Numeral classifiers developed during the documented history of Persian; but insufficient data are as yet available for linguistic analysis. Old Persian (6th - 4th cent. BC) lacked numeral classifiers just as Proto-Indo-European and Proto-Indo-Aryan did. It was apparently only after antiquity that Indo-Aryan languages developed numeral classifiers. Middle Persian (1st cent. BC - 11th cent. AC) shows faint beginnings. Mostly, the counted noun is combined with the bare numeral, which may precede or follow it. Although the language has nominal plural, it is optional in counted noun phrases ().
| . | hān | panz | yazd |
| Pers | D.MED | five | god |
| those five gods | (Shābuhragān) | ||
At any rate, the noun tāg ‘unit’, which figures prominently in the modern classifier paradigm, is already widely used as a mensurative ().
| . | nay | ēw | tāg | |
| Pers | reed | one | piece | |
| one stick of reed | (Moazami 2014:272) | |||
The first clear examples of numeral classifiers are from Classical Persian (since 11th cent.). A small set of individual concrete nouns is recruited for this category, composed from inherited nouns like tāg, grammaticalized to the classifier tā, and nouns borrowed from Arabic and Turkish. As in other languages, nouns lending themselves to this function are mainly of two sorts: They either designate categories of a rather high taxonomic level like tā or nafar ‘person’ (), or parts of the individuals so counted, like raʔs ‘head’. These are combined directly with a numeral to form an enumerative phrase, which may then be followed by the noun designating the counted object (). The formerly variable word order is now for the enumerative phrase to precede the counted noun.
| . | haft | ’adad | kašti | ’ast |
| Pers | seven | CL.number | ship | be.PRS:3.SG |
| they were seven ships | (Nasir Khusraw, Safarnama, p. 32; 11th cent). | |||
Contemporary Farsi has a rather large paradigm of numeral classifiers as shown in the following table:
| classifier | classes | example | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| form | basic meaning | form | meaning | |
| tā | piece, unit | person, animal, plant, object | se tā asb | three horses |
| nafar | person | human being | yek nafar kešāvarz | one peasant |
| tan | body | human being | do tan mozdūr | two mercenaries |
| raʔs | head | animal | yek raʔs gāv | one head of cattle |
| dāne | grain, piece | small animal/plant/object | se dāne sīb | three apples |
| ʕadad | number | small animal/plant/object | do ʕadad medād | two pencils |
| šomāre | number | periodical | do šomāre maǰalle | two journals |
| ǰeld | binding, volume | book | čahar ǰeld ketāb | four books |
| taxte | board, piece | elongated object | yek taxte farš | one carpet |
| farvand | wooden bar | machine | se farvand havā-peymā | three airplanes |
| pārče | piece | utensil | dah pārče ẓarf | three vessels |
| bāb | door | locality | se bāb dokān | three shops |
| ḥalḳe | ring | jewelry | do ḥalḳe angoštar | two rings |
| dast | hand | set | yek dast lebās | one dress |
Source: Moinfar 1980
The classifier is optional in many contexts. is from Modern Farsi.
| . | do | (nafar) | kāregar |
| Pers | two | CL.person | workman |
| two workmen | (Mache 2012: 96) | ||
The category of numeral classifiers is an innovation in Persian and several other Indo-Iranian languages. The role played by language contact and borrowing in this development is under investigation (Mache 2012, Cathcart et al. 2020).
References
Cathcart, Chundra A. & Hölzl, Andreas & Jäger, Gerhard & Widmer, Paul & Bickel, Balthasar 2020, ‘ Numeral classifiers and number marking in Indo-Iranian. A phylogenetic approach’. Language Dynamics and Change. [online]
Mache, Avazeh 2012, Numeral classifiers in Persian. München: LINCOM Europa (LINCOM Studies in Language Typology, 22).
Moazami, Mahnaz 2014, Wrestling with the demons of the Pahlavi Widēwdād. Transcription, translation, and commentary . Leiden & Boston: Brill (Iran Studies, 9).
Moinfar, Moh. Djafar 1980, „Les classificateurs en persan.“ Brettschneider, Gunter & Lehmann, Christian (eds.), Wege zur Universalienforschung. Sprachwissenschaftliche Beiträge zum 60. Geburtstag von Hansjakob Seiler. Tübingen: G. Narr (Tübinger Beiträge zur Linguistik, 145); 317-320.