श"द — word

श"द, the regular Hindi word for ‘word’, is one of the first linguistic terms that a Hindi learner encounters. Being a Sanskrit loan, श"द is little used in Urdu, which has instead the Arabicthrough-Persian loan ظ"ف"""""""""ل lafẕ; this singular form comes complete with its own plural, formed on the Arabic pattern by a repatterning of the triconsonantal root l-f-z as الفاظ alfāẕ, ‘words’.