Persian grammar

Every grammar guide of Lingora’s Persian A1 course, with examples you can listen to.

01Personal PronounsPersian has six personal pronouns, and they are refreshingly simple: they do not change their form for anything. There is no separate word for "me" as…
02Expressing 'to be'The verb "to be" is the most common verb in Persian, and it is irregular in the present tense - as it is in most languages. Its forms have to be learned…
03The Enclitic CopulaAlongside the full forms ⁧⁧هَستَم⁩⁩ (hastam) and ⁧⁧اَست⁩⁩ (ast), Persian has a shorter "to be" that does not stand as a word at all. It is glued onto the…
04Negation with نیستPersian negates most verbs with a prefix. "To be" is the exception: its negative in the present tense is a separate word, ⁧⁧نیست⁩⁩ (nist), which replaces…
05Existence with وُجود داشتَنTo say that something exists - English "there is" and "there are" - Persian has two ways, and neither of them resembles the English construction.
06The EzafeIf you learn one thing about Persian grammar, learn this. The ezafe is a tiny unstressed vowel, an -e, added to the end of a word to link it to whatever…
07The Object Marker راPersian marks a definite direct object with the little word ⁧⁧را⁩⁩ (râ), placed after it. There is nothing quite like it in English, and getting a feel…
08Nouns: Plural with هاPersian nouns have no gender, take no article, and change their form for almost nothing. The one ending they do take regularly is the plural ⁧ها⁩ (-hâ).
09Plurals in ان and from Arabic⁧ها⁩ (-hâ) will pluralise any Persian noun, and a beginner can lean on it entirely. But two other plurals turn up constantly in writing, and they are…
10The Indefinite یPersian has no word for "the" and no word that must be used for "a". A bare noun stands for the definite thing, or for the whole class of things,…
11Possessive EncliticsPersian shows possession in two ways. One is the ezafe - ⁧⁧کِتابِ مَن⁩⁩ (ketâb-e man), "book of me". The other is shorter: a small ending glued straight…
12Demonstratives این and آنPersian has two demonstratives, and they are as simple as words get: they never change their form, and they always come before the noun.
13NumbersPersian numbers are regular and, once the first dozen are learned, entirely predictable. What is worth attention is not the counting but what happens to…
14Ordinal NumbersOrdinals - first, second, third - are built from the plain numbers with a single ending, and they come in two shapes depending on where they stand.
15Comparison of AdjectivesPersian compares things with two endings and one preposition, and there is almost nothing else to it. No irregular chains of the "good, better, best"…
16Verbs: Present TenseThe Persian present tense is built out of three pieces, always in the same order: the prefix ⁧می‌⁩ (mi-), then the verb's present stem, then an ending…
17Verbs: Simple PastAfter the present tense, the past comes as a relief. The stem is completely regular, and the endings are the ones you already know.
18Verbs: Past ImperfectivePersian marks the difference between something that happened once and something that used to happen, and it does it with the same ⁧می‌⁩ (mi-) that builds…
19Verbs: Perfect TenseThe perfect is for something finished whose result still matters - "I have seen", "she has gone". Persian builds it out of two familiar pieces.
20Verbs: Subjunctive MoodEnglish has almost lost its subjunctive; Persian uses one constantly. Any time a second verb depends on a first - wanting, being able, having to, in…
21Verbs: Imperative MoodCommands, requests and invitations all use the imperative, and it is built from the same present stem as everything else in the present system.
22Verb NegationPersian negates a verb with a single prefix. There is no equivalent of the English "do" - nothing is added to the sentence, and nothing moves.
23Progressive with دَر حالِPersian's plain present already covers "I am eating" as well as "I eat". When a speaker wants to insist that something is going on at this very moment,…
24Progressive with داشتَنThe second Persian progressive is the one people actually say. It puts ⁧⁧داشتَن⁩⁩ (dâštan), "to have", in front of an ordinary present tense, and it…
25Compound VerbsPersian has surprisingly few simple verbs. Most of what English does with a single word, Persian does with two: a noun or an adjective carrying the…
26Verbs: Future TensePersian has a dedicated future tense. It belongs to writing and to careful speech; in ordinary conversation people use the present tense and let the…
27The Passive with شُدَنPersian uses the passive far less than English does, and when it does, it builds it with the verb ⁧⁧شُدَن⁩⁩ (šodan), "to become".
28Expressing Ability with تَوانِستَن"Can" and "to be able" are ⁧⁧تَوانِستَن⁩⁩ (tavânestan). It is a full verb, conjugated like any other, and the verb that follows it goes into the…
29Obligation with بایَد⁧⁧بایَد⁩⁩ (bâyad) is Persian for "must" and "have to", and it is the simplest modal in the language, because it never changes.
30Possibility with می‌شَوَد⁧⁧می‌شَوَد⁩⁩ (mi-šavad) is the third person of ⁧⁧شُدَن⁩⁩ (šodan), "to become", frozen and used impersonally. It asks whether something is possible - and…
31Possession with داشتَن⁧⁧داشتَن⁩⁩ (dâštan) is "to have", and it behaves like an ordinary transitive verb - but with two peculiarities worth knowing early.
32Questions with آیاA Persian yes/no question looks exactly like the statement it came from. Nothing is inverted, no auxiliary appears, and no word changes place.
33Question WordsPersian question words behave unlike the English ones in a way that takes some getting used to: they do not move. They sit where the answer would sit,…
34Subordination with کِه⁧⁧کِه⁩⁩ (ke) is the workhorse of Persian sentence-building. One short word does the job of English "that", "who", "which", "where" and "when", and it…
35Conditional Sentences with اَگَرPersian conditionals turn on one distinction: whether the thing might really happen, or whether it plainly did not. The two take different tenses.
36The Many Meanings of تا⁧⁧تا⁩⁩ (tâ) is one of the smallest words in Persian and one of the hardest to pin down. It has several quite separate jobs, and only context tells them…
37PrepositionsPersian prepositions fall into two groups, and the difference between them matters as soon as you want to attach a pronoun.
38The Reflexive خُود⁧⁧خُود⁩⁩ (xod) means "self". One word covers what English spreads across six - myself, yourself, himself, herself, ourselves, themselves - and the…
39Politeness with شُماPersian, like French or German, has two ways of saying "you", and choosing between them is a social decision more than a grammatical one.
40Impersonal ConstructionsA whole family of Persian expressions has no subject at all. Where English says "I am hot", Persian says something closer to "my hot is" - the person…
41Expressing 'to like' with دوست داشتَنPersian has no single verb for "to like". The everyday way to say it is ⁧⁧دوست داشتَن⁩⁩ (dust dâštan) - literally "to have as a friend".