گرگ

What it means

گرگ (gorg) means “wolf.” Pure Persian, A2 priority because while the word itself is short and easy, you encounter it more in storytelling and idiom than in everyday speech. The plural is گرگ‌ها (gorg-hâ).

Persian wolves (Canis lupus pallipes, the Iranian wolf) are a real subspecies that lives in the Zagros mountains, the Alborz range, and the steppes of northeastern Iran. They show up in news stories about livestock attacks in rural areas every winter.

How to use it

• گرگ خاکستری (gorg-e khâkestari) “gray wolf”
• گله گرگ‌ها (galle-ye gorg-hâ) “a pack of wolves”
• گرگ زوزه می‌کشد (gorg zuze mikeshad) “the wolf howls”
• گرگ گرسنه (gorg-e gorosne) “a hungry wolf”
• گرگ‌ها در کوه (gorg-hâ dar kuh) “wolves in the mountains”

The bloody-mouthed wolf

The most-used Persian wolf phrase is گرگ دهان آلوده (gorg-e dahân-âlude), “the bloody-mouthed wolf.” It comes from a Saadi-era moral image: a wolf that has just torn into a lamb but disguises itself in the lamb’s pelt to fool the other sheep. The blood at the corner of its mouth gives it away.

Persian speakers use the phrase to describe a hidden enemy who has done damage and is now pretending to be on your side. Family disputes, political betrayals, business deals gone bad. Saying گرگ دهان آلوده about someone marks them as a known traitor whose innocence is performance.

Related: گرگ در لباس میش (gorg dar lebâs-e mish), “a wolf in sheep’s clothing,” an exact analog to the English idiom (both languages got the image from the same broader Mediterranean and Near Eastern fable tradition).

Wolves in Iranian wilderness

Iran has surviving wolf populations, especially in less-developed mountain and forest areas. Conservation status varies; livestock conflict is the main pressure point. Shepherds in Lorestan, Kurdistan, and Mazandaran still build their winter routines around wolf risk. The Caspian wolf, which once ranged into northern Iran, was hunted to local extinction in the 20th century.

The wolf is also one of the four predators that show up in Persian poetry constantly (alongside the lion, the leopard, and the eagle). Rumi, Saadi, and Ferdowsi all use گرگ as a stand-in for danger, treachery, and primal hunger.

Mnemonic

GORG → گرگ. Picture a gray wolf on a snowy ridge in the Alborz, blood at the corner of its mouth, the sheep flock not yet aware.