Talk:List of English words of Persian origin

message: American Heritage Dictionary, online edition 4, says kismet is "Turkish, from Persian qismat, from Arabic qisma, lot, from qasama, to divide, allot. See qsm in Semitic Roots.]"
:good, then the word probably belongs here (among other places) Lethe | Talk
::It's a Persian borrowing from Arabic, then, isn't it, as it's a parallel English borrowing. From Persian? or directly from Arabic?  I don't know. A long long list of English words of Persian origin flatters cultural vanity. A shorter list, of words directly borrowed from Persian, would be more interesting, because it actually would tell us something. "Lilac" for instance may indeed have a Persian root, but it entered English in the 16th century, when the rooted cuttings first were imported from Constantinople. "Lilac" is a word borrowed from Turkish, not from Persian.
::As it stands, this vanity list is pointless. Do people understand why I say this? or do people think I'm "anti-Persian" or something?--Wetman 02:24, 8 Jan 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I have to disagree with Your Wetness.  Sure, perhaps the creation of this list was motivated by vanity or Persian chauvanism, and some of the etymologies are false (or like peach, not directly derived from Persian, but instead allude to the fact that the thing described came from Persia).  Still, most of these words are genuinely of Persian origin, many Wikipedians might not know that, and some of them may be desirious of knowing.  Shall we delete the list simply because some of the entries are incorrect and not all Wikipedians care about the subject? Shall we delete it because the motives of the person who started it aren't 100% point-of-view pure?  No, that would be arrogant and violate don't be a d*** policy, which you seem to endorse on your Userpage.  
And as far as personal feelings go, we're supposed to maintain an NPOV in writing articles, not in creating them.  People tend to contribute to articles about things they care about.  I haven't made any contributions to Art Nouveau or carp because I care not a whit about them, and I know very little.  I leave it to others who are more knowledgable and motivated than me to write them.  Why can't deletionists do that?  If you don't like this list, don't read it.  I do like it, and I find it useful, and I'll bet there are many others who do as well.  So don't you dare try to delete it! --Jpbrenna 23:23, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

text: The problem is, the list isn't actually useful(except for ego-stroking) if it is riddled with errors and half-truths. At that point, you might as well simply suggest that all English words are Persian in origin. The any Iranian who wants to can tape a Persian dictionary page by page to their wall and imagine that English people use all of those words everyday, just because Persians are so great. I don't know how much of this is actually vanity, but if that is the case, or if it's here simply because someone "likes it", well, it is still false information, and should be tagged as such. 
Please realize that most of these words are not used in English. If ever they are/were it is in extremely rare cases. rare enough that they would better be called"improper translations of Persian words", or something of the sort. I am a native English speaker with a fairly extensive vocabulary, and I have never heard anyone speak at least eighty percent of the words on this list. This page is lying to the readers. I am very interested in linguistics, yet disappointed in Wikipedia when I discover pages like this: just list of Persian words disguised an accurate example of etymology. I mean, why not make a list which is actually a list of actual words used in English, whose origins are actually Persian, instead of filling up hyperspace with disinformation? That would be useful.Knowon (talk) 21:18, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Wikipedia is about being sourced and the information is sourced.  The average vocabulary of a person is 5000 to 10000 words.  Thus the information is sourced from reputable dictionary.   --Nepaheshgar 06:26, 7 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Untitled

message: Just an observation. Many words in Old Persian/Avestan are formed by replacing the 's' in the corresponding Sanskrit word with an 'h'. Examples:
*Ahura - Asura
*Homa - Soma
*Hind - Sind
*Namaha - Namasa
I found many more, but can't recall right now.
:Not sure about the other examples, but Ahura is not borrowed from Asura.  They're genuine cognates from Indo-Iranian (at least).  Similarly, the Persian word for 10 dah didn't come from Sanskrit das or dáça.   OTOH, Hind is indeed borrowed from the Sanskrit Sindh, meaning river.  --jonsafari 14:14, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Observation 

message: Mani1 has mass reverted the article to a ridiculous level, and the fact that he also reverted my removal of Devil from the list indicates that he was just suspicious of all my edits. There is no question that English devil is from Late Latin diabolus, in turn from Greek diabolos. In Romanian, the word is found as diavol and in Spanish diablo, etc. No authoritative linguistic reference questions this. Alexander 007 12:59, 10 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Devil

message: The new article, as per what appears to be a consensus that Wikipedia should not duplicate Wiktionary, will not have a list of words but many examples can be discussed within the text rather than listed. If someone wants to see a list they can see the list in Wiktionary, Category:Persian derivations, then they can click on each individual word for an etymology. Alexander 007 15:07, 11 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: How incredibly tedious. Why would I want to make 2 clicks for every word (which, for the Wiktionary version of this page, would come out to well over 200 carefully-executed clicks), when I could read all of them on one page without any clicking at all? Nohat 06:59, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: If there are not too many of them, then no problem. However, if the list becomes too long:Wiktionary. If we accept these lists, then someone should restart List of English words of Latin origin, which was deleted by consensus that there would be too many to list, and Wiktionary would be better. Alexander 007 07:00, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

text: So, who wants to restart List of English words of Latin origin? Nohat? Alexander 007 07:07, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Words from Latin form a substantial stock of all English vocabulary because words were borrowed from Latin into English regularly and under ordinary circumstances. The number of words in English borrowed from Latin is too large to list reasonably on a single page or set of pages. However, the number of words in English of Persian origin is finite and enumerable; words were borrowed into English from Persian only under extraordinary circumstances. Therefore it is reasonable to enumerate all the words borrowed from Persian on a single page. In all likelihood, the vast majority of such words are already on this page, and it will not likely grow much more, although it is not unreasonable to assume a few more words borrowed from Persian might be uncovered. Nohat 07:11, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I no longer oppose these lists for most languages, but I do oppose them for Latin, and probably even French and Greek. In fact, any language where a one-page listing would be much too long.Alexander 007 07:15, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree wholeheartedly: the French and Greek pages should be changed to be general discussions of the conditions by which words from those languages get borrowed into English, which is extensive enough to merit a discussion. On the other hand, the conditions by which words were borrowed from Persian are not very interesting, and amount to just random chance. The most interesting thing to say about words borrowed from Persian is simply to enumrate them. Nohat 07:17, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

text: I guess with me it was more an aesthetic issue, but not everyone agrees with my aesthetics, which I was pushing onto Wiki in this case. I agree having them on one page is an advantage, so if for no other reason, these shorter lists have an excuse to be in Wikipedia. Alexander 007 07:31, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: New article

message: Many words in the list are parallel borrowings from Sanskrit into Persian and Hindi -> English. Example, the word for Sugar.
See also List of English words of Sanskrit origin, List of English words of Hindi origin  deeptrivia (talk) 03:17, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There aren't too many modern Persian words that derive from Sanskrit.  Many derive from Old Persian and some from Avestan, both of which were contemporary languages of Sanskrit, all of which come from a common Indo-Iranian branch of PIE.  See the heading Observation for more discussion on this topic.   --jonsafari 06:00, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Yeah, that's exactly not what I meant. The article is about English words from Persian, so probably we can leave out any words that might be derived from Avestan, etc. This is similar to having a separate List of English words of Sanskrit origin, and List of English words of Hindi origin. In case of cognates present all over the IE family, deriving from a common PIE source, it is not appropriate to say that those words are of Persian origin. E.g., it's true that modern Persian Ariya derives from Avestan, which is a contemporary of Sanskrit, but the English word Arya derives from Sanskrit word Arya. deeptrivia (talk) 06:29, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: My references also derive the English word from Sanskrit. Alexander 007 06:43, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

text: I've been debating that also. Orange is another example. I think they should be listed especially if: the passage through Persian is a vital part of a given word's development into an English word. Alexander 007 07:02, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Would make sense to also mention where the word is originally derived from. deeptrivia (talk) 17:11, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Of course. Alexander 007 17:13, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: At what point do we go back to?  For example, the List of English words of French origin lists café, but obviously it's not ultimately from French.  It could very well be in the Italian list (under a liberal definition of origin, eg. if a given language contributed somewhere along the path to bring the word into English), as well as the Turkish list, not to mention the Arabic list.  In fact, very few of the words on the French list, for example, would survive your original derivation requirement.  We should also take out khaki and pajamas from the Hindi list, by this same requirement.  Many words wouldn't even survive on the Latin or Sanskrit list, if you want to go back as far as possible.  Either all the 'words of ... origin' articles should standardize on the ultimate derivation requirement, or they should all standardize on a more liberal definition of origin.  As it stands now there is an inconsistent mixture found on this page, and most other like pages (including Hindi and Sanskrit).   I'm ok with either definition, as long as all the origin lists conform to a standardized definition of origin.  --jonsafari 23:07, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I find two sources important. One is the immediate source, like the French sucre in the sugar example, and one the ultimate source, (Sanskrit sharkara in the sugar example.) We can list, for example, sugar in French, Arabic, Persian origin lists, but with the mention that ultimately it derives from Sanskrit. Otherwise, it will be misleading. deeptrivia (talk) 00:00, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Words originally Sanskrit origin 

message: *Esther is included here and this goes against the norm as far as the other lists of English etymology.  I think this is a valid area of study, but I'm not sure if it belongs on this exact page.  Does anyone have any feelings on this or know of an existing page which would be better suited to an entry like this?  Or, does anyone have a proposal for starting a new page?  I don't think Persian would have enough entries to justify a whole page, but maybe in conjunction with another language(s) it would.--Hraefen 22:39, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Personal names

message: I made it only down to "c", but this article has so many mistakes or short-comings (Bactria, Caravan, etc.) that I think we better just scrap the whole thing and write it anew.
In writing these things, one should really use something besides the online sources. No one bothers with etymological dictionaries and other sources apparently. Come on! Being wiki does not mean being wacky too. If you are giving knowledge, make sure it is at least correct!--Khodadad 08:30, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Major re-writing 

message: Al-Khwarezmi was Persian, but his name, which the word algorithm is derived, is Arabic. So, I think algorithm should be deleted.
:Where is your source on that?  As far as I can tell, the word Khwarezm is of some central Asian origin.  --jonsafari 18:07, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Origin of Algorithm is not Persian 

message: I have capitalized each word as per the general convention in a dictionary entry. --Bhadani 12:47, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Capitalized

message: the word "bad" has the same meaning in both persian and english, but this as with other words does not imply it came from one or the other. the oed only goes as far as middle english, listing its appearance as after 13th century. 
if bad there was question, the oed would say so.
are there linguists out there who can verify words on this list?
--Ampersand 17:22, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  this list should be double checked 

message: I have removed many entries from the page because they do not meet the criteria. I have copied them here and organized them by reason for deletion. If anyone can find a reliable source that shows that these words are (a) English words and (b) of demonstrably Persian origin, then I am willing to entertain putting them back in.
===No Persian origin listed in OED etymology===
;Absinth/Absinthe
;Algorithm: variant of algorism influnced by the word Arithmetic (<Middle English < Old French < Latin < Greek)
;Algorism : <Middle English algorisme <Old French <Medieval Latin algorismus< Al-Khwarizmi, a Persian mathematician, named after Khwarezmia, a former state in what is now Uzbekistan  
;Armenia: from Persian Arman.
;Arsenic: from Middle Persian zarnikh
;Aubergine : from  Persian بادنجان Bâdinjân itself maybe originally from Sanskrit.
;Better : from "behtar" or "بهتر"
;Best : from "behest" or "بهست". but "behest" comes from "behesht" or "بهشت"
;bombast : from pambak "cotton".
;Bronze : Perhaps ultimately from Pers. birinj "an alloy of copper (mainly) and ..." :: copper and Zinc 
;Cameo : from Pers. chumahan "agate."
;Caviar : from Khâg-âvar ("bringer of eggs")
;Cumin : from Kerman
;Ghoul : from "Ghoul" or "غول" 
;Guitar : from ancient Greek kithara, perhaps from Persian sitaar "Three snares".
;Henna : Zie.
;Jasper (boy's name): from Persian meaning "treasure master".
;Jasper (stone): from Persian Yashp
;Jujube : from Pers. zayzafun meaning "soft candy with date-like flavor" 
;Lacquer : through Ar. lakk, from Pers. lak from Prakrit lakkhā from Sanskrit lākşā "red dye"
;Mihrab: from Persian Mihr (the God Mithra)
;Mummy : from Pers. mumiya "asphalt," from mum "wax."
;must (n): via Urdu mast "intoxicated, in rut," from Pers. mast, lit. "intoxicated"
===Not listed in OED at all===
;Ahriman: from Persian Ahriman.
;Ahura Mazda : from Old. Persian (Zoroastrian god)
;Angra Mainyu : older version of Ahriman
;Asmodeus : evil spirit, prince of demons, from L. Asmodaeus, from Gk. Asmodaios, from Talmudic Heb. Ashmeday, from Avestan (Old-Iranian) Aesh-ma-dæva, lit. "Aeshma the deceitful." Aeshma is the Zoroastrian daeva of wrath. This trait association was also passed on.
;Casper : from Persian Jasper
;Chador : from châdor "tent"
;Cyrus: from Persian Kurosh, diminutive: Cy
;Darius: Daryoosh
;Darya -e- noor : Sea of light
;Euphrates : O.E. Eufrate, from Gk., from Avestan (Old-Iranian) huperethuua "good to cross over," from hu- "good" + peretu- "ford."
;Georgia: from Persian Gurjistan.
;Julibrissin : from Gul-i Abrisham (Silk flower).
;Khedive : from Pers. khidiv "prince," derivative of khuda "master, prince," from Old-Persian khvadata- "lord,"
Nohat 21:22, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Khedive is listed in OED. Ellipi (talk) 23:05, 15 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removed words 

message: ;Ahriman: from Persian Ahriman.
;Ahura Mazda : from Old. Persian (Zoroastrian god)
;Angra Mainyu : older version of Ahriman
;Asmodeus : evil spirit, prince of demons, from L. Asmodaeus, from Gk. Asmodaios, from Talmudic Heb. Ashmeday, from Avestan (Old-Iranian) Aesh-ma-dæva, lit. "Aeshma the deceitful." Aeshma is the Zoroastrian daeva of wrath. This trait association was also passed on.
;Casper : from Persian Jasper
;Chador : from châdor "tent"
;Cyrus: from Persian Kurosh, diminutive: Cy
;Darius: Daryoosh
;Darya -e- noor : Sea of light
;Euphrates : O.E. Eufrate, from Gk., from Avestan (Old-Iranian) huperethuua "good to cross over," from hu- "good" + peretu- "ford."
;Georgia: from Persian Gurjistan.
;Julibrissin : from Gul-i Abrisham (Silk flower).
;Khedive : from Pers. khidiv "prince," derivative of khuda "master, prince," from Old-Persian khvadata- "lord,"
Nohat 21:22, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Khedive is listed in OED. Ellipi (talk) 23:05, 15 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Not listed in OED at all

message: Canal is also a Persian word. Suez canal was first finished by the Persian king Darius I and he named it canal. It's from present stem of kandan (to dig) plus suffix -âl. kan+âl. we have -âl in words like changâl, gowdâl, etc.
:On the Online Etymology Dictionary, it lists canal in this sense as arising in 1673 (), and coming from the Latin root canalis. Kandan might have a shared origin with canalis, as 'to dig' and 'groove' are similar enough meanings. --Tha Pyngwyn (talk) 15:15, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Canal 

message: English is not an Indo European language as the article suggests, but Germanic. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.163.151.230 (talk) 04:39, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Germaic is a branch of IE which English also belongs to.  --alidoostzadeh 00:40, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Indo European Languages 

message: Very educational article. Badagnani 00:08, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Good page

message: Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged. Merriam-Webster, 2002, does not support chakari as a Persian originated word.  It is true that the underlying chakar is supported as a Persian originated word; however, chakari, according to Webster's originated in Hindi.  This is consistent with the practice of chakari, or attendance on a patron, which originated in Nepal. See, for example, Bista, Dor Bahadur (1994) Fatalism and development: Nepal's struggle for modernization  Orient Longman, Calcutta, India, pages 89-92, .  The Oxford English Distionary, online edition, does not list chakari. Chakari, "institutionalised sycophancy", has been defined in the Nepali context as etymologically coming from 'to wait upon, to serve, or to seek favour from a god', a derived usage from chakar. Hutt, Michael (1994) Nepal in the nineties: versions of the past, visions of the future Oxford University Press, Oxford, England, page 118, .  That usage and the sense of waiting attendance upon a patron are more common in the scanty English usage that chakari sees, rather than in the sense of a domestic service. See also, Agrawal, Hem Narayan (1976) The administrative system of Nepal: from tradition to modernity‎ Vikas Publishing House, New Delhi, India, page 123, . I am not saying that chakari isn't a Persian word, it is just unsupported by the provided source as of Persinate origin, and such origin is undermined by other extrinsic evidence. Its English meaning appears to come from Hindi, as indicated by the provided source. --Bejnar (talk) 14:32, 15 February 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Chakari

message: During the past few days somebody inserted "Betruger" into the article as a word having Persian etymology whereas no word "betruger" exists in English language, and the German word "betruger" (which means deceiver in German) has no Persian etymology. I was going to remove this item of vandalism, but then I started to review the rest of the article and I found longstanding errors all over the place. Here are some words that the article has been claiming -- since at least 15 August 2008 -- to be of Persian origin and that are not at all of Persian origin:
SEER
SHAME
RANK
NAVY
CALENDER
CASH
CARCASS
... and that's a casually compiled and very incomplete list of the errors in the article.
Somebody needs to got through the list word for word to clean up the article. But it's not going to be me. Sorry about that. Seanwal111111 (talk) 23:46, 17 February 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Back in the year 2005 somebody inserted that the word Sherry (the drink) comes "from Jerez in Spain, from Pers Shiraz, from the time of Rustamid empire in Spain" whereas in truth Sherry comes from Spainish vino de Xeres "wine from Xeres," modern Jerez near Cadiz. And the town name Xeres/Jerez comes from the Latin "urbs Caesaris" (Caesar's city) and all of the etymology dictionaries say that. This tells me there hasn't been a scrupulous editor at this page since 2005. Seanwal111111 (talk) 00:08, 18 February 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  The article is currently a mess of falsehoods and has been for years 

message: Apart from Indic and Semitic words labelled as of Persian origin, the Persian words form not more than 5-10% of the words listed currently in the article. The guy who created this page has probably no clue about what etymology is, neither about phonological developments of Persian dialects. He probably confused Persian with Iranic, as obviously has listed Parthian, Soghdian, Avestan, Scythian and other northern Iranic words as Persian! Farso777 (talk) 22:40, 14 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: ''Persian'' is wrong, It's ''Iranic''

message: The word "Balkan" is not from persian orign,in the source "http://books.google.com.tr/books?id=-EuFwLQhvYMC&pg=PA27&dq=balkans+etymology+persian&hl=en&ei=Xgm4TqebCpSy8QORstjoBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=balkans%20etymology%20persian&f=false"
it doesn't says its persian,it says there is possibility about the words orign. please don't play with words and please don't make here persian propaganda,try to be polite,objective and polite!--88.255.183.34 (talk) 09:40, 22 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Balkan is not persian 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: The prevailing etymology seems to be that it came from Jock, but given the Persian influence on medieval Polo (the Ayyubid & Mameluk Sultans had a Jocken-dar جوكندار as a high ranking official), it seems rather a coincidence that this would be a false friend, no?--عبد المؤمن (talk) 19:52, 13 December 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Jockey? 

message: Several words are listed as coming from an Old Persian word, which is written in the Arabic script. Old Persian was not written in the Arabic script, which hadn't been invented yet. It was written in its own cuneiform alphabet. Old Persian words should be written in the Old Persian script, with transliteration. phma (talk) 00:33, 24 December 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Old Persian script