced like their closest Persian approximation.

Thus, the twenty-nine sounds of Persian are written in the Perso-Arabic script, which has thirty-two letters and is called الفبا   ‹alefbâ›, named after its first two letters (similar to "ABCs" in English). It is a cursive script, written from right to left like Arabic, opposite of the English direction. The letters are presented in the first four lessons of this book, followed by a summary of the whole alphabet in the "Alphabet summary" section of Lesson 4.

 

The two forms of ‹alef›:
آ	ا
‹â› (help·info)

The first letter in Persian is ا   ‹alef›.

At the beginning of a word (on the right side), alef has two forms. The form on the far right here with the madde (the small "hat" on top: آ ) is written as a tall, vertical stroke from top to bottom followed by the madde on top written from right to left as a straight ( ^- ) or curved ( ^~ ) line. This form represents a doubled alef ( اا ). It is pronounced with the long vowel sound /ɒː/ (IPA), transcribed here as ‹â›. That is, it has a long duration and is produced with rounded lips and the tongue low and far back in the mouth, like a slow version of the vowel in the Queen's English pronunciation of hot, American English caught, or South African English park. When the first letter of a word is alef without a "hat" ( ا ), it is read as a short vowel: ‹a› (IPA: /æ/) as in at, ‹e› (/e/) as in end or ‹o› (/o/) as in open, as will be seen in later examples.

When alef appears later in a word (after the first letter), it is always written without the "hat" ( ا ) and it always represents long ‹â›.

Distinguishing a and â:

Decide whether the ‹alef› in the following words stands for (short) ‹a› or (long) ‹â›. You do not need to be able to read the whole word at this stage. To see the correct answer, click “[show ▼]”.

آب (long) ‹â› اتو (short) ‹a› اسب (short) ‹a› آن (long) ‹â›

  Writing practice

 

Get out a pen and paper and practice writing آ ‹alef madde› and ا ‹alef›. Remember to write from right to left and to keep the base lines even.

آ آآآ ا ااا

آ آآآ ا ااا

After alef ( ا ), the next four Persian letters, shown on the right, are all written similarly but with varying dots.

Persian letters have names that begin with the sound they make, so these four letters make the sounds ‹b›, ‹p›, ‹t›, and ‹s›.

ب

‹be›

The second Persian letter is ب   ‹be›. It represents the /b/ sound. Its name sounds like a quick pronunciation of the English word “bay”.

آب	←	آ	ب				←	آب
‹âb›		‹â›	‹b›

The Persian word آب   ‹âb› (“water”) is shown on the right. In this word, the initial alef is written with a “hat” ( آ ), so it is read as long ‹â›. Persian is written from right to left and positioned on and around a horizontal baseline that is typically not visible on the page. The swooping stroke of ب is written from right to left and sits on that baseline, as does آ . The dot is below the baseline and, like the dot in the English cursive letter i, it is written after the connected strokes in the word.

بابا	←	ب‍	‍ا	ب‍	‍ا		←	بابا
‹bâbâ›		‹b›	‹â›	‹b›	‹â›

As shown on the right, the swooping stroke of each ب connects with the following ا to spell بابا   ‹bâbâ›, an informal word for “father”, similar to the English words “dad” and “daddy”. The other letters in this section are like ب in that each has a swooping stroke that sits on the baseline and connects with the following letter, and each has one or more dots that are written after all of the connected strokes of the word.

Note that the alefs in بابا are not at the beginning of the word, so they represent long ‹â› and are not written with a “hat”.

پ	←	پ‍	‍پ‍	‍پ			←	پپپ
‹pe›		connecting forms

The third Persian letter is پ   ‹pe›. It is pronounced as /p/ and its name sounds like a quick pronunciation of the English word “pay”. Its swooping stroke is written from right to left like the other letters of this group, then after the rest of the connected strokes of the word are written, the three dots of پ are written below the baseline.

پا	←	پ‍	‍ا				←	پا
‹pâ›		‹p›	‹â›

پ followed by ا spells the word پا   ‹pâ› (“foot”).

ت	←	ت‍	‍ت‍	‍ت			←	تتت
‹te›		connecting forms

The letter ت   ‹te› is pronounced like /t/ and is written with two dots above the swooping line. Its name rhymes with the other letters in this section.

ت followed by ا spells the word تا   ‹tâ› (“until”).

ث	←	ث‍	‍ث‍	‍ث			←	ثثث
‹se›		connecting forms

The letter ث   ‹se› is one of three separate Persian letters for the /s/ sound, since that is the Persian approximation of the letter's Arabic sound [θ]. In Persian, its name sounds like an abbreviated version of the English word “say”. It is used mainly in words of Arabic origin and is not a very common letter in Persian.

As shown on the right, ث appears twice in the word اثاث   ‹asâs› (“furniture”).

Note the difference between a hatless initial alef pronounced as short ‹a› and an alef in the middle of a word, pronounced as long ‹â›.

  Writing practice

 

Get out a pen and paper and practice writing ب ‹be›, پ ‹pe›, ت ‹te› and ث ‹se›. Remember to write from right to left and to keep the base lines even.

ب ببب پ پپپ ت تتت ث ثثث

ب ببب پ پپپ ت تتت ث ثثث

The next four Persian letters, shown on the right, are all written similarly but with varying dots.

ج	←	ج‍	‍ج‍	‍ج			←	ججج
‹jim›		connecting forms

The letter ج   ‹jim› is transcribed as ‹j› and pronounced as [d͡ʒ] (i.e. like the English letter j in jump). The top stroke is written first from left to right above the baseline, followed by the lower hook extending counterclockwise below the baseline. The dot is written later, after any other connected strokes in the word.

ج followed by ا spells the word جا   ‹jâ› (“place”). This example shows that the shape of this letter changes when another letter follows it. The top stroke is still written from left to right, but a simple right-to-left stroke along the baseline replaces the hook when another letter follows. The other letters in this section change shape similarly when another letter follows.

When a ج follows a connecting letter, as in پنج   ‹panj› (“five”) or اینجا   ‹injâ› (“here”), the top stroke is still written before the tail (or the following connecting stroke, as the case may be).

The letter چ   ‹ce› is transcribed in UniPers as ‹c› and pronounced as [t͡ʃ] (i.e., like ch in English church).

The letter ح   ‹he› is pronounced as /h/. Its name sounds like a quick version of the English word “hay” (that is, it does not sound like the English word “he”).

ح followed by ب spells the word حب   ‹hab› (“pill”).

The letter خ   ‹xe› is pronounced like the IPA sound [x] (like the Spanish letter j or the German ch), transcribed in UniPers as ‹x›.

خ followed by ا and ج spells the word خاج   ‹xâj› (“cross”). Like the previous few letters, the tail of خ is not written when another letter follows it.

  Writing practice

 

Get out a pen and paper and practice writing ج ‹jim›, چ ‹ce›, ح ‹he› and خ ‹xe›. Remember to write from right to left and to keep the base lines even.

ج ججج چ چچچ ح ححح خ خخخ

ج ججج چ چچچ ح ححح خ خخخ

In this lesson, you learned some greetings, the first nine letters of the Persian Alphabet, and how to spell several words with those letters from right to left. You also learned that short vowels are usually not written, and that many letters change their shape depending on whether they connect with letters before or after them.

Continue to Lesson 2 ( ۲ ), The alphabet (continued) >>