Until the early 1900s,به(be) was almost always written joined to the next word:
باو(be u)
Instead of modern
به او(be u)
However, this is now done only for common adverbial constructions formed withبه(be), and even that not consistently. In other cases, it is always written as a separate word. When older works are republished,به(be) is often edited to be separate.
(Use with inflectional enclitics)
While in literary Persian inflectional endings are never attached to prepositions, in many spoken varieties of Persian this is not the case. In the dialect of Tehran, the prepositionبه(be) has a /h/ inserted before inflectional endings starting with a vowel, while the dialect of Mashhad has a /z/ instead. For example, while one may say "to him" asبه او(be u) (or archaicallyبدو(bed-u)) in literary Iranian Persian, in spoken dialects one would instead typically attach the inflectional endingـش(-aš,pronounced in most dialects as-eš), formingبهش(beheš) in Tehrani andبذش(bezeš) in Mashhadi. See the table below for other examples:[1][2]
English
Literary Persian
Tehran
Mashhad
"to me"
به من(be man)
بهم(beham)
بذم(bezem)
"to you" (singular)
به تو(be to)
بهت(behet)
بذت(bezet)
"to him/her"
به او(be u) بدو(bed-u)
بهش(beheš)
بذش(bezeš)
"to us"
به ما(be mâ)
بهمون(behemun)
بذمون(bezemun)
"to you" (plural)
به شما(be šomâ)
بهتون(behetun)
بذتون(bezetun)
"to them"
به ایشان(be išân) بدیشان(bed-išân)
بهشون(behešun)
بذشون(bezešun)
Note that this is not unique toبه(be), and other prepositions such asبا(bâ) andاز(az) are also inflected in many spoken varieties of Persian.
^Ela Filippone (2011), “The Language of the Qorʾān-e Qods and its Sistanic Dialectal Background”, in M. Maggi, P. Orsatti, editors,The Persian Language in History[1], Wiesbaden: Reichert, pages179-235: “Mašh.bezem,bezet,bezeš, etc. for ‘to me, to you, to him/her, etc.’ (= Prs.be man,be to,be u) have also been interpreted as frompad + suffix withz <d.”
^Miller, Corey; Livingston, Jace; Vinson, Mark; Triebwasser Prado, Thomas (2014),Persian Dialects: As Spoken in Iran[2], University of Maryland Center for Advanced Study of Language, pages89-90
FromMiddle Persian[script needed](byh/bēh/,“quince”).Thisetymology is incomplete. You can help Wiktionary by elaborating on the origins of this term.
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