Persian Phonology

New Persian is about 1200 years old and naturally, its phonological features have undergone some changes over this long period. Phonologically, New Persian has two variants: classical and modern. Classical pronunciation has the same phonological features as in Middle Persian. Modern pronunciation reflects the received pronunciation in today’s Iran.

Vowels in Modern Pronunciation

Modern Iranian Persian has six vowels: three long and three short vowels.

Regarding the long vowels ⟨î, û⟩, since their short variants do not exist in modern pronunciation, they are written without diacritics ⟨i, u⟩ in common transcription schemes.

In academic books, long vowels are marked by placing a macron diacritic over them ⟨ā, ē, ī, ō, ū⟩. Here, the circumflex diacritic will be used to denote long vowels ⟨â, ê, î, ô, û⟩ because they are prevalent in Latin-based alphabets such as that of French. In Kurmanji Kurdish, which is another Iranian language, ⟨ê î û⟩ are used for the same purpose.

Vowels in Classical Pronunciation

In the classical pronunciation of Persian, there are five long and three short vowels, exactly the same vowels as in Middle Persian.

Historical Vowel Shifts

The classical vowel system has been preserved in many regional dialects both in Iran and other Persian-speaking countries. The vowels ⟨o, e⟩ do not belong to classical pronunciation. Modern pronunciation has lost the classical vowels ⟨ê, i, ô, u⟩. Overall, modern pronunciation has two vowels less than the classical. The following table shows the historical shifts in the vowels of New Persian.

There are four vowel shifts from classical to modern pronunciation. With a few exceptions, they can be mapped onto each other:

• long vowel “ê” to long vowel “î”
• short vowel “i” to short vowel “e”
• long vowel “ô” to long vowel “û”
• short vowel “u” to short vowel “o”

These vowel shifts have caused some previously distinct words to become homophone. For example, “šêr” (lion) and “šîr” (milk) are both pronounced “šîr” in standard Iranian Persian.

Classification of Vowels

The following table demonstrates the phonological features of modern Persian vowels. Vowel height refers to the position of the jaw, vowel backness refers to the position of the tongue and vowel roundedness refers to the form of the lips during the articulation of a vowel. Among these characteristics, only height and backness have phonemic value in Persian language. Roundedness is not a distinctive or contrastive feature.

Plosive Consonants

Persian has eight plosive consonants: two bilabials, two dentals, two palatals, one uvular and one glottal. Plosive Consonants are also known as “occlusives” or “stops”. For instance, the glottal plosive /ʔ/ is normally called glottal stop.

Fricative Consonants

Persian has eight fricative consonants: two labio-dentals, two alveolars, two alveo-palatals, one uvular and one glottal.

Affricate Consonants

Persian has two affricate consonants. Both of them are alveo-palatal.

Trill Consonants

Persian has only one trill consonant. It is voiced and alveolar.

Nasal Consonants

Persian has two nasal consonants: one bilabial and one alveolar. Both of them are voiced.

Approximants

Persian has two approximants: one alveolar and one palatal. Both of them are voiced.

Classification of Consonants

The following table classifies Persian consonants based on their place and manner of articulation.

List of Consonants

Classical pronunciation has twenty-four consonants. In the received pronunciation of Iranian Persian, ⟨ ق ⟩ (voiced uvular plosive) is articulated like ⟨ غ ⟩ (voiced uvular fricative). Therefore, there are twenty-three consonants in modern pronunciation. The following table lists these consonants based on their voicing, place of articulation and manner of articulation.