Both Persian and Arabic alphabets contain the letters ta (ﻄ) and té (ﺖ) even though in spoken Persian the two letters sound identical. Yet to the Iranian hyper-nationalist the very sight of tā (Arabic) produces an allergic reaction. To this sensitivity one owes the orthographic changes which have rendered two otherwise meaningful Iranian toponyms into meaningless names. Exhibit A: Tehran; Exhibit B: Tonb.

The spelling of the toponym (place-name) Tehran until recently had been always with a t dasteh-dar (or tā) (ﻄ). During the time of Reza Shah, or perhaps slightly before him, the spelling of Tehran changed from tā to t doe noghteh (two-dotted té) (ﺖ) to give us ﺘﻬﺮﺍﻦ. Once such change in spelling is made, ones who make them find themselves in a pickle when it comes to explaining the meaning of the new-looking term. Thus we come to the explanation that Tehran is a combination of the word te (from tah, meaning “bottom, below”) and rān (taken to mean “range”), giving sense to the proposition that the place got its name because it lies down the mountain range, the range being the Alborz Mountains. See, for example, https://www.youtube.com/@OldTehran. Another theory holds that the name Tehran comes form the word teh (taken to mean “warm”), as opposed to shem (taken to mean “cool”), indicating a climatological distinction between the low-lying Tehran (warm place) and the higher elevation of Shemrān (cool place). For this explanation and other invented ones, see https://bagheketab.com/content/ID/2284 (اسم «تهران» از کجا آمده است؟).

Truth be told, neither of the foregoing explanations is attested, meaning they are made up (az khod daravardi) or menendi. See https://abadis.ir/fatofa/%D8%B7%D9%87%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86/.

We know three facts about Tehran before it was named as such. First, geographically, it was a region north of Shahr-e Rey. Second, Rey was completed destroyed by the Mongols during their invasion of Persia in 1219-1221. Third, in the face of the Mongol invasion, the population that could escape the slaughter took refuge took to the hills and settled eventually in the region north of Rey, untouched by the Mongols. Therefore, it is easy to see why this region became known as Tehran (a clean place), derived from tahr, which is Arabic for “clean,” unsullied by the infidels (Mongols). See https://abadis.ir/fatofa/%D8%B7%D9%87%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86/.

To the Iranian’s aversion toward Arabic influences we owe also the orthographic change in the name of the Tonb islands in the Persian Gulf from (ﻄﻨﺐ) to (ﺘﻨﺐ). This change occurred also during Reza Shah’s rule and at a time when Iran was asserting her claim of ownership over the two islands in the 1920s.

In spoken Persian of southern Iran as well as in the larger Iranian language system stretching to Turkmenistan and Afghanistan, the sound tonb and tonbu, regardless of the spelling of t, refers to a “hill” or “modest elevation.” Ahmad Eqtedari, “Zabānhā-ye mahali va folklor-e khalij-e fārs" [Local languages and folklore of the Persian Gulf], in Khalij-e fārs [The Persian Gulf], Tehran: Edārehy-e enteshārāt-e kol-e rādio [Office of general publications of Radio Iran), 1342 [1963-1964], vol. 1: 119-32, p. 123.  Regardless of whether the Persian-dialect toponym tonb or tonbu were known to the wordsmiths in Reza Shah’s government, when the government “Persianized” the islands’ name by changing the ta to té, it also disconnected the islands’ etymological connection with the Iranian coast at the detriment to their argument that the islands belonged to Iran by virtue of its longstanding association with the Iranian mainland, regardless of the ethnicity of its inhabitants.

In Arabic, the word tonb or tunub (ﻄﻨﺐ) connotes “settlement” to live or abide at a place. J. M. Cowan, ed., The Hans Wehr Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic, 3^rd edition (Ithaca, New York: Spoken languages Services, Inc., 1976), p. 570. Two German cartographical works from the early decade of the 19th century tell us of the earliest known inhabitants of the Tonb Islands. In the first one, published in 1804, the Iranian coast from Kangan to Bardestan, is colored in orange and identified as the habitat of the Beni Hule. The islands Thunb (Great Tonb) and Thunb Namiu (Little Tonb) are colored also in orange and bear the designation unbenohul. Persien (1804) (publisher and place of publication unknown – a copy of the map is available at Harvard College Library, No. 2276/8). The second map, published in 1811, contains the same information as the first one, except on this one Thunb Namiu does not have the designation unbenchul. Carte von Persian (Prague, 1811) (publisher unknown – a copy o this map is available at Harvard College Library, No. 2276/10).

The designation unbenhule or unbenchul that accompanied the names of the Tonb islands on the aforementioned German maps is the corrupt form of Ibn Hule (Houl). These were an Arab tribe, but had lived on the Iranian coast for as long as anyone could remember and for sure since the second half of the 17^th century. This evidence of the ethno-geographical association of Tonbs with the Iranian coast was compromised severely therefore when the Iranian government changed the despicable tā to the presumably Persian té!