Persian is an Iranian language within the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages. It is mainly spoken in Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Bahrain and also in surrounding areas; it has official-language status in the first three countries under different names.

 
The Persian language has been a medium for literary and scientific contributions to the Islamic world as well as the Western. It has had an influence on certain neighboring languages, particularly the Turkic languages of Central Asia, Caucasus, and Anatolia as well as Urdu, Hindi, Saraiki and other Indian languages. It has had a lesser influence on Arabic and other languages of Mesopotamia.