Persian as a Source Language for Words of Arabic Origin in Contemporary Turkish Dictionaries

Abstract

While determining the origins of words in current Turkish dictionaries, the issue of “source language” is overlooked. There exist several studies on words of Western origin in terms of lexicology, but the words of Arabic-Persian origin also deserve attention. The Persian language influenced Oghuz languages as they emerged as the written languages in the Anatolian region. And because of this, many words of Arabic origin got absorbed into Turkish with their Persian orthography. Most of the words with the last letter “closed t” in Arabic are written with an “open t” in Persian. These words were written with an “open t” in the periods of both Old Anatolian Turkish and Ottoman Turkish, just like it was in Persian. Also, the letter ḍād in Arabic, pronounced like the /d/ sound in Turkish, is pronounced in Persian like the /z/ sound in Turkish. Therefore, Persian should be acknowledged as the source language for words that contain the letter ḍād in Arabic orthography and are pronounced with the /z/ sound in Turkish. In current Turkish dictionaries, words whose last letter is a “closed t” in Arabic and are marked as a /t/ in Turkish, and the words that contain the letter ḍād and are recorded with the letter /z/ in Turkish are assumed to be of Arabic origin. Considering the commonality of Persian and Turkish in terms of how both languages spell Arabic-origin words, Persian should be shown as the source language of the words in question in current Turkish dictionaries.