Pahlavi

Pahlavi is a term used in several contexts in Iranian history and culture. It commonly refers to the Pahlavi dynasty, the ruling house of Iran from 1925 to 1979; the Pahlavi script, a family of writing systems used for Middle Persian and related languages during the Sassanian era; and the Pahlavi language, often called Middle Persian, the language of the Sassanian state and Zoroastrian literature.

The Pahlavi script developed in the Sassanian period (roughly the 3rd to 7th centuries CE) to write Middle Persian and other Northwestern Iranian languages. It employs a combination of Aramaic-derived letters and logograms, known as heterograms, which stand for whole words borrowed from Avestan or Persian. The script is written from right to left and is characterized by elements of ambiguity in reading due to its use of logograms. Modern scholarship reconstructs its phonology and usage from manuscript evidence.

Middle Persian, or Pahlavi, is an Iranian language in the southwestern branch of Northwestern Iranian languages. It served as the prestige language of the Sassanian empire and is the primary source for much Zoroastrian literature and administration from that era. Following the Arab conquest, Middle Persian gradually gave way to New Persian (Farsi), which became the dominant language of Iran.

The Pahlavi dynasty comprises Reza Shah Pahlavi (reigned 1925–1941) and his son Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi (reigned 1941–1979). Reza Shah established a modern Iranian state and enacted secular reforms; Mohammad Reza Shah pursued further modernization and Westernization. The monarchy was toppled in the 1979 Islamic Revolution, after which the Pahlavi dynasty went into exile. The name continues to figure in historical and cultural discussions about Iran.