Lesson 1: Short Vowels in Persian

Short Vowels

There are three short vowels in Persian: /a, e, o/. These vowels are not alphabetically represented; they are rather represented by specific symbols technically called 'diacritics':

-َ for /a/;

 

-ِ for /e/;

 

and -ُ for /o/.

 

The diacritics for the short vowels cannot appear independently; they need a base - which must be a letter of the alphabet (X = any letter of the alphabet):

xَ    xِ    xُ

 

• When a word starts with one of these vowels, the base is always 'alef', the first letter of the Persian alphabet (NOTICE THAT PERSIAN IS WRITTEN AND READ FROM RIGHT TO LEFT; since you still do not know the letters of alphabet, I use Latin script):

           B S اَ   

         /asb/ 'horse'    

 

         M S اِ   

        /esm/ 'name'         

 

          U T اُ

        /otu/ 'electric iron'

 

• When short vowels appear medially, they are carried by the consonant that immediately precedes them:

               T S Dَ              L Dِ                 M Dُ

        /dast/ 'hand'  /del/ 'stomach'    /dom/ 'tail'