The evolution of the meaning of the word nurse based on the classical texts of Persian literature

The semantic evolution of a word over time is inevitable, indicating a social, political, religious or cultural process. Nurse is one of the words that has a significant presence in Persian literature texts and has been used in many different meanings such as slave, servan, maid, devotee, obedient, patient and preserver. The purpose of this study is to show its semantic evolution by using the views of linguists and reviewing literary texts.

This research is a library study, which has been done by descriptive-analytical method. By referring to some classical texts of Persian language and by studying various articles and books and searching in valid databases, Like Magiran, SID, noormags, civilica, the materials were collected and the information obtained after analysis was presented in a regular format. Search keywords include nurse, Persian literature, meaning.

In this study, the works of poets and writers of Persian literature from the fourth century to the contemporary century (more than 70 works) were examined, based on which it was determined:
Shahnameh is one of the oldest literary texts in which the word nurse can be seen with high frequency. The semantic range of this word expands from the fifth century onwards with the expansion of the field of Persian language and the greater frequency of prose and poetic works. And finds new meanings. It seems that the word nurse was rarely used in the modern sense until today before the eleventh century.

The results of this study indicate a semantic change in the nurse in the classical texts of Persian literature. This semantic change has manifested itself in periods in the form of semantic development and in periods in the form of semantic allocation. Also, based on the findings of this study, it was found that this word has changed from meaning to whole to meaning to part and from general to specific meaning.