تفنگ

See also: تفنك

Persian

Borrowed most likely from Chagatai or Khorezmian Turkic and borrowed at least semantically also from Ottoman Turkish تفنك (tüfenk), cognate to Karakhanid [script needed] (tüwek) in the Dīwān Luḡāt at-Turk meaning a blowpipe propelling pebbles to kill birds, so called by onomatopoeia mimicking the sound made when it is puffed: Tüf! See Azerbaijani tüfəng for cognates. The terminus ante quem the tüfenk in the meaning of a matchlock-gun has resounded in Persian lands is the end of the Battle of Çaldıran where the Safavids incurred resounding defeat because of the Ottoman use of – then expensive – firearms to devastate the Persians as resolutely as never before because of the new Shia threat.

(Dari, formal) IPA^(key): [t̪ʰʊ.fäŋɡ]
- (Kabuli) IPA^(key): [t̪ʰʊ.fäŋɡ]
- (Hazaragi) IPA^(key): [t̪ʰu.fäŋɡ̥]


Iranian Persian	تفنگ
Dari	تفنگ
Tajik	туфанг

تفنگ • (tofang) (plural تفنگ‌ها (tofang-hâ))

Vullers, Johann August (1855) “تفنگ”, in Lexicon Persico-Latinum etymologicum cum linguis maxime cognatis Sanscrita et Zendica et Pehlevica comparatum, e lexicis persice scriptis Borhâni Qâtiu, Haft Qulzum et Bahâri agam et persico-turcico Farhangi-Shuûrî confectum, adhibitis etiam Castelli, Meninski, Richardson et aliorum operibus et auctoritate scriptorum Persicorum adauctum‎^[1] (in Latin), volume I, Gießen: J. Ricker, page 451a

A painting of Mughal Emperor Jahangir holding a تفنگ (tufáng, "gun", "rifle") after slaying a nilgai during a royal hunt.

Borrowed from Classical Persian (tufang), perhaps from Khorezmian Turkic, but more likely via Chagatai through the Mughal Empire whose rulers were initially Chagatai-speaking, and established one of the three "gunpowder empires" alongside the Ottoman Empire and Safavid Iran. The word is itself derived as an onomatopoeia mimicking the sound of blowpipes used to kill birds.

تفنگ • (tufaṅg) f (Hindi spelling तुफ़ंग)