The Emergence of the Verb "Pendâštan" in Persian Language and its Modal Functions

This article is concerned with the emergence of the verb “pendâštan” and its modal roles in Persian language. Here, the focus is on two linguistic processes, lexicalization and grammaticalization, to analyze data extracted from texts written in Old Persian, Middle Persian, and New Persian and to study changes the verb “pendâštan” has gone through in the history of Persian language. The main purpose of this article is to find the origin and function of the two forms “pendâšti” and “pendâri” both used in New Persian to indicate modality: the speaker’s attitude toward the sentence. In order to achieve this goal, we should study how these two forms function in post-Islamic Persian texts and trace the influence of Middle Persian optative construction on New Persian language. Evidence extracted from Old, Middle and New Persian texts, indicate that the Middle Persian formula “pad ēd dāšt-/ dār-”, gone through phonological reduction and three stages of lexicalization, entered New Persian lexicon in the form of “pendâšt-/ pendâr-”. In Dari Persian, “pendâštan” was known as a lexical main verb containing conceptual content while on the other hand, having lost its verbal features, was reanalyzed as a grammatical device to represent irrealis modality.