Spread of the Persian language
The Persian language belongs to the Iranian languages and originates from Central and Middle Asia. It is assumed that there are around 70 million native Persian speakers worldwide.Persian is named differently depending on the country. There are also numerous dialects. The most well-known are Farsi (Persian translation of the word) and Dari (name in Afghanistan). The Tajik language and Azerbaijani Tat are also varieties of Persian.
Origins and development
The Persian language belongs to the Indo-Iranian subgroup of the Indo-European language family. Its roots go back over 2500 years. The oldest evidence of the language dates back to the time of the Achaemenid Empire (approx. 550-330 BC) in the form of ancient Persian cuneiform script. Its origins lie in present-day Iran, and over the centuries it spread across Central Asia to the Indian subcontinent.The language went through several phases of development: Old Persian during the Achaemenid dynasty, Middle Persian or Pahlavi during the Sassanid dynasty (224-651 AD) and finally New Persian from the 9th century onwards. The Islamization of Persia in the 7th century led to the extensive adoption of Arabic words and characters. New Persian, which developed from the Middle Ages onwards, is characterized by a high degree of stability in structure and vocabulary and became the literary and administrative language in a number of empires, including the Timurids and the Mughals.
Today, Persian is the official language of Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan. In addition to the approximately 70 million native speakers, it is spoken by a further 50 million as a second language. The current distribution is mainly in Iran and neighboring countries, with significant speaker communities in the diaspora worldwide.
| Country | Region | Official language | Distribution | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Iran | South Asia | yes | 56.6 % | 51,827,000 |
| Afghanistan | South Asia | yes | 33.0 % | 14,074,000 |
| Tajikistan | Central Asia | yes | 68.1 % | 7,212,000 |
| Uzbekistan | Central Asia | no | 9.0 % | 3,273,000 |
| Iraq | Western Asia | no | 1.0 % | 460,000 |
| Azerbaijan | Western Asia | no | 0.5 % | 51,000 |
Unless otherwise described in the text, this page is about native speakers — not the total number of speakers. How many people understand or speak Persian as a subsequently learned language is not the subject of this page. Countries where native speakers make up only a few thousand, or even a few hundred people, or countries with a percentage well below 1% are unlikely to be listed here.
Official language, national language or lingua franca: explanation of frequently used terms