leading to the reappearance of a voiced stop . (Both languages have also shifted earlier *θ > .) The consonant clusters *ft and *xt have also been widely lenited, though again excluding Ormuri-Parachi, and possibly Yaghnobi. External influences The neighboring Indo-Aryan languages have exerted a pervasive external influence on the closest neighbouring Eastern Iranian, as it is evident in the development in the retroflex consonants (in Pashto, Wakhi, Sanglechi, Khotanese, etc.) and aspirates (in Khotanese, Parachi and Ormuri). A more localized sound change is the backing of the former retroflex fricative ṣ̌ , to x̌ or to x , found in the Shughni–Yazgulyam branch and certain dialects of Pashto. E.g. "meat": ɡuṣ̌t in Wakhi and γwaṣ̌a in Southern Pashto, but changes to in Shughni, γwax̌a in Central and Northern Pashto. Notes Munji dā is a borrowing from Persian but Yidgha still uses los. Ormuri marzā has a different etymological origin, but generally Ormuri [b] is preserved unchanged, e.g. *bastra- > bēš, Ormuri for "cord" (cf. Avestan band- "to tie"). Ossetic ærvad means "relative". The word for "brother" æfsymær is of a different etymological source. See also Western Iranian languages Dari (Eastern Persian), a dialect of a Western Iranian language, despite the name Sakan language References External links Compendium Linguarum Iranicarum, ed. Schmitt (1989), p. 100.