Issues in Persian Cataloging

1. Issues in Persian Cataloging Romanization: Grammatical Signs: Hamzah and Persian Izafah Persian Personal Names Importance of Affixes in Persian Cataloging

2. Signs Representing Certain Grammatical Structures • The sign “ء” a small “ی” (y) is one of the orthographical symbols which exists in Farsi and Arabic. The glottal stop in Arabic called Hamzah, “ء”, is identical with the same symbol called Izafah in Farsi.

3. Izafahfinal (i) or (yi) preceded by a hyphen • The state of Izafah occurs when one word is added to another in order to complete the meaning of the former, called muzaf. The connecting mark of Izafah is represented by the vowel “ِ ” (zir) which appears at the end of the muzaf, but is practically never indicated in the script. • If however the muzaf ends in such letters as ”الف“ (a), “و “ (u) ی“” (y), and ”ه“(final silent “h”), the mark of Izafah becomes “ِء”(-yi). F. Tehrani, Chapter 7

4. Izafah GuidelinesLibrary of Congress Romanization tables recommend: • When the muzaf bears no special mark of Izafah, it is followd by –i: • When the muzaf is marked by the addition of”ء“, it is followed by –’i: • When the muzaf is marked by the addition of ”ی“ it is followed by –yi:

5. Hamzah or Glottal Stop (ی = ء) • Hamzah is used to mark the indefinite article • It is romanized as (’) • Examples: • In Farsi, the mark for the indefinite article is the letter “ی” (y). When the word to which the article is attached ends in silent “h,” three different marks, all representing the same values, are employed according to the pleasure of calligraphers of manuscripts or printers, or there is a complete absence of any mark. These are: F. Tehrani, Chapter 7.

6. Hamzah (ی = ء)Library of Congress Recommends • Farideh Tehrani “Negligence and Chaos”, 1991, p 127. • “All the above variations of marks are related to one grammatical case and therefore, in romanization, they should be represented by one form, “Khanei ziba” (a beautiful house).”

7. Persian names Historical events in Iran have deeply impacted the Iranian Names. Under various cultural traditions Iranian personal names have changed from one of two simple names such as Kaykavus or Siyavash to complicated form of names such as Abu Majd Majdud ibn Adam Samai or Abu al-Najm pisar-I Qaws pisar-I Ahmad Manuchihri Damghani. For this reason it is logical to divide Persian names to 3 Periods of Ancient (Before 652), Middle (652-1926) and Modern (1926-)

8. Persian Personal Names • 3 major periods: • Before 652 or Bastani • Names made up of one or two elements. • 652 – 1926 or Miyanah • Most complex Persian names (Pahlavi, Persian, Arabic, or Religious names) • 1926 to Present or Mudirn

9. Names: Before 652 or Bastani • Contain one or two elements • Examples: • One Element: Daryush – داریوش • Two Elements: Mihrdad – مهرداد affix • Compound names = Two personal names put together without Izafah. • Example: • Ardeshir Babakan – اردشیر بابکان

10. Names: 652 – 1926 or Miyanah • Contain up to 7 elements (i.e. title of address, forename, genealogy, etc.) • 2 groups: • Pre-Islamic names (Zoroastrian names) • Names of Arabic origin (Islamic or Shiah names) • Distinction does not always hold. Sometimes two groups of names combine. Such as Jamshid ibn Masud (جمشید ابن مسعود)or Anushiravan ibn Khalid (انوشیروان ابن خالد)

11. 7 elements of 625-1926 Period names consist of: • A man may have several unvan, laqab, and nisbat. Or even two names, forming a compound.

12. Names: 1926 – Present or Mudirn • 1926 onwards, family names were introduced in Iran • The name in the present period consist of two parts: • Forename • Family name • Example: • Emad Khorasani- عمادخراسانی • All unvans are considered absolute, among the few exceptions are: • Aqa - آقا • Banu - بانو • Dushizah - دوشیزه • Khanum - خانم • Sayyid - سیدّ • Iranian names from 1926 can be treated exactly as Western names, taking in to consideration the fact that middle names are not in use in Iran. • Special care has to be taken in dealing with compound personal names and also with names with suffixes and prefixes that are in most cases connected to the previous word and affect the transliteration of the names. Consult Sharifi, Nasir, “Fihrist Kardan Asar-I Farsi”, 1959.