Iranian Dialects Research Articles

Valency‐Conditioned Allomorphy in the Verbal Agreement of the Takestani Dialect of Southern Tati

AbstractThis paper studies the morphological structure of verbs in Takestani, an endangered Iranian dialect of Southern Tati. We analyse the effects of various morphological conditions on subject agreement allomorphy. The agreement suffix exhibits a large range of allomorphs in the past tense. We show that the primary factor for the agreement allomorphy is the valency of the root, and secondary factors are the presence of auxiliaries or perfective aspect. We also propose that the agreement allomorphy is a long‐distance process. The agreement allomorphy is conditioned by the voice or transitivity of the verb stem even though the stem is not directly adjacent to the agreement suffix. Alternative formulations in terms of clitics vs. suffixes do not negate the long‐distance nature of this allomorphy. We also find morphomic patterns of behaviour, such that the verbal agreement suffixes are mobile and can alternatively surface as possessive suffixes on nouns.

The Iranian Sound Change *w- > *γw- in the Indo-Iranian Borderlands and a New Etymology for Gāndhārī and Sanskrit guśura(ka)-

Abstract It is generally accepted that the etymology of the Gāndhārī and Sanskrit official title guśura(ka)- has to be sought within the Iranian sphere, but the details remain debatable. In this article, I first give an overview of recently discovered evidence for an early sound change of *w- > *γw- in some Iranian dialects from the Indo-Iranian borderlands. On this basis, I then propose to derive guśura(ka)- from a dialect form such as *γwazurg / *γwuzurg / *γuzurg < *wazr̥ka- ‘strong’. Two by-products of this article are a new Bactrian etymology for the Gāndhārī personal name G̱aṇavhryaka and some notes on the etymology of the Gāndhārī title sturaka-*.

Materia Medica Tocharo-Hvatanica

AbstractThe two languages once spoken in the oases in the North of the Tarim basin, Tocharian A and B, have preserved many Iranian loanwords. These belong to different chronological layers and are of different dialectal origins. Whereas the oldest layers are now most likely seen as belonging to an unattested Old Iranian dialect, more recent layers have not yet been studied in detail. In this respect, the vocabulary of medical texts represents an important field of enquiry. Most terms come from Middle Indian, but a significant number are of Middle Iranian origin. This component, mostly ingredients and technical vocabulary, seems to be largely of Khotanese origin. The article introduces the material and examines possible scenarios for historical transmission and contact between the North and the South of the Tarim Basin.

A Comparative Syntactic Typological Study of Iranian Languages: A case of Persian and Kurdish

Iranian dialects are subgroups of Indo-Iranian dialects and are arranges dependent on their course of events and locale. All Iranian dialects of the center and current occasions have some normal highlights. The plain word request is generally action word last, and the time framework depends on two action word lines, present and past, no matter what. While the current stem proceeds with the Old Iranian present that was acquired straightforwardly from Indo-European, the previous stem depends on a participatory type of the action word finishing off with – ta. The Iranian dialects are probably going to be spoken by in excess of 80 million individuals in a wide zone from Turkey with Zaza as the westernmost to China with Sarikoli as the western that the easternmost Iranian language and primarily cover the entirety of Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan. The advancement of the Iranian dialects can be analyzed in three significant chronicled periods: Old Iranian (up to the fourth/third century BC), Central Iranian (from the fourth/third century BC to the eighth/ninth century AD) and new Iranian language (since 900 AD). Two of the antiquated Iranian dialects are known and archived, Avestan and Old Persian. The Central Iranian dialects (approx. 300 BC – AD 950) are significantly more various. They are partitioned into two principle gatherings, western and eastern. Current Iranian dialects fall into two enormous “Eastern” and “Western” gatherings, with “Northern” and “Southern” sub-gatherings, separately. The qualification between the eastern and western Iranian dialects lies in the fundamental geological dispersion of the principle speakers of these dialects in the east or west of Lut deserts in Iran.

A Linguistic Survey of Khorasan: Implications for Language Isolation, Language Change, and Contact Linguistics

This paper describes and analyzes data from a number of Modern Iranian dialects spoken in Khorasan in the east of Iran which are unusual among the other Western Iranian languages in that they have grammaticalized a split tense-sensitive alignment in indexation, compared to other Iranian languages whose indexation splitness is sensitive to both tense and transitivity. These dialects are the former dialect of Birjand in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, the present-day dialect of Ferdows, Khanik, and Se-Ghal’e. The findings are put in the context of the available data from the Classical Persian texts to show that the tense-sensitive splitness mentioned above is traceable in those texts. A number of external factors are discussed which seem to have been influential in the restructuring of the split-alignment of the former dialect of Birjand into a uniformly nominative-accusative alignment in terms of indexation as observed in the present-day dialect of Birjand. It is proposed that this restructuring is an instance of simplification. The three other dialects cited above are endangered in the sense that they can undergo the same kind of restructuring as happened to the dialect of Birjand.

Notes on Language Affinity and Imagined Kinships

The paper is an attempt to analyse the emergence of virtual “alliances” based on imagined kinship between some ethnic groups and peoples of the Irano-Caucaso-Anatolian region. It focuses on several illustrative examples, particularly the case of the Talysh-Zaza rapprochement, which has been developed recently as a result of popular interpretation of the postulated theory of the Caspian-Aturpatakan language union, implying a close symbiosis, in the historical past, of the ancestors of the present-day speakers of several New Iranian dialects.

“Ice” in Western New Iranian

The paper aims at analysis of the terms denoting “ice” in New Western Iranian dialects. Most of the attested forms reflect NPers. yax. However, an attempt is made to identify several genuine designations of “ice”, which do not fit the common pattern, particularly based on the data obtained from toponymy of the region. In addition, some conjectures regarding the origin of yax are proposed.

Armenian Textile Terminology

The part of the Armenian vocabulary that is inherited from the Indo-European protolanguage is notoriously limited, variously estimated to include between 450 and 700 stems. Otherwise, the lexicon is dominated by etymologically obscure elements and an impressive amount of Middle Iranian loanwords, reflecting the centuries of Iranian political dominance. In particular the Parthian loans, introduced during the Arsacid dynasty (247 BC-224 AD), have left their mark on the Classical Armenian language, attested from the early 5th century, to a similar extent as Old French on English or Low German on Danish, so that linguists until the late 19th century still considered Armenian an aberrant Iranian dialect rather than an independent branch of the Indo-European family. The other main sources of loanwords, Syriac and Greek, are intimately connected with the introduction of Christianity around 300 and hence mainly restricted to the specific word fields of religion and philosophy. Obviously, this state of affairs also affects the textile vocabulary where the impact of Iranian language and culture can hardly be overestimated. Thus, it is quite natural that the Iranian superstrate dominates the lexicon pertaining to advanced textile production, clothing, fashion and ornaments, while on the other hand the core of inherited terms refers to basic products and techniques such as fleece and wool, spinning and weaving. The basis of the present lexical study is the classical language, mainly as attested in the oldest text, the Bible translation from around 410.

The Linguistic History of Rayy up to the Early Islamic Period

Abstract:The purpose of this paper is to give a short sketch of the linguistic history of Rayy from ancient times through the early Islamic period. The language of Rayy in the Old Iranian period must have been Median. The only traces of Median are a few loanwords identified in Old Persian, Assyrian and Babylonian inscriptions, Elamite tablets, Aramaic documents, and Greek texts. The language of Rayy in the Middle Iranian period seems to have been very close to the well-documented northwestern Middle Iranian language spoken in Parthia, known as Parthian or Arsacid Pahlavi. The Iranian dialect of Rayy in the Islamic period, known as the Rāzī dialect, was in fact the natural continuation of Middle Median. The only Rāzī texts available are a small number of poems by Bundār, a Shīʿīte poet at the court of Majd al-Dawla, the Buwayhid ruler of Rayy. In addition, scanty information about the Rāzī dialect can be obtained from a few classical Islamic sources and some of the Persian texts written in Rayy by Rāzī-speaking writers.

Thirty-two More Pears For Uwe

The paper deals with the etymology and dialectology of Turkic armut, Persian armud ‘pear’. The interrelations of these phytonymical families were treated a few years ago by Prof. Uwe Bläsing who considered the Turkic words borrowed from a Middle Iranian language (viz. Pahlavi, because of some isolated attestation in this language), but also the Iranian words probably borrowed from a third (unknown) language of the Irano-Caucasian area. On the basis of an extensive areal study (with original materials from the archive of the Balochi Etymological Dictionary Project, L’Orientale University, Naples) the author argues for a back dating of the Iranian attestations, and the preservation in many modern Iranian dialects of a lexical type believed to be isolated in Middle Persian.

A Thematic and Etymological Glossary of Aquatic and Bird Genera Names in Iranian Bundahišm

The purpose of this study is to present a thematic and etymological glossary of aquatic and bird genera names which have been mentioned in Iranian Bundahišn. In this research, after arranging animal names in Persian alphabetic order in their respective genus, first the transliteration and transcription of animal names in middle Persian language are provided. Afterwards, the part of Bundahišn that contains the actual animal names and the relevant translations are mentioned. The etymology of every animal name is described by considering the morphemic source. Finally, mention is made of the mythology connected to the animal and the animal category in Iranian Bundahišn (if available), and the way in which the words have changed from Old Persian up to now. Changes in the name of every animal from the ancient languages such as Indo-European, Sanskrit, Old Persian and Avestan to middle languages such as Pahlavi, Sogdian, Khotanese, and Chorasmian and how the name appears in new Iranian languages and dialects such as Behdini (Gabri), Kurdi, Baluchi and Yaghnobi are also referred to.

A Caspian Term for “Mud, Clay, Slime”

The paper examines a common term for “mud, clay, sludge, slime, mire, etc.” in the Iranian dialects spoken in the south and south-western shores of the Caspian Sea and north-western parts of Iran, widely attested also in the local toponymy.

Major Phonetic Processes in Sabzevari Dialect

Sabzevar with an area of 19500 square kilometer is located in Northeast Iran, In Khorasan Razavi province. Northward, it is bounded to Quchan and Esfarayen, Eastward to Neyshabour, Southward to Kashmar and Shahrood and Westward to Semnan province. With a phonetic approach and after giving a short definition for ―dialect, this piece of writing attempts to introduce the most prominent phonetic processes of Sabzevari dialect –one of the Western new Iranian dialects- and introduce vocal changes of this dialect compared with Standard Persian. The findings of this research show that in Sabzevari dialect ―mutation is the main phonetic process and ―metathesis is of the lowest frequency.

The Avromani-speaking Area in Iran

AbstractOne of the difficult tasks of linguistic geography is the clear delimitation of dialectal borders in a multi-dialectal and multi-lingual environment. Western Iran is exactly such a region, hosting a number of Iranian and non-Iranian dialects: Kurdish, Avromani, Gurani, Laki, Kalhori, Luri, Azari Turkish, etc. The demographic situation is rather complicated here as well: along with the localities that are inhabited by a single ethnic group, there are many townships and rural settlements having mixed populations of different ethnic and linguistic backgrounds. In addition, the indiscriminate use of the ethnonym Kurd, applied as a common label to almost all Iranian-speakers of the area, except for, of course, Persians. This paper tries to identify the area populated by the Avromans in the abovementioned region, with possibly accurate statistical data on the number of inhabitants, obtained through the author's personal efforts during several fieldwork periods. This is a part of a larger project on Gurani dialects, including Avromani.

The Dialect of Jowshaqan Part One: Phonology, Morphology and Syntax

AbstractThis article presents the grammar of Jowshaqani, a Central Iranian dialect. Like other members of this group, Jowshaqani has its own peculiarities; for instance, it has a rich inventory of personal pronouns distinguished by gender in the 3rd person singular, as do verb endings: nen ate “he comes”, néna atea “she comes”, etc. The past tenses of transitive verbs are inflected ergatively, with the agential affixes, which float through the sentence yielding complex syntactic structures.

The Komisenian Dialect of Aftar

A Northwest Iranian dialect, Aftari, is grouped both diachronically and typologically together with the other dialects spoken around the town of Semnān, east of Tehran. For this group the designation Komisenian, after the old name of the province, is proposed in the article. As is the case with the neighboring Caspian dialects to the north, Aftari is the language of postpositions, and it has a relatively elaborate system of personal and demonstrative pronouns. Aftari shares with Tabari the element -enn- in the present indicative, a remnant of the Old Iranian present participle *-ant-. In terms of ergativity, Aftari holds a position somewhere between Tabari, which has none, and the Central Plateau Dialects which have preserved the system. Remnants of the Middle Iranian ergativity remain in Aftari as a distinct set of personal endings for the past transitive; in the past, these acted as agents of transitive verbs. Thus, transitivity still plays a role in the past conjugation, but there are indications that the difference is fading away, most notably in 3 rd person singular forms. The intransitive past tenses are marked by -st- preceding the personal endings, except for the 3 rd person singular, which has neither. The perfect tense has various constructions, often merging with the preterit, and thus may not be authentic to Aftari.

Ethno-Linguistic Materials from Rural Mazandaran

AbstractThe texts published here are in an eastern Mazandarani dialect spoken in the Caspian littoral in northern Iran. The informant is a rural woman who recollects the supernatural deeds of her father-in-law, revered like a saint after his death. The stories are narrated in a most intimate manner, something rarely published previously in Iranian dialect documentations. The folkloric songs typify those sung in Caspian rice paddies by women, who traditionally have a dominant role in the rural economy. The stories and songs provide both linguistic and ethnographic data for this poorly studied but important province with its unique culture among the Iranian-speaking groups in Iran.

Donald Stilo. Vafsi Folk Tales. Wiesbaden, Ludwig Reichert Verlag, 2004, 288 p., biblio., no index.

Vafsi refers to the language of people of four villages in west central Iran: Vafs, Chehreqân, Gurchân and Fark in Markazi province, and is regarded as a north-western Iranian language. It shares similarities with Ashtiyani, Amore'i and Tafreshi dialects, and has also been influenced by Taleshi and some central Iranian dialects. Actually, it is believed that Vafsi is a mixture of Tati and the Iranian central dialects, and due to the special geographic situation of Vafs, it has kept many of it...

A Note on Ethnicity and Ethnic Groups in Iran

Even a brief review of the history of Iran clearly indicates that the country has always been the host of diverse ethnic groups during the past four millennia.' Hence, any generalisation concerning the Iranian society and culture is unsatisfactory unless the ethnicity is taken into consideration. Yet, surprisingly, the knowledge about the ethnicity and ethnic groups in Iran remains incomplete and demands clarification. There were no national censuses indicating the population types, geographical distribution, political, socio-economic, and linguistic situations in various ethnic environments in Iran. The lack of relevant information on the ethnic groups has led to incorrect assumptions about the nature of ethnicity and ethnic composition in Iran. For instance, while the total number of the Turkic-speaking groups in Iran, according to our estimations, does not exceed 9 millions,2 almost half of the population of the country (30 millions) are usually considered to be Turks. Furthermore, some scholars, mechanically identifying the speakers of Persian as a distinct ethnic unit (the 'Persians'), exclude those Iranians who speak dialects of Persian, or other Iranian dialects closely related to Persian.3 On the other hand, the Persian-speaking non-Iranian ethnic groups (such as, for instance, Arabs) are numbered as Persians. However, it is obvious that this approach to ethnicity in Iran is misleading, as historically all ethnic groups in Iran, including the 'Persians', irrespective of their origin, language, or religion were always referred to, collectively, as Iranians (Irani). Anyway, with the lack of precise demographical data, the groups of Iranian origin can be estimated around 85 percent of the population of Iran.

Le nom du ‘gendre’ en indo-européen et en balto-slave

Summary The PIE. word for ‘daughter’s husband’ can be reconstructed on the basis of Indo-Iranian, Greek, and Latin as *g1émer- (or *g1émor-), weak grade *g1m̥r-. I.-Ir. *jā́mātar- underwent the influence of ‘daughter’ (1.2) and *jāmí- ‘relative’ (1.5). Some Old Iranian dialects developed a hypocoristic variant *zāma- (2). Gk. γαμβρός; is based on gen. pl. *g1m̥rṓm (3). Lat. gener has n after genō ‘beget’ or genus ‘family’, thematic inflection after socer (4). The Balto-Slavic forms Latv. znuõt(i)s, Lith. žéntas, Sl. zętь are related to Skt.jñātí-, Gk. γνωτός, ‘relative, brother’, root *g1neH3- ‘to know, recognize’ (5). Albanian dhëndër(r) may be akin to the Balto- Slavic forms, with *- Vr- after* ‘daughter’ or ‘father-in-law’ (6). The instability of the word for ‘daughter’s husband’ may be a result of its low frequency (7.1). No etymology is known (7.2).