This is something that I also am interested in. Could someone please let me know pure Persian words for "yes" and "no". I believe "bale" is Arabic, is n't it?
I think "bale" (originally balaa) is of Arabic extraction.
I think as you, but I'm not sure too. I send a email about it to a linguist. I'm waiting to receive his answer (I hope he have enough time to answer me).
Thank you very much indeed, especially for آري in English.
I received the answer some day ago:
بله and خير are Arabic, but آري and نه are Persian.
I am curious as to how "Khair" (if Arabic) means "no". My Arabic dictionary does n't give this meaning of the word.
Unfortunately I don't know, but agree with you. That is interesting for me too. If I found the answer, I will backed again.
As in let it go or laisses tomber, and a following generalization to all cases of no.
But Khair essentially means "good" in Arabic. In Urdu, we use it with this meaning...
Khair, aap kii marzii...
achchhaa, aap kii marzii
In Persian, one can say "no" by saing "Khair"/"na-Khair". I am just interested in this word's etymology. Could it be Persian and the Arabic "Khair" is purely co-incidental?
Thank you Morteza. This makes perfect sense! I am indebted for your troubles.
Your are welcome.
آری was pronounced ārē (still is in Eastern Persian). When Western Persian lost یای مجهول , it became آره in the spoken language. Similar process with بلی ~ بله. I don't know how آره ended up as the informal word. I hope someone else can shed light on the etymology.
By the way, in southern Iran, ها is prevalent as the informal "yes". A word probably familiar to subcontinentals!
By the way, in southern Iran, ها is prevalent as the informal "yes". A word probably familiar to subcontinentals!
Hi, sett, nice to speak to you after a long time.
Here, I believe, we do not have a "majhuul" vowel phenomenon as such. I will offer my explanation once I have answered your question.
Classical Persian had 2 "majhuul" vowels which are practically lost in the modern Iranian Persian but they still exist in Indian and Pakistani Persian, Afghan Persian and Tajik Persian.
The vowel e. (represented by ے in the subcontinent and ی elsewhere) This is exactly equivalent to the vowel in the English word "bake" or when one pronounces "A" as in "A, B, C..."
The vowel o. As in "go" (represented by و)
Now to the second issue. Arabic بلٰی, لٰکن and perhaps other such words with a long "a" went through a transformation process in the Persian language known as "imaalah" which means "inclining towards". لٰکن became لیکن in Persian, the ی is majhuul, i.e lekin. بلٰی became "bale" and came to be written as بله.
This is the reason why I asked if آری was Persian or not. Whatever its origins may be, it has "suffered" the same "imaalah" fate and ended up as آرہ.
It is likely that the Arabs which were in contact with Persians during Abbasid times are the reason for this. The medieval Mesopotamian Arabic dialects (the ones Iranians were in contact with) had strong imaalah. They pronounced the ا the same way you pronounce ے in Urdu, so كتاب would be kitēb. When Persians wrote لٰکن as لیکن , they were just phonetically rendering this word the way they heard it from Arabs, since in Persian the ی could represent this vowel. This only happened in Arabic words with the long "a", that's why you don't find this happening in random Persian words with a long "a" sound. Those all kept a long "a". But in medieval Persian writings you will sometimes rarely encounter Arabic words like اسلام written as اسليم. It is because the Arabs who lived near Persians pronounced it that way, with a long "e".
آری is not due to imaalah, since it is not an Arabic word. It was ārē, and in modern Iran became ārī, and through a colloquial transformation, āre.
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^ Thank you Derakhshan. Your first paragraph. It does appear to be logical. I wonder if there are "majhuul" sounds in any of today's Arabic speech communities. It does seem rather illogical that Arabs spoke with majhuul vowels, yet they felt these vowels were "majhuul" in their own language and only existed in Persian.
Second paragraph. Yes, it makes perfect sense.
Second paragraph. Yes, it makes perfect sense.
About the vowel ‘o’, which sounds like the ‘o’ in the English ‘go’, it is actually still pronounced that way in certain instances around the central parts of Iran.
Perhaps we could add cheraa (چِرا) to the list of words for ‘yes’. The word actually means ‘why’, but is also used as a word (or sentence) of affirmation
Perhaps we could add cheraa (چِرا) to the list of words for ‘yes’. The word actually means ‘why’, but is also used as a word (or sentence) of affirmation
I thought in a related thread there was a consensus that Arabs called some Persian sounds "majhuul" or "unknown", (more likely the Persian scribes) because those sounds were unknown in Arabic.
Isn't چِرا used to mean 'yes' only when the question is asked in the negative form or a statement is made in a negative tone?
That is what I am alluding to in my response to Derakhshan Jaan.
Not exclusively. But it is true that in saying cheraa to mean ‘yes’, the speaker strongly rules out any statements contrary to what has been affirmed.
Isn't that what I said in different words, if not an example will clarify it.
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I see.
It seems "imaalah" was present in Arabic dialects themselves, like Derakhshan explained, just not in the standard formal Arabic of the grammarians. There is another interesting tidbid - alif maqsuurah evolved from etymological -ay, and apparently some Quranic qiraa'aat still pronounce it more or less consistently as a long -ē.