The Pronunciation Presentation Pattern of Entries in Borhān-i Qāti’: Some Useful Implications

Among the authoritative dictionaries of Persian language, Borhān-i Qāti’ (lit. ‘Conclusive Proof’) is considered a turning point in the field of dictionary production, and  it provides attractive data for applied linguistics studies in the field of lexicography. Borhān-i Qāti’, compiled in India in the ۱۷th century by Moḥammad-Ḥosayn Khalaf Tabrīzī, is remarkable in several respects, but one of its features which does not seem to have received a proper attention, is its method of providing the pronunciation of its entries. In this reference, almost half of the entries have been given a pronunciation based on analogy, in which the entry word is echoed with a second-well known one, having the same phonotactics (distribution and arrangement of vowels and consonants), and distribution of vowels, and prosody pattern. This method was successfully practiced later on in another important but unfinished reference: Āsaf al-Loghāt (۱۹۰۶-۱۹۲۱). In This article, this pattern of presenting pronunciation is introduced and explained. Also it   provides the readers with a list of the reference words which have been used to recognize the pronunciation of the other words, and the frequency of them will also be given and analyzed. The final list of this article presents those words which were believed to be “basic” or “core” by the compiler of Borhān-i Qāti’.

کلیدواژه ها:

Borhān-i Qāti’ ، Lexicography ، Persian ، analogy ، Dictionary