Middle Persian - Transition To New Persian

Transition To New Persian

The modern-day descendant of Middle Persian is New Persian. The changes between late Middle and Early New Persian were very gradual, and in the 10th-11th centuries, Middle Persian texts were still intelligible to speakers of Early New Persian. However, there are definite differences that had taken place already by the 10th century:

• Sound changes, such as
  • the dropping of unstressed initial vowels
  • the epenthesis of vowels in initial consonant clusters
  • the loss of -g when word final
  • change of initial w- to either b- or (gw- → g-)
• Changes in the verbal system, notably the loss of distinctive subjunctive and optative forms, and the increasing use of verbal prefixes to express verbal moods
• Changes in the vocabulary, especially the substitution of a large number of Arabic loanwords for words of native origin
• The substitution of Arabic script for Pahlavi script.