Permian Etymologies: Some Iranian Loanwords in the Udmurt And Komi Languages
DOI: 10.23951/2307-6119-2026-3-9-20
This article presents new material on the linguistic and cultural contacts between Iranian peoples and the Permians, ancestors of the modern Udmurts and Komi. The main focus is on Iranian lexical borrowings in the Udmurt and Komi languages. Although Iranian lexical borrowings in Permian (Udmurt and Komi) languages are considered well studied today, research in this area is not yet complete. The ancestors of the Udmurts and Komi maintained close contact with Iranian-speaking peoples for about two thousand years. This interaction has left significant traces in the languages and cultures of the Permians. One result of Permian-Iranian cultural and linguistic interaction was the Komi of a substantial layer of Iranian lexical borrowings in the Udmurt and Komi languages, comprising dozens of words. The author proposes about twenty new possible lexical Iranisms in the Permian languages and demonstrates that these borrowings likely originate from different Iranian languages and entered the languages of the Permian ancestors at various times and in different historical periods. Some differences in the phonetic adaptation of Iranian loanwords in the Permian languages, especially in vowel systems, can be explained by the long duration of contact between the Permian ancestors and Iranian speakers, during which certain lexical items were borrowed at different times and thus exhibited different phonetic forms and underwent different developments. Additionally, it is important to consider the possible variety of pathways through which Iranian lexical borrowings entered these languages. It should be noted that during the proto-Permian period, Permian unity was continuously evolving, passing through various stages of development. All these factors inevitably influenced the character of the borrowed vocabulary.
Keywords: Iranian languages, Finno-Ugric languages, Permian proto-language, Udmurt language, Komi languages, etymology, historical linguistics
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Issue: 3, 2026
Series of issue: Issue 3
Rubric: LINGUISTICS
Pages: 9 — 20
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