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This article is about the doctrine of the formation of celestial bodies in Pahlavi texts. The doctrine is peculiar. It clashes not only with the accounts of the Gāϑā and the Younger Avesta but also with the general cosmology of Pahlavi literature. Nonetheless it must be authoritative since it is found in our main sources of Zoroastrian (Pahlavi) cosmogony and there does not seem to be an alternative account of the formation of celestial bodies. It thus prompts us to look for its background. This article presents and discusses the texts that contain the Pahlavi doctrine, examines its Avestan roots, and shows the influence of Presocratic cosmogonic speculations on the doctrine. Further, comparative material allows us to propose a conceptual genealogy of the basic constituents of the doctrine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

About 150 years ago, after Avestan researchers such as Jackson, Browne, and Westergaard had unsuccessfully attempted to discover new manuscripts in Iran, it was assumed that there were few or no Avestan manuscripts remaining in Iran. However, recent research and fieldwork in Iran have resulted in important findings disproving this assumption. Since 2011, more than eighty-five Avestan manuscripts have been discovered in Iran. One of these important discoveries has been Pouladi's Collection, which was found in February 2016 in a Zoroastrian house in the Priests' Quarter (Mahalle-ye Dastūrān) in Yazd. This article deals with the secondary life of Avestan manuscripts of Pouladi's Collection, focusing on colophons and marginal notes. The article makes available a collection of Middle Persian and New Persian colophons and marginal notes, all which have been excerpted, transcribed, and translated for the first time from the Avestan manuscripts of Pouladi's Collection, copied mostly in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Based on different types of colophons, this contribution establishes a classification of colophons and marginal notes of this collection with regard to formal, contextual, and functional characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The lack of evidence for the existence of fire temples in ancient Iran has been used as an argument for the absence of the concept of the "eternal fire" in the Avestan texts. However, a new analysis of the final section of the Long Liturgy shows that the fire was usually removed from the sacrificial area before the recitation of Yasna 62.7 and transported back to the "house of men" from which it had been taken. As such, the Long Liturgy partly appears as a functional equivalent of the bōy dādan ceremonies performed for the feeding of the fire at the fire temples in later times. This new reading of the final section of the liturgy is the result of a re-evaluation of the manuscripts, highlighting the shortcomings of previous editions of the Long Liturgy. Furthermore, the new interpretation approaches the Long Liturgy from a non Yasna-centric perspective, taking into account the Yasna as well as the Visperad (and other variants). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Zoroastrian Dari, also known as Behdini or Gavruni, is an endangered Iranian language spoken by the Zoroastrian minority who mostly live in Yazd and the surrounding areas as well as in Kerman and Tehran. Zoroastrian Dari is a unique Iranian language on account of its historical background and large number of subdialects. This language is only a spoken language and not a written one, but it seems that remnants of this language are attested in the Avestan manuscripts, particularly in the colophons. This paper provides a study of the existence of Zoroastrian Dari in the personal names in the colophons and Sālmargs of the Avestan manuscripts. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Since the works of M. Boyce, Zoroastrianism is often analyzed on the axiomatic basis of an "immense conservatism". This position seems to be methodologically, hermeneutically and empirically unsatisfying. My research on the history of the Zoroastrian cult of fire indicates that even at the heart of Zoroastrian identity -- the worship of (an eternal) fire -- resides history. In the following article I try to follow, retrogradely, the historical tracks of the eternal fire in Zoroastrianism, from the New Persian Zoroastrian sources to the Young Avestan texts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Yasna 19 contains an Avestan exegesis of the Gāthic stanza Ahuna Vairiia, the most revered text in Zoroastrianism. The stanza is traditionally understood to be the essential statement of the religion of Mazdā. Thus, in Y 19 we have a unique opportunity to ask about the significance that the Gāthās of Zarathuštra held for the later Avestan tradition. In what intellectual horizon did Zoroastrian priests place their founding text? Although Y 19 exegesis of the Ahuna Vairiia contains semantic obscurities, it is possible to establish the meaning of the commentary through syntactic and conceptual analysis of two key terms and the phrases where they occur. The article critically examines the earlier interpretations of the text. Having found these inadequate, it proposes a new reading and understanding of the Avestan exegesis. In particular, the article argues that the Avestan exegete understood the Gāthic stanza within an eschatological horizon. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article argues that the Avestan text Yasna Haptaŋhāiti (“Yasna of the seven chapters”) was not originally divided into seven chapters. It was divided into three parts that were not considered hāitis (chapters) in the same way as the gathic hāitis. The division of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti into seven parts and its corresponding title is based on the arrangement of the Old Avestan texts. These texts try to reproduce the structure of the prayer Ahuna Vairiia; three verses with two hemistichs each correspond to three pairs of compositions with 7, 4 four and 1 hāiti each of the Old Avestan texts. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The present article investigates the relations between the corpus of the five Avestan Niyāyišns and that of the Yašts, showing the dependance of the former on the latter. Four Niyāyišns out of five incorporate chapters attested into the corpus of the Yašts; only the fifth Niyāyišn depends on Yasna 62, although it shares some stanzas with Yasna 27, 33 and 34; in any case this text cannot be considered the source of the parallel passages attested in the Yasna. The paragraphs of the Niyāyišns which do not have a direct parallel in other Avestan passages, cannot be considered as original, but probably depend on other original sources or have been made through imitating earlier passages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Pahlavi literature of the Sasanian and post-Sasanian periods preserves not only many fragments of Pahlavi translations of lost Avestan texts, but also parallel versions of those attested in the extant Avestan manuscripts. Their differences are generally interpreted on the assumption of the existence of an underlying common Avestan text. However, the structural comparison between the Pahlavi translation of Vīdēvdād 11 in the Pahlavi text Zand ī Fragard ī Juddēwdād and its Avestan text in the Vīdēvdād Sāde and the Pahlavi Vīdēvdād manuscripts could point to the existence of two or even three different Avestan versions of the same chapter (fragard). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the mention of the ancient Iranian city of Nisa in Avestic and Islamic manuscripts, as well as in the Achaemenid royal inscriptions. The author comments on the distinction between the Parthian and Median districts in ancient inscriptions of Persian rulers Darius the Great and Xerxes. Topics include the role of Zoroastrian priests in translating Avestic texts to Middle Persian as well as the Pahlavi text called "Bundhishn" which mentioned Nisa. Also mentioned is geographer Shams al-din Abu Abdollah Mohamad ibn Ahmad ibn abi Bakr, born in Bayt al Muqaddas, Jerusalem, known more commonly as Maqdisi, a geographer and traveler of the Samanid period dating 874-879 AD.

All extant Pahlavi-Vīdēvdād (PV) manuscripts derive from a single copy. The binding of this copy was damaged early on, and some folios were lost and others displaced. A detailed analysis of the extant manuscripts allows us to reconstruct the original order and to discover where some folios are lost, but in previous editions (especially of the Pahlavi translation), this fact was not always noted appropriately and numerous errors occurred. Moreover, other typical transmission errors in this common source have slipped into all extant PV manuscripts and caused omissions of several fragments of the Avestan text and its Pahlavi translation, hence the importance of the Sādes for the edition of the Avestan text of the Vīdēvdād. Geldner was, unfortunately, too confident in the quality of the PV manuscripts and omitted from his edition Avestan texts that should have been included. But not every difference between the Avestan text of the Sāde and Pahlavi manuscripts can be attributed to the transmission. One of the most important differences is the omission of fragard 12 in the Pahlavi-Vīdēvdād manuscripts. Since its omission cannot be attributed to transmission, an alternative explanation for this important difference is proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is dedicated to the interpretation of the Avestan razura- "forest, grove", its Middle Persian derivation razūr, and the related place-name, the so called "White Forest" (Avestan Spaēitita razura-, and Middle Persian Arus-razūr and Spēd-razūr). The author investigates all passages in the Avestan and Middle Iranian texts, where the lexeme is found. The Avestan razura- is attested predominantly in the Young Avestan texts (Aban Yasht, Den Yasht, Zamyad Yasht) and in Videvdat, while as a component of the place-name it may be found in Ram Yasht. In most cases, it is mentioned in connection with war campaigns and important battles of the ancient Iranians with their enemies. More detailed accounts on "White Forest" have been preserved in the Middle Persian sources, such as Ayādgār ī Zarērān (the Pahlavi text of Parthian origin), Bundahishn, and in the apocalyptic writing Zand ī Vohuman Yasn. The battle of king Vishtasp with the Khyons is held near this "White Forest", Arusrazūr, which is also mentioned in Zand ī Vohuman Yasn as Spēd-razūr. Evidently, this place had a great importance for the ancient Iranians; Ilya Gershevitch called it, following Ram Yasht, "the Pan-Iranian forest"; for Mary Boyce it was "the forest of All-Aryans". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most scholars generally pre-suppose that the concept of democracy is the exclusive creation of classical Greece and a token of the West to the rest of the world. This concept has originated mainly due to the fact that much of the ancient Iranian history was only known through classical Greek writings before the ever-increasing archaeological finds and decipherments of ancient Near Eastern primary sources, which have shed a very different light on the subject. This paper attempts to alleviate and restore a few of the more vital recurring misunderstandings, misinterpretations and misconceptions in this field, and endeavours to present them in a more realistic historic and historiographic perspective in the light of the latest available scholarship. Beginning in 2200 B.C. Old Elamite Kingdom, was the first manifestation in the world of a structured and, at times, democratically elected heads of state based on matriarchal right of descent. Beginning in Elam and continuing at least to the beginning of the Islamic period, no ancient peoples, including the Greeks and the Egyptians, have surpassed the practice of the rights of women, and the equality of men and women as in Iran. In early 7th century B.C. Iran, the pronouncement by Zoroaster, through Avestan literature, was the first manifestation of the rights of women and unequivocal equality of gender in all aspects and positions of society. In the second part of the 7th century B.C. Media, we encounter the ratification by popular vote of the first constitution for a democratically elected confederated empire, headed by Dioces, who was the first recorded popularly elected emperor. In 539 B.C., we come upon the declaration of the first generally accepted Charter of Rights of Nations by Cyrus the Great. In 522-486 B.C., in the reign of Darius the Great, appeared the first confirmation of a written entrenched democratic constitution. In the 4th century A.D. (or earlier) Sasanian Iran, the first appearance of an advanced system of Common Law based on well-documented jurisprudence was materialised. And finally, the confederated system of government in Iran, which survived the vicissitudes of history and changes of several dynasties, remained in force one way or the other to become the most enduring system of government in world history spanning a period of two-and-half millennia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This presentation aims at addressing an apparent minor discrepancy between citations in Shevelov's A Prehistory of Slavic (1964) and his Historical Phonology of the Ukrainian Language (1979). Shevelov (1964: 403) cites Russian "Multiple line equation(s) cannot be represented in ASCII text", 'drake', also occurring in Ukrainian, and gives an Old Irish form selg, glossed as 'hunt', as a cognate. In Shevelov 1979: 94, however, Old Irish selg, unglossed, is offered as a cognate for Ukrainian "Multiple line equation(s) cannot be represented in ASCII text" 'spleen' id., and other related Slavic forms, see also Trautmann 1923: 256, Pokomy 1959: 900-901, 987, Vasmer 1964-1973: III: 594-595, while his comment on Russian "Multiple line equation(s) cannot be represented in ASCII text" cites no other cognates. For Old Irish seig itself; which, like "Multiple line equation(s) cannot be represented in ASCII text" and "Multiple line equation(s) cannot be represented in ASCII text" has two meanings, see Lewis & Pedersen 1961: 18, 33; Thumeysen 1946: 139, Vendryes 1974: S-80-S-81. Superficially, this would provide a very rare example of East Slavic *TolT reflexes developing to *Telel, and not the regular, and expected *ToloT, but such examples should be treated with caution, cf. Shevelov loc. cit. Indeed, a glance at proposed Indo- European cognates of "Multiple line equation(s) cannot be represented in ASCII text"/selg 'spleen' shows a degree of irregular development that points to a need for closer scrutiny by scholars, cf. Greek "Multiple line equation(s) cannot be represented in ASCII text", Avestan "Multiple line equation(s) cannot be represented in ASCII text", etc., raising the question: what has happened to the Slavic *-p-? In contrast to Celtic, Slavic preserves Indo-European *p under most circumstances, and therefore one would expect it to be preserved in any cognate of the Greek and Avestan forms cited above. By simply juxtaposing Old Irish seig here, without further comment, Shevebov bc. cit. introduces a note of confusion for those interested in Slavo-Celtic cognates, and it is the purpose of this paper to disentangle such confusion, and to account for a situation whereby Slavic and Goidelic appear to use the same forms for the concepts of 'duck'/'hunting' and 'spleen'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Offers a look at Avestan scholarship and what it is based on. Speculation surrounding the identity of Zarathustra; Who first wrote Avestan texts; Reference to Jean Kellen's book `Old Avestan' which gives detailed information on temples.

Criticizes Karl Hoffmann's principles of Avestan manuscripts. Restoration of the text; How is the perfect participle formed in Indo-Iranian languages; Analysis of specific words.