[XeTeX] [Off-topic] Persian versus Farsi

[Vafa Khalighi]

Persian, as you well know.  But now we are asked to call the country "Iran",

> and the people "Iranian", so preferred names can change.  And while it is
> most certainly not for me to say whether "Persian" or "Farsi" is the better
> name
> for the language today, if there is disagreement amongst the Iranian people
> themselves then all is not as clear-cut as it might be.
>

The name of Iran is the Modern
Persian<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Persian>derivative from
the
Proto-Iranian <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Iranian> term *Aryānā,*,
meaning "Land of the Aryans <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aryan>", first
attested in Zoroastrianism <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoroastrianism>'s
Avesta <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avesta> tradition. The term *Ērān* is
found to refer to Iran in a 3rd
century<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3rd_century>
Sassanid <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sassanid_Empire> inscription, and the
Parthian <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthian_language> inscription that
accompanies it uses the Parthian term "aryān" in reference to
*Iranians*.<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran#cite_note-MacKenzie-33>However
historically Iran has been referred to as Persia or similar (
*La Perse, Persien, Perzië, etc.*) by the Western
world<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_world>,
mainly due to the writings of Greek historians who called Iran
*Persēs*(Πέρσης), meaning land of the
Persians <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_peoples>.[1]


So Iranians from the first day called their country Eran or Iran and Greeks
and West world called it Persia. There is no disagreement between Iranians
for the English version of the language. All Iranians believe that the
language should be called Persian in English.



>
>
> What gives the people of one nation the right to tell the people of another
> nation what the latter must call the language of the former ?  The people
> from the Netherlands don't seek to tell us we must call their language
> "Nederlands"; they know that we call it "Dutch", and their country
> "Holland",
> and even if both of these are indefensible in terms of logic, it is simply
> the *status quo*.
>
>
>
The same right that allowed British conspiracies in Iran for the past 200
years.


[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran
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