Persians love obscurities
written in Calcutta in 1919, Higher Persian Grammar by Lieutenant-Colonel D.C. Phillott is a treasure trove of orientalist kitsch and that kind of dated knowledge of Persian literature and history (you know the type, using rhyming translations of Omar Khayyam poetry to illustrate adverbial usage) that makes me squeal like a teenage girl. Even the transliterations date themselves. the whole PDF is available online. here is the section on Abjad, treated as it were, like just another aspect of Grammar, literally arranged in a section between solar and lunar letters and numeral figures:
11. Abjad (a) the following meaningless words give the letters in their numerical order:- 1000,900,800,700,600,500,400,300,200,100,90,80,70,60,50,40,30,20,10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 ا بجد هوز حطي كلمن سعفص قرشت ثخذ ضظغ The use of letters as numerals is confined to mathematical works, almanacs, and chronograms. The sum of the letters in the name of a work, or of a brief sentence or verse recording an historical event, gives the year of the Hijra in which the event took place. The practice of commemorating events by chronograms is common in all Muslim countries. The system is called abjad ا بجد and hisab-i-jummal حساب جمل , the Arabic word Jummal جمل signifying "cable; addition" A letter marked with Tashdid تشديد is reckoned as a single letter. (b) Examples:- When Nadir Shah proclaimed himself sovereign of Persia, he struck coins with the Arabic inscription as a chronogram الخير في ما وقع al-khayr fi ma waqa'a "the best is in what happened" the sum of these letters = 1148 (A.H.) = A.D. 1735-6 The date of Taymurlang's death is in the dramatic words وداع شهرياري vida'-i Shahryari "farewell to Royalty" this 807 (H.) = A.D. 1404-5. A new gate to the mosque at Kazimayn was constructed by Farhad Mirza, an uncle of Nasir-d-din, Shah of Persia, in A.H. 1300 (=A.D. 1882) and an Afghan poet of Baghdad, who wrote under the Takhallus تخلص or 'nom de plume' of Shihab, immortalised (as his son says) the event in a poem, the chronogram of which, according to custom, occurs in the last, or the last two misra' مصرع (a line of verse) شهابش از پی تاریخ گفت با دل شاد بود بجانب فردوس راهت از این در "Shihab in a happy frame of mind fixes its date - "May your road to Paradise be by this gate". The sum of the letters in the second misra is 1299, but the writer says at the end of the first line "ba dil-i-shad" and these words may also be translated "with the heart of shad": now the heart of Shad is alif which = 'one' so this makes the total 1300. Persians love obscurities.
11. Abjad (a) the following meaningless words give the letters in their numerical order:- 1000,900,800,700,600,500,400,300,200,100,90,80,70,60,50,40,30,20,10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 ا بجد هوز حطي كلمن سعفص قرشت ثخذ ضظغ The use of letters as numerals is confined to mathematical works, almanacs, and chronograms. The sum of the letters in the name of a work, or of a brief sentence or verse recording an historical event, gives the year of the Hijra in which the event took place. The practice of commemorating events by chronograms is common in all Muslim countries. The system is called abjad ا بجد and hisab-i-jummal حساب جمل , the Arabic word Jummal جمل signifying "cable; addition" A letter marked with Tashdid تشديد is reckoned as a single letter. (b) Examples:- When Nadir Shah proclaimed himself sovereign of Persia, he struck coins with the Arabic inscription as a chronogram الخير في ما وقع al-khayr fi ma waqa'a "the best is in what happened" the sum of these letters = 1148 (A.H.) = A.D. 1735-6 The date of Taymurlang's death is in the dramatic words وداع شهرياري vida'-i Shahryari "farewell to Royalty" this 807 (H.) = A.D. 1404-5. A new gate to the mosque at Kazimayn was constructed by Farhad Mirza, an uncle of Nasir-d-din, Shah of Persia, in A.H. 1300 (=A.D. 1882) and an Afghan poet of Baghdad, who wrote under the Takhallus تخلص or 'nom de plume' of Shihab, immortalised (as his son says) the event in a poem, the chronogram of which, according to custom, occurs in the last, or the last two misra' مصرع (a line of verse) شهابش از پی تاریخ گفت با دل شاد بود بجانب فردوس راهت از این در "Shihab in a happy frame of mind fixes its date - "May your road to Paradise be by this gate". The sum of the letters in the second misra is 1299, but the writer says at the end of the first line "ba dil-i-shad" and these words may also be translated "with the heart of shad": now the heart of Shad is alif which = 'one' so this makes the total 1300. Persians love obscurities.
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