Pahlavi Language
Pahlavi is an extinct Middle Persian language, historically significant as a transitional form between Ancient Persian and Modern Persian (Farsi). It belongs to the Iranian branch of the larger Indo-European language family, which includes numerous languages spoken across Europe and parts of Asia. Pahlavi evolved during the time of the Parthian and Sassanian empires, with its script originating from Aramaic cursive, enabling its use in various inscriptions and texts. The language featured several written forms, including Inscriptional Pahlavi, Psalter Pahlavi, and Book Pahlavi, each serving different functions from recording information to religious translations. Although Pahlavi was the official language during the Sassanian period and played a role in promoting Zoroastrianism, it gradually became extinct around the ninth century CE, primarily due to the rise of Arabic following the Islamic conquest. Despite its extinction, Pahlavi laid the groundwork for modern Persian languages, including Dari and Tajik, which retain millions of speakers today.
Pahlavi Language
The Pahlavi language is an extinct member of the Iranian language group, a subdivision of the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European language family. This family includes most of the modern European languages as well as languages of Southwest, Central, and South Asia. More than two-and-a-half- billion people speak Indo-European languages, making it the largest language family in the world.
Pahlavi is a Middle Persian language and is also sometimes referred to as Sassanian Pahlavi. Pahlavi is a transitional language that evolved from Ancient Persian and eventually became Modern Persian. Persia was the historic region of southwestern Asia and is home to the modern-day nation of Iran.
The Pahlavi script, the written form of the language, evolved from Aramaic cursive script. Aramaic is a family of languages belonging to the Semitic family, which also includes Hebrew and Phoenician. It was the language used for international trade in the ancient Middle East. Its script, which was also widely used, was commonly adopted by many cultures to develop variations of their own writing systems.
Like the Aramaic script, the Pahlavi script was written and read from right to left. It had fewer letters than sounds, so some letters were pronounced differently according to their placement in a word. Pahlavi had about twenty-three consonants along with three short and three long vowels, two diphthongs (a combination of vowel sounds), and one semivowel.
The written script had several versions. One version was Inscriptional Pahlavi, which dates back to about the first or second century BCE and was used to record information in clay, coins, and rock. This version of the script had nineteen letters that were not joined together when written. Psalter Pahlavi was used to translate religious documents, including a book of psalms in the sixth or seventh century CE. Psalter Pahlavi had eighteen letters that were joined together when written. Book Pahlavi was a version used for most written material. This version consisted of twelve or thirteen letters that were joined together when written and was used until about the ninth century CE.
The Pahlavi script was eventually replaced by the Perso-Arabic script. This writing system was based on the Arabic script. The same script has been applied to several other languages, including the Urdu alphabet, Sindhi alphabet, Kurdish alphabet, and several others.
History and Classification
The first Persian Empire rose to power in the sixth century BCE under the Achaemenid Dynasty. It expanded quickly across the region from Mesopotamia to Afghanistan. Because the empire’s growth was so rapid, it did not have time to institute a uniform language for governing and had to rely on many different languages. The primary language used was Old Persian. The script of Old Persian was cuneiform, a wedge-shaped writing system. It resembled Sumerian, but used original characters developed by Achaemenid rulers.
The Achaemenids, under the line of Cyrus the Great and his family, ruled Persia until 330 BCE when the empire was conquered by Alexander the Great. When Alexander died at a young age without any heirs, the empire was divided among four of his generals. One general, Seleucus, gradually took over most of Persia. In the third century BCE, a nomadic people from the Parthia region of Persia established a new dynasty. The Parthians replaced Old Persian with the Pahlavi script. Pahlavi was spoken and written in a form that came from a dialect of Parthian. Greek was the official language of the Parthian Empire until the first century CE, when it was replaced by Pahlavi .The earliest evidence of the Pahlavi language was discovered on coins and building inscriptions in the capital of Dura-Europus, located along the Euphrates River in modern-day Syria.
The Parthians controlled the region for the next five centuries, until 224 CE, when the armies of Ardashir I conquered Parthia. Ardashir I was the founder of the Sassanian Dynasty that ruled from 224–651 CE. After he was crowned king of the state of Persis in 202 CE, he soon conquered lands to the west, including Persia. The Sassanid Empire sought to revive Iranian traditions and eliminate Greek influence on the region. They recognized Pahlavi as the official language and declared Zoroastrianism as the state religion. Zoroastrianism is one of the world’s oldest monotheistic religions, a belief system that worships one god as opposed to multiple deities. Pahlavi’s use as the language of Zoroastrianism helped it spread farther in the region.
After years of warfare, economic decline, and religious unrest, the Sassanid Empire was conquered by Islamic forces in 652 CE. Although the invaders replaced Pahlavi with Arabic, small communities continued to use Pahlavi and the script was written for another three hundred years. It became the foundation for modern languages such as Modern Persian and Dari.
Geographic Distribution and Modern Usage
Pahlavi existed from the third century BCE and became extinct about the ninth century CE. A language is classified as extinct when it has no native speakers.
Pahlavi served as the precursor to Modern Persian, which is also called Farsi in Iran where it is the official language. Two forms of Farsi, known as Dari and Tajik, are official languages in Afghanistan and Tajikistan, respectively. This language gets its name from the ancient Persian region of Fars in southwestern Iran where Pahlavi had been spoken. About fifty-six million people speak some form of Persian in the twenty-first century.
Bibliography
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Hale, Mark. "Pahlavi." The Ancient Languages of Asia and the Americas. Roger D. Woodward, ed. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2008. 123–35. Print.
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