12 Iran: Scripts, Old Persian, Aramaic, Avestan
Iran: Scripts, Old Persian, Aramaic, Avestan
P O Skjærvø, Harvard University, Cambridge,
MA, USA
ß 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Writing systems for Iranian languages include cunei-
form (Old Persian); scripts descended from ‘imperial’
Aramaic (earliest monuments of Chorasmian, Sogdian,
Parthian, and Middle Persian, as well as Avestan,
derived from the Middle Persian script); two Syriac
scripts, Estrangelo or ‘Manichean’ (Middle Persian,
Parthian, Bactrian, Sogdian, Modern Persian) and
‘Nestorian’ (Christian Sogdian, Modern Persian);
Hebrew (Modern Persian and local Persian dialects:
Judeo-Persian); Arabic (Modern Persian, Chorasmian,
Kurdish, Pashto, Balochi); Brahmi (Khotanese,
Tumshuqese, Sogdian); Greek (Bactrian); Cyrillic
(Ossetic, Tajik); Georgian (Ossetic); and Latin
(Kurdish, Ossetic).
Old Persian Cuneiform
Old Persian is written in a cuneiform script, but with
only a small number of signs. There are 3 vowel signs
ha, i, ui, 33 signs of the form ‘consonant þ vowel’
(CV), 8 logograms, a word separator, and numerals.
The CV signs contain the vowels a, i, or u hCa, Ci,
Cui, but the set of hCii and hCui signs is not
complete. There are only 4 hCii signs and 7 hCui
signs, and most of the hCai signs also have to serve
for the missing hCii and hCui signs. Thus, crucial
morphological distinctions such as the 3rd singular
endings active -tiy and middle -taiy, both h-ta-i-yai,
are not indicated. The hCai signs are also used where
a consonant is followed by no vowel, before other
consonants, or in word-final position (only m, r,
and š).
The vowel signs ha, i, ui are used initially (when the
word begins with a vowel). Medially, hai is used to
write long ā. The signs hii and hui are used medially to
write short i and u and long ı̄ and ū. They are preced-
ed by the hCii and hCui signs whenever these exist.
Very rarely in the attested corpus, hCii and hCui are
used alone to indicate consonant plus i or u. In final
position, they are followed by hyai and hvai (-ı̄˘y, -ū˘v).
Certain sounds that are expected from the etymol-
ogy of the words are not written in the Old Persian
script, notably h before u and m and nasals before
consonants, although they may be present both in
transcriptions into other languages and in later stages
of Persian:
h: Ahuramazdā is spelled ha-u-ra-ma-za-da-ai, but
ha-hu-ru-ma-az-da->i in Akkadian; the Middle Per-
˘
sian form is Ōhrmazd; ahmiy ‘I am’ is spelled both
ha-mi-i-yai and ha-ha-mi-i-yai; with tauhmā hta-u-
ma-ai ‘family’, cf. Av. taoxman-‘offspring’, NPers.
toxm ‘seed’; and with ahrı̄ka ha-ra-i-kai ‘on the side
of the Evil one’, cf. Mid. Pers. ahrı̄men ‘the Evil one’;
nasals: Kambū˘jiya- is spelled hka-ba-u-ji-i-yai, but
Elamite hkán-bu-zi-iai, Akkadian hkam-bu-zi-iai, Ar-
amaic hkmbwzyi, Greek Kambúsēs; with bandaka
‘bondsman’, spelled hba-da-kai, cf. Middle Persian
bandag ‘servant’.
The script was therefore not quite phonemic. It is
also not certain to what extent the written consonants
were unambiguous; for instance, diachrony and syn-
chrony suggest that hjai may be for both // and /ž/, if
these were separate phonemes. (See Table 1.)
Numerals
The numerals are simple: the unit is ‘1’, is ‘3’, etc.;
‘ten’ is ‘19’, etc.); and ‘20’ is’ ‘27’,
etc.). The only higher numeral attested is ‘120’.
Scripts Derived from Aramaic
All the Iranian scripts derived from Aramaic express
vowels other than short a by means of matres lectio-
nis as follows: h>i initially ¼ short or long ā˘- (long
initial ā- is often written h>>-i); between vowels ¼
long ā (in the Sogdian script also short a).
hyi and hwi: between vowels ¼ short or long ı̄˘ or ē˘
and ū˘ and ō˘, respectively; in the Sogdian script h>yi
and h>wi is used for āy and āw (also h>>y, >>wi) or
instead of hy, wi; in the Manichean script initial h<y-i
ı̄˘- may be distinguished from h>yi ē-. In Christian
Sogdian in the Nestorian Syriac script, vowel quality/
quantity is sometimes indicated by vowel marks.
Scripts Derived from Imperial Aramaic
During the Achaemenid period (549–330 B.C.E.),
Aramaic (‘Imperial Aramaic’) was used as the chan-
cellery language, and the Aramaic script was subse-
quently, at the latest by the Parthian period (ca. 210
B.C.E.–224 C.E.), adopted by several Iranian states:
Parthia, the local Persian dynasty, Chorasmia, and
Sogdiana. There is a small corpus of Aramaic docu-
ments from Bactria from the 4th century B.C.E., and
Aramaic was also used in the edicts of King Aśoka
(3rd century B.C.E.) written in ancient Bactria and
Gandhara (northern Pakistan).
From the early Parthian period (2nd–1st centuries
B.C.E.) there are a number of inscriptions, some of
which are clearly in Iranian languages, presumably
Parthian (thus, e.g., the wine receipts from Nisa, east
of the Caspian Sea), although the fact is obscured by

Table 1 The Old Persian syllabary
the extensive use of aramaeograms (heterograms,
ideograms). Others are more likely to be in faulty
bureaucratic Aramaic. By the 2nd century C.E., the
official Parthian script had reached its standard form.
The Middle Persian variant, seen on the coins of
pre-Sasanian kings, evolved in southern Iran in the
late Parthian period and became the official script of
the Sasanian empire (224–651 C.E.), seen in royal and
private inscriptions from the 3rd to the 5th centuries.
Variants of this script are found on the coins of the
Sasanian kings. A more cursive variant of the Middle
Persian script used for writing on paper is the
so-called Psalter script, known from a fragmentary
manuscript of the Psalms of David found in Chinese
Turkestan. This script developed via a simplified epi-
graphic variant (known from funerary inscriptions)
into the so-called (Book) Pahlavi script, used in
the Zoroastrian books. The final stage is the almost
Iran: Scripts, Old Persian, Aramaic, Avestan 13
indecipherable script used in the Pahlavi papyri and
parchments of the late Sasanian early Islamic period.
The Avestan script is a composite script made on
the basis of the Psalter and Book Pahlavi scripts.
The Chorasmian script is known from a few
inscriptions; it was later replaced by the Arabic script.
The Sogdian script is known in three principal
forms. The earliest form is used in letters written on
paper and dating from the early 4th century C.E. and
in a few short inscriptions from northern Pakistan.
The common Sogdian script is a cursive variant found
in secular documents and in Buddhist and Manichean
manuscripts, of which two stages are distinguished:
the ‘formal’ or ‘sutra script,’ and the more ambiguous
‘Uighur’ variant. (See Table 2.)
Use of Aramaic Letters
The Aramaic alphabet contained letters for numerous
sounds not found in Iranian. Some of these were
adopted to write sounds that were not found in Ara-
maic (hs. i for Iranian č [tS] and hh. i for the fricative
velar /x/; hli in Sogdian for /d/), but even so the
Aramaic alphabet contained more letters than were
needed, and ht. , <, qi were never used in writing Irani-
an words (except with numerical values; differently in
the Syriac scripts). In Middle Persian, hli is used more
often than hri (¼ hwi) to write r. In Aramaic docu-
ments from the mid-Parthian era, hh. i and hhi are
being confused, and, in Parthian and Middle Persian, ¯
hhi is confined to final position in aramaeograms
¯
while hh. i is written elsewhere, regardless of their
etymologies. Aramaic hhi was also used in Parthian
¯
and Sogdian for the feminine ending -ā˘, which resem-
bled the Aramaic ending -ā, but this became a mere
convention when the ending was lost both in Parthian
and in Sogdian in ‘heavy’ stems.
The Middle Persian Script
Typical of the development of the Middle Persian
script is the ever-increasing merger of letters into the
same shape, for example:
Out of the 22 distinct letters of the Aramaic alpha-
bet and the 18 of the inscriptions and the Psalter, the
Pahlavi alphabet distinguishes only 12 letters, which
have to do duty for 21. As we see from Table 3, some
of these letters have at least two different orthograph-
ic values (Psalter forms in parenthesis). As the script
14 Iran: Scripts, Old Persian, Aramaic, Avestan

Table 2 The Main Iranian scripts developed from Aramaic and Syriac

The table contains a selection of initial, medial, and final variants.

is strongly cursive, there are numerous positional In practice, therefore, most of the time Pahlavi has
variants. to be read word by word or morpheme by morpheme,
Of these, h<i and hqi, as well as hhi (¼ hm þ rather than letter by letter. For instance, Ohrmazd,
w, ni) are found only in aramaeograms,¯ transliterated inscr. h>whrmzdi became h>whrmzdi
as hO, Q, Ei, and hQi is found only in hQDMi ¼ h>w>wm>i ¼ h>nhwm>i (hence the traditional Parsi
abar ‘on’. pronunciation anhuma). The word yazdān ‘god(s)’,
In Indian manuscripts, hši is replaced by hy>i. inscr. became hyzd>n"i ¼ hy>>wwi, which
To remedy the ambiguities, diacritical marks are was distinguished from dēwān ¯ ‘demons’, inscr.
sometimes used (not always etymologically correct): , Pahl. hŠDYAn"i ¼ hš>>>wwi (¼
hdi, hgi, hyi, hi (initial). hy>>>>wwi with hy>i for hši) by the number of loops,
 Iran: Scripts, Old Persian, Aramaic, Avestan 15

Table 3 The 12 distinct Pahlavi letters Table 4 The Avestan alphabet

which in the manuscripts are sometimes multiplied

even further ( , etc.). The word mā˘zdēsn
‘Mazdayasnian’ is usually written like mahist
hmhyst"i ‘greatest’ with hyti for hsni.
The name of the devil, Ahrimen, is sometimes writ-
ten up-side-down .

The Avestan Script

The Avestan script was invented probably sometime
in the 6th century C.E. in order to write down the
Avestan texts, which until then had been transmitted
only orally. It is an alphabetical script, in which each
allophone of the language as recited at the time cor-
responds to one letter. The earliest known forms of
the Avestan and Pahlavi scripts are those of the
13/14th-century manuscripts and probably represent
later developments of the original script. Some letters
may have been added in the course of time. (See
Table 4.)
The alphabet was based upon the official Pahlavi
script, using diacritical marks (e.g., hı̄i and hūi
from hii and hui and some letter forms from differ-
ent stages of the Pahlavi script (e.g., Psalter hdi). It
has also been suggested that hei was adopted from
Greek E.
By the time of the earliest manuscripts, the original
value of some of the letters was no longer known,
notably, the distribution of the three sibilants hš, , i
is not consistent in the manuscripts, and their values
have been inferred on linguistic grounds. Several let-
ters are found only in certain manuscripts (e.g., hńi
. the omission indicated by super/subscript dots (e.g.,
and hgi). hy, Yi, and hvi are used only initially, while
huui and hiii are used medially.
Syriac Scripts
Two forms of Syriac script were used for Iranian
languages. The Manichean script, a modified
estrangelo (sometimes, but probably apocryphally,
ascribed to Mani), was used for Middle Persian,
Parthian, Bactrian, Sogdian, and Persian (it was also
used for the non-Iranian Tokharian and Old Turkish).
The Nestorian script was used by the Christians at
Turfan.
The Manichean Script
As in the Sogdian script, Syriac hli was used to write d.
Diacritics were used to express specifically Iranian
sounds, e.g., superscript double dots over hbi ¼ hbi,
hgi with a loop ¼ hgi. The only new letter, h i, is
commonly transliterated as hi, while hzi with
double dots is transliterated as hži.
Initial sibilant þ stop took a prosthetic vowel writ-
ten h<i (Mid. Pers. h<sp>hi ¼ espāh ‘army’, Parth.
h<sp>di ¼ espād). Words with¯ ē or ı̄ and ō or ū may
be distinguished by the use of h<i or h>i (e.g., Mid.
Pers. h>ygi ēg ‘then’ versus h<ygi ı̄(g), relative particle;
hzwri zōr ‘strength’ versus hz<wri zūr ‘deception’).
Sometimes, letters marking vowels are left out and
hwi with double dots for h>wdi ud ‘and’ and hši
with double dots for h>wši u-š ‘and he/by him/his’).
In the Bactrian Manichean script, the double dots
were used to distinguish the palatal ś and ź from the
presumably palato-alveolar š and ž.
The Nestorian Script
This script included vowel marks and contains a new
letter (corresponding to Man. , but commonly tran-
sliterated as hži). The letters hti and ht. i are most often
16 Iran: Scripts, Old Persian, Aramaic, Avestan
used for y and t, respectively, but in a few manuscripts
ht. i is t and ht. i is y. Vowels are marked using the Syriac
pointing system, which makes this the only variety of
Sogdian script in which the crucial distinctions be-
tween a- and ā- , ˇı̄ and ēˇ , ūˇ and ōˇ are
indicated in the script. Short a is noted also with other
consonants, e.g., wa .
See also: Aramaic and Syriac; Avestan; Iranian Lan-
guages; Persian, Modern; Persian, Old.
Bibliography
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B Ingham, School of Oriental and African Studies,
University of London, UK
ß 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Main Language Families
Three main languages families are spoken in Iran,
covering discrete areas, but overlapping in places.
This is facilitated by the thinness of the population in
parts. The majority group in terms of number of spea-
kers and geographical area is the Iranian group of the
Indo-European family, spoken as original local lan-
guages over most of the country except in Azerbaijan
and Khuzistan. The national language Persian (Farsi)
was originally a dialect of the region of Fars and has
a written history in the present alphabet of about
1000 years. It is spoken in all the main cities and in
the northeast. Kindred dialects are those of Fars and
of the Lur tribes of the south. Other Iranian varieties
include (Schmitt, 1989: 294–295) (i) Kurdish in the
west, (ii) Tati and Talishi in the north west, (iii) Gilaki
and Mazandarani north of the Elburz mountains,
(iv) Central dialects around Hamadan, Tehran, Isfahan,
and Yazd, and (v) Baluchi in the southeast. Most of
these are quite distinct from Farsi and not mutually
intelligible with it. However, only Kurdish, Baluchi,
and to a lesser extent Luri are usually accorded sepa-
rate language status, because of the political power of
Naveh J & Shaked S (eds.) (2005). Ancient Aramaic docu-
ments from Bactria (fourth century, B.C.E.). Corpus
Inscriptionum Iranicarum (Part I, Vol. 5, Texts 2).
London: Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum.
Sims-Williams N (1985). The Christian Sogdian manuscript
C2. Berliner Turfantexte 12. Berlin: Akademie-Verlag.
Skjærvø P O (1995). ‘Aramaic in Iran.’ ARAM 7 (Palmyra
and the Aramaeans) 283–318.
Skjærvø P O (1996). ‘Aramaic scripts for Iranian lan-
guages.’ In Daniels P T & Bright W (eds.) The world’s
writing systems. New York: Oxford University Press.
515–535.
Stronach D (1990). ‘On the genesis of the Old Persian
cuneiform script.’ In Vallat F (ed.) Contribution à l’his-
toire de l’Iran. Mélanges offerts à Jean Perrot. Paris:
Recherche sur les civilisations. 195–203.
Weber D (2003). Berliner Papyri, Pergamente und Leinen-
fragmente in mittelpersischer Sprache unter Mitarbeit
von W. Brasheary. Ägyptische Urkunden aus den Staatli-
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their speakers. Kurdish and Baluchi are written lan-
guages. The next in size is the Turkic group, repre-
sented by Azeri in the north west (Azerbaijan), by
Uzbek, spoken by the Turkomans in the northeast,
by large numbers of Turkish speakers in Fars in the
southwest, of particular importance being the tribal
Qashqai and Khamse and in other localities, spread-
ing round from northeast to southwest interspersed
with the Iranian-speaking population. The two groups
overlap considerably, this sometimes resulting from
resettlement by previous governments. The third, the
Semitic group, is represented by Arabic spoken in
Khuzistan in the southwest and at various localities
along the Gulf Coast, the Makran Coast and possibly
also by some of the nomadic population of Fars
among the Khamse. There are also Arabic speaking
populations in the northeast around Sarakhs and in the
east around Birjand. The above are all non-minority
languages, spoken over large areas by native popula-
tions spanning the borders of Iran and neighboring
states. Persian spreads into Afghanistan (known there
as Darri) and Tadjikistan (known there as Tadjik).
Turkic spreads into Turkey and Azerbaijan in the
west, into Turkmenistan and other central Asian states
in the northeast, and into Afghanistan in the east.
Arabic spreads westward into Iraq. The population
of the Persian Gulf islands speak Arabic or Persian or
are bilingual.