# Persian: پیکر



## Jamshed Aslam

What does the word پیکر mean? My dictionary says "figure, portrait", but somebody has translated it as "heaven" in the following line:

ز نام و نشان و گمان برترست, نگارندهٔ بر شده پیکرست

Who is above conception, name, or sign,
The Artist of the heaven's jewelry!

He has even added the word "who", even though it is not present in the Persian.


----------



## James Bates

Perhaps the translator had a different edition of the text in front of him. Take a look at this:

شاهنامه/آغاز کتاب - ویکی‌نبشته

However, both editions lack a word for "who".


----------



## colognial

I cannot detect a word that would mean 'jewelry' in the line of verse. Here's my understanding of the same line:
[The Lord] is above names, symbols, or thought.
[He is] the artisan of heavenly bodies.

The word "heavenly" is deduced from the meaning of the word برشده, 'soared', 'elevated, 'risen'.


----------



## PersoLatin

Jamshed Aslam's version is correct i.e. with پیکر, although the interpretation (The Artist of the heaven's jewelry!) suggests the translator was working on the variation here: شاهنامه/آغاز کتاب - ویکی‌نبشته



Jamshed Aslam said:


> What does the word پیکر mean?


پیکر means the physical body/figure/corpus

This is my take of what it says, literally, others can provide more poetic versions:

He is above any name, sign or ideas/thoughts/imaginations,
He is the maker/creator of (نگارندهٔ) the upstanding(بر شده) figure/body (پیکر) - 'he is the creator of our bodies'


----------



## James Bates

Thank you!
But what about the word for "who"?


----------



## PersoLatin

James Bates said:


> But what about the word for "who"?


There isn't a 'who', this verse is part of a much longer piece, so the missing 'who' is found there. It starts with:  "به نام *خداوند* جان و خرد   کزین برتر اندیشه برنگذرد"


----------



## James Bates

Oh, you mean the کہ in کزین?


----------



## PersoLatin

James Bates said:


> Oh, you mean the کہ in کزین?


No, the whole piece praises the Lord *خداوند *who....


----------



## James Bates

Okay.


----------



## Jamshed Aslam

خیلی ممنون!


----------



## Stranger_

Dehkhoda says that برشده گوهر is a metonymy for "sky".


----------



## Jamshed Aslam

بر شده پیکر means "a heavenly body". Does that mean that it is pronounced barshode-ye paykar?


----------



## soheil1

Jamshed Aslam said:


> What does the word پیکر mean? My dictionary says "figure, portrait", but somebody has translated it as "heaven" in the following line:
> 
> ز نام و نشان و گمان برترست, نگارندهٔ بر شده پیکرست
> 
> Who is above conception, name, or sign,
> The Artist of the heaven's jewelry!


OK, you can go sell your dictionary at Amazon upoon returning to your country.
There is vajehyab.com, and thefreedictionary.com, plus farsidict, aryanpour, babylon, etc.

پیکر actually refers to the body- It's common to hear The purified "پیکر" of a holly person was buried at a place in a graveyard or so, or a body, as پیکرتراشی is the job of cutting stones to form statues.



> He has even added the word "who", even though it is not present in the Persian.


He probably used who as the subject, as all verbs are in 3rd person singular.


----------



## soheil1

Jamshed Aslam said:


> بر شده پیکر means "a heavenly body". Does that mean that it is pronounced barshode-ye paykar?


No
barshode-peykar


----------



## James Bates

soheil1 said:


> OK, you can go sell your dictionary at Amazon upoon returning to your country.
> There is vajehyab.com, and thefreedictionary.com, plus farsidict, aryanpour, babylon, etc.


----------



## Jamshed Aslam

soheil1 said:


> No
> barshode-peykar



خیلی ممنون!


----------



## soheil1

Jamshed Aslam said:


> خیلی ممنون!


اصلا حرفشم نزن!


----------



## Jamshed Aslam

What does that mean? Hmm...اصلاً means "not at all". نزن means "don't hit", but in this context means "don't speak". حرفشم would be the colloquial form of حرفش بمن. I guess حرفشم نزن means "Don't talk to me about it."


----------



## Stranger_

> اصلا حرفشم نزن!


don't mention it.

The literal meaning is: don't even talk about it.

حرفشم = حرفش هم


----------



## Jamshed Aslam

Oh, so it was actually حرفش ھم نزن?


----------



## soheil1

Jamshed Aslam said:


> Oh, so it was actually حرفش ھم نزن?


=حرفش را هم نزن.
را is omitted
حرفش هم is turned into حرفشم- quite common with informal,day-to-day Persian, like بعدش هم turning into بعدشم, or تازه اش هم into تازشم.

pronounced "harfesham", "ba'desham", taazasham"


----------



## James Bates

Thank you again!


----------



## soheil1

چچوبکاریمون نکن!


----------



## Jamshed Aslam

Er, what does چچو mean? 

بکاریمون نکن is equivalent to بہ کارِ مان نکن


----------



## soheil1

sorry, چوبکاریمون


----------



## Jamshed Aslam

What does it mean though?


----------



## soheil1

Jamshed Aslam said:


> What does it mean though?


informal for چوبکاری مان نکن
short for ما را چوبکاری نکن


----------



## Jamshed Aslam

My dictionary doesn't list chubkaari. What does it mean?


----------



## soheil1

Jamshed Aslam said:


> My dictionary doesn't list chubkaari. What does it mean?


search for چوبکاری in
لغت نامه دهخدا، معین، عمید و دیکشنری | واژه یاب


----------



## Stranger_

> My dictionary doesn't list chubkaari.


Well, I think you should take soheil khan's valuable advice a bit more seriously and go sell your dictionary at the nearest time possible.


----------



## James Bates

My dictionary doesn't list it either 
My dictionary happens to be Sulayman Haim's dictionary, which is very comprehensive.
New Persian-English dictionary, complete and modern, designed to give the English meanings of over 50,000 words, terms, idioms,and proverbs in the Persian language, as well as the transliteration of the words in English characters

I wonder which one Jamshed Aslam has.


----------



## soheil1

If you search in one dictionary, you are restricted to one dictionary.

If you google, you are restricted to the results that come up, which are quite bige.

If you combine them, you habe even greater options.


----------



## PersoLatin

I wonder how & why پيكر was changed to گوهر? Maybe someone couldn't read it correctly from a very very old munuscript, or worse, they couldn't make sense of پيكر, in the verse, so changed it to گوهر, either way Jamshed's source wasn't working with the original.

ز نام و نشان و گمان برترست  نگارندهٔ بر شده *گوهر*ست


معنی چوبکاری کردن | فرهنگ فارسی معین


----------



## soheil1

PersoLatin said:


> I wonder how & why پيكر was changed to گوهر? Maybe someone couldn't read it correctly from a very very old munuscript, or worse, they couldn't make sense of پيكر, in the verse, so changed it to گوهر, either way Jamshed's source wasn't working with the original.
> 
> ز نام و نشان و گمان برترست  نگارندهٔ بر شده *گوهر*ست


some translations are interpretation-based


----------



## Alfaaz

Jamshed Aslam said:
			
		

> My dictionary doesn't list chubkaari.





			
				James Bates said:
			
		

> My dictionary doesn't list it either


 Since Jamshed Aslam SaaHib has Urdu listed as his native language and James Bates SaaHib has mentioned that he also knows Urdu (amongst multiple other languages), you might find _Feroz-ul-Lughaat Persian-Urdu_ helpful in addition to all of the other aforementioned resources...?! Here is the entry for چوبکاری.


----------



## PersoLatin

Alfaaz said:


> _Feroz-ul-Lughaat Persian-Urdu_ helpful in addition to all of the other aforementioned resources...?! Here is the entry for چوبکاری.


Although i don't fully understand the Urdu meaning given, I suspect it is the actual meaning for چوبكارى as opposed to its idiomatic meaning which soheil1 meant, for that go to the link in my post #33.


----------



## PersoLatin

soheil1 said:


> some translations are interpretation-based


Interpretation + incorrect verse (گوهر) = The Artist of the heaven's jewelry!


----------



## Jamshed Aslam

I have Steingass, and the meaning it gives for this word doesn't seem to fit!


----------



## James Bates

Steingass says this:

A comprehensive Persian-English dictionary


----------



## PersoLatin

Jamshed Aslam said:


> I have Steingass, and the meaning it gives for this word doesn't seem to fit!


Please read post #36.

This part of the thread has gone on long enough, I'm sure we agree.

چوبكارى - means: working with wood, e.g. making ornaments etc etc.

چوبكارى - in the sense used in this thread, means 'embarrassing someone by flattery'


----------



## James Bates

Thanks!


----------

