Talk:Vizier

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Comment[edit]

The Kingdom of the Hejaz was "merged" into Saudi Arabia????? WTF???? The Hejaz was conquered by the Wahhabis. The King of what one might say was the only legitimate Hashemite Kingdom was dethroned and sent into exile on Cyprus. Thousands of people were slaughtered. It was one of the worst British betrayals in the history of the 20th century. Why is the material about advisors to the Hunnic kings and Egyption Pharoahs here? If "Vizier" is an Arabic term, these officials would not have been called such at the time. --Jfruh 20:46, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)

  • That's why the section title says anachronistic: the use is as real and at least as relevant as in fiction, but not contemporary with the 'rela historical' viziers. Fastifex 12:26, 14 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Is this script in the intro (وزير) Arabic or Persian? DragonRouge 16:28, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

So, no one knows, or no one wants to say? Because what is the point of having the script there if we don't know what language it is? I'm going to remove it, and if and when someone deigns to tell us what language it is, please reinsert. Thank you. DragonRouge 15:04, 25 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

وزير is an Arabic term[edit]

It comes from the root word وزر. It's not a Persian term...in fact, I think the change from Wazir to Vizier was basically due to the fact that the Persian language doesn't have an equivalent to the sound the letter "و" in Arabic, so they spelled it with a V. 195.229.241.182

Well, good luck in telling this to the "Persians" of Wikipedia. For them anything Middle-Eastern must be Persian, no matter what. -Ur

yes. but even 1001 more "good luck" to you if you can find a single important thing (in the sense of encyclopedia!) in the middle east which is not persian.--خنیاگر (talk) 05:08, 3 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I think there's another etymology which I believe to be more convenient. The word Wazir (when considering it to be of Arabic origin, with respect to the Persian theory) is the 'exaggeration form' (صيغة المبالغة) derived from the agent noun (إسم فاعل) waazir (وازر) of the verb wazara وزر the meaning of which is to bear a burden (usually on behalf of someone who cannot). On another note, and while the cultural effect that Persian civilization had and continues to have on the Middle East is unassailable, I do think it's quite arrogant and imperious for one to dismiss that other cultures have had their share of contribution, or to diminish the importance thereof. SufianBak (talk) 03:45, 19 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]
خنیاگر, thanks for proving my point.-Ur 71.103.1.201 (talk) 22:29, 16 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Just joining the discussion here: I notice someone had added to the silliness and called it a "muslim" rank. vizier is anon-religious political term that pre-dates islam by centuries. It is definitely Persian - so what if it is used in the Quran? That does not make it arabic, it simply means it's a borrowed word.Zenbb (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 20:28, 28 July 2011 (UTC).[reply]
Total nonsense. The Middle Persian origin of the word - vecir - is given in many scholarly sources, including Richard Nelson Frye's "Persia: Until the Islamic conquest" (Zürich, 1963). And of course Persian has the letter "و" ... what Persian lacks is the letter "v" ... that's why the original Persian "و" is either transliterated as a "v" or as a "w" into Latin script. Tājik 15:57, 21 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I think most likely origin of this word is "vecir" of Persian. It is related to the word "vicar(ious)" of indo-european languages, meaning "in place of." The Arabic wazara (to carry burden and responsibility) also makes sense. Certainly nobody can 100% know for sure. That is why I am just irritated by what I see in wikipedia regarding the ultra-nationalistic, self-assured, unquestioning attitude of some Persians owning everything Middle-Eastern. This is a very unscholarly and abject behavior for me. I care about the truth and am ready to recognize it when presented. -Ur

Am I blind? Or are those two spellings (Persian and Arabic) completely identical? If the words look exactly the same, why the hell are they listed separately? That would be like having a wikipedia page that says "British English: [...], American English: [...]" in cases OTHER than regional differences! That just doesn't make sense! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.54.130.227 (talk) 06:55, 1 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It is an Arabic word and it should be listed in Wikipedia as an Arabic word it come from the Semitic root W-R-Z. That is good enough for anyone to admit it is an Arabic word, it make much more sense than Vicir which means legal document. WZR means support and the Wazier is job was to backup the King. I blame the French for translating 1001 nights the first from Persian instead of Arabic.Isa123456789 (talk) 09:53, 17 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

With the above rational even "telephone" is a Arabic word because they have the root "LFN" as alfana yolfeno! Anooshahpour (talk) 22:17, 4 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

recent edit[edit]

I have tried to clean up the "etymology" section. Tājik (talk) 10:34, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

adding persian in the top[edit]

in the top the word is given in arabic. however it is explained that the word is persian. shouldn't we change (Arabic: وزير to (Persian/Arabic: وزير)? the reason is that the word still exists in today persian. although the article gives a good summary of etymology of the word, but i think it is important to get the top right. i will wait a bit and if there is no reasoning given by others that why we should keep that as it is now, i will make my change.--خنیاگر (talk) 16:51, 3 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I suggest that Arabic be included. The Turkish word vazir sounds more like Arabic wazir than "vichir" or "vicira". I don't think the Arabic word wazir comes from the Persian word. First of all, there are many non-loan words that are common to many languages: vast in English, wasi'a in Arabic; crime in English, jurum in Arabic to name a few. This indicates some sort of proto-language. In such cases, it is misleading to say it is from one language or the other. We simply don't know. Furthermore, in the case of vazier, the word wazir (or its root WaZaRa) is of typical Semitic construction with three root letters. Therefore, I suggest we include Arabic alongside Persian at the beginning and remove the claim under the Etymology section that Arabic wazara is from Persian. Thanks.-Ur —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.103.1.201 (talk) 22:25, 16 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

neutrality[edit]

There is an imbalance here, The article contains a large mistakes and I will explain this: First, we must realize that the word Vizier means a high official in certain "Muslim countries and caliphates" so we are not talking about "vicir" Which is something else entirely. Secondly, the Word appeared in the era of the Umayyad and also in the Quran (Goyṭayn, Šelomo D.. Studies in Islamic history and institutions. P.171) --Rondiar99 (talk) 17:50, 21 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Etymology[edit]

In the Etymology section it is clearly mentioned, with references, that this word comes from Persian وزیر. So what is the point of having "Arabic: وزیر"?! If it is not Persian, kindly change the whole Etymology section and then include (Arabic: وزیر) at the top. Is this whole Persian/Arabic thing related to some kind of middle-eastern racism issue?! 115.133.209.99 (talk) 20:31, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Please visit Talk:Vicar Etymology section to discuss whether the claim that vicar and vizier are etymologically related should be removed from three articles: Vicar, Vizier and Vicarious. Falamingotoo (talk) 11:55, 11 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Both the Arabic and the Persian etymologies are not straightforward and therefore a bit fishy. The Arabic verb wazara definitely means only "to bear (a burden)", not "to help". Therefore, a wazīr is not a "helper" literally, although a servant who carries burdens for his master is indeed a kind of helper and therefore the semantic development is plausible. However, the literal meaning is "bearer, porter". The Arabic verb for "to help" is really ʾāzara. The problem on the Iranian side is that the attested meaning in Middle Persian is something like "legal document, decision, judgment, decree, mandate, command, fatwa", not a person. (Even Avestan vīcira- means "deciding" at best, not "decider", and the Armenian word včiṙ – a loan from Iranian – also refers only to an object, not a person.) The development to "minister" implies a sort of metonymy. Perhaps the term was indeed loaned into Arabic and changed both meaning and form somewhat due to folk etymology. So it's hard to tell what the real origin of wazīr is. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 00:28, 21 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
“it's hard to tell what the real origin of wazīr is “
Indeed it is. That is, if one tries to understand the word from today's state of a language.
Let us see:
People some 10 thousand years ago sitting around the fire. One says “I need a word to express a legal document, decision, judgement, decree. Anyone with any idea?”
“I know!” says another one “vergessen!” “That sounds silly” murmurs a deep voice. “Forget that!” says another bloke. They sit for awhile, sipping on their tea then one says “vizier...” They all look at him then: “I reckon wazara is better” says the second one. “All right, wazara it is!” closes the argument the first one.
It was like this, wasn't it that the word came about?
Maybe – just maybe – not.
Quite obviously, in the beginning we made sounds. These then formed into single syllable words.

Our ancestors – say some 50 to 100 thousand years ago – were part of nature. Unlike we are today. Observation was key to survival. Observation and the ability to connect seemingly unconnected observations. That is how we started developing tools. (MAN – from Latin manus – means hand. The hand that makes things: manu-facturing) Today this is called 'empirical science'.

This drive to connect observations drove the language formation too. We started connecting the single syllable words to specify the meaning on a better way. Today we call these languages 'agglutinative'. Agglutinative means 'gluing'. The language sticks or glues several words together to create a precise meaning.

Looking at WAZARA one can see two syllables. There are two words glued together: WAZ-ARA. Do any of these mean anything in Persian or Arabic? If not, then they are not coming from these languages. But then where from?
Cutting the long story short, from Sumerian *.

WAZ comes from BIZ meaning WATER; Source: Deimel 214
ARA from ARU meaning GIVING DIRECTION; Source: Deimel .206.11
Source: Prof Anton Deimel, Sumerisches Lexicon II Volstandige Ideogramm-Sammlung, Rome

It needs to be understood how sounds changed during the millenniums: BIZ → VIZ → WAZ.
BIZ-ARA → WIZARA → VIZAR → VIZIR → VEZIR and so on.

Why water you ask? One needs to think with their head. Water was associated with travelling. Going somewhere. Going anywhere HAD to be near water, possibly on water. The water flowing in a river also gives direction. Hence the water LEADS somewhere. It TAKES you somewhere.

The final meaning of the word is something like 'taking in a direction' 'giving a direction' 'leading' or perhaps 'leadership' but it also fits 'help' and all other meanings attached in above entry. Also see 'grand vizier': great leader.

Also need to remember, a word's meaning do change during thousands of years. It sometimes broadens, sometimes contracts. Also, when another language takes it, the meaning can and often does change dramatically. Also pronunciation changes. This word changed very little.

For interest, how people think, how the word and meaning changes between languages: VIZ means water, VIS means carries, VES means takes or buys. Also, VIZ → PIZ → PIS → PISS → PISA → urinating, that is passing water; Pisa, the town is a town on WATER. The ground water is very high.
Also there are examples how ARU → AR → IR is used today in the meaning of leadership, giving direction but this is not a thesis.

* Sumerian was their Akkad name. Prof Oppert 'stuck' this name on them. They called themselves 'MAHGAR' or 'KUMAHGAR'. Source: British Museum, tablet 14.014 (81-7-27, 130) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 115.70.177.64 (talk) 18:27, 27 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Caption[edit]

What does 'The "winter Diwan" of a Mughal Vizier' refer to? Clicking on the link (Diwan) is not enlightening. 134.134.139.70 (talk) 23:41, 8 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Etymology Section needs changing[edit]

I know that there is a debate about what the etymology is, or which etymology is the most commonly cited, but right now, I see "On the other hand, the presence of a Middle Persian word vizīr or vicīr (meaning "a legal document" or "decision"),[4] cognate to the Avestan vīcira, meaning "decreer" or "arbitrator", could possibly indicate an Indo-European origin.[5][6]" which is fine, but right after it is "however, it is very unlikely that the persian word vicīr has anything to do with the word vizir / wazir since the persian word vicir means a document and it's pronunciation is very different from the Arabic word wazir whic has also a semitic root shared by all the semitic languages and it directly means a helper and someone who helps carry a heavy burden and this is exactly what a vizir /wazir job is, to help the ruler or head of the state get the job done. it is obviously an Arabic and semitic word."

That is very POV, contains logical flaws, and is poorly written by all means. It is possible for us to mention some difficulties with either of the etymologies, but not like whoever wrote this did. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 136.167.246.17 (talk) 03:18, 28 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Wazir is a Pashto word[edit]

Not Arabic or Persian, even the cognate preceeder "viscer" proves it is of Avestan origin (the ancestor of Pashto) W and Z are not only found in Semitic languages but also indo-european languages like Pashto, Persian and English. Akmal94 (talk) 22:58, 8 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

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