Vowels
   

It must be understood that in Persian vowels are not glided upon. In English they are always accompanied by a glide:

æy off-glide on /a/ as in “cat”
ey off-glide on /e/ as in “forte”
ow off-glide on /o/ as in “roller”
ūe off-glide on /oo/ (= /ū/) as in “poor”

This is not the case with Persian. In this lesson vowels are discussed briefly; more extensive discussion is left for the advanced level.

Short Vowels: In Persian short vowels and their signs are as follows:

[tag resources vowels_01]ـــَـــ[/tag] á as in “cat” (no off-glide)
[tag resources vowels_02]ـــِـــ[/tag] é as in “let”
[tag resources vowels_03]ــــُـــ[/tag] ó as in “lord” (no off-glide)

Long Vowels are actual alphabetical characters, which functions as, both, a long vowel or a consonant:

[tag resources vowels_04]ــا[/tag] ā as in “father” پا pā foot, leg, باد bād wind
[tag resources vowels_05]ــو[/tag] ū as in “tool” (no off-glide) شور šur salty, توت tut mulberry
[tag resources vowels_06]ــی[/tag] ī as in “beet” دیر dir late, زین zin saddle

Diphthongs: In Persian they are as follows:

āy as in [tag resources vowels_07]چای[/tag] čāy black tea
ey as in [tag resources vowels_08] نی[/tag] ney reed, bamboo, whicker, reed-flute
ow as in [tag resources vowels_09] جو[/tag] jow barley
uy as in [tag resources vowels_10] رویگر[/tag] ruygar zinc-worker, coppersmith

In the initial position, all vowels are accompanied by an alef:

horse asb [tag resources vowels_11]اَسب[/tag]
name esm [tag resources vowels_12]اِسم[/tag]
duck ordak [tag resources vowels_13]اُردک[/tag]
water āb [tag resources vowels_14]آب[/tag]
he, she u [tag resources vowels_15]او[/tag]
Iran irān [tag resources vowels_16]ایران[/tag]
veranda, portico eyvān [tag resources vowels_17]اِیوان[/tag]
apogie, zenith owj [tag resources vowels_18]اُوج[/tag]
ooch! uy [tag resources vowels_19]اوی[/tag]