Persian alphabet

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Persian alphabet الفبای فارسی Alefbâ-ye Fârsi
A page from a 12th century manuscript of "Kitab al-Abniya 'an Haqa'iq al-Adwiya" by Abu Mansur Muwaffaq with special Persian letters p (پ), ch (چ) and g (گ = ڭـ).
Script type	Abjad
Direction	Right-to-left script
Languages	Persian
Related scripts
Parent systems	Egyptian hieroglyphs Proto-Sinaitic Phoenician Aramaic Nabataean Arabic Persian alphabet
Child systems	Kurdo-Arabic alphabet Ottoman Turkish alphabet Shahmukhi Urdu alphabet
This article contains phonetic transcriptions in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. For the distinction between [ ], / / and ⟨ ⟩, see IPA § Brackets and transcription delimiters.

This article contains Persian text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols.

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The Persian alphabet (Persian: الفبای فارسی, romanized: Alefbâ-ye Fârsi), also known as the Perso-Arabic script, is the right-to-left alphabet used for the Persian language. It is a variation of the Arabic script with five additional letters: پ چ ژ گ (the sounds 'g', 'zh', 'ch', and 'p', respectively), in addition to the obsolete ڤ that was used for the sound /β/. This letter is no longer used in Persian, as the [β]-sound changed to [b], e.g. archaic زڤان /zaβɑn/ > زبان /zæbɒn/ 'language'.^[1][2]

It was the basis of many Arabic-based scripts used in Central and South Asia. It is used for the Iranian and Dari standard varieties of Persian; and is one of two official writing systems for the Persian language, alongside the Cyrillic-based Tajik alphabet.

The script is mostly but not exclusively right-to-left; mathematical expressions, numeric dates and numbers bearing units are embedded from left to right. The script is cursive, meaning most letters in a word connect to each other; when they are typed, contemporary word processors automatically join adjacent letter forms.