ii. The Baḵtīārī Dialect

Baḵtīārī, the dialect and subdialects of the Baḵtīārs in southwestern Iran (between 31° and 34° north latitudes and 48° and 52° east longitudes), is very closely related to the dialects of the Boir-Aḥmadī, Kohgīlūya, and the Mamasanī to the south (population: Baḵtīārī 570,000, B.-A. 120,000, K. 110,000, M. 90,000). These, together with Lorī to the west and north, constitute the “Perside” southern Zagros group, as opposed to Kurdish dialects in the northern Zagros, with which Baḵtīārī shares a number of lexical and morphological items and phonological features, e.g., piā “man,” korr “boy,” bard “stone,” mul “neck”; the topicalizer and vocative marker ak(ū)</em>; the “Zagros-d,” i.e., the intervocalic lenisation, or loss, of d (see below). Other typical items, most shared with Fārs dialects, include: tē “eye,” seil “watching,” (h)ars “tear,” nift “nose,” hauš “courtyard,” tū “room, house,” g(y)er “cliff, rock,” van/vand “throw,” uft/wast “fall,” kip/kipist “fall down.”

Phonology. Consonants show some of the typical “Southwest” Iranian changes from Old to New Iranian: 1. initial *w > b, *waita > bēd “willow;” 2. initial *wi/*wṛ > gu, *wi-raica > gurūs “flee,” *wṛka > gurg “wolf;” 3. initial *y > j, *yāmaka > jūwa “shirt, suit;” 4. initial *dw > d, *dwar > der “door;” 5. *k > h, *akaina > āhan “iron;” 6. *g > d, *gāmātar > dūwā “son-in-law;” 7. *kw > s, *gau kwanta > gusind “sheep;” 8. *gw > z, *gwan– > zuūn/zōn “tongue;” 9. *θr > s, *āθrya–āp– > āsiāu “mill.”

Among the main later changes, two are typically Baḵtīārī: 1. intervocalic *m > w, e.g., dāmād > dūwā “son-in-law,” dāman > dūwan “skirt,” jāma > jūwa “dress, shirt,” āmad > oweid “came;” and 2. š > s in the 3rd sing. and plur. personal suffixes –š/-šūn > –s/-sūn, and in īšā > īsā “you” (plur.), and other words, e.g., angušt > angust “finger.” Other changes are: Initial x > h, xār > hār “thorn,” Arabic xabar > hawar “message.” (Note sporadic x > q and q > x: xurōs > qurūs “rooster,” Arabic qahr > xahr “anger.”) Initial xw > h before mid and high vowels, xwēš > hēs “self, own;” but xw > x elsewhere, xwafs > xous “sleep,” xwar > xar “eat.” Preconsonantal x > h, taxl > tahl “bitter,” tuxm > tuhm > tōm “seed,” f before t > h, raft > raht > rahd “went,” guft > guht > guhd “said” (not in Persian loans like baft “weft”), but > u before strident, xwafs > xous “sleep,” Arabic kafš > kouš “shoe.” Postfricative voiceless stops, mainly t, tend to become voiced, haštād > hašdād “80,” tariste > tarisde “could;” thus ft/xt > fd/xd > hd, raft > rahd “went,” suxt > suhd “burnt.” Voiced stops, in final position: b > v, jēb > jēv “pocket,” d is generally lost after long high vowel, bēd/beḏ “willow,” but zī “soon;” intervocalic position, b > w, bi-bur > buwur “cut!” g > y, tē-gal > tī-yel “eyes,” while d > y or is lost, mādīyān > māyūn “mare,” duxtar > duhdar > du(w)ar “daughter, girl.” Geminate rr/ll tend to be aspirated > hr/hl, *dar-n > darr– > dahr “tear,” *br-n > burr > buhr “break” (intransitive).

The main developments of the vowels are as follows: Long *ē generally remains ē/ĕ, indefinite sufitx –ē, lē/ĕs “lick,” xwēš > hēš. (Note ī > ē in several Arabic loans, taqsīr > tasxēr “fault.”) Long *ō tends to remain unchanged, durōq > durō “lie,” kōh > kō “mountain,” but is raised to ū before dentals and palatals, dōst > dūst “friend,” dōz > dūz “sew.” Baḵtīārī ū changed further to ī before non-strident dentals, mōd > mūd > mī “hair,” zūd > zī “soon,” xūn > hīn “blood.” Long *ā tends to be quite rounded in Baḵtīārī and is raised to ō before Baḵtīārī ī/y, bādū > bāhū > bōhī “arm,” xāya > hōya “egg;” pre-nasal ā is raised to ō/ū, e.g., xāna > hōna “house,” šām > šōm “dinner,” especially in frequent suffixes, e.g., asp-ūn “horses,” and the 3rd plural suffix –šōn > –sūn. Ā is sporadically changed to a(h), šāh > sah “black,” mān > mahn “remain.”

Baḵtīārī ah, ih, uh (from preconsonantal ā, x, ft, and rr/ll) tend to be lowered to ɛ̄, ē, ō. This change, together with the change ft/xt > hd and the intervocalic loss of d, results in characteristic contracted verb forms, rahd-um bī/rɛ̄-m bī “I had gone,” girihd-um/girē-m “I took,” suhd-um/sō-m “I burnt.” Hiatus is avoided by the insertion of n before: 1. forms of the substantive verb, dast-e kē-n-i “In whose hand is it?” 2. personal suffixes, dād-e-n-um “He has given to me” (dād-e 3rd sing. perf.); 3. the direct/indirect object marker a, alī-n-a “(to) Ali”; 4. the ē preceding relative clauses, tāzī-n-ē ke . . . “the hunting dog who . . . .” Vocalic verb stems insert a h-like glide before endings, bū-h-e/bū-’-e “that he be.”

Grammar. The plural has three markers: inanimate ā, human ūn and gal, animals all three. Of these, gal appears to imply the notion of collective set; e.g., māl-ā “tents, houses,” ded-ūn/dedū-yel “sisters,” gā-w-ūn/gā-h-ā “cows,” guar-gal “calves.” The specific direct/indirect object is marked by a, har dī gyāgū-n-a kušden “They killed both brothers,” daftarī-n-a qam neid “For D. there is no sorrow.” Indefiniteness is marked by ē, ya kār-ē “a task.” Topicalizer/endearment ak, yār-ak-um “my friend,” dā-k-e pīr-um “my old mother.” (Note ak after pronouns in be mun-ak ci tovūn “What strength is there to me?”) Vocative: ey and ak, dūst-ey/dūst-ak “o friend!” (Ak is to be distinguished from optional k after ā, e.g., pā-m/pā-k-um “my foot.”) Dependent nominals are connected to their head noun by i (often elided after vowel), gul-i bustūn “the rose of the fragrant garden.” Frequent prepositions: wā “with, to,” we/bi “to” (note we bā-t “with you”), wur “on, in(to),” sī “for, to,” tēy “before, to,” ze “from,” men(-i) “in,” cī “like.”

The pronouns, personal suffixes, verbal endings, and the present and past of “to be” are shown in Chart 5.

The direct/indirect object forms add (n)-a. Yō is the general referential pronoun, but “this one” when in contrast with hō “that one”. Yō/hō only occur independently, yō gul-e bustūn-e u hō šounam-es-e “This one is the rose of the fragrant garden and that one is its dew,” dāng ye-n-en “the complaints are this,” yō ke . . . “this one who. . . ” hō ce bīd “Who was that?” Ū/ī occur both independently and before nouns, ū bard “that stone,” ī piā “this man;” ī may occur before the substantive verb and relative clause, ī-n-um/in-ūn-īm “Here I am/we are!” na ī-n-e “Isn’t it this one?” The plurals of ī/ū occur rarely, ce hesāw-e ze īnūn īxōī “What reckoning do you want from these?” ūnūn kē bīd-en “Who were those people?”

The personal suffixes have the following functions: 1. possessor, dast-um “my hand” (the independent possessive is expressed by pronoun + “to be,” hama kas-emū tu-n-īm “We all are yours”); 2. direct object, bexared um/bexare-m “that he eat me,” burd es-e “He has taken it;” 3. indirect object, šou īyām tu-n-a “Tonight I come for/to you;” 4. object of prepositions, sī-t “for you,” wur-s “on it.” Note the use of the direct object function to express existence, tā zinde-t-e “As long as you are alive,” neid-et “You are not here” (compare colloquial Persian 3rd sing. nist-eš “He isn’t here”). Similarly, the direct object is used, tā tu-n-a hest “as long as you are here” (German “Solange es dich gibt”).

The verb system is typically West Iranian. In the present “to be” has non-emphatic enclitic forms, as indicated in the table above, distinguished from the emphatic forms based on hest, hed/neid-, du mō diyer hedum “I will be here two more months.” Note the frequent use of na separated from the verb, na hō-n-i “Isn’t it that one?” The regular verbal paradigm is shown (verb kun/kerd “do,” 1st sing.; traditional terms added) in Chart 6.

The aspectual, modal, and negative prefixes are as follows: non-general imperfective aspect ī, neg. n-ī</em>; present subjunctive, be/neg. na</em>; imperative, be/neg. ma. The optative suffix is ā. In addition, the 3rd sing. of the past may prefix be, be-kard “he did it.” These precede the directional-locational prefixes wā, wā-b “become,” wer, wer-ār “bring forth,” der, der-ār “bring out:” be-wer-isde “he has stood up,” n-ī-wer-isde “he was not standing (up).”

As opposed to the progressive/inchoative present, the general present expresses general habitual action, ze šūmī tā dam-a suv vazan-um zane šūr “From nightfall to morning my Vazan wanders about.” The optative expresses wishes, tu-n-a (be-)bīn-a-m “Oh, may I see you.” Stative forms are distinguished from perfect forms by adding the endings after bīd, [nišeste bī]-m “I was sitting” vs. [nišest]-um bī “I had sat down.”

The causative suffix is n/ūn, sūz-n “burn (something),” pīc-ūn “twist (something).” The intransitive past ending is ist, buhr-isd “it broke” vs. bur-īd “broke it,” xam-isd-e “it is (has) bent over.” (Pseudo-)passive is expressed by the perfect participle ending in –é + (wā-) b “become,” beste bīd-um “I was tied.” Modal verbs (all followed by the subjunctive) are: tar/tarisd “can,” ke tare z-es berūhe “Who can go away from her?;” wä/wāstī “must,” amšou wä duhdar-a bedīn bi mu “Tonight you must give your daughter to me;” xā(h)/xāst “want,” īxōm ruvum bi šahr “I want to go to the city.”

Syntax and conjunctions. 1. cūn “because;” 2. ayer/ar “if;” general condition with general present, ar kunī, xarj makun “If you make it (i.e., a loan), do not spend it;” factual condition with present indicative, ar har neidī, īfamī “If you are not an ass, you will understand,” ar bi xou ībīnum-es, makun-um z-ī xou bēyār “When I am seeing her in my dream, do not wake me up from that sleep;” pre-condition to other action with past, ar duhdar-i tu bi fulūn kasūn nadādī, duhdar-et īmīre “If you do not give your daughter to so-and-so, your daughter will die;” 3. tā, temporal clauses, tā tari “as long as you can;” 4. ki, temporal clauses, tu ki rahdī “when you went,” final clauses, muntazir bī ki jēv-i hō-n-a buwure “He was waiting for him to pick his pockets,” object clauses, dīd um ki neid “I saw that he was not there;” relative clause, har ki mandīr-i homsā-s-e, šou be šōm xouse “Whoever waits for his neighbor, will sleep without dinner,” tāzī-n-ē ke bi zūr fešnen šekāl, šekāl nīkone “The hunting dog whom they send to hunt by force will not hunt.”

Sample verses: ayer mu bāl dāšt-um/ī perīd-um//zi dīn-i parīrū/ī-daunīd-um///zi ī sīna-ispēd/yār-i Fāyiz//bi har qīmat ī-fruhd/ī-xerīd um///Persian: agar man bāl dāštam/mīparīdam//az dombāl-e parī-rū/mīdavīdam///az īn sīna-safīd/yār-e Fāyeż//be har qeymat mīforūḵt/mīḵarīdam/// “If I had wings, I would fly. I would run after the fairy-faced girl. From this white-bosomed girl, the beloved of Fāyeż, I would buy at whatever price she would sell.”