Farsi (Persian): Certified translation & interpreting

Farsi is the official language of Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan. It is a minority language in some countries, such as Uzbekistan, Iraq, Turkey, Qatar, Pakistan and Kuwait, but does not have an official status. There are about 60-70 million Farsi native speakers in the world and about 50 million who speak Farsi as their second language. Approx. 41 million Farsi native speakers live in Iran, 15 million in Afghanistan and another 15 million in different states of central Asia, mostly in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. In the West, the language is often referred to as Persian, while the name Farsi is preferred in the Middle East.

The modern Persian language has borrowed many words from Arabic and has in turn influenced its neighbours’ languages, in particular the Iranian languages such as Kurdish, and the Turkic languages (Azerbaijani and North Indian languages such as Urdu). Even the European languages have borrowed words from Farsi.

Farsi is a member of the Indo-European language family and belongs to the Iranian linguistic subgroup. Farsi is a pluricentric language, which means that there are multiple standard variants: Parsi, Dari and Tajik, which are mainly spoken in Iran, Afghanistan and Central Asia. The specialist Farsi translator or interpreter has to know all these minute and large linguistic differences to guarantee the best possible translation or interpretation. When you entrust AP Fachübersetzungen with your translation or your interpreting project, you can rest assured that we will find the right language mediator - even for urgent projects. If you need a certified translation, we only use certified, publicly appointed and sworn translators for Farsi to guarantee the best quality and accuracy of your Farsi translation. To ensure that your Farsi interpreting project is successful, we use our best court, consecutive, liaison, conference and simultaneous interpreters. At AP Fachübersetzungen, your Farsi interpreting and translation projects are in professional hands.

Old Persian, which was spoken in the Achaemenid Empire (ca. 6th century BC - 4th century BC), developed into Middle Persian. This transition is marked by the decline of the old Persian Empire. Middle Persian had a much more developed linguistic system: written and oral forms were more similar compared to the Old Persian language. The development of Middle Persian was not officially documented until its appearance in the Sassanid Empire around the 3rd century.

In the 8^th century, Middle Persian underwent another transformation, and as a result the New Persian language came to be. The term "Parsi" changed over time into Farsi since the "P" sound does not exist in the Arabic language.

When the language developed from Middle Persian into modern Persian, its grammar became more regular and partially simplified, as some flexions and the gender were omitted. After the Arabs had conquered Persia, many words were borrowed from the Arabic language, so that today, these loan words make up more than 50% of the Persian vocabulary. There are, however, also loan words from English, French, Russian and Turkish.

Arabic does not only influence the Farsi vocabulary but also its writing. As there are sounds in Persian that the Arabic language simply does not have, the Arabic alphabet was extended by four letters, making it 32 letters in total. The writing is read and written from right to left.

Unlike in German and English for example, there are no articles in the Persian language. Farsi translators must also be careful when it comes to syntax. The German word order is quite flexible, but there are constructions in the Persian language which cannot be simply copied into the translation. The syntax in Farsi is often subject-object-predicate but due to some omissions and replacement structures it can also be object-predicate-subject, predicate-subject-object or predicate- object-subject.

All these peculiarities can often be a challenge - even for a well-trained translator and interpreter. For this reason, you should never have your documents translated into or from Farsi by an amateur or an untrained linguist. At AP Fachübersetzungen, we exclusively work together with highly competent and experienced specialist translators and interpreters to ensure the impeccable quality of our services.

Certified translations are only carried out by well-trained, publicly appointed and sworn specialist translators for Farsi to provide you with a flawless and accurate Farsi translation. To maximize the success of your interpreting project, we use our best court, consecutive, liaison, conference and simultaneous interpreters for Farsi. At AP Fachübersetzungen, your interpreting and translation projects are in the best hands.