Persian alphabet
| Persian alphabet الفبای فارسی Alefbâ-ye Fârsi | |
|---|---|
A page from a 12th century manuscript of "Kitab al-Abniya 'an Haqa'iq al-Adwiya" by Abu Mansur Muwaffaq with special Persian letters p (پ), ch (چ) and g (گ = ڭـ). | |
| Script type | |
Period | c. 7th century CE – present |
| Direction | Right-to-left script |
| Languages | Persian, Mazanderani,[a] Moghol, Qashqai |
| Related scripts | |
Parent systems | Egyptian hieroglyphs
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Child systems |
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| ا ب پ ت ث ج چ ح خ د ذ ر ز ژ س ش ص ض ط ظ ع غ ف ق ک گ ل م ن و ه ی |
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| Part of a series on |
| Writing systems in India |
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The Persian alphabet (Persian: الفبای فارسی, romanized: Alefbâ-ye Fârsi), also known as the Perso-Arabic script, is the right-to-left alphabet used for the Persian language. This is like the Arabic script with four additional letters: پ چ ژ گ (the sounds 'g', 'zh', 'ch', and 'p', respectively), in addition to the obsolete ڤ that was used for the sound /β/. This letter is no longer used in Persian, as the [β]-sound changed to [b], e.g. archaic زڤان /zaβɑn/ > زبان /zæbɒn/ 'language'.[2][3] Although the sound /β/ (ڤ) is written as "و" nowadays in Farsi (Dari-Parsi/New Persian), it is different to the Arabic /w/ (و) sound, which uses the same letter.
It was the basis of many Arabic-based scripts used in Central and South Asia. It is used for both Iranian and Dari: standard varieties of Persian; and is one of two official writing systems for the Persian language, alongside the Cyrillic-based Tajik alphabet.
The script is mostly but not exclusively right-to-left; mathematical expressions, numeric dates and numbers bearing units are embedded from left to right. The script is cursive, meaning most letters in a word connect to each other; when they are typed, contemporary word processors automatically join adjacent letter forms. Persian is unusual among Arabic scripts because a zero-width non-joiner is sometimes entered in a word, causing a letter to become disconnected from others in the same word.
Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).
- ^ "THE ARABI - MALAYALAM SCRIPTURE". 2008-03-18. Archived from the original on 18 March 2008. Retrieved 2023-01-11.
- ^ "PERSIAN LANGUAGE i. Early New Persian". Iranica Online. Retrieved 18 March 2019.
- ^ Orsatti, Paola (2019). "Persian Language in Arabic Script: The Formation of the Orthographic Standard and the Different Graphic Traditions of Iran in the First Centuries of the Islamic Era". Creating Standards (Book).