This article is about the group of Indo-European peoples. For the inhabitants of the modern country of Iran, seeEthnicities in Iran. For other uses, seeDemographics of Iran.
There have been many attempts to qualify the verbal root ofar- in Old Iranianarya-. The following are according to 1957 and later linguists:
Emmanuel Laroche (1957):ara- "to fit" ("fitting", "proper"). Old Iranianarya- being descended fromProto-Indo-Europeanar-yo-, meaning "(skillfully) assembler".[17]
Georges Dumézil (1958):ar- "to share" (as a union).
Harold Walter Bailey (1959):ar- "to beget" ("born", "nurturing").
Unlike theSanskritārya- (Aryan), the Old Iranian term has solely an ethnic meaning.[18][19] Today, the Old Iranianarya- remains in ethno-linguistic names such asIran,Alan,Ir, andIron.[20][15][21][22]
In theIranian languages, the gentilic is attested as a self-identifier included in ancient inscriptions and the literature ofAvesta.[23][a] The earliestepigraphically attested reference to the wordarya- occurs in theBistun Inscription of the 6th century BC. The inscription of Bistun (orBehistun;Old Persian:Bagastana) describes itself to have been composed inArya [language or script]. As is also the case for all other Old Iranian language usage, thearya of the inscription does not signify anything butIranian.[24]
In royal Old Persian inscriptions, the termarya- appears in three different contexts:[19][20]
As the name of the language of the Old Persian version of the inscription ofDarius I in the Bistun Inscription.
As the ethnic background of Darius the Great in inscriptions atRustam Relief and Susa (Dna, Dse) and the ethnic background ofXerxes I in the inscription from Persepolis (Xph).
As the definition of the God of Iranians,Ohrmazd, in theElamite version of the Bistun Inscription.
In the Dna and Dse, Darius and Xerxes describe themselves as "an Achaemenid, a Persian, son of a Persian, and an Aryan, of Aryan stock".[25] Although Darius the Great called his languagearya- ("Iranian"),[25] modern scholars refer to it asOld Persian[25] because it is the ancestor of the modern Persian language.[26]
Thetrilingual inscription erected by the command ofShapur I gives a more clear description. The languages used are Parthian, Middle Persian, and Greek. In Greek inscription says"ego ... tou Arianon ethnous despotes eimi", which translates to "I am the king of the kingdom (nation) of the Iranians". In Middle Persian, Shapur says"ērānšahr xwadāy hēm" and in Parthian he says"aryānšahr xwadāy ahēm".[19][27]
The Avesta clearly usesairiia- as an ethnic name (Videvdat 1;Yasht 13.143–44, etc.), where it appears in expressions such asairyāfi daiŋˊhāvō ("Iranian lands"),airyō šayanəm ("land inhabited by Iranians"), andairyanəm vaējō vaŋhuyāfi dāityayāfi ("Iranian stretch of the good Dāityā").[19] In the late part of theAvesta (Videvdat 1), one of the mentioned homelands was referred to asAiryan'əm Vaējah which approximately means "expanse of the Iranians". The homeland varied in its geographic range, the area aroundHerat (Pliny's view) and even the entire expanse of theIranian Plateau (Strabo's designation).[28]
The Old Persian and Avestan evidence is confirmed by the Greek sources.[19]Herodotus, in hisHistories, remarks about the Iranian Medes that "Medes were called anciently by all peopleArians" (7.62).[19][20] In Armenian sources, the Parthians, Medes and Persians are collectively referred to asIranians.[29]Eudemus of Rhodes (Dubitationes et Solutiones de Primis Principiis, in Platonis Parmenidem) refers to "theMagi and all those ofIranian (áreion) lineage".Diodorus Siculus (1.94.2) considers Zoroaster (Zathraustēs) as one of theArianoi.[19]
The name ofAriana is further extended to a part ofPersia and of Media, as also to theBactrians andSogdians on the north; for these speak approximately the same language, with but slight variations.
All this evidence shows that the nameArya was a collective definition, denoting peoples who were aware of belonging to the one ethnic stock, speaking a common language, and having a religious tradition that centered on the cult of Ohrmazd.[19]
The academic usage of the termIranian is distinct from the state ofIran and its various citizens (who are all Iranian by nationality), in the same way that the termGermanic peoples is distinct fromGermans. Some inhabitants of Iran are not necessarily ethnic Iranians by virtue of not being speakers of Iranian languages.[citation needed]
Iranian vs. Iranic
Some scholars such asJohn Perry prefer the termIranic as the name for the linguistic family of this category (many of which are spoken outside Iran), whileIranian for anything about the country Iran. He uses the same analogue as in differentiatingGerman fromGermanic or differentiatingTurkish andTurkic.[32] German scholar Martin Kümmel also argues for the same distinction ofIranian fromIranic.[33]
The Indo-Iranian migrations took place in two waves.[34][35] The first wave consisted of the Indo-Aryan migration through theBactria-Margiana Culture, also called "Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex," into the Levant, founding theMittani kingdom; and a migration south-eastward of the Vedic people, over the Hindu Kush into northern India.[36] The Indo-Aryans split off around 1800–1600 BC from the Iranians,[37] whereafter they were defeated and split into two groups by the Iranians,[38] who dominated the Central Eurasian steppe zone[39] and "chased [the Indo-Aryans] to the extremities of Central Eurasia."[39] One group were the Indo-Aryans who founded theMitanni kingdom in northern Syria;[40] (c. 1500 – c. 1300 BC) the other group were the Vedic people.[41]Christopher I. Beckwith suggests that theWusun, anIndo-EuropeanCaucasian people ofInner Asia inantiquity, were also of Indo-Aryan origin.[42]
The second wave is interpreted as the Iranian wave,[43] and took place in the third stage of the Indo-European migrations[36] from 800 BC onwards.
The Sintashta culture emerged from the interaction of two antecedent cultures. Its immediate predecessor in the Ural-Tobol steppe was thePoltavka culture, an offshoot of the cattle-herdingYamnaya horizon that moved east into the region between 2800 and 2600 BC. Several Sintashta towns were built over older Poltavka settlements or close to Poltavka cemeteries, and Poltavka motifs are common on Sintashta pottery. Sintashtamaterial culture also shows the influence of the lateAbashevo culture, a collection ofCorded Ware settlements in theforest steppe zone north of the Sintashta region that were also predominantlypastoralist.[48] Allentoft et al. (2015) also found closeautosomal genetic relationship between peoples ofCorded Ware culture and Sintashta culture.[49]
The earliest knownchariots have been found in Sintashta burials, and the culture is considered a strong candidate for the origin of the technology, which spread throughout theOld World and played an important role inancient warfare.[50] Sintashta settlements are also remarkable for the intensity ofcopper mining andbronzemetallurgy carried out there, which is unusual for a steppe culture.[51]
Because of the difficulty of identifying the remains of Sintashta sites beneath those of later settlements, the culture was only recently distinguished from theAndronovo culture.[45] It is now recognised as a separate entity forming part of the 'Andronovo horizon'.[44]
The Andronovo culture's approximate maximal extent, with the formative Sintashta-Petrovka culture (red), the location of the earliestspoke-wheeledchariot finds (purple), and the adjacent and overlappingAfanasevo,Srubna, andBMAC cultures (green).
The Andronovo culture is a collection of similar localBronze AgeIndo-Iranian cultures that flourished c. 1800–900 BC in westernSiberia and the westAsiatic steppe.[52] It is probably better termed an archaeological complex orarchaeological horizon. The name derives from the village of Andronovo (55°53′N55°42′E / 55.883°N 55.700°E /55.883; 55.700), where in 1914, several graves were discovered, with skeletons in crouched positions, buried with richly decorated pottery. The olderSintashta culture (2100–1800), formerly included within the Andronovo culture, is now considered separately, but regarded as its predecessor, and accepted as part of the wider Andronovo horizon. At least four sub-cultures of the Andronovo horizon have been distinguished, during which the culture expands towards the south and the east:
The geographical extent of the culture is vast and difficult to delineate exactly. On its western fringes, it overlaps with the approximately contemporaneous, but distinct,Srubna culture in theVolga-Ural interfluvial. To the east, it reaches into theMinusinsk depression, with some sites as far west as the southernUral Mountains,[54] overlapping with the area of the earlierAfanasevo culture.[55] Additional sites are scattered as far south as theKoppet Dag (Turkmenistan), thePamir (Tajikistan) and theTian Shan (Kyrgyzstan). The northern boundary vaguely corresponds to the beginning of theTaiga.[54] In the Volga basin, interaction with the Srubna culture was the most intense and prolonged, and Federovo style pottery is found as far west asVolgograd.
Most researchers associate the Andronovo horizon with earlyIndo-Iranian languages, though it may have overlapped the earlyUralic-speaking area at its northern fringe.
The archeological features of theYaz I culture are seen as the results of the intrusion of nomadic Indo-Iranians from the northern Andronovo culture and their interaction with indigenous traditions from the precedingBMAC culture.[56]
The division into an "Eastern" and a "Western" group by the early 1st millennium is visible inAvestan vs.Old Persian, the two oldest known Iranian languages.[citation needed] The Old Avestan texts known as theGathas are believed to have been composed byZoroaster, the founder ofZoroastrianism, with theYaz culture (c. 1500 BC – 1100 BC) as a candidate for the development of Eastern Iranian culture.[62]
Western Iranian peoples
Distribution of Iranic peoples during the Iron AgeAchaemenid Empire at its greatest extent under the rule ofDarius I (522–486 BC)Persepolis: Persian guards
During the 1st centuries of the 1st millennium BC, the ancient Persians established themselves in the western portion of the Iranian Plateau and appear to have interacted considerably with the Elamites andBabylonians, while theMedes also entered in contact with theAssyrians.[63] Remnants of theMedian language andOld Persian show their common Proto-Iranian roots, emphasized in Strabo and Herodotus' description of their languages as very similar to the languages spoken by the Bactrians andSogdians in the east.[28][64] Following the establishment of theAchaemenid Empire, the Persian language (referred to as "Farsi" in Persian after being changed fromParsi) spread from Pars orFars province (Persia) to various regions of the Empire, with the modern dialects of Iran, Afghanistan (also known asDari) and Central-Asia (known asTajiki) descending from Old Persian.
At first, the Western Iranian peoples in theNear East were dominated by the variousAssyrian empires. An alliance of the Medes with thePersians, and rebellingBabylonians,Scythians,Chaldeans, andCimmerians, helped the Medes to captureNineveh in 612 BC, which resulted in the eventual collapse of theNeo-Assyrian Empire by 605 BC.[65] The Medes were subsequently able to establish their Median kingdom (withEcbatana as their royal centre) beyond their original homeland and had eventually a territory stretching roughly from northeastern Iran to theHalys River inAnatolia. After the fall of the Assyrian Empire, between 616 BC and 605 BC, a unified Median state was formed, which, together withBabylonia,Lydia, andEgypt, became one of the four major powers of theancient Near East
Later on, in 550 BC,Cyrus the Great, would overthrow the leading Median rule, and conquerKingdom of Lydia and the Babylonian Empire after which he established theAchaemenid Empire (or the First Persian Empire), while his successors would dramatically extend its borders. At its greatest extent, the Achaemenid Empire would encompass swaths of territory across three continents, namely Europe, Africa and Asia, stretching from theBalkans andEastern Europe proper in the west, to theIndus Valley in the east. The largest empire ofancient history, with their base inPersis (although the main capital was located in Babylon) the Achaemenids would rule much of the known ancient world for centuries. This First Persian Empire was equally notable for its successful model of a centralised, bureaucratic administration (throughsatraps under aking) and a government working to the profit of its subjects, for building infrastructure such as apostal system androad systems and the use of anofficial language across its territories and a large professional army and civil services (inspiring similar systems in later empires),[66] and for emancipation of slaves including theJewish exiles in Babylon, and is noted in Western history as the antagonist of theGreek city states during theGreco-Persian Wars. TheMausoleum at Halicarnassus, one of theSeven Wonders of the Ancient World, was built in the empire as well.
The Greco-Persian Wars resulted in the Persians being forced to withdraw from theirEuropean territories, setting the direct further course of history ofGreece and the rest of Europe. More than a century later, a prince ofMacedon (which itself was a subject to Persia from the late 6th century BC up to theFirst Persian invasion of Greece) later known by the name ofAlexander the Great, overthrew the incumbent Persian king, by which the Achaemenid Empire was ended.
Old Persian is attested in theBehistun Inscription (c. 519 BC), recording a proclamation byDarius the Great.[67] In southwestern Iran, theAchaemenid kings usually wrote their inscriptions in trilingual form (Elamite,Babylonian andOld Persian)[68] while elsewhere other languages were used. The administrative languages were Elamite in the early period, and laterImperial Aramaic,[69] as well asGreek, making it a widely usedbureaucratic language.[70] Even though the Achaemenids had extensive contacts with the Greeks and vice versa, and had conquered many of the Greek-speaking area's both inEurope andAsia Minor during different periods of the empire, the native Old Iranian sources provide no indication of Greek linguistic evidence.[70] However, there is plenty of evidence (in addition to the accounts of Herodotus) that Greeks, apart from being deployed and employed in the core regions of the empire, also evidently lived and worked in the heartland of the Achaemenid Empire, namely Iran.[70] For example, Greeks were part of the various ethnicities that constructed Darius' palace inSusa, apart from the Greek inscriptions found nearby there, and one short Persepolis tablet written in Greek.[70]
The early inhabitants of the Achaemenid Empire appear to have adopted the religion ofZoroastrianism.[71] TheBaloch who speak a west Iranian language relate an oral tradition regarding their migration fromAleppo,Syria around the year 1000 AD, whereas linguistic evidence linksBalochi toKurmanji,Soranî,Gorani andZazaki language.[72]
Eastern Iranian peoples
TheEastern Iranic andBalto-Slavic dialect continuums inEastern Europe, the latter with proposedmaterial cultures correlating to speakers of Balto-Slavic in the Bronze Age (white).Red dots = archaic Slavic hydronymsArchaeological cultures c. 750 BC at the start of Eastern-Central Europe'sIron Age; the Proto-Scythian culture borders the Balto-Slavic cultures (Lusatian,Milograd andChernoles)Silver coin of theIndo-Scythian kingAzes II (reigned c. 35–12 BC). Buddhisttriratna symbol in the left field on the reverse
While the Iranian tribes of the south are better known through their texts and modern counterparts, the tribes which remained largely in the vast Eurasian expanse are known through the references made to them by the ancient Greeks, Persians, Chinese, and Indo-Aryans as well as by archaeological finds. TheGreek chronicler,Herodotus (5th century BC) makes references to a nomadic people, theScythians; he describes them as having dwelt in what is today southern European Russia andUkraine. He was the first to make a reference to them.Many ancientSanskrit texts from a later period make references to such tribes they were witness of pointing them towards the southeasternmost edges of Central Asia, around theHindukush range in northern Pakistan.
It is believed that these Scythians were conquered by their eastern cousins, theSarmatians, who are mentioned byStrabo as the dominant tribe which controlled the southern Russian steppe in the 1st millennium AD. These Sarmatians were also known to theRomans, who conquered the western tribes in theBalkans and sent Sarmatian conscripts, as part of Roman legions, as far west asRoman Britain. These Iranian-speaking Scythians and Sarmatians dominated large parts ofEastern Europe for a millennium, and were eventually absorbed and assimilated (e.g.Slavicisation) by theProto-Slavic population of the region.[8][9][11]
The Sarmatians differed from the Scythians in their veneration of the god of fire rather than god of nature, andwomen's prominent role in warfare, which possibly served as the inspiration for theAmazons.[73][74] At their greatest reported extent, around the 1st century AD, these tribes ranged from theVistula River to the mouth of theDanube and eastward to theVolga, bordering the shores of theBlack andCaspian Seas as well as theCaucasus to the south.[b] Their territory, which was known as Sarmatia toGreco-Roman ethnographers, corresponded to the western part of greater Scythia (mostly modernUkraine andSouthern Russia, also to a smaller extent north eastern Balkans aroundMoldova). According to authors Arrowsmith, Fellowes and Graves Hansard in their bookA Grammar of Ancient Geography published in 1832, Sarmatia had two parts,Sarmatia Europea[75] andSarmatia Asiatica[76] covering a combined area of 503,000 sq mi or 1,302,764 km2.
Throughout the 1st millennium AD, the large presence of the Sarmatians who once dominated Ukraine,Southern Russia, and swaths of theCarpathians, gradually started to diminish mainly due to assimilation and absorption by theGermanicGoths, especially from the areas near the Roman frontier, but only completely by the Proto-Slavic peoples. The abundant East Iranian-derivedtoponyms inEastern Europe proper (e.g. some of the largest rivers; theDniestr andDniepr), as well as loanwords adopted predominantly through theEastern Slavic languages and adopted aspects of Iranian culture amongst the early Slavs, are all a remnant of this. A connection betweenProto-Slavonic and Iranian languages is also furthermore proven by the earliest layer ofloanwords in the former.[77] For instance, the Proto-Slavonic words for god(*bogъ), demon(*divъ), house(*xata), axe(*toporъ) and dog(*sobaka) are ofScythian origin.[78]
The extensive contact between these Scytho-Sarmatian Iranian tribes in Eastern Europe and the (Early) Slavs included religion. After Slavic and Baltic languages diverged the Early Slavs interacted with Iranian peoples and merged elements of Iranian spirituality into their beliefs. For example, both Early Iranian and Slavic supreme gods were considered givers of wealth, unlike the supreme thunder gods in many other European religions. Also, both Slavs and Iranians had demons –- given names from similar linguistic roots, Daêva (Iranian) and Divŭ (Slavic) –- and a concept ofdualism, of good and evil.[79]
The Sarmatians of the east, based in thePontic–Caspian steppe, became theAlans, who also ventured far and wide, with a branch ending up inWestern Europe and thenNorth Africa, as they accompanied the GermanicVandals andSuebi during their migrations. The modernOssetians are believed to be the direct descendants of the Alans, as other remnants of the Alans disappeared following Germanic,Hunnic and ultimately Slavic migrations and invasions.[80]Another group of Alans allied with Goths to defeat the Romans and ultimately settled in what is now called Catalonia (Goth-Alania).[81]
Some of the Saka-Scythian tribes in Central Asia would later move further southeast and invade theIranian Plateau, large sections of present-dayAfghanistan and finally deep into present day Pakistan (seeIndo-Scythians). Another Iranian tribe related to the Saka-Scythians were theParni in Central Asia, and who later become indistinguishable from theParthians, speakers of a northwest-Iranian language. Many Iranian tribes, including theKhwarazmians,Massagetae andSogdians, were assimilated and/or displaced in Central Asia by the migrations ofTurkic tribes emanating out of Xinjiang and Siberia.[82]
The modernSarikoli in southern Xinjiang and the Ossetians of theCaucasus (mainlySouth Ossetia andNorth Ossetia) are remnants of the various Scythian-derived tribes from the vast far and wide territory they once dwelled in. The modernOssetians are the descendants of the Alano-Sarmatians,[83][84] and their claims are supported by their Northeast Iranian language, while culturally the Ossetians resemble theirNorth Caucasian neighbors, theKabardians andCircassians.[80][85] Various extinct Iranian peoples existed in the eastern Caucasus, including theAzaris, while some Iranian peoples remain in the region, including theTalysh[86] and theTats[87] found in Azerbaijan and as far north as the Russian republic ofDagestan. A remnant of the Sogdians is found in the Yaghnobi-speaking population in parts of the Zeravshan valley in Tajikistan.
Later developments
The mainmigration ofTurkic peoples occurred between the 6th and 10th centuries, when they spread across most ofCentral Asia. The Turkic peoples slowly replaced and assimilated the previous Iranian-speaking locals, turning the population of Central Asia from being largelyIranian into being primarily of East Asian descent.[88]
Starting with the reign ofOmar in 634 AD,MuslimArabs began a conquest of the Iranian Plateau. The Arabs conquered theSassanid Empire of the Persians and seized much of theByzantine Empire populated by theKurds and others. Ultimately, the various Iranian peoples, including the Persians, Pashtuns, Kurds and Balochis, converted toIslam, while theAlans converted toChristianity, thus laying the foundation for the fact that the modern-day Ossetians areChristian.[89][page needed] The Iranian peoples would later split along sectarian lines as the Persians adopted theShi'a sect. As ancient tribes and identities changed, so did the Iranian peoples, many of whom assimilated foreign cultures and peoples.[90]
Later, during the 2nd millennium AD, the Iranian peoples would play a prominent role during the age of Islamic expansion and empire.Saladin, a noted adversary of theCrusaders, was an ethnicKurd, while various empires centered in Iran (including theSafavids) re-established a modern dialect of Persian as the official language spoken throughout much of what is today Iran and theCaucasus. Iranian influence was also an principal factor in theOttoman Empire. The Ottoman Turks integrated Persian into their court, governance, and daily life. Supported by the sultans, nobility, and spiritual leaders, Persian was promoted as a second language, intertwining with Turkish and greatly influencing Ottoman cultural traditions.[91] However, a heavyTurko-Persian basis in Anatolia was set already by the predecessors of the Ottomans, namely theSultanate of Rum andAnatolian Beyliks amongst others) as well to the court of theMughal Empire. All of the major Iranian peoples reasserted their use of Iranian languages following the decline of Arab rule, but would not begin to form modernnational identities until the 19th and early 20th centuries.[citation needed]
Inspired by European and Turkishnationalist ideologies,Reza Shah Pahlavi's regime crafted an artificial narrative of Iranian history centered on Persian ethnic unity over 2,500 years.[93] This contradicted the historical reality, as previous Iranian dynasties, such as theQajars andSafavids, were ofAzeri Turkish origin, and the Persian Empire itself historically united diverse peoples through imperial administration andPersian as alingua franca rather thanethnicity.[93] This nationalistic approach extended as far as to theGulf Arab states where the Iranian migrants lived; as such, anything that happened inIran that was annoying tothese countries, the pressure was immediately put onIranians living in Bahrain,in Kuwait, or therest of the Gulf in general.[94]: 44–45 Reza Shah's policies were mainly influenced byAryanism, acolonial-eraideology linkinglanguage withethnicity.[93] This framework, which tied theIndo-European language family to an imagined migration of an Aryan nation, shaped nationalist projects inEurope andIran.[93]Aryanism conveniently justified European colonial views of Indian and Persian civilizations while influencingIranian nationalism to adopt an exclusionary identity framework.[93] Author Mehran Kokherdi [Author of "History of South Fars"] states that the termPersians is used to refer to all groups with original Parsi roots, including the inhabitants of villages scattered across Persia who still speak theirancient Parsi language. However, the termhas also come to describe the populations of major cities (e.g.Tehran,Shiraz,Isfahan) more broadly, who consist of a blend ofvarious ethnic groups, all unified by their use ofModern Persian—alanguage that incorporates elements fromArabic,Turkish,French,Russian,Mongolian, and Parsi. Based on their shared language, the people of Iran generally identify them asPersians.[95]: 3–4 This leads many scholars to believe that the term "Iranian" is more encompassing and inclusive of these various ethnic groups (Iranic people, andethnic groups in Iran).[96] It's worth noting that many groups such as theKurds, do not refer to themselves as such (Persian), despite their Iranic/Iranian roots.
Nowruz, an ancient Iranian annual festival that is still widely celebrated throughout the Iranian Plateau and beyond, inDushanbe,Tajikistan.
Iranian culture is today considered to be centered in what is called theIranian Plateau, and has its origins tracing back to theAndronovo culture of the lateBronze Age, which is associated with other cultures of theEurasian Steppe.[114][115] It was, however, later developed distinguishably from its earlier generations in the Steppe, where a large number of Iranian-speaking peoples (i.e., theScythians) continued to participate, resulting in a differentiation that is displayed inIranian mythology as the contrast betweenIran and Turan.[114]
Like other Indo-Europeans, the early Iranians practiced ritual sacrifice, had a social hierarchy consisting of warriors, clerics, and farmers, and recounted their deeds through poetic hymns and sagas.[116] Various common traits can be discerned among the Iranian peoples. For instance, the social event ofNowruz is an ancient Iranian festival that is still celebrated by nearly all of the Iranian peoples. However, due to their different environmental adaptations through migration, the Iranian peoples embrace some degrees of diversity in dialect, social system, and other aspects of culture.[1]
With numerous artistic, scientific, architectural, and philosophical achievements and numerous kingdoms and empires that bridged much of the civilized world in antiquity, the Iranian peoples were often in close contact with people from various western and eastern parts of the world.
The early Iranian peoples practiced theancient Iranian religion, which, likethat of other Indo-European peoples, embraced various male and female deities.[118] Fire was regarded as an important and highly sacred element, and alsoa deity. In ancient Iran, fire was kept with great care infire temples.[118] Various annual festivals that were mainly related to agriculture and herding were celebrated, the most important of which was the New Year (Nowruz), which is still widely celebrated.[118]Zoroastrianism, a form of the ancient Iranian religion that is still practiced by some communities,[119] was later developed and spread to nearly all of the Iranian peoples living in the Iranian Plateau. Other religions that had their origins in the Iranian world wereMithraism,Manichaeism, andMazdakism, among others. The various religions of the Iranian peoples are believed by some scholars to have been significant early philosophical influences onChristianity andJudaism.[120]
Nowadays, most Iranian people follow Islam (Sunnism, followed by Shi'ism), with minorities following Christianity, Judaism,Mandaeism, Iranian religions and various levels of irreligion.[citation needed]
Iranian languages were and, to a lesser extent, still are spoken in a wide area comprising regions around theBlack Sea, theCaucasus,Central Asia, Russia and thenorthwest of China.[121] This population was linguistically assimilated by smaller but dominant Turkic-speaking groups, while the sedentary population eventually adopted thePersian language, which began to spread within the region since the time of the Sasanian Empire.[121] The language-shift from Middle Iranian to Turkic and New Persian was predominantly the result of an "elite dominance" process.[122][123] Moreover, various Turkic-speaking ethnic groups of the Iranian Plateau are often conversant also in an Iranian language and embrace Iranian culture to the extent that the termTurko-Iranian would be applied.[124] A number of Iranian peoples were also intermixed with theSlavs,[9] and many were subjected toSlavicisation.[10][11]
The following either partially descend from or are sometimes regarded as descendants of the Iranian peoples.
Azerbaijanis: In spite of being native speakers of a Turkic language (Azerbaijani Turkic), they are believed to be primarily descended from the earlier Iranian-speakers of the region.[1][114][125][126][127] They are possibly related to the ancient Iranian tribe of theMedes, aside from the rise of the subsequentPersian andTurkic elements (changing of the native Iranian language) within their area of settlement,[128] which, prior to the spread of Turkic, was Iranian-speaking.[129] Thus, due to their historical, genetic and cultural ties to the Iranians,[130] the Azerbaijanis are often associated with the Iranian peoples. Genetic studies observed that they are also genetically related to the Iranian peoples.[131]
Turkmens: Genetic studies show that the Turkmens are characterized by the presence of local Iranian mtDNA lineages, similar to the eastern Iranian populations, but modest femaleMongoloidmtDNA components were observed in Turkmen populations with the frequencies of about 20%.[132]
Uzbeks: The unique grammatical and phonetical features of theUzbek language,[133] as well as elements within the modern Uzbek culture, reflect the older Iranian roots of the Uzbek people.[121][134][135][136] According to recent genetic genealogy testing from a University of Oxford study, the genetic admixture of the Uzbeks clusters somewhere between the Iranian peoples and the Mongols.[137] Prior to theRussian conquest of Central Asia, the local ancestors of the Turkic-speaking Uzbeks and the Persian-speaking Tajiks, both living in Central Asia, were referred to asSarts, whileUzbek andTurk were the names given to the nomadic and semi-nomadic populations of the area. Still, as of today, modern Uzbeks and Tajiks are known to their Turkic neighbors, theKazakhs and theKyrgyz, asSarts. Some Uzbek scholars also favor the Iranian origin theory.[138][page needed] However, another study, conducted in 2009, claims that Uzbeks and Central Asian Turkic peoples cluster genetically and are far from Iranian groups.[139]
Uyghurs: Contemporary scholars consider modern Uyghurs to be the descendants of, apart from the ancient Uyghurs, the IranianSaka (Scythian) tribes and other Indo-European peoples who inhabited theTarim Basin before the arrival of the Turkic tribes.[140]
TheHazaras are a Persian-speaking ethnic group native to, and primarily residing in, the mountainous region ofHazarajat, in central Afghanistan. Although the origins of the Hazara people have not been fully reconstructed, genetic analysis of the Hazara indicate partialMongol ancestry. Mongol and Turkic invaders (Turco-Mongols) mixed with the local indigenous Turkic and Iranian populations; for example,Qara'unas settled in what is now Afghanistan and mixed with the local populations. A second wave of mostlyChagatai Turco-Mongols came from Central Asia, associated with theIlkhanate and theTimurids, all of whom settled in Hazarajat and mixed with the local populations. Phenotype can vary, with some noting that certain Hazaras may resemble peoples native to the Iranian plateau.[141][142]
Croats andSerbs: Some scholars suggest that the Slavic-speaking Serbs and Croats are descended from the ancientSarmatians,[143][144] an ancient Iranian people who once settled in most of southern European Russia and the easternBalkans, and that their ethnonyms are of Iranian origin. It is proposed that the SarmatianSerboi and allegedHoroathos tribes were assimilated with the numerically superior Slavs, passing on their name. Iranian-speaking peoples did inhabit parts of the Balkans in late classical times, and would have been encountered by the Slavs. An archaeogenetic IBD study found that the Slavs make a specific and recognisable genetic cluster which "was formed by admixture of a Baltic-related group with East Germanic people andSarmatians orScythians".[145] Although previous direct linguistic, historical, or archaeological proof for such a theory is lacking.[d]
Shirazis: The Shirazi are a sub-group of theSwahili people living on theSwahili coast ofEast Africa, especially on the islands ofZanzibar,Pemba, andComoros. Local traditions about their origin claim they are descended from merchant princes fromShiraz in Iran who settled along the Swahili coast.
Population genomic PCA, showing the CIC (Central Iranian cluster) among other worldwide samples.
Recent population genomic studies found that the genetic structure of Iranian peoples formed already about 5,000 years ago and show high continuity since then, suggesting that they were largely unaffected by migration events from outside groups. Genetically speaking, Iranian peoples generally cluster closely withEuropean and otherMiddle Eastern peoples. Analyzed samples of IranianPersians,Kurds,Azeris,Lurs,Mazanderanis,Gilaks andArabs cluster tightly together, forming a single cluster known as the CIC (Central Iranian cluster). Compared with worldwide populations, Iranians (CIC) cluster in the center of the wider West-Eurasian cluster, close to Europeans, Middle Easterners, and South-Central Asians. Iranian Arabs and Azeris genetically overlap with Iranian peoples. The genetic substructure of Iranians is low and homogeneous, compared with other "1000G" populations. Europeans, and certain South Asians (specifically the Parsi minority) showed the highest affinity with Iranians, while Sub-Saharan Africans and East Asians showed the highest differentiation with Iranians.[152]
TheBMAC population largely derived from preceding localCopper Age peoples who were in turn related toNeolithic farmers from theIranian plateau and to a lesser extent earlyAnatolian farmers, as well asWest Siberian hunter-gatherers. The samples extracted from the BMAC sites did not have derived any part of their ancestry from theYamnaya people, who are associated withProto-Indo-Europeans, although some peripheral samples did already carry significant Yamnaya-likeWestern Steppe Herders ancestry, inline with the southwards expansion of Western Steppe Herders from the Sintashta and Andronovo cultures towards Southern Central Asia at c. 2100 BCE.[153]
TheYaz I culture of Margiana, Bactria and Sogdia was characterised by a combination of BMAC and Andronovo ancestries.[56] Likewise, a 2022 study also shows that the ancestry of modernTajiks andYaghnobis largely formed during the early Iron Age by a mixture between these two groups.[154]
Regueiroet al (2006)[155] and Grugniet al (2012)[156] have performed large-scale sampling of Y chromosome haplogroups of different ethnic groupswithin Iran. They found that the most common paternal haplogroups were:
J1-M267; commonly found amongSemitic-speaking people, was rarely over 10% in Iranian groups.
J2-M172: is the most common Hg in Iran (~23%); almost exclusively represented by J2a-M410 subclade (93%), the other major sub-clade being J2b-M12. Apart from Iranians, J2 is common in northern Arabs, Mediterranean and Balkan peoples (Croats, Serbs, Greeks, Bosniaks, Albanians, Italians, Macedonians, Bulgarians, Turks), in the Caucasus (Armenians, Georgians, Chechens, Ingush, northeastern Turkey, north/northwestern Iran, Kurds, Persians); whilst its frequency drops suddenly beyond Afghanistan, Pakistan and northern India.[157] In Europe, J2a is more common in southern Greece and southern Italy; whilst J2b (J2-M12) is more common in Thessaly, Macedonia and central – northern Italy. Thus J2a and its subgroups within it have a wide distribution from Italy to India, whilst J2b is mostly confined to the Balkans and Italy,[158] being rare even in Turkey. Whilst closely linked with Anatolia and the Levant; and putative agricultural expansions, the distribution of the various sub-clades of J2 likely represents a number of migrational histories which require further elucidation.[157][159]
R1a-M198: is common in Iran, more so in the east and south rather than the west and north; suggesting a migration toward the south to India then a secondary westward spread across Iran.[160] Whilst the Grongi and Regueiro studies did not define exactly which sub-clades Iranian R1a haplogrouops belong to, private genealogy tests suggest that they virtually all belong to "Eurasian" R1a-Z93.[161] Indeed, population studies of neighbouring Indian groups found that they all were in R1a-Z93.[162] This implies that R1a in Iran did not descend from "European" R1a, or vice versa. Rather, both groups are collateral, brother branches which descend from a parental group hypothesized to have initially lived somewhere between central Asia and Eastern Europe.[162]
R1b – M269: is widespread from Ireland to Iran, and is common in highland West Asian populations such as Armenians, Turks and Iranians – with an average frequency of 8.5%. Iranian R1b belongs to the L-23 subclade,[163] which is an older than the derivative subclade (R1b-M412) which is most common in western Europe.[164]
HaplogroupG and subclades: most concentrated in the Caucasus,[165] it is present in 10% of Iranians.[156]
HaplogroupE and various subclades are frequently found among Middle Easterners, Europeans, northern and eastern African populations. They are present in less than 10% of Iranians.
Two large – scale papers by Haber (2012)[166] and Di Cristofaro (2013)[167] analyzed populations from Afghanistan, where several Iranian-speaking groups are native. They found that different groups (e.g. Baluch, Hazara, Pashtun) were quite diverse, yet overall:
R1a (subclade not further analyzed) was the predominant haplogroup, especially amongst Pashtuns, the Baloch and Tajiks.
The presence of "East-Eurasian" haplogroupC3, especially in Hazaras (33–40%), in part linked to Mongol expansions into the region.
The presence of haplogroup J2, like in Iran, of 5–20%.
A relative paucity of "Indian"haplogroupH (< 10%).
A 2012 study by Grugni et al. analyzed the haplogroups of 15 different ethnic groups from Iran. They found that about 31.4% belong to J, 29.1% belong to R, 11.8% belong to G, and 9.2% belong to E. They found that Iranian ethnic groups display high haplogroup diversity, compared to other Middle Easterners. The authors concluded that the Iranian gene pool has been an important source for the Middle Eastern and Eurasian Y chromosome diversity, and the results suggest that there was already rather high Y chromosome diversity during the Neolithic period, placing Iranian populations in between Europeans, Middle Easterners and South Asians.[168]
A 2024 study by Vallini et al. stated that ancient and modern populations in the Iranian plateau have a similar genetic component to the Ancient West Eurasian lineage which stayed in the 'population hub' (WEC2). But they also display some ancestry fromBasal Eurasians andAncient East Eurasians via contact events starting in thePaleolithic.[169]
^In the Avesta theairiia- are members of the ethnic group of the Avesta-reciters themselves, in contradistinction to theanairiia-, the "non-Aryas". The word also appears four times in Old Persian: One is in theBehistun inscription, whereariya- is the name of a language or script (DB 4.89). The other three instances occur inDarius I's inscription atNaqsh-e Rustam (DNa 14–15), in Darius I's inscription at Susa (DSe 13–14), and in the inscription ofXerxes I atPersepolis (XPh 12–13). In these, the two Achaemenid dynasts describe themselves aspārsa pārsahyā puça ariya ariyaciça "a Persian, son of a Persian, an Ariya, of Ariya origin." "The phrase withciça, "origin, descendance", assures that it [i.e.ariya] is an ethnic name wider in meaning thanpārsa and not a simple adjectival epithet".[23]
^Harmatta 1992, p. 348: "From the first millennium b.c., we have abundant historical, archaeological and linguistic sources for the location of the territory inhabited by the Iranian peoples. In this period the territory of the northern Iranians, they being equestrian nomads, extended over the whole zone of the steppes and the wooded steppes and even the semi-deserts from the Great Hungarian Plain to the Ordos in northern China."
^abBrzezinski, Richard; Mielczarek, Mariusz (2002).The Sarmatians, 600 BC-AD 450. Osprey Publishing. p. 39.(...) Indeed, it is now accepted that the Sarmatians merged in with pre-Slavic populations.
^abcAdams, Douglas Q. (1997).Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture. Taylor & Francis. p. 523.(...) In their Ukrainian and Polish homeland the Slavs were intermixed and at times overlain by Germanic speakers (the Goths) and by Iranian speakers (Scythians, Sarmatians, Alans) in a shifting array of tribal and national configurations.
^abAtkinson, Dorothy; Dallin, Alexander; Lapidus, Gail Warshofsky, eds. (1977).Women in Russia. Stanford University Press. p. 3.ISBN978-0-8047-0910-1.(...) Ancient accounts link the Amazons with the Scythians and the Sarmatians, who successively dominated the south of Russia for a millennium extending back to the seventh century B.C. The descendants of these peoples were absorbed by the Slavs who came to be known as Russians.
^abcSlovene Studies. Vol. 9–11. Society for Slovene Studies. 1987. p. 36.(...) For example, the ancient Scythians, Sarmatians (amongst others) and many other attested but now extinct peoples were assimilated in the course of history by Proto-Slavs.
^Roy, Olivier (2007).The New Central Asia: Geopolitics and the Birth of Nations. I.B. Tauris. p. 6.ISBN978-1-84511-552-4.The mass of the Oghuz who crossed the Amu Darya towards the west left the Iranian Plateau, which remained Persian and established themselves more to the west, in Anatolia. Here they divided into Ottomans, who were Sunni and settled, and Turkmens, who were nomads and in part Shiite (or, rather, Alevi). The latter were to keep the name 'Turkmen' for a long time: from the thirteenth century onwards they 'Turkised' the Iranian populations of Azerbaijan (who spoke west Iranian languages such as Tat, which is still found in residual forms), thus creating a new identity based on Shiism and the use of Turkish. These are the people today known as Azeris.
^Frye 2005, p. xi: "Iran means all lands and people where Iranian languages were and are spoken, and where in the past, multi-faceted Iranian cultures existed."
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^Laroche. 1957.Proto-Iranian*arya- descends fromProto-Indo-European (PIE)*ar-yo-, ayo-adjective to a root*ar "to assemble skillfully", present in Greekharma "chariot", Greekaristos, (as in "aristocracy"), Latinars "art", etc.
^G. Gnoli, "Iranian Identity as a Historical Problem: the Beginnings of a National Awareness under the Achaemenians", in The East and the Meaning of History. International Conference (23–27 November 1992), Roma, 1994, pp. 147–67.
^Dalby, Andrew (2004), Dictionary of Languages, Bloomsbury,ISBN0-7475-7683-1
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^cf.Gershevitch, Ilya (1968). "Old Iranian Literature".Handbuch der Orientalistik, Literatur I. Leiden: Brill. pp. 1–31., p. 2.
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^MacKenzie D.N. Corpus inscriptionum Iranicarum Part. 2., inscription of the Seleucid and Parthian periods of Eastern Iran and Central Asia. Vol. 2. Parthian, London, P. Lund, Humphries 1976–2001
^R.W. Thomson. History of Armenians by Moses Khorenat’si. Harvard University Press, 1978. Pg 118, pg 166
^The "Aryan" Language, Gherardo Gnoli, Instituto Italiano per l'Africa e l'Oriente, Roma, 2002
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^Perry 1998, p. 517: ""Iranian" is still the more commonly used term; I prefer "Iranic," as being more consistent with analogous categories such as "Turkic" and "Germanic" and unambiguous with "Iranian" in the sense "pertaining to the country or state of Iran": cf. Indic/Indian, Italic/Italian"
^Kümmel 2018, p. 3: "Iranic for Iranian[:] To avoid confusion with terms related to the country or territory of Iran (especially in recent geneticist papers speaking of prehistoric "Iranian" populations almost certainly not "Iranian" in the linguistic sense)"
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^The Sarmatians: 600 BC-AD 450 (Men-at-Arms) by Richard Brzezinski and Gerry Embleton, 19 August 2002
^James Minahan, "One Europe, Many Nations", Published by Greenwood Publishing Group, 2000. pg 518: "The Ossetians, calling themselves Iristi and their homeland Iryston are the most northerly Iranian people. ... They are descended from a division of Sarmatians, the Alans who were pushed out of the Terek River lowlands and in the Caucasus foothills by invading Huns in the 4th century CE.
^"Ossetians".Encarta. Microsoft Corporation. 2008.
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^Inan, Murat Umut (2019). "Imperial Ambitions, Mystical Aspirations: Persian Learning in the Ottoman World". In Green, Nile (ed.).The Persianate World: The Frontiers of a Eurasian Lingua Franca. University of California Press. pp. 88–89.As the Ottoman Turks learned Persian, the language and the culture it carried seeped not only into their court and imperial institutions but also into their vernacular language and culture. The appropriation of Persian, both as a second language and as a language to be steeped together with Turkish, was encouraged notably by the sultans, the ruling class, and leading members of the mystical communities.
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^Gordon, Raymond G. Jr. (2005)."Report for Iranian languages".Ethnologue: Languages of the World (Fifteenth ed.).Archived from the original on 1 October 2012. Retrieved22 December 2005.
^Taherkhani, Neda; Ourang, Muhammed (2013)."A Study of Derivational Morphemes in Lari & Tati as Two Endangered Iranian Languages: An Analytical Contrastive Examination with Persian"(PDF).Journal of American Science.ISSN1545-1003.Lari is of the SW branch of Middle Iranian languages, Pahlavi, in the Middle period of Persian Language Evolution and consists of nine dialects, which are prominently different in pronunciation (Geravand, 2010). Being a branch of Pahlavi language, Lari has several common features with it as its mother language. The ergative structure (the difference between the conjugation of transitive and intransitive verbs) existing in Lari can be mentioned as such an example. The speech community of this language includes Fars province, Hormozgan province and some of the Arabic-speaking countries like the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Oman (Khonji, 2010, p. 15).
^"Larestani".UNESCO WAL.Archived from the original on 19 November 2024. Retrieved10 December 2020.
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^The World Factbook (Online ed.). Langley, Virginia: USCentral Intelligence Agency. 2015.ISSN1553-8133. Archived fromthe original on 6 January 2019. Retrieved2 August 2015. A rough estimate in this edition gives populations of 14.3 million in Turkey, 8.2 million in Iran, about 5.6 to 7.4 million in Iraq, and less than 2 million in Syria, which adds up to approximately 28–30 million Kurds in Kurdistan or in adjacent regions. The CIA estimates are as of August 2015[update] – Turkey: Kurdish 18%, of 81.6 million; Iran: Kurd 10%, of 81.82 million; Iraq: Kurdish 15–20%, of 37.01 million, Syria: Kurds, Armenians, and other 9.7%, of 17.01 million.
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^Kleiss, Wolfram (20 April 2012)."KANGAVAR – Encyclopaedia Iranica".Encyclopædia Iranica. Vol. XV. pp. 496–497.Archived from the original on 11 September 2018. Retrieved11 September 2018.
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^Raun, A. (1969).Basic course in Uzbek. Bloomington.
^Minorsky, V. "Azerbaijan". In Bearman, P.; Bianquis, Th.; Bosworth, C.E.; Donzel, E. van; Heinrichs, W.P. (eds.).Encyclopaedia of Islam. Brill.
^Roy, Olivier (2007).The new Central Asia. I.B. Tauris. p. 6.ISBN978-1-84511-552-4. Retrieved28 May 2020.The mass of the Oghuz who crossed the Amu Darya towards the west left the Iranian Plateau, which remained Persian, and established themselves more to the west, in Anatolia. Here they divided into Ottomans, who were Sunni and settled, and Turkmens, who were nomads and in part Shiite (or, rather, Alevi). The latter were to keep the name 'Turkmen' for a long time: from the 13th century onwards they 'Turkised' the Iranian populations of Azerbaijan (who spoke west Iranian languages such as Tat, which is still found in residual forms), thus creating a new identity based on Shiism and the use of Turkish. These are the people today known as Azeris.
^Gabain, A. von (1945).Özbekische Grammatik. Leipzig and Vienna.
^Bečka, J. "Tajik Literature from the 16th Century to the Present". In Rypka, J. (ed.).History of Iranian Literature. pp. 520–605.
^Jung, A. (1983).Quellen der klassischen Musiktradition Mittelasiens: Die usbekisch-tadshikischen maqom-Zyklen und ihre Beziehung zu anderen regionalen maqam-Traditionen im Vorderen and Mittleren Orient (PhD). Berlin.
^Levin, T. (1984).The Music and Tradition of the Bukharan Shashmaqam in Soviet Uzbekistan (PhD). Princeton.OCLC24081562.
^Millward, James A.; Perdue, Peter C. (2004). "Chapter 2: Political and Cultural History of the Xinjiang Region through the Late Nineteenth Century". In Starr, S. Frederick (ed.).Xinjiang: China's Muslim Borderland. M.E. Sharpe. pp. 40–41.ISBN978-0-7656-1318-9.
^B. Campbell, Disappearing people? Indigenous groups and ethnic minorities in South and Central Asia in: Barbara Brower, Barbara Rose Johnston (Ed.) International Mountain Society, California, 2007
^Kieffer, Charles M. "HAZĀRA" [iv. Hazāragi dialect]. Encyclopædia Iranica. Retrieved 22 August 2017.
^Milanović, Miodrag (2008).Srpski stari vek. Beograd. p. 81.
^Mehrjoo, Zohreh; Fattahi, Zohreh; Beheshtian, Maryam; Mohseni, Marzieh; Poustchi, Hossein; Ardalani, Fariba; Jalalvand, Khadijeh; Arzhangi, Sanaz; Mohammadi, Zahra; Khoshbakht, Shahrouz; Najafi, Farid (24 September 2019)."Distinct genetic variation and heterogeneity of the Iranian population".PLOS Genetics.15 (9): e1008385.doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.1008385.ISSN1553-7404.PMC6759149.PMID31550250.Seven groups (Iranian Arabs, Azeris, Gilaks, Kurds, Mazanderanis, Lurs and Persians) strongly overlapped in their overall autosomal diversity in an MDS analysis (Fig 1B), suggesting the existence of a Central Iranian Cluster (CIC), notably also including Iranian Arabs and Azeris. On a global scale (Fig 2 including "Old World" populations only; see S2 Fig for all 1000G populations), CIC Iranians closely clustered with Europeans, while Iranian Turkmen showed similar yet distinct degrees of admixture compared to other South Asians. A local comparison corroborated the distinct genetic diversity of CIC Iranians relative to other geographically close populations [2, 6, 44] (Fig 3 and S3 Fig). Still, genetic substructure was much smaller among Iranian groups than in relation to any of the 1000G populations, supporting the view that the CIC groups form a distinct genetic entity, despite internal heterogeneity. European (FST~0.0105–0.0294), South Asians (FST~0.0141–0.0338), but also some Latin American populations (Puerto Ricans: FST~0.0153–0.0228; Colombians: FST~0.0170–0.0261) were closest to Iranians, whereas Sub-Saharan Africans and admixed Afro-Americans (FST~0.0764–0.1424) as well as East Asians (FST ~ 0.0645–0.1055) showed large degrees of differentiation with Iranians.
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