Language

The place of the Kurdish language among Indo-European languages

As it is known, the Kurdish language is one of the Indo-European languages and belongs to the Iranian languages. The origin of all Indo-European languages is the Sanskrit language. This language has become a very rich language and according to historians and linguists, it was spoken in the region of South Asia, in the then great India, several thousand years before Christ.

Later, many people migrated from South Asia and migrated westward. In this migration, some of them reached the region called Iran, which later became Kurdistan and Pars (Persia). Some of them went to the northwest, some to the east and reached the geography that was later called Europe. Thus they were separated and dispersed. They settled in these regions.

Since they have been separated, for a long time, their vocabularies have undergone many changes and each of these modified forms has settled in a region and has become an independent language.

The languages collectively known as “Indo-European languages” have come to the fore in that way. Since some of these people stayed in India and some of them went to Europe and settled there, all their languages were called “Indo-European languages”; that is, the languages that spread and settled from India to Europe. Thus, that name has become a common scientific name for all these languages.

One can compare all the Indo-European languages to a very large tree with many flowers and branches, each part of those languages can be compared to a flower in that tree, and each language in those parts can be compared to a branch of this flower.

The large tree has five main shoots. To put it more clearly, there are five main divisions of the Indo-European language. These parts are:

1-Indian Section. The languages spoken in today’s India and in some of its surrounding countries like Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka and all are part of the Indian language and each one of them is a branch of this flower.

2-The Iranian part. The Kurdish, Farsi and Baluchi languages are included in the Iranian part and each of them is a branch of this flower.

3-Germanic section. German, English, Dutch and the languages of the Scandinavian countries are included in the German part and each of them is a branch of this flower.

4-Latin department. The French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and Romanian languages are included in the Latin division and each of them is a branch of this flower.

5-Slavic part. Russian, Ukrainian, Bulgarian, Macedonian, Serbian and several other languages are found in the Slavic part and each of them is a branch of this flower.

Greek, Armenian and Albanian (Albanian) are three Indo-European languages. But what part of them is not dependent on; that is, they are not branches of any of these flowers. All three languages are connected to the Indo-European tree. In other words, each of them is an independent branch of that tree and is immediately separated from the trunk of that tree.

Pahlavi/Kurdish

According to the findings of historians and linguists, after the departure of many people from the former great India region and their spread in the west and northwest, one of the languages that was born from Sanskrit and became an independent language was the Avestan language.

But from that language, only the book “Avesta” of the Zoroastrian religion has survived to our time. Apart from that book, there is nothing written in the Avesta language.

The Avestan language is derived from the Pahlavi language. Pahlavi was the language of the Median state, which became a great empire during its time. The people of that state were also called “Med”. According to historians, the Medes were the predecessors of the Kurds. In other words, Kurds are descendants of Medan.

The Pahlavi language does not exist as a spoken language and has not reached this time. Only a few documents and other written things from that language have survived to this time. These documents and written things have been preserved in some libraries and archives in Iran and thus have reached our time. In addition to these documents, there were some stone inscriptions and writings on stones written in the Pahlavi language and remaining from the Medan period. These petroglyphs are found in the Hewraman region of southern Kurdistan.

One can compare the Pahlavi language with the Latin language. The Latin language is not the same as the spoken language and has not reached our time. But as mentioned above, five languages are known and understood from that language in our time. Likewise, many documents and other written things in Latin have been preserved in archives and libraries and are still available at this time.

The Pahlavi language is accepted by linguists as the origin of the Kurdish, Farsi and Baluchi languages. That is, the three languages are known and derived from the Pahlavi language. With the passage of time, Pahlavi has left the field and disappeared; Kurdish, Farsi and Baluchi have become three different languages, each of them has become an independent language, each of them has got its own form and name.

Since the origin and source of the Kurdish and Persian languages is the Pahlavi language, the roots of many Kurdish and Persian words reach the Pahlavi language. In other words, there are many words from the Pahlavi language and the Persian Kurdish language. Such words are common in both languages. Some words are exactly the same in both languages, such as “free”, “hand”, “one”, “ten”, “hundred” and so on. Some words have changed a bit. Like Kurdish “didan” and Persian “dendan” and Kurdish “lip” and Persian “leb”, Kurdish “nav” and Persian “nam”, Kurdish “nimêj” and Persian “nemaz”, “roj” in Kurdish and “rouz” in Farsi etc.

These words come from the source of both languages, that is, from the Pahlavi language. You cannot say that those words are Kurdish and came into Persian from Kurdish, or Persian and came into Kurdish from Persian. These words came from the source of both languages, that is, from the Pahlavi language and reached both languages; some of them have remained the same on both the languages, some of them have been slightly changed in both languages and entered into the form and place of that language.

This situation, that is, the similarity of certain words or the similarity of certain words to each other, can be seen not only in Kurdish and Farsi, but also in some other languages, in French and Italian, Spanish and Portuguese, there are similar words in English and Swedish that resembles or something similar.

Some Pahlavi words have remained the same in Kurdish. In other words, these words came to the Kurdish language in the form of the Pahlavi language and they remained so in Kurdish, there was no change in them; but there is a slight change in Farisi. For example, the noun “good” has become “good” in Pahlavi, and it has become the same in Kurdish; but in Farsi it changed a little and became “happy”.

Some Pahlavi words have remained the same in Persian, no changes have been found in them; but in Kurdish it has changed a little. For example, the first person singular has become “men” in Pahlavi, while in Persian it remains as Pahlavi “”; but in Kurdish it has changed a bit and become “mine”.

Some Pahlavi words have changed more or less in both Kurdish and Persian. For example, Pahlavi “ayenek” was changed to “eynik” in Kurdish and “ayine” in Persian. Similarly, Pahlavi “roc” in Kurdish has changed a little to “roj”, in Farsi it has changed more to “ruz”. Another word that has changed is “a part” of Pahlavi. That word has also changed a little in Persian and has become “pare”, in Kurdish it has changed more and has become “pere”.

Note: The entire above article is part of the introduction to the book “Ferhenga Kurdi” prepared by M. Emin Bozarslan, published by Deng Publications in October 2011.