Persian/Lesson 3

In lessons 1 and 2, you learned some greetings, the first twenty letters of the Persian Alphabet, and how to spell several words with those letters. You also learned syllable stress in Persian words.

In this lesson, you will learn more about casual and formal speech, the next nine Persian letters, and more about short vowels in Persian.

Dialogue: ‹sobh bexeyr›
Hassan drops by to see his good friend Mohamad:


 * }

Explanation
 * Mohamad and Hassan are using a very casual style of speech because they are close friends. “Mamad” is a common nickname for people named Mohamad.  “Hassani” is a common nickname for people named “Hassan”.

Vocabulary

 

ع ‹’eyn›, غ ‹qeyn›
The next two letters have the same form except only one has a dot over it. The bottom hook in these letters is a tail that only appears in isolated and final position.



The Persian letter represents the sound [ʔ], i.e. the glottal stop in the middle of “uh-oh” in English. Traditionally, as well as in UniPers it is transcribed as ‹’›. Its name sounds something like the English word “main”, but beginning with a glottal stop instead of an m. The top loop sits on the baseline. When it is the last (or only) letter in a word, its lower loop hangs below the baseline. When another letter follows it, it has a different form.



As shown on the right, the letter ﻉ ‹’eyn› combines with the letter that follows it, e.g. with د in the word.



The Persian letter represents the sound [ɣ], that is, it is produced by placing the back part of the tongue against the soft palate and vibrating the vocal cords while pushing air from the lungs over the middle of the tongue.

The top loop sits on the baseline. When it is the last (or only) letter in a word, its lower loop hangs below the baseline. When another letter follows it, it has a different form.



As shown on the right, the letter ﻍ ‹qeyn› is used to spell.

  

ف ‹fe›, ق ‹qaf›
The next two letters are shown on the right.



The Persian letter sits on the baseline. Its name sounds like a quick pronunciation of "Faye".



As shown on the right, the letter ف ‹fe› combines with the letter that follows it, e.g. as the first letter in the word.



The Persian letter is pronounced like غ ‹qeyn›, i.e. like [ɣ]. The small loop sits on the baseline and the tail, when present, hangs below the baseline. Like other Persian letters with tails, the tail is only written when no other letter follows.



As shown on the right, the letter ﻕ ‹qaf› combines with the letter that follows, as in.

 

ک ‹kaf› and گ ‹gaf›
The next two letters are shown on the right.

<br style="clear:both"/>

The Persian letter sits on the baseline. The slash on top ( / ) is written after the connected strokes of the word, along with the dots in any of the word’s dotted letters. Its name sounds a bit like the English word “cough”.

<br style="clear:both"/>

As shown on the right, the letter ک combines with the letter that follows it, e.g. as the first letter in the word.

<br style="clear:both"/>

The Persian letter sits on the baseline. The two slashes on top ( // ) are written after the connected strokes of the word, along with the dots in any of the word’s dotted letters.

<br style="clear:both"/>

As shown on the right, the letter گ is used in the word.

<br style="clear:both" /><span id="ل" >

ل ‹lâm›
The letter sits on the baseline and connects with the letter that follows it.

<br style="clear:both" />

ل is the last letter in.

<br style="clear:both" /><span id="م" >

م ‹mim›
The Persian letter م is pronounced as /m/.

<br style="clear:both" />

The Persian word, shown on the right, is an example of an initial alef without a “hat” ( ا ) used to indicate that the word begins with a short vowel, in this case, with ‹e›.

<br style="clear:both" /><span id="ن" >

ن ‹nun›
The name of this letter "nun" is pronounced rhyming with "noon" and not "nun". Note the difference between nun and  be, in be the dot is below the curve and in nun it is above. The shape of nun is also narrower than the "be, pe, se, te" group of letters.

<br style="clear:both" />

The Persian word is shown on the right. Note that the written form uses, indicating that the word should be pronounced as ‹nân›, but in standard Persian, is usually pronounced ‹un›, including the word.

Exercises

 * What are the names of and sounds represented by the following letters?


 * }


 * Read these words by breaking them down into their component parts.


 * }

Review
In this lesson, you learned ..., the next seven letters of the Persian Alphabet, and how to spell several words with those letters from right to left. You also learned about syllable stress in Persian words.