Persian Online – Grammar & Resources

Generally speaking, the diglossia rules of Persian are inconsistent and only implemented to some extent. Still, it is very useful to learn them, particularly when listening to native speakers with varying dialects.

Here in the following pages are gathered 10 sets of basic rules, in no particular order.

Let’s begin with some basic phonemic consonant changes:

In the [st] and [zd] clusters the alveolar plosives are assimilated into the preceding alveolar fricatives, as [s] ([ss] before a vowel) and [z] ([zz] before a vowel):

hand	dast	[tag resources diglossia02001]دست[/tag]	das; followed by a vowel dass-am ‘my hand’	[tag resources diglossia02002]دس[/tag]
ice cream	bastani	[tag resources diglossia02004]بستنی[/tag]	bassani	[tag resources diglossia02005]بسنی[/tag]
transitive verb, intransitive verb, to break	šekastan	[tag resources diglossia02006]شکستن[/tag]	šekassan	[tag resources diglossia02007]شکسن[/tag]
tired	xaste	[tag resources diglossia02008]خسته[/tag]	xasse	[tag resources diglossia02009]خسه[/tag]
pistachio	peste	[tag resources diglossia02010]پسته[/tag]	pesse	[tag resources diglossia02011]پسه[/tag]
Where is he, she, it?	kojāst	[tag resources diglossia02012]کجاست[/tag]	kojās	[tag resources diglossia02013]کجاس[/tag]
thief, robber	dozd	[tag resources diglossia02014]دزد[/tag]	doz followed by a vowel dozzā ‘(the)thieves’	[tag resources diglossia02015]دُز[/tag] [tag resources diglossia02016]دزا[/tag]
thirteen	sizdah	[tag resources diglossia02017] سیزده[/tag]	sizza	[tag resources diglossia02018]سیزَ [/tag]

The [n] in an [nb] cluster is invariably pronounced as [m] (that is, [nb] becomes [mb]); this is in the anticipation of the following bilabial:

Saturday	šanbe	[tag resources diglossia03001]شنبه[/tag]	šambe
tail-fat	donbe	[tag resources diglossia03002]دنبه[/tag]	dombe
storage (room/space)	anbār	[tag resources diglossia03003]انبار[/tag]	ambār
behind, after	donbāl	[tag resources diglossia03004]دنبال[/tag]	dombāl
intransitive verb, to move, wag	jonbidan	[tag resources diglossia03005]جنبیدن[/tag]	jombidan
movement	jonbeš	[tag resources diglossia03006]جنبش[/tag]	jombeš

In certain instances the [b] of [-mb] cluster (from [-nb]) disappears in final position:

tail	donb	[tag resources diglossia03007a]دنب[/tag]	domb	dom	[tag resources diglossia03007]دم[/tag]
a large earthen jar	xonb	[tag resources diglossia03008a]خنب[/tag]	xomb	xom	[tag resources diglossia03008]خم[/tag]
hoof	sonb	[tag resources diglossia03009a]سُنب[/tag]	somb	som	[tag resources diglossia03009]سُم[/tag]

Only in the following words the final [-ar] becomes [-e]:

if	agar	[tag resources diglossia04001]اگر[/tag]	age	[tag resources diglossia04002]اگه[/tag]
the other; not any more, no more	digar	[tag resources diglossia04003]دیگر[/tag]	dige	[tag resources diglossia04004]دیگه[/tag]
(does not exist in English as a single particle)	magar	[tag resources diglossia04005]مگر[/tag]	mage	[tag resources diglossia04006]مگه[/tag]

The particles digar and magar have many syntactic functions. See the sections on these particles.