UPMSP High School Persian flashcards

33 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

Ezafe construction

An unstressed -e linking a noun to a following modifier (possessor, adjective, or another noun), as in 'ketab-e xub' (a good book). Written as hamza after a vowel: 'xane-ye man'.

Persian SOV order

Standard Persian clauses place subject first, object next, and the finite verb last. The final verb carries tense, person, and negation, so comprehension questions often hinge on the last word.

Object marker ra

The particle 'ra' follows a definite direct object: 'ketab ra xandam' (I read the book). It marks definiteness, not case, and has no single Hindi/Urdu or English equivalent.

Discourse marker pas

'Pas' means 'therefore, then' and signals a conclusion drawn from the preceding statement. Recognising it turns a detail question into an inference question about cause and result.

Bayt and misra

A bayt is a couplet made of two half-lines called misra. In a ghazal, both misra of the opening bayt rhyme, while later bayts rhyme only in the second misra.

Radif and qafiya

Radif is a word or phrase repeated identically after the rhyme at each line end; qafiya is the rhyming element preceding it. Locating the radif quickly reveals line endings in a ghazal.

Aruz metre

Persian quantitative prosody in which syllables are counted as long or short in fixed patterns called bahr. All bayts of a ghazal share one bahr, which helps restore unclear words.

Matla of a ghazal

The opening bayt of a ghazal, in which both half-lines carry the qafiya and radif. It sets the rhyme scheme that the rest of the poem follows in its second half-lines only.

Irfanic symbolism in ghazal

Wine, tavern, cupbearer, and the beloved's hair are conventional mystical symbols for divine love and the veil, not literal descriptions. Exams expect the symbolic reading alongside the surface meaning.

Past and present stems

Persian verbs have a past stem (raft-) and often irregular present stem (rav-). Past simple adds -am, -i, -, -im, -id, -and; present adds mi- or be- to the present stem.

Subjunctive with be-

After verbs of wanting, ordering, or possibility plus 'ke', the subjunctive uses the prefix be- on the present stem: 'mixaham ke beravam' (I want to go), not 'mi-'.

Future with xah-

The future tense uses the auxiliary 'xah-' carrying the personal ending plus the past stem of the main verb: 'xaham raft' (I will go), 'xahad nevesht' (he will write).

Comparative -tar and -tarin

The suffix -tar forms comparatives and -tarin superlatives: 'bozorgtar' (bigger), 'bozorgtarin' (biggest). The standard of comparison is marked by 'az': 'az u bozorgtar ast'.

Animate and inanimate plurals

Animate nouns typically take -an/-yan (mardan, pisaran), while inanimate nouns take -ha (ketabha). Arabic broken plurals such as 'kutub' are treated as singular for verb agreement.

Copula ast and its omission

'Ast' means 'is' and is often dropped in written Persian: 'in ketab xub (ast)'. Its absence does not make a clause incomplete; the predicate still asserts a state.

Translating ezafe into Hindi

An ezafe chain becomes a Hindi/Urdu 'ka/ki/ke' construction, translating the innermost modifier first: 'dar-e xane' becomes 'ghar ka darvir'. Gender agreement must then be applied to the Hindi noun.

Gender loss in translation

Persian has no grammatical gender, so translators into Hindi/Urdu must infer natural gender from the noun and apply it to adjectives and verbs, which Persian never marks.

Idiom dast-e man giriftan

Literally 'to take my hand', this idiom means to help or support someone. It must be translated as a unit, never word for word, in prose comprehension passages.

Polysemy of ke

'Ke' may be a relative pronoun (who, which), a complementiser (that), or a conjunction (because, when). The clause that follows determines which Hindi/Urdu or English word is correct.

Solar Hijri calendar

The Persian solar calendar begins at the Prophet's migration and starts the year at Nowruz in spring. It differs from both the Gregorian and the Vikram Samvat calendars used in India.

Persian letter count

The Persian alphabet has 32 letters. Four Arabic letters (ث, ص, ض, ط) survive in spelling but are pronounced like س, س, ز, and ت respectively in standard Iranian Persian.

Non-connecting letters

The letters ا, د, ذ, ر, ز, ژ, و never join to the following letter, creating a visible pen lift. All other letters connect forward within a word.

Unwritten short vowels

Short vowels a, e, and o are normally not written in Persian. The same consonant skeleton can therefore be read several ways, and context plus known vocabulary decides the reading.

Ezafe after silent he

Nouns ending in silent 'he' take the ezafe written with a hamza: 'xane' becomes 'xane-ye man'. After a long alef the ezafe appears as 'ye' with hamza: 'dana-ye'.

Arabic ta marbuta in Persian

The Arabic ending ة is written as 'he' (ه) in Persian and pronounced without /t/: 'madrase', 'daftar-e'. It is never pronounced as a final /t/ except in Arabic phrases.

Productive Persian suffixes

Suffixes such as -mand (having), -var (like), -gah (place), and -ban (keeper) build new words. Recognising them unlocks unfamiliar vocabulary in unseen comprehension passages.

Rudaki's role

Rudaki (c. 858–941), a Samanid court poet in Bukhara, is called the father of Persian poetry. He is famed for qasidas, including the ode called 'mother of wine'.

Firdawsi and Shahnama

Firdawsi (940–1020) composed the Shahnama, the Persian national epic of roughly 50,000 couplets, completed around 1010 and presented to Sultan Mahmud of Ghazna.

Sa'di's two masterworks

Sa'di of Shiraz (1210–1291) wrote the Bustan in verse in 1257 and the Gulistan, mixing prose and verse, in 1258. Both are known for simple, aphoristic moral teaching.

Rumi's Masnavi

Jalal al-Din Rumi (1207–1273), founder of the Mevlevi order and resident of Konya, wrote the Masnavi-ye Ma'navi in six books and the Divan-e Shams-e Tabrizi.

Hafiz and the ghazal

Hafiz of Shiraz (c. 1315–1390) is the acknowledged master of the ghazal. His Divan is celebrated for ambiguity between earthly and mystical love and for rich radif patterns.

Formal Persian letter layout

A formal letter places place and date top right, an honorific salutation (janab-e aqa/khanoom) next, then the body, a closing courtesy such as 'ba ehtiram', and the signature at bottom left.

Application opening formula

Formal applications open with 'bedin vasile az janab-e ali ... khahishmandam ke', stating the request in the first sentence and following it with justification. This formula is expected in exams.