Persian

American  

[pur-zhuhn, -shuhn] / ˈpɜr ʒən, -ʃən /

adjective

1. of or relating to ancient and recent Persia (now Iran), its people, or their language.

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noun

• Persians
  plural

1. a member of the native peoples of Iran, descended in part from the ancient Iranians.

2. a citizen of ancient Persia.

3. an Iranian language, the principal language of Iran and western Afghanistan, in its historical and modern forms.

4. Architecture. a figure of a man used as a column.

5. Persians. Persian blinds.

Persian British  

/ ˈpɜːʃən /

adjective

1. of or relating to ancient Persia or modern Iran, their inhabitants, or their languages

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noun

1. a native, citizen, or inhabitant of modern Iran; an Iranian

2. a member of an Indo-European people of West Iranian speech who established a great empire in SW Asia in the 6th century _bc

3. the language of Iran or Persia in any of its ancient or modern forms, belonging to the West Iranian branch of the Indo-European family See also Avestan Old Persian Pahlavi 2 Farsi

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• pre-Persian
  adjective
• pseudo-Persian
  adjective
• trans-Persian
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• Persians
  plural

Etymology

Origin of Persian

First recorded in 1325–75; Persi(a) + -an; replacing Middle English Persien, from Middle French; replacing Old English Persisc ( -ish ¹ )

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

Persian Persians

The art of fine carpet weaving was introduced in the Himalayan valley of Kashmir in the 15th century by Persian travellers, and received patronage during the reign of its last local king Zain-ul-Abidin Budshah.

From Barron's ● Aug. 27, 2026

Iran’s recently created agency, the Persian Gulf Strait Authority, identified 46 vessels it says violated its rules for crossing the strait and threatened them with fines, detention or seizure of their cargoes.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 25, 2026

I was surrounded by kids of all ethnicities at school, from Black to white to Persian to Vietnamese.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 21, 2026

On 15 April, police were called to the offices of Volant Media in Park Royal, the parent company of Persian news channel Iran International, after an "ignited container" was thrown towards the site.

From BBC ● Aug. 21, 2026

Through the guard’s legs, I could see a round man arise from a Persian rug.

From "The Many Assassinations of Samir, the Seller of Dreams" by Daniel Nayeri

Near the start of that period the Greeks saw the Persians, rulers of a vast empire, overreach themselves and fail in two invasions of Europe, the second time catastrophically.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 25, 2026

Persians, Parsis, Kurds, Armenians, Azerbaijanis, Tajiks, Kazakhs, Uzbeks and other cultures celebrate the festival and have their own traditions surrounding it.

From BBC ● Mar. 19, 2026

Kurds, while mostly Sunni, share cultural and linguistic affinities with Persians and have historically had less friction with the Iranian state than with fellow Kurds in Iraq and Turkey.

From Barron's ● Mar. 5, 2026

Persians, Jews, Christians, Muslims, Zoroastrians, Baha’is and those of every background were entitled to live in peace.

From Salon ● Jan. 22, 2026

By the 600s, the doctors at the school were writing about a medicine from India named sharkara or, as the Persians called it, shaker— sugar.

From "Sugar Changed the World: A Story of Magic, Spice, Slavery, Freedom, and Science" by Marc Aronson