a-practical-kurdish-grammar

228 A PRACTICAL KURDISH GRAMMAR
Kurdish pronunciation and accept by writing it o\«-"
(sa'at). See 59, 1 and 2.) Some write vIl->-lj (rahat) 'quiet',
'comfortable', (a Turkification of the Ar. 4>-lj ), instead of
adhering more closely to Kurdish accentuation and write
w9-j (rahat).
The letter 1 is less prominent in Kurdish than in its neigh¬
boring tongues. In words employing the negative particle
\j (na), the \ is often omitted and the contraction (na)
is employed. Example : ^3^ (na-khösh) 'sick', 'unpleas¬
ant'; and in other words the I is substituted by a (ha) or
c5(e). Examples; a^jA (hiimed) 'hope', for Jl^jl
(limed); jOJ^i- (khwendin) 'to read', 'reading', for jX\y
(khwandin), etc. (See 35, 47, 4, 160 and 207.)
In short, the general rule for Kurdish orthography is to
write Kurdish words with Kurdish pronunciation and accent,
and to express the vowel sounds more frequently by the letters
o 3 I and ^^ than is usually the case in Arabic,
Turkish or Persian.
If this rule is followed out, a more uniform Kurdish ortho¬
graphy will gradually be established, and the individuality of
the Kurdish language, as to sounds and accents, will be pre¬
served. (See 8-29, and Note.)
CHAPTER XIII
MISCELLANEOUS
411. Designation of Years
Jb jl (aii sal this year
jl) (par) last year