Iran (word)

See also: Name of Iran
Shapur I's inscription at the Ka'ba-ye Zartosht (c. AD 262), with Ērānšahr and Ērān highlighted.

In Modern Persian, the word Īrān (ایران) derives immediately from 3rd-century Middle Persian Ērān (𐭠𐭩𐭫𐭠𐭭), initially meaning "of the Aryans"[1] before acquiring a geographical connotation as a reference to the lands inhabited by the Aryans.[1] In both the geographic and demonymic senses, Ērān is distinguished from the antonymic Anērān, literally meaning "non-Iran" (i.e., non-Aryan).[1][2]

In the geographic sense, Ērān was also distinguished from Ērānšahr, which was the preferred endonym of the Sasanian Empire, notwithstanding the fact that it included lands that were not primarily inhabited by the various Iranic peoples.[1]

The term Iranian appears in ancient texts with diverse variations. This includes Arioi (Herodotus), Arianē (Eratosthenes apud Strabo), áreion (Eudemus of Rhodes apud Damascius), Arianoi (Diodorus Siculus) in Greek and Ari in Armenian; those, in turn, come from the Iranian forms: ariya in Old Persian, airya in Avestan, ariao in Bactrian, ary in Parthian and ēr in Middle Persian.[3]

  1. ^ a b c d MacKenzie, David Niel (1998), "Ērān, Ērānšahr", Encyclopedia Iranica, vol. 8, Costa Mesa: Mazda, p. 534.
  2. ^ Gignoux, Phillipe (1987), "Anērān", Encyclopedia Iranica, vol. 2, New York: Routledge & Kegan Paul, pp. 30–31.
  3. ^ Foundation, Encyclopaedia Iranica. "Welcome to Encyclopaedia Iranica". iranicaonline.org. Retrieved 2023-07-31.