parsi
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Detailed reference entry for the English word "parsi", 5-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Wiktionary, and usage frequency ranked against an open word-frequency list covering the top 100,000 English words. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "parsi" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "parsi" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
The verdict
“Parsi” is an uncommon English word, ranked #63,872 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #63,872
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
Dominant Wiktionary sense: A member of the larger and older of the two Zoroastrian communities of the Indian subcontinent (the other community being that of the Iranis).
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See how Parsi compares against similar English words.
Browse all word comparisons →| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | Parsi |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈpɑːsiː/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #63,872 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “Parsi” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for Parsi is 5 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈpɑːsiː/. Corpus data places it at rank #63,872 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "A member of the larger and older of the two Zoroastrian communities of the Indian subcontinent (the other community being that of the Iranis).".
No misspelling variants are generated for Parsi in our index, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: Borrowed from Gujarati પારસી (pārsī), "as the Gujaratis, from long tradition, called anyone from Iran", from Sanskrit पारसि (pārasi), पारसिक (pārasika), from Middle Persian [Term?]. The Indian term is attested many centuries prior to the arrival of the Pars… Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is Parsi, spelled P-A-R-S-I, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1A member of the larger and older of the two Zoroastrian communities of the Indian subcontinent (the other community being that of the Iranis).
Etymology
Borrowed from Gujarati પારસી (pārsī), "as the Gujaratis, from long tradition, called anyone from Iran", from Sanskrit पारसि (pārasi), पारसिक (pārasika), from Middle Persian [Term?]. The Indian term is attested many centuries prior to the arrival of the Parsis on the Indian subcontinent, and appears both for Iranians generally, as well as in the specific Iranian sense of Middle Persian parsi(k) ("of, or pertaining to, Persia proper") to refer to Sassanian kings, e.g. in the 4th-century Mahabharata. The Indian term is thus conventionally assumed to be ultimately a loanword from Middle Persian (or general Middle Iranian) parsi(k). In colonial times the term was also applied to the Portuguese, and by extension to Europeans in general. Older texts have pārasā́rya "Perso-Iranian", etc. Other Iranian ethnonyms found in the Mahabharata include Sanskrit pahlava, pahnava "Parthian(s)", sāka "(eastern) Scythian(s)", bāhlika "Bactrian(s)".
This word in other languages
Frequency rank: #63,872 in English
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “Parsi”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is P-A-R-S-I — every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈpɑːsiː/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter P in our English index: