PAHLAVI, PEHLVI. The name applied to the ancient Persian language in that phase which prevailed from the beginning of the Sassanian monarchy to the time when it became corrupted by the influence of Arabic, and the adoption of numerous Arabic words and phrases. The name Pahlavi was adopted by Europeans from the Parsi use. The language of Western Persia in the time of the Achaemenian kings, as preserved in the cuneiform inscriptions of Persepolis, Behistun, and elsewhere, is nearly akin to the dialects of the [Zend-Avesta], and is characterised by a number of inflections agreeing with those of the Avesta and of Sanskrit. The dissolution of inflectional terminations is already indicated as beginning in the later Achaemenian inscriptions, and in many parts of the Zend-Avesta, but its course cannot be traced, as there are no inscriptions in Persian language during the time of the Arsacidae; and it is in the inscriptions on rocks and coins of Ardakhshīr-i-Pāpaḳān (A.D. 226-240)—the Ardashīr Babagān of later Persian—that the language emerges in a form of that which is known as Pahlavi. "But, strictly speaking, the medieval Persian language is called Pahlavi when it is written in one of the characters used before the invention of the modern Persian alphabet, and in the peculiarly enigmatical mode adopted in Pahlavi writings.... Like the Assyrians of old, the Persians of Parthian times appear to have borrowed their writing from a foreign race. But, whereas the Semitic Assyrians adopted a Turanian syllabary, these later Aryan Persians accepted a Semitic alphabet. Besides the alphabet, however, which they could use for spelling their own words, they transferred a certain number of complete Semitic words to their writings as representatives of the corresponding words in their own language.... The use of such Semitic words, scattered about in Persian sentences, gives Pahlavi the motley appearance of a compound language.... But there are good reasons for supposing that the language was never spoken as it was written. The spoken language appears to have been pure Persian; the Semitic words being merely used as written representatives, or logograms, of the Persian words which were spoken. Thus, the Persians would write malkân malkâ, 'King of Kings,' but they would read shâhân shâh.... As the Semitic words were merely a Pahlavi mode of writing their Persian equivalents (just as 'viz.' is a mode of writing 'namely' in English[[198]]), they disappeared with the Pahlavi writing, and the Persians began at once to write all their words with their new alphabet, just as they pronounced them" (E. W. West, Introd. to Pahlavi Texts, p. xiii.; Sacred Books of the East, vol. v.).[[199]]
Extant Pahlavi writings are confined to those of the Parsis, translations from the Avesta, and others almost entirely of a religious character. Where the language is transcribed, either in the Avesta characters, or in those of the modern Persian alphabet, and freed from the singular system indicated above, it is called Pazand (see [PAZEND]); a term supposed to be derived from the language of the Avesta, paitizanti, with the meaning 're-explanation.'
Various explanations of the term Pahlavi have been suggested. It seems now generally accepted as a changed form of the Parthva of the cuneiform inscriptions, the Parthia of Greek and Roman writers. The Parthians, though not a Persian race, were rulers of Persia for five centuries, and it is probable that everything ancient, and connected with the period of their rule, came to be called by this name. It is apparently the same word that in the form pahlav and pahlavān, &c., has become the appellation of a warrior or champion in both Persian and Armenian, originally derived from that most warlike people the Parthians. (See [PULWAUN].) Whether there was any identity between the name thus used, and that of Pahlava, which is applied to a people mentioned often in Sanskrit books, is a point still unsettled.
The meaning attached to the term Pahlavi by Orientals themselves, writing in Arabic or Persian (exclusive of Parsis), appears to have been 'Old Persian' in general, without restriction to any particular period or dialect. It is thus found applied to the cuneiform inscriptions at Persepolis. (Derived from West as quoted above, and from Haug's Essays, ed. London, 1878.)
c. 930.—"Quant au mot dirafeh, en pehlvi (al-fahlviya) c'est à dire dans la langue primitive de la Perse, il signifie drapeau, pique et étendard."—Maṣ'ūdī, iii. 252.
c. A.D. 1000.—"Gayômarth, who was called Girshâh, because Gir means in Pahlavî a mountain...."—Albîrûnî, Chronology, 108.
PAILOO, s. The so-called 'triumphal arches,' or gateways, which form so prominent a feature in Chinese landscape, really monumental erections in honour of deceased persons of eminent virtue. Chin. pai, 'a tablet,' and lo, 'a stage or erection.' Mr. Fergusson has shown the construction to have been derived from India with Buddhism (see Indian and Eastern Architecture, pp. 700-702). [So the Torii of Japan seem to represent Skt. toraṇa, 'an archway' (see Chamberlain, Things Japanese, 3rd ed. 407 seq.).]
PÁLAGILÁSS, s. This is domestic Hind. for 'Asparagus' (Panjab N. & Q. ii. 189).
PALANKEEN, PALANQUIN, s. A box-litter for travelling in, with a pole projecting before and behind, which is borne on the shoulders of 4 or 6 men—4 always in Bengal, 6 sometimes in the Telugu country.
The origin of the word is not doubtful, though it is by no means clear how the Portuguese got the exact form which they have handed over to us. The nasal termination may be dismissed as a usual Portuguese addition, such as occurs in mandarin, Baçaim (Wasai), and many other words and names as used by them. The basis of all the forms is Skt. paryañka, or palyañka, 'a bed,' from which we have Hind. and Mahr. palang, 'a bed,' Hind. pālkī, 'a palankin,' [Telugu pallakī, which is perhaps the origin of the Port. word], Pali pallanko, 'a couch, bed, litter, or palankin' (Childers), and in Javanese and Malay palañgki, 'a litter or sedan' (Crawfurd).[[200]]