Բարև (Barev): Why Armenians Greet with “Goodness”
Barev and welcome to the first issue of ԲամԲաս (BamBas): language un(dis)covered, where we take familiar Armenian words and expressions and look a little more closely. Whether Armenian is your native language, your heritage language, or a language you are encountering for the first time, there is always something hiding in plain sight.
As with the start of every conversation, we begin our exploration into the world of Armenian with բարև (barev), “hello.”
In Eastern Armenian, it is pronounced barev; in Western Armenian, parev. Same greeting, different pronunciation. But whichever one you say, have you ever wondered what you are actually saying?
Here is where it gets interesting.
Բարև (barev) is connected to բարի (bari), “good.” Today, many Armenian speakers may associate bari with “kind,” but in Classical Armenian its meaning was more concretely “good.” Its story takes us back to բարեաւ (bareaw), the instrumental form of բարի (bari). In other words, it carries the sense of “with good” or “with goodness.”
Over time, բարեաւ (bareaw) became the everyday greeting բարև (barev).
So hidden inside one of the most familiar words in Armenian is a tiny linguistic fossil. Every time we say barev, we are using a greeting whose history reaches back to Classical Armenian and to the idea of goodness.
To make a good thing even bigger, instead of simply returning barev, you may hear հազար բարև (hazar barev). Hazarmeans “thousand,” so you are quite literally returning a thousand greetings. One barev comes your way; a thousand go back.
From Classical Armenian բարեաւ (bareaw) to a casual barev between friends, a surprising amount of history is tucked inside a word Armenians around the world say every day. Not bad for “hello.”
How do you say it? Barev, parev, hazar barev, or something else in your family or community? Send an email to bambas@usc.edu and tell us.
Go deeper: Barev, belonging, and connection.
At the Institute’s inaugural TEDxLittle Armenia, USC Gould School of Law lecturer Ani Adjemian explored how something as simple as barev can signal belonging and create human connection.
BamBas: language un(dis)covered is created by the USC Dornsife Institute of Armenian Studies, with research and writing developed in collaboration with Dr. Lilit Ghazaryan and original artwork by Nooneh Khoodaverdyan.