Sasanian Studies: Late antique Iranian world | Sasanidische Studien: Spätantike iranische Welt, Vol. 1 3447114142, 9783447114141

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Late Antique Iranian World

SASANIDISCHE STUDIEN Spätantike iranische Welt VOL. I / 2022 Edited by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee

SASANIAN STUDIES Late Antique Iranian World

SASANIDISCHE STUDIEN Spätantike iranische Welt

VOL. I

Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee Harrassowitz

Samra Azarnouche A Zoroastrian Cult Scene on Sasanian Stucco Reliefs at Bandiyān (Daregaz, Khorāsān-e Razavī) | Alberto Cantera & Jaime Martínez-Porro Sasanian Rituals and their Continuity in the Avestan Liturgical Manuscripts: The Double Āb-zōhr of the Dō-Hōmāst | Touraj Daryaee In Search of Lost Time: The Fratarakās and the Genealogy of Sasanian Ancestry | Shervin Farridnejad “Under the Banner of the Mane”. Pahlavi Letters and the Sasanian Art of Epistolography. (An Unpublished Pahlavi Papyrus Letter from Sasanian Egypt, P.Pehl. 569 | Mariachiara Gasparini “Sasanian Textiles” and the Tang Cosmopolitan Style | James Howard-Johnston The Coming of the Arabs to Iran | Götz König Überlegungen zur Avesta-Transmission in der Sasanidenzeit | Götz König Zur Bedeutung der Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Avesta für die Zoroastrismusforschung. Notizen zu Arash Zeinis Studie über das Pahlavi Yasna Haptaŋhāiti | Sara Kuehn ‘Ganymede and the Eagle’: Representations of Spiritual Ascent in the Greater Iranian World from Late Antiquity to the Medieval Period | Paolo Ognibene Beyond the Gate: Alans, Sasanians and the Caucasus | Antonio Panaino Between Semantics and Pragmatics: Origins and Developments in the Meaning of dastgerd. A New Approach to the Problem | Daniel T. Potts Antoine-Isaac Silvestre de Sacy and the Study of Tāq-e Bostān | Nikolaus Schindel The Justinianic Plague and Sasanian Iran: The Numismatic Evidence | Hossein Sheikh Aramaic Legal Terminology in the Sasanian Law-Book Mādayān ī Hazār Dādestān: Some Remarks on Late Antique Legal termini technici | Yuhan Sohrab-Dinshaw Vevaina The Hermeneutics of Political Violence in Sasanian Iran: The Death of Mani and the Seizure of Manichaean Property | Dieter Weber Sasanian Festivals in the Documents from the “Pahlavi Archive”

SASANIAN STUDIES VOL I

SASANIAN STUDIES

Edited by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee 2022 Harrassowitz Verlag · Wiesbaden

Sasanian Studies Late Antique Iranian World

Sasanidische Studien Spätantike iranische Welt Vol. I

Edited by

Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee

2022 Harrassowitz Verlag · Wiesbaden

Sasanian Studies: Late Antique Iranian World, Volume 1 (2022), Issue 1 © 2022 Harrassowitz Verlag Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

Editors: Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee

Scientific Board: Jaleh Amouzegar (Tehran), Chiara Barbati (Pisa), Olga Chunakova (St. Petersburg), Mehrdad Ghodrat Dizaji (Urumia), Simcha Gross (Pennsylvania), Albert de Jong (Leiden), Aliy Kolesnikov (St. Petersburg), Philip G. Kreyenbroek (Göttingen), Pavel Lurje (St. Petersburg), Bruno Jacobs (Basel), Shahram Jalilian (Ahvaz), Maria Macuch (Berlin), Cyrus Nasrollah-Zadeh (Tehran), Antonio C. Panaino (Ravenna), Kianoosh Rezania (Bochum), Nikolaus Schindel (Vienna), M. Rahim Shayegan (Los Angeles), Yuhan Sohrab-Dinshaw Vevaina (Oxford), Dieter Weber (Berlin), Josef Wiesehöfer (Kiel), Roozbeh Zarrinkub (Tehran) Cover Illustration: Winged horse in a pearl bordered medallion from a Sasanian textile, ca. 8th–7th ce. Die Zeitschrift erscheint einmal jährlich. / The journal appears once a year.

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Editorial Board: Samra Azarnouche (Paris), Matthew P. Canepa (Irvine), Carlo G. Cereti (Rome), Iris Colditz (Bochum), Dietrich Huff (Berlin), Khodadad Rezakhani (Leiden), Vesta Sarkhosh Curtis (London)

Bibliografische Information der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek verzeichnet diese Publikation in der Deutschen Nationalbibliografie; detaillierte bibliografische Daten sind im Internet über https://www.dnb.de/ abrufbar. Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the internet at https://www.dnb.de/.

https://www.harrassowitz-verlag.de/ © Otto Harrassowitz GmbH & Co. KG, Wiesbaden 2022 This journal, including all of its parts, is protected by copyright. Any use beyond the limits of copyright law without the permission of the publisher is forbidden and subject to penalty. This applies particularly to reproductions, translations, microfilms and storage and processing in electronic systems. Printed on permanent/durable paper Typesetting & layout: Kian Kahrom Cover: Kourosh Beigpour Printing and binding: Beltz, Bad Langensalza Printed in Germany ISSN 2699-7649 eISSN 2749-9146 ISBN 978-3-447-11414-1

DOI Zeitschriftenreihe 10.13173/2699-7649 DOI Titel 10.13173/SSt.1

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Contents Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . V Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . IX Samra Azarnouche A Zoroastrian Cult Scene on Sasanian Stucco Reliefs at Bandiyān (Daregaz, Khorāsān-e Razavī) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Alberto Cantera & Jaime Martínez-Porro Sasanian Rituals and their Continuity in the Avestan Liturgical Manuscripts: the Double Āb-zōhr of the Dō-Hōmāst . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 Touraj Daryaee In Search of Lost Time: The Fratarakās and the Genealogy of Sasanian Ancestry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41 Shervin Farridnejad “Under the Banner of the Mane”. Pahlavi Letters and the Sasanian Art of Epistolography. An Unpublished Pahlavi Papyrus Letter from Sasanian Egypt, P.Pehl. 569 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57 Mariachiara Gasparini “Sasanian Textiles” and the Tang Cosmopolitan Style . . . . . . . . . . . . 81 James Howard-Johnston The Coming of the Arabs to Iran . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99 Götz König Überlegungen zur Avesta-Transmission in der Sasanidenzeit . . . . . . . . 127 Götz König Zur Bedeutung der Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Avesta für die Zoroastrismusforschung. Notizen zu Arash Zeinis Studie über das Pahlavi Yasna Haptaŋhāiti . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157

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IV Contents Sara Kuehn ‘Ganymede and the Eagle’: Representations of Spiritual Ascent in the Greater Iranian World from Late Antiquity to the Medieval Period . . . . 179 Paolo Ognibene Beyond the Gate: Alans, Sasanians and the Caucasus . . . . . . . . . . . . 207 Antonio Panaino Between Semantics and Pragmatics: Origins and Developments in the Meaning of dastgerd. A New Approach to the Problem . . . . . . . . . . . 215 Daniel T. Potts Antoine-Isaac Silvestre de Sacy and the Study of Tāq-e Bostān . . . . . . . 243 Nikolaus Schindel The Justinianic Plague and Sasanian Iran: the Numismatic Evidence . . . . 259 Hossein Sheikh Aramaic Legal Terminology in the Sasanian Law-Book Mādayān ī Hazār Dādestān: Some Remarks on Late Antique Legal termini technici . . . . . 277 Yuhan Sohrab-Dinshaw Vevaina The Hermeneutics of Political Violence in Sasanian Iran: the Death of Mani and the Seizure of Manichaean Property . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291 Dieter Weber Sasanian Festivals in the Documents from the “Pahlavi Archive” . . . . . 323

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Abbreviations Journals and Periodicals AA Archäologischer Anzeiger AAASH Acta Antiqua Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae AcAs Acta Asiatica: Bulletin of the Institute of Eastern Culture AcIr Acta Iranica AfO Archiv für Orientforschung AION AION Annali dell’Università degli Studi di Napoli “L’Orientale” AIS Ancient Iran Series AJA American Journal of Archaeology AJN American Journal of Numismatics AJSLL The American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures AKAWB Abhandlungen der Königlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin AMI Archäologische Mitteilungen aus Iran AMIT Archäologische Mitteilungen aus Iran und Turan Anabasis Anabasis. Studia Classica et Orientalia AnatS Anatolian Studies ANSMN American Numismatic Society Museum Notes AntOr Antiguo Oriente Anzeiger Zeitschrift der philosophisch-historischen Klasse der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften (formerly: Anzeiger der philosophischhistorischen Klasse) AO Acta Orientalia AoF Altorientalische Forschungen ArIs Ars Islamica ArO Ars Orientalis ArOr Archív Orientální ArtAs Artibus Asiae ARW Archiv für Religionswissenschaft AS Asiatische Studien/Études Asiatiques ASOR The American Schools of Oriental Research AUAD Avrasya Uluslararası Araştırmalar Dergisi BAI Bulletin of the Asia Institute BAIPAA Bulletin of the American Institute of Persian Art and Archaeology BAIPUS Bulletin of the Asia Institute of Pahlavi University of Shiraz BAOM Bulletin of the Ancient Orient Museum, Tokyo BAS Berytus Archaelogical Studies BB Beitrage zur Kunde der indogermanischen Sprachen

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VI Abbreviations BCIETA

Bulletin du CIETA = Bulletin du Centre international d’étude des textiles anciens (formerly: Bulletin de Liaison du CIETA) BCSMS Bulletin of the Canadian Society for Mesopotamian Studies Berytus Berytus: Archaeological Studies published by the Museum of Archaeology of the American University of Beirut. Beirut, Libanon BIBR Bulletin de l’Institut Historique Belge de Rome BII Bulletin of the Iranian Institute BM Baghdader Mitteilungen BMC The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs BMFA Bulletin of the Museum of Fine Arts BMMA Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art BSOAS Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies BSOS Bulletin of the School of Oriental Studies BT Bāstānšenāsī-o Tārīḫ C&C Continuity and Change CleO Classica et Orientalia Dabir The Digital Archive of Brief notes & Iran Review (DABIR) EIT Estudios Iraniaos y Turanios EJFE L’Esprit des Journaux, François et Étrangers EuSt Eurasian Studies FAR Frontiers of Architectural Research FARMS The FARMS Review GB Gozāreš-hāye Bāstānšenāsī (Archaeological Reports) HARIBL Histoire de l’Académie royale des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres HdO Handbuch der Orientalistik HiMA Revue intenationale d’Histoire Militaire Ancienne HMIRF Histoire et Mémoires de l’Institut Royal de France, classe d’histoire et de littérature ancienne HR History of Religions HS Historische Sprachwissenschaft (Historical Linguistics) IIJ Indo-Iranian Journal IJDL International Journal of Diachronic Linguistics and Linguistic Reconstruction IM Istanbuler Mitteilungen Iran Iran: Journal of the British Institute of Persian Studies IrAnt Iranica Antiqua IrSt Iranian Studies JA Journal Asiatique JAAS Journal of Asian and African Studies JAF Journal of the American Folklore JAH Journal of Ancient History JAOS Journal of the American Oriental Society JBBRAS Journal of the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society JCOI Journal of the K.R. Cama Oriental Institute JdI Jahrbuch des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts JLAS Jewish Law Association Studies

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Abbreviations VII JNES Journal of Near Eastern Studies JNG Jahrbuch für Numismatik und Geldgeschichte JNSI Journal of the Numismatic Society of India JNSI Journal of the Numismatic Society of India JONS Journal of the Oriental Numismatic Society JPK Jahrbuch der Preußischen Kunstsammlungen JPS Journal of Persianate Studies JRAS Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society JRS Journal of Roman Studies JS Journal des Savants JSAI Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam JSAS Journal of the Society for Armenian Studies JSS Journal of Semitic Studies JWCI Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes Kratylos Kratylos: Kritisches Berichts- und Rezensionsorgan für indogermanische und allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft KS Kievskaja Starina LNV Litterae Numismaticae Vindobonenses Maarav Maarav: A Journal for the Study of the Northwest Semitic Languages and Literatures MB Motāleʿāt-e Bāstān-šenāsī (Journal of Archaeological Research) MBT Majalleh-ye bāstān-šenāsī va tārīkh (Iranian Journal of Archaeology and History) MDOG Die Mitteilungen der deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft zu Berlin MIO Mitteilungen des Instituts für Orientforschung MKPAWB Monatsberichte der Königlichen Preussische Akademie des Wissenschaften zu Berlin MMJ Metropolitan Museum Journal MÖNG Mitteilungen der Österreichischen Numismatischen Gesellschaft MSS Münchener Studien zur Sprachwissenschaft Muséon Le Muséon: Revue d’Études Orientales NEMBR Notices et Extraits des Manuscrits de la Bibliothèque du Roi NHMS Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies NIB Nāme-ye Irān-e Bāstān Numen Numen: International Review for the History of Religions NZ Numismatische Zeitschrift OLA Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta OLP Orientalia Lovaniensia Periodica OLZ Orientalistische Literaturzeitung Oriento Oriento: Bulletin of the Society for Near Eastern Studies in Japan (Nippon Oriento Gakkai) OS Orientalia Suecana P&P Past and Present: a journal of historical Studies PBI Paǰouheš-hāye Bāstān-šenāsī-ye Irān PBM Paǰouheš-hāye Bāstān-šenāsī-ye Modarres PK Paǰuhešnāmeh-ye Kāšān

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VIII Abbreviations PNAS Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America PrH Provence Historique RAA Revue des Arts Asiatiques REA Revue des Études Armeniennes REJ Revue des Études Juives RHR Revue de l’Histoire des Religions RS Religious Studies SBE The Sacred Books of the East SPS Sasanika Papyrological Studies SR The Silk Road SRAA Silk Road Art and Archaeology StA Studia Asiatica StIr Studia Iranica StIs Studia Islamica StR Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses SZS Die Sprache. Zeitschrift für Sprachwissenschaft VChr Vigiliae Christianae VDI Vestnik Drevnej Istorii W&S Wörter und Sachen WZKM Wiener Zeitschrift fur die Kunde des Morgenlandes ZÄSA Zeitschrift für ägyptische Sprache und Alterthumskunde ZDMG Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft ZII Zeitschrift für Indologie und Iranistik ZNMP Žurnal Ministerstva Narodnogo Prosveščenija

Frequently Cited Works AirWb Bartholomae, Ch. 1904 [1961]: Altiranisches Wörterbuch, Berlin. CPD MacKenzie, D. N. 1971: A Concise Pahlavi Dictionary. London [Reprints 1986, 1990]. EAW Mayrhofer, M. 1996–2000: Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Altindoarischen. 3 vols (Indogermanische Bibliothek. II. Reihe, Wörterbücher), Heidelberg. EI2 Bearman P./Th. Bianquis/C. E. Bosworth/E. van Donzel/W. P. Heinrichs (eds.) 1960–2005: Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, Leiden. Available online: https://referenceworks.brillonline.com/ browse/encyclopaedia-of-islam-2 EIr Yarshater, E. (founding ed.) 1982–: Encyclopædia Iranica. New York. EIr Online Encyclopædia Iranica, Online Edition: http://www.iranicaonline.org/ GrIrPh Geiger, W./E. Kuhn (eds.) 1896–1904: Grundriss der iranischen Philologie, Strassburg. JE Singer, I. (ed.) 1901–1906: The Jewish Encyclopedia, New York.

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Introduction “Eine Sasanidische Zeitschrift” “Ērānšahr is from the Amū Daryā (“Oxus”) river to Meṣr (Nile) river and these other regions are around it, and from these seven regions, Ērānšahr is more magnanimous in every part”.1 It has been one hundred and twenty-nine years since the first volume of the Byzantinische Zeitschrift, the Byzantine studies journal was established in 1892 by the German scholar, Karl Krumbacher (1856–1909), and one of the foremost founders of modern Byzantine Studies as an independent academic discipline. Since then, Byzantine Studies has been both en vogue and at times out of favor in the academia. But what is certain is that since Diocletian or Constantine, the impact and legacy of Byzantium looms large, not only for the history of the Mediterranean, but also for that of the Near East. A search on the database of world libraries gives close to over a hundred thousand books and articles on Byzantine subjects. This is certainly worthy of an empire which lasted for a thousand years and had to deal with various foes and friends, from Northern Europe to Arabia in the South as well as the Iranian Empire to the East, ruled by their powerful political rivals, the Sasanian dynasty, who called their empire Ērānšahr “The Territory of the Aryans/Iranians” and the people, Ērān “Iranians”. However, the Sasanian Empire (224–651 ce) in comparison has received far less scholarly attention, although that is slowly changing. At the beginning of Late Antiquity in the 3rd century ce, the Sasanians in their heyday dominated Western Asia, extending from Mesopotamia to Central Asia and Northern India and controlled the territory from Oxus to Euphrates, including parts of Southeast Asia, Armenia, and — for a short period in the early seventh century — even Egypt and greater Syria, and also made military forays deep into India and established regular diplomatic relations with China. Together with the Imperium Romanum, the two empires referred to themselves as the ‘Two Eyes of the Earth’ in their diplomatic interactions. Being an overwhelming 1

The Preface to the Šāhnāme-ye Abū Manṣūrī; cf. Qazvīnī, M. 1363: Moghadame-ye Šāhnāme-ye Abū Manṣūrī. In: A. Eqbāl (ed.): Bīst maqāle-ye Ghazvīnī. Tehran, p. 49; Monchi-Zadeh, in editing the text, forces the issue by attempting to correct the text based on the traditional boundaries of the Sasanian empire, where he replaced the Nile River with that of forāt “Euphrates”; cf. Monchi-Zadeh, D. 1975: Topographischhistorische Studien zum iranischen Nationalepos (Abhandlungen für die Kunde des Morgenlandes 41, 2). Wiesbaden, p. 8.

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world-power, the Sasanians seriously challenged the Roman Empire and, later, the Byzantine Empire to claim a hegemonic predominance in the Middle East and were successfully able to establish an empire with a stable political centre, as well as an international trading network. Culturally, the Sasanian influence went far beyond its political boundaries, where Jaxartes in the East, Arabia in the South, Georgia and Armenia in the Caucasus and Syria and Egypt in the Near East and Africa was felt. Sasanian art, Middle Persian literature, its world of luxury and etiquette was known and emulated, and its economic reach was felt in all the way to China. Even with the fall of the Sasanian Empire in the seventh century ce, to quote Ehsan Yarshater, “the Persian presence in Islam,” impacted every aspect of life and culture which was a product of earlier Sasanian cultural achievement. Among others, the genre of Pahlavi andarz-literature (anthologies of advice and Life wisdoms regarding proper behaviours) enjoyed considerable attention among the Muslim conquerors. The ʿAbbāsids (750–1258 ce) and their successors adopted the Sasanian congenial models of lifestyle, culture and manners, translated, modified and redacted many of these works into Arabic and later also into New Persian, which gave the birth to the Perso-Arabic adab literature and the Persian handbooks of general etiquette and on political mirrors for princes that combined ethical with political advice. However, the amount of research done on the Sasanian Empire is infinitesimal compared to that of Byzantine Empire. Until the twenty first century there were only three or four survey books of the Sasanian World. Positions for this field of study was almost non-existent, and the number of edited and translated Middle Persian texts was in dire need of attention. Archaeology presented hope and has been more promising, but the political tensions and wars has made Iraq, what is known as the “Heart of Ērānšahr” (Persian del-e īrānšahr)2, and Afghanistan and Balkh, things difficult and the recent political changes in the region, unfortunately makes this hope even more impossible. It is only in the twenty first century that more scholars and tomes are being written on the Sasanians, an important period of Iranian, Near Eastern and World history. The reason for this new interest is varied, but clearly the inclusion of the Sasanian Empire within the temporal field of Late Antiquity / Antiquité Tardive / Spätantike, has brought this civilization into dialogue with that of the Romano-Byzantine World and it is becoming clear that in order to understand the larger picture of the field of late antiquity, knowing both empires is a desideratum. The Sasanians are often regarded among the historians and scholars of the ancient world as the faithful inheritors of the Achaemenids (559–330 bce). Proclaiming Zoroastrianism as the state religion of the empire, they had a great impact on the development of other religions, namely Christianity, Manichaeism, Judaism and Buddhism among others and Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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X Introduction

2

Mustawfī of Qazwīn, Ḥamdallāh 1919: The Geographical Part of the Nuzhat-al-Qulūb. Translated by Guy Le Strange. E. J. W. (Gibb Memorial Trust, XXIII). Leyden, p. 34.

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Introduction XI

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© (Brill’s New Pauly, Supplements I - Volume 3, Historical Atlas of the Ancient World)

Fig. 1. Map of the Sasanian Empire with major cites and cities, c. 300 ce

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XII Introduction thus have made a significant contribution in the emergence and evolution of late antique religions. Most specifically the Christians and Jews played an important role and flourished under the rule of the Sasanians. Whereas the Nestorian Catholicus and the Jewish Exilarch dwelled in the Sasanian capital of Ctesiphon (Ṭīsfūn), both the cities and the neighbouring regions were inhabited by predominantly Christians and Jews. This made Sasanian Iraq to a major centre of Judaism and gave birth to the Babylonian Talmud. They also left also a significant impact on the later established Islamic Empire of the ʿAbbāsids (750–1258 ce) and their successors. Furthermore, the Sasanian Empire was an Asiatic Empire which was not only Westward looking, towards Rome, but had relations with that of the Kushans (putting an end to it in 224 ce), the Guptas in India, nomadic tribes and kingdoms of Central Asia, and also that of China. In a sense the Sasanian Empire was the middle empire of the world empires of late antiquity. It was both powerful, and due to its position, a conduit for exchange of knowledge, ideas and commodities in the Afro-Eurasian world.

© Classical Numismatic Group, Inc.

Fig. 2. Drachm of Ardaxšīr I. ad 223/4–240, 26mm, 4.32 g, 3h, Mint C (Ctesiphon). The recent finds, both of archaeological, material culture and literary nature has made the field of Sasanian Studies more enticing. For these reasons and others, it was decided that a Zeitschrift should be dedicated to this large and one of the long-lasting empires of the Near East, which will be published for the time being annually. We seriously hope that in this way, we can not only better understand the empire of Ērānšahr, but also that of Rome/Byzantium, Central Asia during time, but also the foundation of Islamic Civilization. One does not necessarily need to look at Mecca for the only beginning, as Ctesiphon, close

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Introduction XIII

to Baghdad was an important center for things to come. Thus, Sasanian history and its civilization illuminates our understanding of the history of humanity, both synchronically and diachronically in time and space. Our inaugural issue is characterized by a selection of innovative and fresh researches, done by excellent scholars in the field. We are delighted that so many eminent scholars of the Sasanian Empire and Late Antiquity have responded to our invitation, for which we thank them all very much. Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee Berlin/Irvine, Summer 2021

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A Zoroastrian Cult Scene on Sasanian Stucco Reliefs at Bandiyān (Daregaz, Khorāsān-e Razavī)1 Samra Azarnouche En hommage à l’inspirateur de cet article, Pierfrancesco Callieri, en signe d’estime et d’amitié The excavations at Bandiyān, 2.8 km north-west of Daregaz (also spelled Dargaz or Darreh Gaz) in northern Khorāsān (Khorāsān-e Razavī province) are particularly noteworthy among the most recent archaeological discoveries related to the Sasanian period. The site was discovered accidentally in 1990 during work to flatten the mound that corresponds to Teppe A. Conducted by M. Rahbar, the two first excavation campaigns of 1994 and 1995 revealed remarkable stucco remains that adorned the walls of a reception hall with four columns. Some of the stucco panels have “label inscriptions” that identify the characters and founders of the dastgird. No trace of the ceiling materials was found. The site was therefore destroyed and levelled towards the end of the Sasanian period. A fire chamber was also uncovered, with in its centre the only complete Sasanian fire altar which has come down to us. At the end of eleven excavation campaigns, two other teppes were excavated: Teppe B situated 35 m from the first teppe, and Teppe C at a distance of 100 m. Teppe B contains a circular building 20 m in diameter, identified by Rahbar as a tower of silence, and at Teppe C a palatial complex dated by a coin to the time of Khosrow I and workshops dated to the time of Khosrow II2 were revealed. It is also thanks to the efforts of Rahbar and Ichhto that a museum has been built on the site of Teppe A over the past few years to showcase its remains and attract visitors to the green valley of Daregaz.3 1

2 3

I would like to express my gratitude to Mr Toghrāyī, Director of the Museum of Bandiyān, to Mehdī Rahbar for his encouragement, and to the museum staff, Ms Hedāyatī and Mr Hasan for facilitating my access to the museum on May 7th 2019. I am particularly grateful for the assistance given by the Šojā‛pūr family during my memorable stay in Daregaz. Rahbar 1998; 1376 [1998]; 1999; 1378–1382 [1999–2003]; 2004; 1385 [2007]; 2008; 1389–1390 [2011]. In addition to its agriculture and green landscapes, the region owes its present-day prestige as much to the trade routes that carry goods to and from Turkmenistan as to the aura of Nāder Shāh, a native of the city of Daregaz.

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Samra Azarnouche

Since the first publications concerning this site appeared, significant progress has been made, thanks to excavation campaigns and to comparative studies with other sites. An important discovery is that this site is in some respects perfectly compatible with the archaeological and artistic remains of the Sasanian period in the western and south-western parts of the Iranian plateau, while at the same time belonging to a local culture, the “Abaršahrian” culture, which possessed intrinsic peculiarities that are sometimes difficult to grasp. Five of the most significant and recent advances are examined below, as well as some new avenues for further thought: 1. The identification of Teppe A as a religious complex is no longer questioned (Fig. 1). The fire temple is a sanctuary belonging to the dastgird “landed property,” and not a private chapel, as Rahbar has already pointed out.4 After a synthesising of the attempts at interpretation, P. F. Callieri points out that the building does not have a dominant axis and the complexity of the layout of the spaces leads definitely towards a cultic interpretation.5 According to Callieri, it is probable that the building of Teppe A was intended for the funeral rites of the dastgird, “where the dādgāh in which the sacred fire was lit, was preceded by a ceremonial hall with stucco figurative decorations that celebrated the family’s feats” (ibid., p. 98). The tribute to the deceased (or his ancestors?) was achieved through a narration of his exploits as a fighter and his actions as a Zoroastrian devotee. 2. It is now certain that the name “dastgird”6 (attested in inscription C in the north-western corner of the south-western wall, […] ēn dastgird kard “(...) made this dastgird”7) applies to the three teppes A, B and C, which cover an area of more than four hectares, and not only to the fire complex of Teppe A.8 The complex of buildings must have stretched as far as the protohistoric mound of Yārim Teppe, 600 m to the west.9 This dastgird, its outbuildings and its cultivated fields must have been one of the focal points of the Abāward territory (known since the Parthian period as Apavartikene10). From at least the 6th century ce onwards, Abāward and Sarakhs together formed an independent province called “Saraxs-ud-Abāward,” to which the site of Ak Depe also belonged.11 Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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Rahbar 1389–1390 [2011], p. 168. Callieri 2014, pp. 93–98, 124–125. For a new etymological analysis of the word dastgird, see Panaino’s contribution to the present volume, “Between Semantics and Pragmatics: At the Origin of the Meaning of dastgird. A New Approach to the Problem”. 7 Baššāš Kanzaq 1376 [1997], p. 34; Gignoux 1998, p. 253; Cereti 1398 [2019], pp. 153–154 who considers as does Baššāš Kanzaq that inscriptions C and D should be read separately. 8 Callieri 2014, pp. 54–55. 9 Rahbar 2008, p. 15. 10 The mountainous region around the Mount Apaortenon, where the city of Dara (the exact location of which remains in dispute, perhaps in the region of the Old Khivabad?) was built, offered a natural protection, as well as fertile land, numerous springs and forests and abundant game. The chief town was Apavarktikè (Chaumont 1973, p. 199). 11 Gyselen 2019, p. 193.

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In the beginning of the Sasanian period, they must have been included in the province of Hamag-Abaršahr or Marw.

Fig. 1. Plan of the fire complex of Bandiyān, Teppe A (after Rahbar 2004, p. 22, Fig. 1, with modifications). Among the state administrations located in Saraxs-ud-Abāward, a sealing of mowūh, “magi office,” was found at Ak Depe (ibid.). The regional network was maintained beyond the Sasanian period: the road between Sarakhs and Abāward (or Bāward) and its various stages are documented in the works of geographers of the 9th–10th centuries.12 We should now consider Bandiyān’s strategic situation, which would enable a fresh look at its possible military function (Map 1)13. The dramatic battle scenes on the south-eastern wall of the tetrastyle hall, which are unfortunately incomplete, could thus reveal their full meaning. In its early phase, Bandiyān dates to the 5th century ce, contemporary to the Wall of Gorgān and about 450 km distant from its eastern end. From this end of the wall, a long mountain barrier protects the southern hinterland, becoming more penetrable only at the point where the valley leads to Ashgabat and, further east, where a second 12 For example, in Masālik va Mamālik by al-Istakhrī, Afšār 1347 [1968], p. 223. 13 Its military function was already hypothesized by Daryaee 1389 [2010], based on the military meaning of the word dastgird.

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valley is located that contains Bandiyān. The location of the site, especially in such a sensitive area of the Ērānšahr, could not have been chosen at random. The dastgird is embedded in a fertile and irrigated valley, at the crossroads of the east-west route which follows the eastern extension of the Köppet Dagh mountains and the only road that leads to the other side of the range, towards the road to Marw and the steppes of Central Asia (Fig. 2). According to medieval geographers, this road to Marw had six stations14. It can even be surmised that the site was a staging post for the troops to reach Marw15 from the Wall of Gorgān.16 It has been shown through numismatic sources that Gorgān was an important operation base for Wahram V’s eastern war.17 It should be remembered that the natural resources that the area offers reinforce the value of the location of the site. To the south and south-west of the

© Emmanuel Giraudet, CeRMI, CNRS.

Map 1 valley is a large mountain nature reserve (the present-day “Tandoureh National 14 Afšār 1347 [1968], p. 222. 15 In the Middle Persian Zoroastrian literature, the region of Marw is described as kardār, ‘active’, (Bundahišn 31.8–9, Pakzad 1384 [2005], p. 353) or abzār, ‘strong’ (Pahlavi Vīdēvdād 1.5), and reference is made to its strategic and military role (spāh-rawišnīh “army circulation” is its ahrimanian scourge, and āmār aswārān ānōh weš kunēnd “it is the place where the highest number of cavalrymen is counted”). 16 The Middle Persian text Šahrestānīhā ī Ērānšahr §19–20 alludes to Khosrow I’s status as a builder king and mentions a 180 parasangs wall lined with bastides and bordering 180 castles and dastgird. Given its length, this wall can only refer to the Wall of Gorgān, and in this case, the large rectangular fortifications or campaign bases could correspond to the definition of the dastgird (Azarnouche 2015, p. 237). On the Wall of Gorgān, see Sauer et al. 2013. 17 Schindel 2006, p. 679.

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Fig. 2. Geographical position of Bandiyān in the valley leading to the Turkmenistan border (Google Earth 2020). Park”), famous for its waterfalls and for being inhabited by wildlife such as ibexes and panthers. Thus, the two hunting scenes on the stuccoes at Teppe A (stags on the south-eastern wall, and ibexes, wolves, birds etc. in the drawings on the chests of room E18) would appear to reflect the reality of the landscape. 3. The geographical and administrative proximity to the region of Sarakhs may partly explain the many parallels between the fire complex of Bandiyān and the fire complex at Mele Hairam, despite the different dimensions and the material used (pakhsa at Bandiyān, bricks at Mele Hairam). Some of these parallels that appear to be important are mentioned below. Other features, mainly archaeological in nature, are the subject of an enlightening analysis by Callieri.19 3.1. The decorative programme: identical patterns were used in both buildings, the most remarkable of which is certainly the Heracles knot (on a column in the tetrastyle hall at Bandiyān and on the table-like clay platform covered with a thick layer of stucco, in the largest chamber, IV, at Mele Hairam).20 18 Rahbar 2004, pp. 25–29. 19 Callieri 2014, pp. 89–99. 20 The Heracles knot with “ribbon ends” or “swallow’s tail” at Mele Hairam (Kaim 2002, p. 230, figs. 9–11; Wagner 2002, p. 217) is more similar to specimens found on stucco decoration at Ctesiphon and to some extent to the pattern recently found at Bāzeh Hūr (Labbāf Khānīkī forthcoming), and also on Sasanian seals (Gyselen 2016, pp. 250–251, n° 3–4), than to the pattern at Bandiyān, where the knots are interlocked and alternate with rinceaux of acanthus leaves (Rahbar 2008, p. 27, fig. 7). A precise description of the similar patterns is presented by Kaim (2002, pp. 219–220) who considered this pattern to be a dating criterion (5th ce, see also Wagner 2002, p. 218). Later she proposed

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3.2. The shape of fire recipient support: a clay panel with a depression left for the fire bowl, was placed on the hourglass-shaped altar.21 At Mele Hairam this uppermost slab was destroyed, but it is still in place at Bandiyān, on the only Sasanian fire altar that has survived intact: it consists of three squares of plaster, progressively smaller in size from the top one (125 x 125 x 20 cm) to the bottom one, to support the fire recipient.22 In the prescriptive Zoroastrian texts, clay and plaster are both acceptable as building materials for the ātaxš-gāh “place of fire”, a term that would apply to the base, to the hourglass-shaped shaft, and to the upper stepped table.23 3.3. It is interesting to note that so far, these two sites are the only fire temples to have provided representations of the Zoroastrian cult: on the stucco panels of the southwestern wall in the tetrastyle hall at Bandiyān (see below) and in the niche, and on bone plaques at Mele Hairam.24 Although neither the nature of the supports nor the quality of the execution can be compared, these artefacts remind us that icons and images representing the instruments of the ritual and the cult of fire were displayed for the faithful to observe. 3.4. The junctions between the two main rooms are also comparable; the communication between the reception hall and the fire chamber is never direct.25 At Mele Hairam (Fig. 3), a long clay platform is placed only at 1.30 m from the entrance of the fire chamber (dimensions about 5.20 x 5.10 m).26 At Bandiyān, the tetrastyle hall and the fire chamber (dimensions 4.10 x 4.10 m) are connected by an antechamber (room C), which is accessed by three descending high steps.27 A low wall of 40 cm high prevents entry.28 These features were certainly intended to limit access to the sacred fire. In both cases, the fire would have remained

21 22 23

24 25 26 27 28

an earlier chronology (2nd century for the earliest phase, Kaim 2002, p. 325, and 1st –4th century ce, Kaim 2015, p. 201). One may wonder why the motif appears only on the eastern side of the central podium and only on this particular podium. If the pattern of the Heracles knot retained the apotropaic virtues attributed to it in Byzantine art, its function would have been to separate the sacred space from the profane space, and to strengthen the “filtering” effect of the podium between the fire chamber and the hall. Kaim 2002, p. 221; 2012, p. 136. Rahbar 2008, p. 17. Nērangestān 28.33, Kotwal/Kreyenbroek 2003, pp. 88–89: ātaxš-gāh az gilēn šāyēd ud gačēn šāyēd, hān pad pādyāb bawēd. Ast kē ēdōn gōwēd ay hād nērang-ē pas guft bawēd kū-z dārēn šāyēd. “A seat of the fire (made) of clay is permissible, (one made of) gypsum is also permissible; these can be purified. There is one (commentators) who says thus: ‘A ritual direction has later been given that even a wooden one is permissible.’” More suitable for ritual purifications but also more expensive to produce, stone altars were probably reserved for the most prestigious Fires (as at Kūh-e Khwājeh where a stone fire altar in one piece was discovered, Herzfeld 1941, p. 301, fig. 397, pl. XCIX) Kaim 2015. For other parallels see Callieri 2014, pp. 98–99. The same obstruction devices have been observed at Takht-e Soleymān (Huff 2008, p. 2). Kaim 2002, p. 219. Rahbar 2008, p. 20. Rahbar 1389–1390 [2011], pp. 167, 169, fig. 2.

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visible from the assembly room,29 at least from the area between the four pillars at Bandiyān. The floor of the fire chamber had been raised at Bandiyān30 and the fire altar is off-centre, in exact alignment with the axis of the hall entrance, in order to ensure its visibility.31 3.5. Both sites feature unique but incomplete representations of the fire altar. On a bone plaque from Mele Hairam is depicted a structure that presents

Fig. 3. Plan of the centre part of the fire temple, Mele Hairam (after Kaim 2018, fig. 3). cross-hatching, supporting a large bowl with high blazing flames but no smoke32 (Fig. 4). The arch above it could allude to the dome (gumbad) built on the top of the cruciform chamber, or it could be part of a canopy33 or the support structure, as the annulets depicted on it are very similar to the pattern on the 29 The visibility of the firelight was indeed a rule not to be infringed: it was necessary that the ceremonial fire be visible in the house (ātaxš […] abar ādurgāh […] ō srāyān dīdārīhed “the fire installed on the fire-stand is seen from the rooms,” Wīzīdagīhā ī Zādspram 29.4 (Gignoux/Tafazzoli 1993, pp. 94–95). 30 Rahbar 2004, p. 11. 31 The fire is not visible from the niche, a part of the hall that all evidence (the concentration of inscriptions, the triple vertical decorative strips and characters depicted individually as members of the family of the founders of the dastgird) indicates as the most prominent area of the building. Perhaps the fire was considered to be symbolically “present” because of the stucco representation at the back of the niche, or precisely because it was invisible from this point, it was chosen to be represented on this wall. 32 Smoke is believed to have been an anti-creation that Ahreman has mixed (gumēxt) with fire (Bundahišn 4.27, Pakzad 1384 [2005], pp. 64–65). On the smoky (dūdōmand) and smokeless (adūd) fires, see Dēnkard III.376 (de Menasce 1973, p. 337). On the opposition between light and smoke, see Dēnkard III.403 (ibid., p. 361). 33 At Takht-e Soleymān, in the centre of Room B, in temple 1, there is a square basin made of bricks with a depression at each of the four corners. Huff (2008, p. 3) questions

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Fig. 5. Relief of the fire altar in the niche of room A at Bandiyān (detail) (after Rahbar 1998, p. 244, fig. 7). Fig. 4. Fire holder with a bowl for the sacred fire (bone plaque, 7.20 x 3.60 cm, Mele Hairam, after Kaim 2015, p. 203, fig. 2).

Fig 6. Agate seal depicting the bust of the god Ādur with flames around his head, Bibliothèque Nationale de France C 2971 (after Gyselen 1990, p. 267, pl. II.23). two pillars at either side of the hourglass altar in the Bandiyān stucco (Fig. 5). These pillars, which are no longer present on the altar in room D — although the four points of attachment or post holes are still visible34 — had not only an ornamental function, they were also necessary to support the heavy table with its three layers. On a Sasanian seal depicting the bust of the god Ādur, the spiral columns on either side of the shaft may have played the exact same role (Fig. 6). So did the vertical lines parallel to the shaft that can be seen on the more stylized representations of the altar on seals, for which no explanation has yet been proposed.35 the function of this chamber as a fire chamber and considers the possibility of that the corner posts of a light canopy were fixed in the depressions. 34 The same is true for the larger base under the altar at the Vīgol fire temple (Jāveri 1394 [2015], p. 88). There are four small rectangular depressions, one at each corner of the platform, that could correspond to fixing points. 35 Gyselen 1990, pp. 256, 266, pl. I, no. 3–5, 11, 14–16, 22.

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4. Interesting stylistic parallels have been observed when comparing the Bandiyān stuccos and the recently discovered stuccos at Qal‛eh Dokhtar in Bāzeh Hūr (75 km south-west of Mašhad and 359 km from Daregaz), and Šilgān village (about 25 km north-east of Bandiyān on the Turkmenistan border).36 Among these parallels are identical floral and geometric motifs, decorative patterns, such as meander swastikas, (half-)acanthus, pleated clothing and patterns on borders of saddle blankets, as well as the same method of execution — the plaster is carved by modelling, not moulded. These parallels are believed to exemplify the features of a Khorāsānian iconographic style. Moreover, there is evidence that some fragments belonged to narrative scenes. In contrast, the shape and dimensions of the altars are fairly uniform across Iran, as already noted in many recent discoveries.37 The only notable difference may be that, at Bandiyān and Mele Hairam, the shaft is less flared than on altars found in the Persian Gulf border area or in the Kermanshah province, which again could be indicative of a regional particularity.

Room E The function of the mysterious room E (dimensions 4.4 x 5.15 m) (Fig. 7) and its unparalleled plaster chests has been the subject of heated debate.38 As far as we know, the chests have been found empty and the residues (if any) have not been analysed. Rahbar has discussed his views on many occasions. It is his belief that the chests are ossuaries. This funerary identification appears to be based on the resemblance of these boxes to the shape of Parthian sarcophagi.39 It is supposed that they contained the bones of high-ranking deceased estate owners, but as the building was only occupied for a short period of time, the chests could not have served such a funerary purpose.40 On the other hand, Ph. Gignoux has suggested a practical function of storage, as may be expected in rural property, an opinion that has not gained much support.41 Until irrefutable material evidence is discovered, perhaps new avenues of reflection may be proposed. Room E is closely linked to the fire chamber and its size is almost the same. We could therefore consider a function related to the fire. The shape and elevation of the chests suggest that they may have contained 36 Labbāf Khānikī 2019, and Labbāf Khānikī forthcoming. 37 See for example, Morādī 1388 [2009]; Askarī Čāverdī 1389 [2011]; Rahbar 1394 [2015]; Towfiqiyān 1396 [2017]; Khosravi/Alibaigi/Rashno 2018. 38 Gignoux 2008, Rahbar 1389–1390 [2011]. 39 Rahbar 2008, p. 19; 1389–1390 [2011], pp. 169–170. 40 The problem of ritual purity caused by the proximity of bones to the sacred fire was discussed again with the discovery of human bones in a chest inside a fire temple of the late Sasanian period (6th–7th c. ce) at Palang Gerd (see Khosravi/Alibaigi/Rashno 2018). 41 Gignoux 2008, p. 166.

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Fig. 7. Room E on the left, and the fire chamber at centre, Bandiyān, Teppe A (view from the west) (source: http:// mirasdargaz.blogfa.com/ [Last accessed 11.08.2020]). objects or materials intended to remain protected and removed from danger of contamination. However, the large openings42 indicate that these objects or materials could have been easily deposited as well as easily removed. The compartmentalized spaces also indicate that they possibly did not possess the same rank or function. Cult objects and instruments (Pers. ālāt) come to mind, as these would have needed to be stored somewhere other than the fire room as it is very narrow. A deposit of ashes, as was found at Mele Hairam in room III,43 may also be considered. Given the structural similarities between the two fires complexes, this is a possibility, even though a small quantity of ashes was found in the hall F44 but not in the chests of room E. In the northern wall of the fire chamber at Mele Hairam (room II) a passage leads to another rectangular room (room III, 3.4 x 2.85 m) where a high clay platform housing a clay furnace was installed. Inside, large quantities of white-coloured ashes were deposited. This room communicated with the eastern part of the temple by means of a corridor that was blocked in the last phase of the temple occupation. Huff has proposed the same function for the square brick basin in the small cruciform room B at Takht-e Soleymān (temple 1) where some sand-like material was found.45 The ashes of the sacred Ātaš Wahrām (of room A?) were possibly collected here and cleaned out from time to time through the outlet. For the three fire temples in question, the orientation of this annex room in relation to the fire room is identical.

42 43 44 45

Described by Rahbar 2008, pp. 19, 34, fig. 18. Kaim 2002, pp. 222, 229, figs. 7–8. Rahbar 1389–1390 [2011], p. 168. Huff 2008, p. 3.

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Evidence for the preservation of ashes within the fire temple enclosures is widely found in various written sources46 as well as in archaeological findings.47 The use of ashes (MP. ādurestar, Guj. bhasam) occurred at different moments of the ritual and in different contexts: it was mixed with the solid offering to the fire (zōhr);48 it was part of the composition of the nērangdēn (consecrated bull’s urine) used for the everyday Yasna ritual and also for the nahn and barešnūm purifications;49 for the purification of women who have had a miscarriage (Vīdēvdād V.51); it is also used in the preliminary stage of the Yasna ceremony, during the consecration of the hairs of the sacred white bull.50 Apart from the use by priests, lay people would also have had to handle or move ashes or embers, both in Iran and India. In the modern Parsi praxis, ashes are sometimes applied on the body and taken home. In Iran, members of the Zoroastrian community in Yazd and Kerman may bring the embers or ashes from any fire — that has been consecrated by the recital of the Avesta (taš-i yašte) or that had cooked food for the Gāhāmbār — to the fire-temple so that the ashes could grow cold in the presence of the sacred fire.51 In the Yazd region, there is a hole especially made in the wall of the fire temple called lok-e taš ‘hole for the fire’, or a metal vessel or even a sort of trough in an outer room into which the lay people place the embers. Once a day, the ātašband or ‘fire keeper’ takes up some of the ashes and carries them into the fire sanctuary (Fig. 8). Boyce observed that in one village, Elābād (or Elāhābād, close to Ardakān, Yazd), embers collected from fires consecrated at major ceremonies were placed separately from the others, on a mud-brick shelf near the fire sanctuary.52 The ash-filled container at Mele Hairam (and perhaps one or some of the plaster shafts at Bandiyān?) could have had a function similar to the lok-e taš, if a comparison between two periods and two remote regions may be allowed. Kaim has already pointed out an interesting parallel with modern practice in Šarīfābād:53 In a small room adjoining the domed chamber with a fire altar, there was a construction described as follows by M. Siroux54: 46 According to Strabo (XV.15), Persians had altars in the middle of their pyraetheia, on which there was a great quantity of ashes. Pausanias (2nd c. ce) relates that in Lydia, the Persians had temples in two cities, in each of which there was an inner chamber with an altar bearing a heap of ashes. 47 This included temples in Central Asia such as Kindyk-Tepe (Grenet 2008, p. 31, Mokroborodov 2018, p. 349) and Surkh Kotal B (Schlumberger/Le Berre/Fussman 1983, p. 42–46). 48 The lungs of the sacrificial animal should be inspected: before boiling them, the ashes (litt. “covering”) of the Wahrām Fire (*warr ī ātaxš ī warhrān) should be added to them (Nērangestān 47.29, Kotwal/Kreyenbroek 2003, pp. 210–211). 49 Modi 1922, p. 162, in this case it should be ashes of an Ātaš Wahrām. 50 ibid., p. 250. Two hairs from the tail of the bull are cut and tied on a metallic ring. Before being used in the ritual, the ring and the hairs should be consecrated before the fire and rubbed with the bhasam. 51 Boyce 1966 a, p. 63; 1977, pp. 45, 59. 52 Boyce 1977, pp. 72–74. 53 Kaim 2002, p. 222. 54 Siroux 1938, p. 85.

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Samra Azarnouche On a brickwork cube about 1m high a small clay dome is built, which is pierced laterally with four holes. The interior is completely hollowed and contains a pile of ashes under which the sacred fire slumbers. When rekindled at the time of the ceremonies, the fire is then carried to the altar. The top of this repository (as well as the top of the great hall) has no holes in it, in order to obtain an effective protection against any possible pollution to the fire.

Figs. 8 a and b: The lok-e taš at Dar-e Mehr in Mazra‛eh Kalāntar, Ardakān, Yazd, filled with ashes brought by Zoroastrians during the ceremonies of Ātaš Panjī at the end of the year (photos courtesy of Prof. Farzāneh Goštāsp). In fact, the clay dome described by Siroux has an exact parallel in plaster at Bandiyān (Fig. 9), which was found in the room E, close to the entrance.55 Room E would appear to be the inactive or dormant reflection of room D: when no ceremony was being held, the instruments were stowed away, the ashes stored for future use and the burning embers kept in a low-burning state under a plaster cover. If this assumption is correct, then the fire at Bandiyān would be a non-perennial fire (nē hamēšag-sōz, Mādayān ī Hazār Dādestān 95.16), which fits well with its modest dimensions. The fire would thus have been intended to burn brightly only during the celebrations of the rituals. 5. Considerable progress has also been achieved in the understanding of the ritual architecture by Iranian archaeologists who have made systematic comparisons of the ritual areas in the centres of the best-preserved Sasanian temples.56  It has already been recognized by Rahbar that the T-shaped platform at the western end of the fire chamber in Bandiyān had a ritual function (yazišn-gāh or urwēsgāh). He describes it as a low bench, completely plastered, measuring 55 See description by Rahbar 2004, pp. 13, 30. During my visit in the spring 2019 the object was on display at the entrance to hall A. 56 Morādī 1388 [2009]; Towfiqiyān 1396 [2017]; Khosravi/Alibaigi/Rahbar 2018.

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A Zoroastrian Cult Scene on Sasanian Stucco Reliefs at Bandiyān

10cm high and 50cm in width and extending to the fireplace.57 This space could correspond to the delimitation of the ceremonial area, which is roughly composed of four sections of varying size: 1. the seat of the main priest, the zōt, 2. the table for depositing the instruments (urwēs), 3. the intermediate space (andarag) and finally 4. the fire table (ādošt or ādišt) (Fig. 10). The 9th-century description of Hudēnān-Pēšōbāy Manuščihr Juwān-Jamān enumerates these areas as follows58:

13

Fig. 9. The clay cover found in Room E,

13. ud ān ī yaštārān-gāh which would have been placed on čēōn xwad ast gāh ī zōt ud a cubic support (photo by the author). hamkārān gyāg ī urwēs ud ādošt andaragīhā pāk kardan ud āb ī yōjdahr abar paššixtan The place of the performers of the sacrifice is exactly the place of the zōt and his fellow priests. They should clean the place of urwēs (ritual table), ādošt (table for the fire-stand) and andarag (“in-between space”59) and sprinkle pure water on them. 14. ān ī yazišn abzār abāg xwēš mardōm ī yaštār ud az ān šaš dām ī gētīgīg hōm *bōy ātaxš ud ayōxšust ud āb ud urwar čēōn passazagīhā ō ham burdan The instruments of the sacrifice should be adequately connected60 between the performers themselves and the six material creations (which are) the hōm, the bōy, the fire, the metal, the water and the plant. ān ī sagēn urwēs ud ān ī sang-gačēn hāwan ud abar-hāwan ud tašt ud māhrōypāyagīhā griftan pad yōjdahr āb pādyābēnīdan The stone urwēs, and the stone-plaster mortar and pestle, the cups (or saucers), and the half-moon stand must be seized and purified with pure water.

57 Rahbar 2008, pp. 17, 31, fig. 13. 58 Dādestān ī Dēnīg 47.13–14, Mirfakhraei 1397 [2018], pp. 45, 133, 225. 59 The andarag is the area between the fire-stand and the ritual table which cannot be entered during the celebration of the Yasna (Kotwal/Boyd 1991, p. 132; Nērangestān 65.3–4, Kotwal/Kreyenbroek 2003, p. 277; Rezania 2017, pp. 274–275). 60 This sentence must allude to the ritual connections or paywand that should be maintained between all the items of the ceremony during the ritual (see Kotwal/Boyd 1991, pp. 19–23). These connections are also virtual boundaries that define and structure a sacred perimeter between the components and the performers of a ritual.

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Fig. 10. The sacred precinct (after Kotwal/Boyd 1991, p. 164, n. 8).

Fig. 11. Reconstructed plan of Mil-e Milegeh fire chamber with the platform (after Morādī 1388 [2009], p. 179, with modifications).

It does not appear possible to match exactly the sacrificial areas known from textual sources with the plaster or brick devices of the Sasanian temples, but at least it is certain that the instruments were the same, because the ālāt (cult instruments) depicted at Mele Hairam (on bone plaques) are all already known to us: the mortar and pestle, the māhrūy (half-moon stand), the barsom, the shovel for ashes, and the fire vessel.61 Thus, it is easy to surmise that the plaster ribbed bases on top of the T-shaped platform in the Sasanian temples at Kermānšāh (Šiyān, Mil-e Milegeh and Palang Gerd) and at Vīgol (Kāšān)62 could correspond to (1) the seating-place63 of the zōt (zōt-gāh or zōtdān64); (2) the space facing it would be the urwēs, and (3) the central part (where the plaster covering is interrupted at Bandiyān) would correspond to the andarag (Fig. 11).65

61 Kaim 2005, p. 203–4, fig. 2, 3. 62 See Jāveri 1394 [2015]. 63 Khosravi/Alibaigi/Rahbar 2008 have already proposed the identification of these as seating-places, but royal ones. The argument is based on the information given by alBīrūnī about the small golden throne called *dēn-gāhūg (previously spelled donbekā) placed outside the dome of the Fire Ādurfarrbay in Fārs (Tafazzoli 1988). 64 Nērangestān 60.1–2, Kotwal/Kreyenbroek 2003, pp. 266–267. 65 Several structural concordance elements were identified by Callieri (2014, pp. 90–93) at Mele Hairam, Šiyān, Mil-e Milegeh, Palang Gerd, and Dehqāyed (Borāzjān) fire temples, in particular a low-walled basin placed in the centre of the čahārtāq and connected to the T-shaped platform.

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Room G Another space with a controversial function is the round room (G) (diam. 5.3 m), which is accessed through a small opening 90 cm wide. To the right of the entrance, a bench 0.5 m high (57 x 55 cm) in čineh/pakhsa topped by a stone slab was discovered, as well as shallow pits close by. This room was identified by the excavator as a space of ritual purification, a barešnūm-gāh,66 referring among others to Boyce’s observations related to the modern period.67 Gignoux68 interprets the function of this chamber as a burial deposit, but in both cases the proximity of the fire room raises justified doubts.69 Other cases are known of round rooms included in a construction complex, but no unanimous interpretation has been proposed.70 Two of them are almost contemporaneous with Bandiyān: the round hall of Kanka in the Tashkent oasis (Fig. 12) and that of Kafir Kala in the Vaskhsh valley, Tajikistan

Fig. 12. Kanka, šahrestān III, plan of the « manor » (after Burjakov 1991, pl. LXXXII, fig. 7). 66 67 68 69

Rahbar 2004, p. 14, 1389–1390 [2011], pp. 171–172. Rahbar 2008, pp. 20–21. Gignoux 2008, p. 167. Callieri (2014, pp. 97–98) appears to favour the arguments proposed by Gignoux and suggests that the entire building of the Teppe A could have been intended for the funeral rites of the dastgird. 70 Rahbar (2008, p. 20) mentions the circular structure of the controversial Koj-KrylganKala, which is rather to be compared to Teppe B, despite its much smaller dimensions, rather than to the small round chamber G.

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(Fig. 13).71 On the urban site of Kanka, the first capital of Chāch, a fortified manor is located in šahrestān III, dating to between the 5th and 7th centuries ce. The corridor of the main entrance leads to two rooms, a round one (about 6 m in diameter) and a square one which is a reception room with benches set all around.72

Fig. 13. Kafir Kala, plan of the citadel, earlier phase (after Litvinsky 2009, Fig. 3). At Kafir Kala, for the period II (4–5th c.), a complex of structures is present on the site of the citadel. On the northeast side, there is a rectangular hall (with benches) connected to a round room (diam. 8.20 m) with a domed ceiling.73 In all cases, the round room communicates with a reception room, which could have been used as an antechamber. In the case of room G at Bandiyān, the original height of the walls and the shape of the ceiling are unknown, therefore the orientation of the furniture is the only evidence that remains for speculation. The bench is precisely oriented to the north, which perhaps indicates that the object upon it faced the opposite way, or that it was an object with a front and a back (such 71 These two similar structures were kindly brought to my attention by Frantz Grenet. 72 Burjakov 1991, p. 201–202, pl. LXXXII, fig. 7. 73 Litvinsky 2009.

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as a small statue?). A round room containing the remains of a statue, probably that of Mithridates I, was found only 150 km from Bandiyān, at Old Nisa, the capital of the early Arsacids, where the Round Hall has generated endless discussions.74 The dimensions of the royal buildings of Nisa are of course not comparable to the much more modest buildings at Bandiyān, but perhaps they served as a model, as they were still visible in the 5th century, and the memorial or devotional nature of the spectacular Round Hall could have inspired the founders of the dastgird. The southwest wall of the tetrastyle hall, which faces the entrance, is pierced by two openings: one leads to the fire temple (C), and the other to the so-called “archive” room (B). The stucco panel on the south side of the wall is completely destroyed; the panel in the middle, which is badly damaged, is preserved in its two ends (a sequence of four plants on one side, Fig. 14, and on the other a figure holding a jug against the fire altar, Fig. 15); and finally, the last panel, the best preserved, showing a figure seated on a carpet (or a saddle cloth), followed by another holding a horse with a rope. The last two panels are accompanied by inscriptions E and C-D respectively. In the middle panel, the plants were first identified as lilies, a symbol of the goddess Anāhītā, who was seen as the figure offering a libation and celebrating a ritual within a room where a pleated curtain is hanging75. It is true that these plants appear to be water plants (possibly Acorus calamus, which grows in northern Fig. 14. South-east wall of the tetrastyle hall Iran, especially in the (Room A), left end of the middle panel, Māzandarān),76 and were Bandiyān (photo by the author). probably depicted at the beginning of a new 74 For an overview see Grenet 2015, p. 515sqq. See also the arguments presented by the Italian mission for a memorial and ceremonial interpretation of this building that is unusual in every respect (Lippolis 2006, pp. 182–188). 75 Rahbar 1376 [1997], p. 13, 29; 1998, pp. 220–221; 1999, p. 64; 2008, p. 16. A hypothesis questioned, like practically everything else, by Gignoux (2008, pp. 168–169), but with no proposal of a better interpretation. 76 The flowers usually associated with Anāhītā (or Ābān) are the water lily (MP. nīlōpal, also called ward al-majūs “flower of the Magi” by al-Bīrūnī) or the lotus (Nymphea lotus or Nymphaea alba), while the lily (MP. sōsan) is associated with Hordād and the wealth (see Azarnouche 2013, pp. 151, 160–161). The only existing image of Anāhītā

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sequence to represent the lush irrigated lands of the dastgird and its abundant water supply.77 However, the large gap that separates the two ends of the wall does not allow us to make a direct association between the two scenes.

Fig. 15. South-east wall of the tetrastyle hall (Room A), right end of the middle panel, Bandiyān (photo by the author). From stylistic elements, such as the person’s costume, it appears that the figure with the jug cannot be a woman,78 and that the object of the libation is in fact the shaft of the fire altar, which has the same shape as the plaster shaft behind the southwestern wall, and as the one depicted on the panel of the niche, with some variations. If the stucco panels of Bandiyān present a narrative sequence as has been proposed,79 it is possible that this scene, which is placed just before the entrance to the niche, anticipates of the elaborate scene depicted there: two richly dressed figures, each holding an incense burner and another object (a stick of barsom?), stand on either side of a fire altar with a ribbed shaft placed on its three bases which also support decorated columns. This scene is the climax of the ritual events that would have taken place in the fire temple. pouring water in libation is depicted on a relief in the upper register of the larger vault at Tāq-e Bostān. Holding a jar in her left hand, she pours water towards the base of the pedestal on which the king (Khosrow II) is standing. 77 It should be noted that today Teppe A is located only a few kilometres from the river Darungar, which nearly overflowed after the heavy rains of April 2019. 78 Callieri 2014, p. 123. 79 Ibid., pp. 118–119.

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On either side of the shaft there is a wide ribbon, tied in the middle, which seems to wave in the rhythm of a holy wind (Fig. 5). The floating ribbon is well known in Sasanian art as an unconditional pattern of royal or divine imagery. Besides men, gods or animals, it can be associated with objects to endow them with an animated status, e.g. the investiture ring, the royal bow, the great vault at Tāq-e Bostān and its crescent at the top, and finally, the fire altars. On coins of Ardašīr I, small ribbons are attached at the corner of the fire table that stands on lions’ feet resting on the incense burners, while on coins of later periods (from Šāpuhr I onwards) the ribbons are attached at the middle of the shaft of a simpler altar. They indicate that the fire is sanctified for worship, and the god Ādur, the beloved son of Ahura Mazdā, is embodied in its flames.80 It may be asked whether pouring a liquid on the altar would have had a ritual and narrative meaning or not. In the middle panel, only the sandglass shaft is depicted (without the bases underneath and the tables above), as a pars pro toto, just as the scene with the jug could be a sort of visual synecdoche referring to the preparation of an official ceremony, perhaps held to commemorate the ancestors and founders of the dastgird (again following Callieri’s idea of the memorial and funerary function of the complex). In fact, the purification of the altar is one of the important steps of the Paragṇā, i.e. the preliminaries of the Yasna ceremony performed by the priest to obtain the consecrated ingredients for the Yasna, especially the parahaōma or consecrated drink (Fig. 16). It is probably not the most crucial one, but it marks a turning point in the course of the preliminary ceremonies, or a temporal shift, which could justify its representation in this context. Indeed, Callieri reminds us, using an idea of Richard Brilliant Fig. 16. The chief priest concerning visual narration, how purifying the firestand important temporality was in the (after Kotwal/Boyd grammar of narrative images.81 1991, p. 45, pl. 5). 80 According to the Bundahišn 18.12, the xwarrah of the Fires takes place upon a fire consecrated by libations, sited on the dādgāh (Pakzad 1384 [2005], p. 233). 81 Callieri 2014, p. 119.

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The Yasna should take place during the Hāvan-gāh, the first watch of the day. The zōt enters the purified pāwī (sacred enclosure) and offers sandalwood and frankincense to the fire and chants some dedications to the fire. After an exchange of antiphonal recitation with the rāspī: Turning and facing south, the zōt begins to purify the eastern side of the firestand by pouring water, in one gesture, from the north corner southward, and wiping the firestand with right hand. While doing so he chants the whole Aṣ̌ǝm Vohu prayer, repeating the beginning word Ašǝm to emphasize “righteousness”. Without lifting his right hand from the firestand, he repeats the same prayer and gesture, cleansing the west and north side of the stand while saying Aṣ̌ǝm Vohu, repeating the beginning word.82

This is the final act of purification (ātaxšgāh pad pādyāb be kunēd “[he] purifies the seat of fire”)83 before the zōt returns to his place and begins the dedication of the ceremony and the ceremony itself.84

Fig. 17. Relief on the south-western wall of the niche of room A at Bandiyān (after Rahbar 1998, p. 242, fig. 6). The bōy dādan (giving of incense or sweet-smelling wood to the fire) ceremony performed in an Ātaš Wahrām is also associated with the cleaning of the ādišt85, but in this case the gesture of ‟feeding” the fire would have been enough to indicate this ritual. In any case, because the scene is destroyed in its left part, it 82 Kotwal/Boyd 1991, pp. 87–88. 83 Nērangestān 28.32, Kotwal/Kreyenbroek 2003, pp. 88–89. 84 Precise details of this ritual movement are given in the Persian Rivāyāt : “[…] he should go to the left side of the ādošt, should hold his hand (containing the goblet or water) aloof (so as not to strike the khwān of ādošt), carry it over slowly, and throw water on the surface of the ādošt in such a way that not a single drop of water may fall over the vessel of gomēz. He should then wash the surface of the ādošt” (Dhabhar 1931, p. 366). 85 Kotwal 1985, pp. 365–366, p. 367, n. 1 (Nērang ī ātaxš abrōxtan 2). For lesser fires, Ātaxš Ādurān and Ātaxš ī Dādgāh, this purification process does not take place.

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is difficult to obtain more information from it, and it is unclear why the artist has frozen the image in this particular scene. It could have been intended to act as a time marker (the morning watch?), to indicate a change in sequence. At this precise point, the space also changes in nature because the wall is interrupted by the entrance of the “archive” room (B), and the following frames take us into the niche.86 Not much can be said about the figure seated cross-legged on a carpet, especially since the inscription E that could have identified him still resists decipherment (see postscript) (Fig. 17). Only noticeable is that the motifs of his garment, and those of the carpet (similar to a tamga), are both found in the very last scene on the northeast wall. As for the next frame, the figure who is identified by an incomplete inscription (D. (…)Weh-Šābuhr brād “(…)Weh-Šābuhr, the brother”) is holding in his right hand a double lasso or rope (and not a pearl necklace, as sometimes described).87 Immediately noticeable is that the horse is not harnessed. This may mean that it is not a warhorse, seemingly unbroken and untrained, nor is it a sacrificial horse, since representations of sacrificial horses – known especially from Sogdian art (paintings and ossuaries) – show them harnessed and saddled. Another argument against it being a sacrificial animal is, if the narrative logic is followed, that according to the textual prescriptions, the animal must be brought to the temple at the very beginning of the ceremony (pad bun ī yašt)88 and the start of the ceremony has already been indicated by the purification scene. Horse sacrifices are only mentioned in the Avesta and for the Parthian period. In Zoroastrian alimentary law, the horse is not subject to a food taboo and only the warhorse is not to be killed for consumption.89 However, the usual offering is sheep or goat, not horse.90 For the Sasanian period, we know only of funerary statuettes of horses broken at the neckline, which could have replaced sacrifices to gain the favours of Mihr, the divine judge.91 In the absence of a better reading of the scene, we are left with the conjecture that it could refer to horse breeding within the dastgird estates, or to the presence of royal stud farms in its vicinity.92 It should be recalled that the only other 86 Rahbar 1998, p. 241, pl. VIII. 87 For identical representations of lassoes (e.g. in a bear hunt), see Harper 1981, p. 210, pl. 9, p. 230, pl. 29. 88 Nērangestān 47.12, Kotwal/Kreyenbroek 2003, pp. 202–203. 89 On the symbolism of the horse in ancient and medieval Iran and its augural role see Azarnouche forthcoming. 90 Boyce 1966b, pp. 102–103. 91 Azarnouche forthcoming. 92 Without going so far as to say that the character on this stucco panel is a “whisperer”, we must not forget the importance of the use and control of equine power in the military and courtly spheres. We know that the knowledge of hippiatry and dressage techniques practiced by the Persians in the Sasanian period were recorded in books (ēwēn-nāmag). The texts that have come down to us mention the importance of the castration of stallions, veterinarians assisting the cavalry, horses specially trained for night ambushes, others trained for court

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representation of an unharnessed horse in the Sasanian art of the aristocratic sphere is on the silver plate of the Miho Museum, where a local ruler (possibly Sistanian) embraces the neck of a mare, a portraiture somewhat reminiscent of the famous episode of the capture of Rakhš by Rostam in the Šāhnāmeh.

Conclusion The richness of the dastgird of Bandiyān, the tireless efforts of Mehdī Rahbar to make it known and preserve it, as well as the recent development of the archaeology of Khorāsān, provide us with an opportunity to look again at the various problems of interpretation of the spaces (including in Teppe B and Teppe C, not taken into account here) and the figurative motifs (of the tetrastyle room A and on the plaster chests of room E), thus broadening our perspective. A significant number of factors invite us to no longer look at the case of Bandiyān as unique or isolated, but to place it within a broader administrative, strategic, visual and religious landscape. In many ways, the dastgird, whose foundation is contemporary to the Gorgān Wall, accords perfectly with the Sasanian administrative and military network. As such, it is possible that it was a foundation financed by the state and entrusted to a local family. The most sacred centre of the complex presents striking parallels both in the articulation of the spaces and in the cult equipment (altar and ceremonial platform), with other temples in western Iran, but also with Mele Hairam in Sarakhs. In some aspects, such as the use of visual narrative and the round room, it appears to be closer to Central Asian traditions, while other aspects appear to be local (plaster chests, carved stuccoes, inscriptions incised into stucco93). Another unique feature is the representation of the purification of the fire altar, which I propose to interpret as the phase of the ritual that corresponds to the preliminaries of the Yasna ceremony, and as an indicator of the morning time. After scenes of triumphant hunting and heroic battles, this image must have had a calming effect on the temple visitor, providing a visual, mental, and spiritual preparation for the vision of a breath-taking scene: the solemn representation of the sanctified fire, displayed in the most prominent part of the hall to which only the local elites had access.

etiquette and to accompany the king on his rides, and finally, training (frahanjēnīdan) for the riders and horses before going into battle (Azarnouche/Petitjean forthcoming). 93 For another typical feature in southern Khorāsān, inscriptions incised on pottery, see Dana/Azarnouche/Soroush forthcoming.

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Postscript If the short inscriptions inscribed on the stuccos are “essentially employed to integrate and complete the narration of the stucco panels,”94 as is now generally accepted, it would be necessary to place the inscriptions in the same order as the narrative sequences. If we follow this order from left to right (that is from the south-east wall to the niche in the north-east wall), the first inscription would be E (not A), which is placed just after the entrance to room B. It is also the first inscription of the niche, where all of them are concentrated.95 One of the reasons why the decipherment of inscription E has been so debatable (it has led to a reading of the names of the Hephtalites,96 which is highly improbable as only the letters tl of the supposed tlt are actually visible97), could be a restoration issue: the surface is not level and the stucco pieces overlap a little or have suffered distortion, although I do not think that the fragments were incorrectly placed during the restoration. It is probable that an inscription was not intended for this tiny space between the thigh and the right arm of the seated warrior, as it is also the case for the other inscriptions for which the space was not provided prior to the completion of the decorative programme. On the other hand its ductus is much less elegant and less assured than the following inscriptions, therefore it could be from a different hand (Fig. 18). Stylistic effort and graphic balance can be seen in the script of the inscriptions A to D, e.g. in the grapheme H in ZNH, also in the letter t whose rounded part to the right is linked to the previous letter, e.g. st in dstklty (inscription C), mt in mtry (A and B) and dt in yzdt (inscription B). This joining of the letter t from above is very different from the cursive script, where the connection is made by the vertical bar of the t98. In any case, the author of the inscriptions, even when he chose the monumental Pahlavi script, was familiar with the practice of cursive writing. The same applies to the inscription E (where we see the links aleph/yy+n in line 1 and 3), but the inclination and the shape of the t,99 are very different from the other inscriptions, as are the size of the letters, smaller in E. 94 Cereti 2019, p. 155. On the narrative nature of the stucco panels of Bandiyān see Callieri 2014, pp. 124–125. 95 The four other inscriptions can be read as follows: A. paykar ēn Weh-Mihr-Šābuhr ī Weh-Šābuhr ī Ardaxšīrān brād “This is the image of Weh-Mihr-Šābuhr son of WehŠābuhr, brother of Ardaxšīr”; B. Druwān-Mihr ī Yazad-Šābuhr “Druwān-Mihr son of Yazad-Šābuhr”; C. (…) ēn dastgird kard “… made this estate”; D. (…) Weh-Šābuhr brād “… Weh-Šābuhr the brother” (see Cereti 2019, pp. 152–154). 96 Baššāš Kanzaq (1376 [1997], p. 35) proposed this reading with great caution in order to conform to the context of the 5th century. Response in Gignoux 2008, p. 171. 97 The name is attested in the Bundahišn 33.23, where it is spelled hypt’l’n (Pakzad 1384 [2005], p. 367). 98 see Weber 2008, p. 222. 99 First letter of line 3, read as m by Cereti 2019, p. 154.

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The poor quality of preservation and the contrast with other inscriptions are both insurmountable obstacles to reading. In his attempt, Cereti tries to read a name and two patronymics, (…)Mard-yasn pus Šāh(…) mard-yasn “*Mard-yasn son of Šāh[…] (son) *Mard-yasn”100.

Fig. 18. Inscription E, south-east wall of the tetrastyle hall (Room A), Bandiyān (photo by the author). I am not in a position to make a new proposal for the reading, but a direct examination of the inscription assures me that in the middle of line 2, the letters w/r y h m are certain. In line 3, I find Gignoux’s proposal plausible for the first word TLYN (dō “two”),101 although the final stroke is missing, and the last word, read by Baššāš Kanzaq as ’ywl (ēwar), can in fact be read as y’wl (jār “time, occasion”), which would indicate an action (a military operation or an exploit?) repeated twice (dō jār).102

100 Cereti 2019, pp. 154–155. 101 Gignoux 2008, p. 171. 102 Baššāš Kanzaq (1376 [1997], pp. 34–35.

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Bibliography Afšār, I. (ed.) 1347 [1968]: al-Istakhrī, Abu Ishāq Ibrāhīm: Masālik va Mamālik (Persian Texts Series 9). Tehran. Askarī Čāverdi, A. 1389/2011: “Madāreki az jonub-e fārs dar zamineh-ye ‘āyīn-e takrim-e ātaš dar Irān-e bāstān.” In: MBT 25.1, pp. 27–39. Azarnouche, S. 2013: Husraw ī Kawādān ud Rēdag-ē « Khosrow, fils de Kawād, et un page », texte pehlevi édité et traduit (Cahier de StIr 49). Paris. — 2015: “La geste zoroastrienne de Husraw Ier selon la littérature moyen-perse.” In: Ch. Jullien (ed.): Husraw Ier: Reconstructions d’un règne. Sources et documents. Paris (Cahier de StIr 53), pp. 235 –255. — forthcoming: “Miracles, oracles et augures: essai sur la symbolique du cheval dans l’Iran ancien et médiéval.” In: M. Spruyt/D. Poinsot (eds.): Lecheval, l’ âne et la mule dans les Empires de l’Orient ancien. Des Néoassyriens aux Sassanides. Paris. Azarnouche, S./M. Petitjean forthcoming: “Sasanian Warriors in Context: Historical Commentary on the Chapter on Artēštārān in the Dēnkard (VIII.24).” In: HiMA. Baššāš Kanzaq, R. R. 1376 [1997]: “Qerā’at-e katibeh-hāye Bandiyān-e Dargaz ‛Dasrgerd-e Yazd-Šāpūrān’.” In: GB 1, pp. 33–38. Boyce, M. 1966a: “The Fire-Temples of Kerman.” In: AO 30, pp. 51–72. — 1966b: “Ātaš-Zōhr and Āb-Zōhr.” In: JRAS 3/4, pp. 100–118. — 1977: A Persian Stronghold of Zoroastrianism, based on the Ratanbai Katrak lectures. Oxford. Burjakov, Ju. F. 1991: “À propos de l’histoire de la culture de la région de Tachkent au Ier millénaire av. n. è. et au Ier millénaire de n. è.” In: P. Bernard/F. Grenet (eds.): Histoire et cultes de l’Asie centrale préislamique: Sources écrites et documents archéologiques, Actes du Colloque international du CNRS (Paris, 22–28 novembre 1988). Paris, pp. 197–204. Callieri, P. 2014: Architecture et représentations dans l’Iran sassanide (Cahier de StIr 50). Paris. Cereti, C. G. 1398 [2019]: “Once more on the Bandiān Inscriptions.” In: Y. Morādi (ed.): Āfarīn-Nāmeh. Essays on the Archaeology of Iran in Honour of Mehdi Rahbar. Tehran, pp. 149 –156. Chaumont, M.-L. 1973: “Études d’histoire parthe II. Capitales et résidences des premiers Arsacides (IIIe-Ier s. av. J.-C.).” In: Syria 50, pp. 197–222. Dana, M./S. Azarnouche/M. R. Soroush forthcoming: “Tessons de poterie inscrits en parthe et en moyen-perse: nouveaux spécimens provenant du Khorāsān méridional.” In: StIr. Daryaee, T. 1389 [2010]: “Dastgerd-e Veh-Šāpūr dar Bandiyān.” In: Semiannual Journal of Archaeology, Art, History and Interdisciplinary Studies 2.3, pp. 247–248. De Menasce, J. 1973: Le troisième livre du Dēnkart. Traduit du pehlevi (Travaux de l’Institut d’études iraniennes de l’Université de Paris III, 5; Bibliothèque des œuvres classiques persanes, 4). Paris. Dhabhar, B. N. 1932: The Persian Rivayats of Hormazyar Framarz and others. Bombay [repr. 1999].

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Gignoux, Ph. 1998: “Les inscriptions en moyen-perse de Bandiān.” In: StIr 27, pp. 251–258. — 2008: “Le site de Bandiān revisité.” In: StIr 37, pp. 163–174. Gignoux, Ph./A. Tafazzoli 1993: Anthologie de Zādspram. Édition critique du texte pehlevi traduit et commenté (Cahier de StIr 13). Paris. Grenet, F. 2008: “Mary Boyce’s Legacy for the Archaeologists.” In: BAI 22, pp. 29–46. — 2015: “Histoire et cultures de l’Asie centrale préislamique. Le fait urbain en Asie centrale préislamique: approche diachronique, approche synchronique, I.” In: Cours et travaux du Collège de France. Résumés 2013–2014. Annuaire 114e année, pp. 507–534. Gyselen, R. 1990: “Note de glyptique sassanide: Quelques éléments d’iconographie religieuse.” In: F. Vallat (ed.): Contribution à l’histoire de l’Iran. Mélanges offerts à Jean Perrot. Paris, pp. 253–267. — 2016: “Noeud d’Héraclès, noeuds lunaires et sceaux sassanides.” In: C. Redard (ed.): Des contrées avestiques à Mahabad, via Bisotun. Études offertes en hommage à Pierre Lecoq (Civilisation du Proche-Orient, Série III, Religions et Culture 2). Neuchâtel, pp. 233–259. — 2019: La géographie administrative de l’empire sassanide. Les témoignages épigraphiques en moyen-perse (Res Orientales XXV). Bures-sur-Yvette. Harper, P. O. 1981: Silver Vessels of the Sasanian Period. Vol. I: Royal Imagery. New York. Herzfeld, E. 1941: Iran in the Ancient East. London/New York. Huff, D. 2008: “The Functional Layout of the Fire Sanctuary at Takht-i Sulaimān.” In: D. Kennet/P. Luft (eds.): Current Research in Sasanian Archaeology, Art and History, Proceedings of a Conference Held at Durham University 2001 (BAR International Series 1810). Oxford, pp. 1–13. Jāveri, M. 1394 [2015]: “Ātaškadeh-ye mohavvateh-ye Vīgol va Harāskān.” In: PK 6, pp. 78–97. Kaim, B. 2002: “Un temple de feu sassanide découvert à Mele Hairam, Turkménistan méridional.” In: StIr 31, pp. 215–230. — 2004: “Ancient Fire Temples in the Light of the Discovery at Mele Hairam.” In: IrAnt 39, pp. 323–337. Kaim, B. 2012: “Most Ancient Fire Temples: Wishful Thinking Versus Reality.” In: H. Fahimi/K. Alizadeh (eds): Nāmvarnāneh. Papers in Honour of Massoud Azarnoush. Tehran, pp. 131–138. — 2015: “New Evidence of Zoroastrian Iconography of the Late Parthian Period.” In: IrAnt 51, pp. 201–213. — 2018: “Architecture of Zoroastrian Fire Temples.” In: P. Callieri/A. Rossi (eds.): Civiltà dell’Iran. Passato, presente, futuro. Atti del Convegno Internazionale Roma, 22–23 febbraio 2013. Rome, pp. 115–122. Khosravi, Sh./S. Alibaigi/M. Rahbar 2018: “The Functions of Gypsum Bases in Sasanian Fire Temples: A Different Proposal.” In: IrAnt 53, pp. 267–298. — 2018: “The Ossuary of Palang Gerd Fire Temple: New Evidence of Zoroastrian Funerary Practice during the Sasanian Period in Western Iran, Kermanshah.” In: StIr 47/1, pp. 51–74.

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Kotwal, F. M. 1985: “An Ancient Irani Ritual for Tending the Fire.” In: Papers in Honour of Professor Mary Boyce II (AcIr 25. Deuxième série. Hommages et Opera Minora, Vol. xi). Leiden, pp. 365–370. Kotwal, F. M./J. W. Boyd 1991: A Persian Offering. The Yasna: A Zoroastrian High Liturgy (Cahier de StIr 8). Paris. Kotwal, F. M./Ph. G. Kreyenbroek 2003: The Hērbedestān and Nērangestān, vol. III: Nērangestān, fragard 2 (Cahier de StIr 30). Paris. Labbaf Khaniki, M. 2019: “Motāle‛eh-ye tatbiqī-e gač-borihāye now-yāfteh-ye Qal‛eh Dokhtar-e Bāzeh Hūr va gač-borihāye Bandiyān-e Dargaz.” In: Y. Morādi (ed.): Āfarīn-Nāmeh. Essays on the Archaeology of Iran in Honour of Mehdi Rahbar. Tehran, pp. 271–276. — forthcoming: “The Sasanian Stuccoes of Northeastern Iran: Khorasanian Imagery in Late Antiquity.” In: StIr. Lippolis, C. 2006: “La sala rotonda e l’edificio rosso. Bilancio e prospettive delle attivita della missione italiana a Nisa Vecchia (1990–2005).” In: Topoi 14, pp. 179–206. Mirfakhraei, M. 1397 [2018]: Dādestān ī Dēnīg, part II (pursišn ī 41–92). Tehran. Modi, J. J. 1922: The Religious Ceremonies and Customs of the Parsees. Bombay. Mokroborodov, V. V. 2018: “Kindyktepa: a Temple of the Mid-first Millennium bc in Southern Uzbekistan.” In:  J. Lhuillier/N. Boroffka (eds.): A Millenium of History. The Iron Age in Southern Central Asia (2nd and 1st millenia bc) [Archäologie in Iran und Turan 17]. Berlin, pp. 343–351. Morādī, Y. 1388 [2009]: “Čahār tāqī-e Mīl-e Mīlehgeh, ātaškadeh-yī az dowreh-ye sāsānī.” In: MB 1, pp. 155–183. Pakzad, F. 1384 [2005]: Bundahišn. Zoroastrische Kosmogonie und Kosmologie, Band I: Kritische Edition (Ancient Iranian Studies Series 2). Tehran. Rahbar, M. 1998: “Découverte d’un monument d’époque sassanide à Bandian, Dargaz (Nord Khorassan). Fouilles 1994 et 1995.” In: StIr 27/2, pp. 213–250. Rahbar, M. 1376 [1998]: “Kāvoš-hāye bāstān-šenāsi-ye Bandiyān-e Daregaz.” In: GB 1, pp. 9–32. — 1999: “Découvertes de panneaux de stucs sassanides à Dargaz.” In: Dossiers d’Archéologie 243, pp. 62–65. — 1378–1382 [1999–2003]: “Moʿarefi-ye ādoriyān (niyāyešgāh) makšufeh-ye dowreh-ye sāsāni dar Bandiyān-e Daregaz va barresi-ye moškelāt-e me‛māri-ye in banā.” In: B. Āyatollāhzādeh Shirāzī (ed.): Dovvomīn kongre-ye tārikh-e meʿmāri va šahrsāzī-ye Irān, vol. II. Tehran, pp. 315–341. — 2004: “Le monument sassanide de Bandiān, Dargaz: un temple du feu d’après les dernières découvertes 1996–98.” In: StIr 33/1, pp. 7–30. — 1385 [2007]: “Bandiyān-e Daregaz dar fasl-e yāzdahom-e kāvoš-hāye bāstānšenākhti.” In: GB 17/2, pp. 131–154. — 2008: “The Discovery of a Sasanian Period Fire-temple at Bandiyān, Dargaz.” In: D. Kennet/P. Luft (eds.): Current Research in Sasanian Archaeology, Art and History, Proceedings of a Conference Held at Durham University 2001 (BAR International Series 1810). Oxford, pp. 15–40. — 1389–1390 [2011]: “Ātaškadeh-ye Bandiān-e Daregaz, yek bār-e digar.” In: PBM 4–5, pp. 167–177.

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— 1394 [2015]: “Āyā emāmzādeh-ye rustāy-e Mohammad Vali Beyk yek ātaškadeh ast?” In: Š. Zāre‛ (ed.): Morūrī bar Bāstān-šenāsī-ye Khorāsān. Tehran, pp. 92–98. Rezania, K. 2017: Raumkonzeptionen im früheren Zoroastrismus. Kosmische, kultische und soziale Räume (Göttinger Orientforschungen III. Reihe: Iranica 14). Wiesbaden. Sauer, E. W./H. Omrani Rekavandi/T. J. Wilkinson/J. Nokandeh 2013: Persia’s Imperial Power in Late Antiquity. The Great Wall of Gorgan and Frontier Landscape of Sasanian Iran (British Institute of Persian Studies, Archaeological Monographs Series II). Oxford/Oakville. Schindel, N. 2006: “The Sasanian Eastern Wars in the 5th Century: the Numimatic Evidence.” In: A. Panaino/A. Piras (eds.): Proceedings of the 5th Conference of the Societas Iranologica Europaea held in Ravenna, 6–11 October 2003. Milan, pp. 675–689, pl. LXXXI–II. Schlumberger, D./M. Le Berre/G. Fussman 1983: Surkh Kotal en Bactriane. Vol. I: Les temples : architecture, sculpture, inscriptions (Mémoires de la DAFA 25). Paris. Siroux, M. 1938: “Le temple zoroastrien de Sharifābād.” In: Athār-é Irān III/I, pp. 83–89. Tafazzoli, A. 1988: “The King’s Seat in the Fire-temple.” In: W. Sundermann/F. Vahman (eds.): A Green Leaf. Papers in Honour of J. P. Asmussen (AcIr 28). Leiden, pp. 101–106. Towfiqiyān, H. 1396 [2017]: “Pajouheši dar pāyeh-ye ātašdān-hāye sāsānī-ye nowyāfteh dar savāhel-e khalīj-e fārs.” In: PBI 12, pp. 195–210. Wagner, M. 2002: “Podia with Stucco Decoration from the Temple of Fire at Mele Hairam in southern Turkmenistan.” In: Światowit 4 (45), pp. 215–218. Weber, D. 2008: Berliner Pahlavi-Dokumente: Zeugnisse spätsassanidischer Briefund Rechtskultur aus frühislamischer Zeit (Iranica 15). Wiesbaden.

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Sasanian Rituals and their Continuity in the Avestan Liturgical Manuscripts: the Double Āb-Zōhr of the Dō-Hōmāst* Alberto Cantera & Jaime Martínez-Porro Our knowledge about the performance of Zoroastrian rituals in Sasanian times is very limited. Sources are often undated, or composed in the first centuries after the fall of the Sasanian empire. The oldest and most significant source of information found on the performance of Zoroastrian rituals, the Nērangestān, is a case in point. This treaty is a section of a nask of the Great Avesta or dēn ōšmurišn, the Huspārom. As such, it likely dates back to Sasanian times, since it is unlikely that the arrangement of the 21 nask Great Avesta has been undertaken after the end of the Sasanian era. In fact, the earliest version of the Nērangestān, the Avestan Nērangestān, is likely to go back to earlier times, when Avestan was still a living language. Regardless, these considerations do not necessarily imply that the actual version of the Nērangestān is identical to the section of the Huspārom, that is, to the Sasanian Nērangestān. Evidence suggests, however, that this actual version of the Nērangestān dates back from Sasanian times, or the first decades after the fall of the Sasanian empire. Two of its three fragard are said to be written according to the teachings of two (likely) Sasanian scholars: Pēšagsar and Sōšans. The second fragard is, indeed, written according to the teaching of Sōšans (pad čāštag ī sōšans), the most illustrious Sasanian scholar1 and the most frequently quoted. Also, his follower, Abarg, is a very popular Sasanian scholar. In an earlier study, Cantera suggested that Sōšans lived at the end of the 4th or the first half of the 5th century (Cantera 2004, p. 214). But the work of J. Jany and Sh. Secunda rather points to the 6th century (Jany 2006, pp. 299ff; Secunda 2012, pp. 332f.). Moreover, the introduction to the Hērbadestān mentions explicitly that the composition of the Nērangestān was done according to the teaching (čāstag) of Pēšagsar. A *

1

This article falls within the project “Corpus Avesticum: eine text-kritische Edition der zoroastrischen Rituale in awestischer Sprache” (CA 955/2-2), funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft. The numbering follows the one of the ceremonies as they are displayed at the CAB-website (https://cab.geschkult.fu-berlin.de/). There, an explanation to the numbering is provided (https://cab.geschkult.fu-berlin.de/exist/apps/ cab/files/The_Numbering_in_CAB.pdf). For the frequency of his mentions see Cantera 2020b, pp. 58ff.

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detail confirms that the first fragard was indeed written under his influence. Chapter 10 of the first fragard of the Nērangestān is about the performance of the Drōn Yašt. The Pahlavi Rivāyat accompanying the Dādestān ī Dēnīg includes a very similar chapter on the same subject.2 At its beginning (PRDd 58.1), it is stated that this chapter is written according to the doctrine of Pēšagsar’s followers3 (pad čāštag ī pēšagsarīg) and the content is almost identical with the Nērangestān. This suggests that the first fragard of the Nērangestān was, indeed, written according to the teaching of Pēšagsar. Second, it implies that the instructions for the performance remained the same between the time of composition of the first fragard of the Nērangestān and of the Pahlavi Rivāyat, at least regarding the Drōn Yašt. Third, it suggests that the Nērangestān belongs to an older textual layer than the Pahlavi Rivāyat that quote the disciples of Pēšagsar and not directly the teaching of Pēšagsar itself. Pēšagsar’s date is problematic. He is not mentioned elsewhere in the zand (Cantera 2020b, pp. 54f.). In fact, he does not appear in the zand of the Vīdēvdād but is the most frequently singular scholar mentioned in the related ̌ Zand ī Fragard ī Juddēvdād. This could be due either to a late chronology for Pēšagsar or to the fact that both texts belong to different schools. In any case, he is already mentioned in the Mādagān ī Hazār Dādestān, a work that is likely to date from the first half of the 7th century (Macuch 1993, pp. 9f.). Kotwal and Kreyenbroek identify a few scholars named in the Nērangestān ̌ as post-Sasanian authorities (Rōšn, Wahrāmšād and Juwānǰam) (Kotwal/ Kreyenbroek 1995, p. 18). Their argument is, however, not conclusive. Thus, Rōšn is a scholar frequently mentioned in the Vīdēvdād. Because of the absence of his followers and also of Abarg, Sōšans or Pēšagsar’s followers, we can assume that the composition took place in Sasanian times or not much later, since the followers of these scholars are mentioned only in later works, with the solely exception of the Mādayān ī Hazār Dādestān (Cantera 2020b, 51f.). The absence of any mention of Muslims or Arabs points as well to the end of the Sasanian era. It is obvious that several versions of the Nērangestān ex­isted in Sasanian times, as it was the case for the Vīdēvdād (see the mention of Mēdōmāh’s Vīdēvdād in Šnš 2.12). The fact that each fragard was copied ac­cording to the doctrine of a different scholar strongly reinforces this possibility. Moreover, our version combining to previous ones might also go back to the Sasanian period or shorltly later. Nonetheless, we cannot exlcude that our extant version is not identical with the original one. It seems, in fact, not to be identical with the version of the Nērangestān described by the Dēnkard. Whereas the description in the Dēnkard of the Vīdēvdād Nask agrees quite exactly (with minor differences) Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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2 3

On these two chapters see (Boyce/Kotwal 1971a; 1971b; Jamaspasa 1985; Williams 1990, 2, pp. 94f., 252f.; Kotwal/Kreyenbroek 1995, 59f.). The Nērangestān shares with the rest of the zand the fact that it does not generic designations of the followers of certain schools like the abargīg, mēdōmāhīg or pēšagsarīg (Cantera 2020b, pp. 51f.).

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with the Vīdēvdād as known from the manuscripts, the case of the Nērangestān is a bit more complex, as the analysis by Kotwal and Kreyenbroek has shown (Kotwal/Kreyenbroek 1995, pp. 19ff.; 2003, pp. 25ff.; 2009, pp. 21f.). The description is quite accurate for the first fragard. Large parts of the second fragard also find an exact correspondence in the description of the Dēnkard, but many chapters are not included in the description of the Dēnkard (Chapters 30, 34–5, 39, 46, 49, 50–3, 65) (Kotwal/Kreyenbroek 2003, p. 26). The description of the third fragard agrees mutatis mutandis with the contents of the extant version, but it is very short and significant variations between the third fragard known by the compilers of the Dēnkard and ours might not be excluded. Hence, since the actual version of the Nērangestān got its final arrangement after the end of the Sasanian era, the details of the performance cannot be uncritically assumed as features of the performances in Sasanian times. Nonetheless, we take it for granted that the global picture depicted in the Nērangestān basically presents the rituals and their performance either at the end of the Sasanian era or little after. The possibility that in the early times after the fall of the Sasanian empire drastic changes in the ritual performance took place is rather unlikely. The above mentioned continuity between the chapter about the Drōn Yašt in the Nērangestān and the Pahalvi Rivāyat accompanying the Dādestān ī Dēnīg shows a strong continuity between the time of the Nērangestān and the late part of the 9th century, or the first quarter of the 10th century, the most likely time for the compilation of the Pahlavi Rivāyat (Williams 1990, 1, pp. 8ff.). Furthermore, if some important changes happened in the Zoroastrian ritual system after the fall of the Sasanian empire, they would have most likely led to a simplification or reduction of the ritual complexity, rather than to the development of a new rich and complex system as described in the Nērangestān. We found additional scarce information about the performance of rituals in the Pahlavi literature of the 9th century, but the most comprehensive source on the performance of the Zoroastrian rituals are the liturgical manuscripts. The oldest manuscript, the manuscript K7 copied by Rōstām Mihrābān,4 goes back to the end of the 13th century,5 and the bulk of the Iranian liturgical manuscripts is to be dated between the 17th and the 19th century.6 Since the middle of the 19th century, these manuscripts have been largely overlooked in the Western academic tradition. The standard editions of the Avestan (Westergaard 1852; Geldner 1886) based their text mainly on the exegetical manuscripts. Furthermore, the ritual instructions in Middle Persian and Gujarati that offer the most complete description of the different variants of the Long Liturgy have only been edited in the form of lithography for the use of priests: e.g. the edition by D. Nāmdār (1893) 4 5 6

Facsimile by Christensen 1944. About the date, see Panaino 2013. For an overview of the Iranian and Indian liturgical manuscripts, see Cantera 2014, pp. 93ff.

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with instructions in Pahlavi and the edition by T. D. Anklesaria (1888) with instructions in Gujarati.7 In the Western academic world, only J. Darmesteter has paid attention to the ritual instructions contained in the Indian and Iranian manuscripts. He included in his translation of the Yasna a translation of the ritual instructions as they appear in Anklesaria’s work (1888), as well as the transcription and translation of most of the ritual instructions contained in the manuscript 400 (Pt4). Elsewhere, the liturgical manuscripts have been completely ignored. They have not been either used or made accessible. The number of known Iranian liturgical manuscripts was, indeed, very limited. This situation started to change with a pioneering paper by K. Mazdapour (2008)8 in which several unknown Iranian liturgical manuscripts were brought to light. Since then, a group of scholars working in the entourage of Mazdāpour, such as F. Goštāsb, F. Jahānpour, M. Ghanei, and a series of private collectors like V. Zolfeghari9, J. Mirza and M. Pouladi,10 have engaged in the search of Avestan manuscripts still available in Iran, in public and private collections and priestly families. Since 2012, Cantera has been regularly traveling to Iran to digitize the newly discovered manuscripts for the Avestan Digital Archive.11 A good part of them are already available for consultation (https://ada.geschkult.fu-berlin.de). Cantera has also finished a critical edition of the Pahlavi instructions found in these manuscripts. The instructions of one selected manuscript for each variant of the Long Liturgy have already been published online in the web of the Corpus Avesticum Berolinense.12 Already Darmesteter noticed that there is a strong continuity between the descriptions of the liturgies in the manuscripts and the Nērangestān, despite the many centuries separating both sources (Darmesteter 1892, 1. XCII). Recent work undertaken on the liturgical manuscripts has confirmed it. In addition to some already identified details (Cantera 2014, pp. 192ff.), the most important element suggesting continuity between the liturgical manuscripts and the Nērangestān, that is, between the performances of the Long Liturgy in Sasanian and the Safavid times, can be found when comparing the morning-dawn (ušahina-) ceremonies in chapter 28 of the second fragard of the Nērangestān with the description of the Long Liturgy in the liturgical manuscripts. The Nērangestān chapter describes the first part of the Long Liturgy, from the beginning until the end of the Hōmāst. Its description is 7

Regarding the lithographies of Indian liturgical manuscripts published in India, see Redard/Daruwalla 2021, pp. 2ff. Redard/Daruwalla have further published a transliteration and translation of the instructions contained in Anklesaria’s book. Most of them had been previously translated by J. Darmesteter. 8 For the English version, see Mazdāpour 2012. 9 On his collection, see Cantera 2019. 10 On this collection, see Gholami/Pouladi 2019. 11 From the second trip accompanied by S. Gholami. 12 https://cab.geschkult.fu-berlin.de/exist/apps/cab/ceremony_generator.html [Last accessed 05.08.2021]

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identical to the one of the liturgical manuscripts. Almost all ritual instructions present in the manuscripts find a correspondence in the Nērangestān. At these passages, we find the same or very similar instructions in the liturgical manuscripts and the chapter 28 of the Nērangestān: Y0.1–2, Y0.3, Y0.4, Y0.5, Y0.6–8, Y0.12, Y3.1, Y7.29, Y8.3, VrS11.9, Y11.10, Y11.11, VrS11.30, Y13.9–10, Y15.1, Y22.2, Y24.1, Y25.1, Y26.11, Y27, Y27.6, VrS31.7–15, Y27.9, Y27.10, Y27.11 The exceptions (that is, the instructions missing in the Nērangestān) concern mostly repetitive actions around the barsom (Y0.13, Y2.1, Y28.18), the offerings to the fire (Y0.14, Y1.1 Y3.21, Y4.1, Y4.3, Y4.24, Y7.1, Y7.23–4, Y8.2, Y10.1, Y10.5, Y10.22, Y20.6),13 or the positions of the auxiliary priest (VrS11.31, VrS15.3, VrS24.3, VrS19.0). Only a few nērang that do not describe such repetitive actions are missing in the Nērangestān: Y8.6, Y15.2, Y18.12–13, Y24.12, Y271.2, Y27.4, Y27.5 and Y27.13. Despite the liturgical continuity, the performance underwent changes and innovations along the centuries. Important changes occurred during the first centuries following Sasanian times and before the first manuscripts (end of the 13th century), such as the reduction of the number of liturgies still performed, the simplification of the number of auxiliary priests,14 the redistribution of the priestly functions, the end of animal sacrifices and offerings to the fire that took place in the middle of the liturgy, during the recitation of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti. However, the continuity is strong enough for allowing a critical use of the evidence of the liturgical manuscripts for a better understanding of the Sasanian performances and for completing the picture of these performances in the Nērangestān. In this paper, we present new similarities between the Nērangestān and the liturgical manuscript 2000 (K7a), suggesting continuity in the performance of the Dō-Hōmāst liturgy from Sasanian times to the 13th century. This allows us to better understand some obscure instructions found in the Nērangestān concerning this liturgy. The Dō-Hōmāst is mentioned there several times as one of the most complex variants of the Long Liturgy (N28.21, N72.11). Only the DahHōmāst (N28.21, N72.11), Dwazdah-Hōmāst (N13.4, N28.21, N72.11, N84.9) and the Visperad ī Artōkartin (N28.21, N72.11) are more complex. Furthermore, it includes a short description of the main features of this liturgy in Chapter 84 of the third fragard, almost at the end of the treaty. The Dēnkard does not mention at all the description of the Dō-Hōmāst as part of the contents of the Nērangestān. This is, however, to be expected, because the description of this ceremony is not the subject of this section of the Nērangestān. The topic addressed in the Avestan text is the seven moments of the liturgy during which the barsom is 13 The reason in this case is not only the repetitive character of the actions, but also that, as it seems, the number of offerings to the fire has been considerably increased in the modern Iranian practice. 14 On this problem see now Cantera 2021a.

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spread (Cantera 2014, pp. 211ff.). For the fifth and seventh passages, N84.5 and N84.7 offer a double possibility: the moment of the recitation of the Uštauuaitī or the Spəṇtā.maińiiu Hāiti. For the Sasanian redactor, this alternative applies to the Dō-Hōmāst. It alludes to the variation in the Dō-Hōmāst, at the end of the Āb-zōhr: the recitation of the Uštauuaitī Hāiti replaces the the recitation of the Spəṇtā.maińiiu Hāiti in the other variants of the Long Liturgy (Kotwal/ Kreyenbroek 2009, p. 81, n. 273; Cantera 2014, p. 238; 2020a, p. 15). This gives rise to the addition of a description of the Dō-Hōmāst liturgy. In a recent paper, Cantera has discussed problems relating to the reconstruction of the Dō-Hōmāst liturgy using the data recorded in the Nērangestān and the manuscript 2000 (K7a) (Cantera 2020a). He focused on the central part of the liturgy, the Staōta Yesńiia. Here, he states two important differences regarding the standard Visperad: a repetition of the Hōmāst after the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti and repetitions with small variations of the Vahištōišti Gāϑā and the Airiiaman Išiia. He also mentions the substitution of the Spəṇtā.maińiiu Hāiti with the Uštauuaitī in the Āb-zōhr. Recently, S. Bakhtiarinasab, transliterating the end of the ms. 2000 (K7a) for the Corpus Avesticum Berolinense, got stuck at the instruction prescribing this substitution and was wondering how to index it. At her requirement, we examined again the passage and noticed the instruction was more complex than previously acknowledged. Not only it prescribes the substitution of one Hāiti with another, but it also recommends the performance of a second Āb-zōhr. The fact that the instructions include many abbreviations made their interpretation a difficult exercise, but after an attentive reading the conclusions became obvious. This new feature of the Dō-Hōmāst offers new perspectives on the understanding of this liturgy and some enigmatic indications in the Nērangestān. The instructions run as follows15: [fol. 100r, l. 6] tąm. yazāitəm. tā sar goftan pərəsat̰ . frašaōštrō. agar yazišn dōhōmāst gyāg nəmō. və̄. gāϑā .̊ aṣ̌aoniš. uštā. aɱāi. tā sar aṣ̌ə m. vohū. sē yeŋ́he. me. tā sar aibi.bairištəm. rāspīg wāz gīrišnīh zōt aϑā. ratuš. kardan rāspīg sraošō. iδā. astū. tā uštəməmcit̰ . zōt yaϑā. [fol. 100v] ahū. vairiiō. yō. atrauuaxšō. frame. mrute. rāspīg aϑā. ratuš. tā sar zōt auuaϑāt̰. iδa. tā ištō. ahurəm. mazdąm. aṣ̌auuanəm. aṣ̌ahe. ratūm. yzm. tā ratufritim. yzm. uštauuaitīm. hāitīm. paitiiāpąm. yzm. mat̰.aβsmanąm. tā aŋhuiiat̰ . haca. ušta. ahurəm. mazdąm. yzm. tā bušiiaṇtəmca. dō-bār goftan ātrə̄m . ahurahe. [fol. 101r] mazdā .̊ tā yeŋ́he. hātąm. tā sar yeŋ́he. me. čiyōn nebešt šaš-bār goftan tąm. yazāitəm. tā sar zōt aṣ̌ə m. vohū. se aiβigərəδmahe. apąm. čiyōn nibišt ka gaodiieheca. narš. aṣ̌aonō. goftan aṣ̌aiiadaδąmi. yasnahe. haptaŋhātōiš. ka šnūman wizārd arəzahibiiō. tā-iz ūštawāyt sar tā-iz tąm. yazāitəm. ta sar pərəsat̰ . frašaoštrō... “tąm yazāitəm (= VrS95, Y70) has to be recited to the end (and then) pərəsat̰ frašaōštrō (= VrS96, Y71). If it is a (ceremony) Dō-Hōmāst, at this place (must be recited) nəmō və̄ gāϑā ̊ aṣ̌aoniš uštā aɱāi to the end (= Y43). (Then) aṣ̌əm vohū three times (= VrS93.1) (and) yeŋ́he me until aibi.bairištəm (= VrS93.2a–d). The 15 The Avestan texts are reproduced as they appeared in the manuscript and are not normalized.

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Sasanian Rituals and their Continuity in the Avestan Liturgical Manuscripts 35 rāspīg takes the wāz and the zōt performs the aϑā ratuš (= VrS93.2 wāz grišnīh). The rāspīg (has to recite) sraošō iδā astū until uštəməmcit̰ (= VrS93.3a). (Then) the zōt (has to recite) yaϑā [100v] ahū vairiiō yō atrauuaxšō frāme mrute and the rāspīg (to perform) aϑā ratuš to the end (= VrS93.3 wāz grišnīh). (Then) the zōt (has to recite) auuaϑāt̰ iδa until ištō (= VrS93.3b). (Then the zōt has to recite) ahurəm mazdąm aṣ̌auuanəm aṣ̌ahe ratūm yzm until ratufritim yzm (= VrS93.4) (and then) uštauuaitīm hāitīm paitiiāpąm yzm mat̰.aβsmanąm (~ VrS57.2), (then) until aŋhuiiat̰ haca (= VrS57.3b 9–10) ušta ahurəm mazdąm yzm (= VrS57.4a), (then) until bušiiaṇtəmca (= VrS57.5d 6) (and this) has to be recited twice (= VrS57.6). (Then he has to recite) ātrə̄m ahurahe mazā ̊ (= VrS93.10, ~ VrS57.8) until yeŋ́he hātąm (= VrS93.12, VrS57.10) until the end. (Then) yeŋ́he me has to be recited six times as it is written (= VrS94). (Then) tąm yazāitəm (= VrS95) until the end. (Then) the zōt (has to recite) aṣ̌əm vohū three times (= VrS87.1) aiβigərəδmahe apąm (= VrS87.2) as it is written. When he has recited gaodiieheca narš aṣ̌aonō (= VrS90.17b 7–9), (he has to recite) aṣ̌aiiadaδąmi yasnahe haptaŋhātōiš. When the šnūman has been performed (= VrS92.27–28), (then they have to recite) arəzahibiiō (= VrS92.32) and until the Uštauuaitī (Hāiti) to the end (~ VrS92.33–VrS93) and also until tąm yazāitəm (= VrS95) to the end (and) pərəsat̰ frašaoštrō (= VrS96)...

First, we find the well-known instruction for the recitation of the Uštauuaitī Hāiti instead of the Spəṇtā.maińiiu Hāiti. Then, the manuscript prescribes the performance of the Srōš-barišnīh of VrS93.2–3 that separates the hāiti from its corresponding Visperad karde. In this case, it is, as expected, the karde for the Uštauuaitī Hāiti (instead the one for the Spəṇtā.maińiiu Hāiti that we found in other variants of the Long Liturgy). However, this is an adaptation of the standard karde of the Uštauuaitī Gāϑā (VrS57). On the one hand, the karde designates this hāiti as the uštauuaitī- hāiti- paitiiāpā- (uštauuaitīm haitīm paitiiapąm yazamaide) “the Uštauuaitī Haīti recited in the section about the water” (Cantera 2020, p. 199),16 instead of uštauuaitīm gāϑām aṣ̌a ōnīm aṣ̌ahe ratūm yazamaide of VrS57.2a; on the other hand, it skips the stanza VrS57.7 uštauuaitiiā ̊ gāϑaiiā ̊ haṇdātā yazamaide uštauuaitiiā ̊ gāϑaiiā ̊ yazamaide hāitišca afsmanāca vacasca vacastaštīmca frasraōϑrəmca framarəϑrəmca fragāϑrəmca frāiiaštīmca, since the adaptation of the karde is not praising the whole Uštauuaitī Gāϑā, but just the Uštauuaitī Hāiti. Then, the recitation of the rest of the Āb-zōhr is prescribed until the end of VrS94 (=Y69) and VrS95 (= Y70). Interestingly, for the arrangers of the Dō-Hōmāst the Āb-zōhr extends from VrS87.1 (=Y63.1) until the end of VrS95 (=Y70) and includes thus the Wīsp Yašt. After the end of VrS95 (tąm yazāitəm tā sar), the instruction prescribes the beginning of a whole second Āb-zōhr from VrS87.1 (=Y63.1) until the end of VrS95 (=Y70) (zōt aṣ̌əm vohū sē aiβigərəmahe apąm čīyōn nibišt, i.e. VrS87.1–2 = Y63.1–2). This second Āb-zōhr is recited, as the first one, with the intercalation of the Uštauuaitī Hāiti instead of the Spəṇtā.maińiiu Hāiti and its corresponding karde. There is, however, one significant difference. In the litany aṣ̌aiia daδąmi of 16 For a different interpretation of paitiiāpąm, see Kellens/Redard 2013, p. 22.

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the second Āb-zōhr (~ VrS90 =Y66), at the end of the list of the textual ratu of the Visperad karde, after the recitation of gaōidiieheca narš aṣ̌aōnō (VrS90.17b 9–11), they have to recite aṣ̌aiia daδąmi yasnahe haptaŋhātōiš (ka gaodiieheca narš aṣ̌aonō guftan aṣ̌aiia daδąmi yasnahe haptaŋhātōiš). This text does not find any correspondence in other variants of the Long Liturgy at this position, but the instruction is quite clear: in the litany of the second Āb-zōhr, the list of the textual ratu is extended through a new mention of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti. The Nērangestān comes to our help for understanding this instruction. In a recent paper about the Dō-Hōmāst, Cantera, in his recent paper (2020a, p. 17), drew attention to a similar instruction found in the Nērangestān (N84.13), but this time for the first litany (āiiese yešti) of the second Hōmāst, performed after the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti: haomanąm ud hōmāst †rawāg tā † gaodiieheca17 narš aṣ̌aonō āiiese ẏešti ẏasnahe haptaŋhātōiš āiiese ẏešti vīspaēibiiō aēibiiō ratubiiō (He should recite) haomanąm (=VrS24.3a 1) and the continuation of the Hōmāst until gaodiieheca narš aṣ̌aonō18 (= VrS25.19b 8–10) (and) āiiese ẏešti ẏasnahe haptaŋhātōiš (and) āiiese ẏešti vīspaēibiiō aēibiiō ratubiiō (VrS25.20a 1–5).19

In the litanies of the Hōmāst that follows the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti, an additional mention of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti at the end of the list of the textual ratu is recited. The Nērangestān mentions it only in the first litany, because there is no need to repeat the same instruction again for the litany āuuaēδaiiamahi, since the sequence at this point is always identical to the one of the litany āiiese yešti. Accordingly, we can assume here, as well in the litany āuuaēδaiiamahi, a similar extension. The text corresponding to VrS27.33 would be āat̰ dīš āuuaēδaiiamahi hadišaheca vāstrauuatō vāstrō.bərətaheca gauue huδā ŋ̊ h ́ e gaōidiieheca narš aṣ̌aōnō yasnāica vaɱāica xšnaōϑrāica frasastaiiaēca āat̰ dīš āuuaēδaiiamahi yasnahe haptaŋhātōiš yasnāica vaµāica xšnaōϑrāica frasastaiiaēca. Since the litany yazamaide does not include the Visperad extension of the litany, no addition is to be expected. As Cantera (2020c, pp. 202ff.) shows, the litany aṣ̌aiia daδąmi of the Ābzōhr is the displaced final litany of the series of litanies of the Hōmāst. According to ms. 2000 (K7a), the addition of a second mention of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti does not take place in the first Āb-zōhr of the Dō-Hōmāst, but it does in the second one. The Nērangestān also mentions the addition only for the litanies of 17 HJ gāidiiaheca. 18 Kotwal/Kreyenbroek mistakenly separated the Avestan text as follows: gaodaiieheca narš aṣ̌aonō āiiese ẏešti; ẏasnahe haptaŋhātōiš āiiese ẏešti; vīspaēibiiō aēibiiō ratubiiō. Kotwal/Kreyenbroek 2009, p. 82. 19 Cantera (2020a, p. 14) wrongly identified this passage with VrS25.39a. The Nērangestān indicates without any doubt that the addition is placed at the very end of the list of the textual ratu and immediately before the mention of the 33 ratu pariš.hāuuani. Accordingly, the doubts expressed by Cantera about the position of the addition in the litany are unfounded.

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the second Hōmāst, not the first one.20 This is not accidental. The litany aṣ̌aiia daδąmi of the first Āb-zōhr (VrS90 ~ Y66) completes the series of litanies of the first Hōmāst (VrS25, 27, 28 ~ Y22, 24, 25) and accordingly, the addition of the second mention of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti is not expected. Conversely, because the litanies of the second Hōmāst include this additional mention, so does the litany of the second Āb-zōhr. The combination of the short remark in the Nērangestān about a textual addition in the first litany of the second Hōmāst with the information in ms. 2000 (K7a) about a similar addition allows us to understand the structure of this ceremony. Its specific feature is the performance of two Hōmāst to produce enough haōma for a double libation to the waters and the barsom at the end of the ceremony. The haōma prepared in the first, standard Hōmāst — whose preparation is concluded with additional pressing during the Ahunauuaitī Gāϑā (Cantera 2020c, pp. 267ff.) — is poured on the barsom and the waters during the first standard Āb-zōhr. In turn, the haōma prepared after the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti during the second Hōmāst, exclusive of the Dō-Hōmāst liturgy, is used for the additional libations to the barsom and the waters during the second Āb-zōhr, also limited to this liturgy. This correlation is marked not only ritually but also textually, through the addition of the second mention of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti. For the preparation of both pressings two different sets of instruments were needed, at least two different saucers (skūrag), but probably also two mortars and pestles. Interestingly, the bone plaque of Mele Hairam depicts not one, but two mortars and pestles. B. Kaim (2015, pp. 203ff.) connects this double representation of the mortar with the frequent use of the dual of hāuuana- in the Avestan texts. This is, however, better explained, as usually done, as designating “mortar and pestle” (AirWb 1786). The image might rather represent the ritual instruments for a complex liturgy like the Dō-Hōmāst. The offerings to the fire and the waters at the end of the liturgy are gaining increasing relevance in our understanding of the Long Liturgy. The invigoration of the ritual fire and water, before they return to their “profane” state to promote life in the world, is now considered as (one of) the main goals of the Long Liturgy (Cantera 2021b). This focus on the water and the fire ceremonies at the end of the liturgy might even have played a role in the abolition of the animal sacrifice in the middle of the liturgy.21 The meat offering to the fire during the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti was still performed at the time of the extant version of the Nērangestān, but there is no mention of its performance in any of the extant liturgical manuscripts. Accordingly, this enigmatic, but fundamental change in the performance of the Long Liturgy took place at some point between the end of Sasanian times and the 20 The same section in the first litany is abbreviated (aṣ̌aiia daδąmi ratauuō maińiiauuanąm [VrS90.9a 1–4] tā vispaēibiiō aēibiiō ratubiiō [VrS90.17a 1–5]) with no indication about the addition. 21 For a recent analysis of the old problem of the animal sacrifice and its disappearance from the Long Liturgy with abundant older literature, see Panaino 2017; 2020.

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end of the 13th century. In his recent analysis about animal sacrifice in the Long Liturgy, A. Panaino states that “we should try to find a solution in the framework of an internal evolution properly developed inside the liturgical history of the Zoroastrian tradition” (Panaino 2020, p. 161) instead of recurring to economic or contextual arguments.22 We fully agree with Panaino’s view and consider that the focus put on the fire and water ceremonies is one of the elements that have to be considered in this context. In conclusion, we have demonstrated that the combination of the evidences found in the Nērangestān and in one single liturgical manuscript of the 13th century allows us to reconstruct the cursus of one of the most solemn liturgies celebrated during Sasanian times. Furthermore, it provides us with new data for our understanding of the Long Liturgy’s structure, goals and evolution. This emerging line of investigation reveals with more detail the complexity and refinement of the Zoroastrian ritual system in its totality. The rituals described in the manuscripts, which are mostly still performed today, are the remainders of a rich system that can only have reached its completion during Antiquity, when Avestan was still a living language. This system continued to flourish in Sasanian times and has endured throughout the centuries, displaying an ever-astonishing vitality despite the passing of time and the adversities.

Bibliography Anklesaria, T. D. 1888: Avesta. The Sacred Book of the Parsis, Part 1. Yasna bâ Nîrang. Bombay. Boyce, M./F. M. Kotwal 1971a: “Zoroastrian Bāj and Drōn I’.” In: BSOAS 34/1, pp. 56–73. — 1971b: “Zoroastrian Bāj and Drōn II.” In: BSOAS 34/2, pp. 298–313. Cantera, A. 2004: Studien zur Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Avesta. Wiesbaden. — 2014: Vers une Édition de la Liturgie Longue Zoroastrienne: Pensées et Travaux Préliminaires (Cahier de StIr 51). Paris. — 2019: “The Contribution to a New Edition of the Avestan Texts Made by the Manuscript 4010 and Others in the Vahid Zolfeghari Collection.” In: A. Cantera/J. Martínez Porro/V. Zolfeghari (eds.): The Liturgical Widēwdād Manuscript 4010 (Ave 977/978) [Avestan Manuscripts in Iran 2]. Girona, pp. 1–15. — 2020a: “A Brief Note on the Possibilities and Limitations Involved in Reconstructing the Historical Performances of the Avestan Liturgies: The Case of the DōHōmāst.” In: EIT 4, pp. 7–28.

22 G. König (2018, pp. 37ff.) also looks for internal reasons to explain the beginning of this process. He sees its origin in the different way the haōma-juice is used in the Vedic and Avestan liturgies, especially that fact that the juice is never offered to the fire in Zoroastrian liturgy. For a discussion on the problem of the offerings of juice to the fire, see Cantera 2021b.

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— 2020b: “Ast kē ēdōn gōwēd : Les opinions divergentes et la prise des décisions doctrinales dans le Zoroastrisme Sassanide et post-Sassanide.” In: F. Ruani/M. Timuş (eds.): Qunad Les Dualistes Polémiquaient: Zoroastriens et Manichéens (Orient & Méditerranée 34). Leuven, pp. 31–64. — 2020c: “Litanies and Rituals. The Structure and Position of the Long Liturgy within the Zoroastrian Ritual System.” In: C. Redard/J. J. Ferrer Losilla/H. Moein/Ph. Swennen (eds.): Aux sources des liturgies indo-iraniennes. Liège, pp. 195–282. — 2021a: “The Sraōšāuuarəza-Priest and the Usage of the Srōš-Barišnīh in the Greater Performance of the Long Liturgy.” In: JRAS 31, 3, pp. 479–514. — 2021b: “Avestan Texts in Context (2): The Nērang ī Ātaxš Abrōxtan and the ‘Eternal Fire.’” In: Dabir 8, pp. 7–34. Christensen, A. 1944: Selections from codices K7 and K25 (Visperad and Frahang i Pahlavīk) and tracings of the Avesta codex K1. Copenhagen. Darmesteter, J. 1892: Le Zend-Avesta. 3 vols. Paris. Geldner, K. F. 1886: Avesta. The Sacred Books of the Parsis. Stuttgart. Gholami, S./M. Pouladi 2019: “Colophons and Marginal Notes of the Avestan Manuscripts of the Pouladi’s Collection in Yazd.” In: IrSt 52, pp. 3–59. JamaspAsa, K. 1985: “On the Drōn in Zoroastrianism.” In: Papers in Honour of Professor Mary Boyce (AcIr 24/1), pp. 335–356. Jany, J. 2006: “The Jurisprudence of the Sasanian Sages.” In: JA 294, pp. 291–323. Kaim, B. 2015: “New evidence of Zoroastrian iconography of the late Parthian period.” In: IrAnt 51, pp. 201–213 Kellens, J./C. Redard 2013: Études Avestiques et Mazdéennes, vol. 5. La liquidation du sacrifice (Y62 à 72) [Persika 18]. Paris. Kotwal, F. M./G. Kreyenbroek 1995: The Hērbedestān and Nērangestān. Volume II: Nērangestān, Fragard 1. (Cahier de StIr 16). Paris. — 2003: The Hērbedestān and Nērangestān. Volume III: Nērangestān, Fragard 2. (Cahier de StIr 30). Paris. — 2009: The Hērbedestān and Nērangestān. Volume IV: Nērangestān, Fragard 3 (Cahier de StIr 38). Paris. — Macuch, M. 1993: Rechtskasuistik und Gerichtspraxis zu Beginn des Siebenten Jahrhunderts in Iran. Die Rechtsammlung des Farroḫmard i Wahrāmān (Iranica 1). Wiesbaden. Mazdāpour, K. 2008: “Čand Dastnewis-e Nouyāfte-ye Awestā [Some Newly Found Avestan Manuscripts].” In: NIB 8, pp. 3–19. — 2012: “Twelve Newly Found Avestan Manuscripts.” In: A. Cantera (ed.): The Transmission of the Avesta. Wiesbaden, pp. 165–72. Nāmdār, D. 1893: Yašt u Nirang. Mumbai. Panaino, A. 2013: “La datazione del ‘più antico’ colophon avestico e altre questioni di cronologia nella tradizione manoscritta mazdaica.” In: A. Agud/A. Cantera/A. Falero/R. el Hour/M. A. Mandzano/R. Muñoz/E. Yildiz (eds.): Séptimo centenario de los estudios orientales en Salamanca. Salamanca, pp. 611–40. — 2017: “Avestico Rec. Pasuuāzah-. Vecchie e nuove considerazioni a proposito dell’immolazione animale nella ritualistica Indo-Iranica.” In: A. Crisanti/C.

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Pieruccini/Ch. Policardi/P. M. Rossi (eds.): Anantaratnaprabhava. Studi in onore di Giuliano Boccali. Milano, pp. 137–152. — 2020: “aētās̊ ə.tē. ātarə zaoϑrā.̊ On the Mazdean Animal and Symbolic Sacrifices: Their Problems, Timing and Restrictions.” In: C. Redard/J. J. Ferrer Losilla/H. Moein (eds.): Aux sources des liturgies indo-iraniennes (Collection Religion 10). Liége. Redard, C./ K. Daruwalla 2021: The Gujarati Ritual Directions of the Paragnā, Yasna and Visperad Ceremonies. Transcription, Translation and Glossary of Anklesaria 1888 (Corpus Avesticum 2). Leiden. Secunda, S. 2012: “On the Age of the Zoroastrian Authorities of the Zand.” In: IrAnt 47, pp. 317–349. Westergaard, N. L. 1852: Zendavesta, or The Religious Books of the Zoroastrians. Copenhagen. Williams, A. V. 1990: The Pahlavi Rivāyat Accompanying the Dādestān ī Dēnīg. Part I: Transliteration, Transcription and Glossary. Part II: Translation, Commentary and Pahlavi Text. (Historisk-Filosofiske Meddelelser 60.1–2). Copenhagen.

Online Sources Corpus Avesticum Berolinense: https://cab.geschkult.fu-berlin.de Avestan Digital Archive: https://ada.geschkult.fu-berlin.de

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In Search of Lost Time: The Fratarakās and the Genealogy of Sasanian Ancestry Touraj Daryaee There has been much discussion in regards to Sasanian ancestry and their connections to past kingdoms and dynasties. Our sources, for the Sasanian view of the past, both internal (Iranian) and external (Roman), are vague. Hence, there are various suggestions as to who the Sasanian’s “ancestors,” or ahēnagān, may be.1 The issue at hand has been to understand whether the Sasanians claimed ancestry to the Achaemenids, or whether they chose an all-together different genealogy, i.e., the Kayānids.2 In this essay I would like to suggest another possibility. In surveying the internal evidence of Persis, we can establish connections between the dynasts of the post-Alexandrian period and the rise of the house of Sāsān. I argue that the house of Sāsān was firmly entrenched in the history of the province of Persis, and its knowledge of the Achaemenids was somewhat vague.3 Knowledge of post-Achaemenid Persis came to the Sasanians in the guise of the Fratarakās, who I contend were well-known by the Sasanians who chose this connection. I would also suggest that both the Achaemenid and the Kayānīd tradition only became used as a firm ideological tool in later Sasanian history. In fact, the connection between the Fratarakās and the kings of Persis was far more important and consequential for early Sasanian memory.4 The period when Seleukos I established his capital in Babylonia in 323 bce, to the coming of the family of Sāsān to power at the beginning of the third century ce, has only recently been understood. J. Wiesehöfer’s important study of what is called the “Dark Ages,” of Persis until the domination of the Arsacids on the Iranian Plateau, has cleared much of our misunderstandings and corrected the old studies.5 Between Seleukos I and Ardaxšīr I, Persis history can be divided into two periods: I: the Fratarakā governorship/rule; and II: the Kings of Persis rule. While the Seleucids controlled the province, they allowed a group under 1 2 3 4 5

Huyse 1999, p. 43. This debate has produced a large bibliography, see Kettenhofen 1984, 2002; Wiesehöfer 1985, 1986, 2005; Daryaee 1995, 2006; Huyse 2002; Shayegan 2011. Yarshater 1971, p. 519; Schoeler 1998, p. 338. Shahbazi 2001, pp. 61–74 opted for Achaemenid memory for early Sasanian history. Wiesehöfer 1994.

Sasanian Studies | Sasanidische Studien. Vol. I (2022). Ed. by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee doi: 10.13173/SSt.1.041

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the name of the Fratarakās to control the affairs of Persis in the third, and at the end of the second century bce. Although Fratarakā relation with their Seleucid overlords is a matter of debate, it is generally thought that they represented the Macedonian rulers of the Iranian Plateau.6 The notable exception is Wahbarz/ Oborzos,7 at the turn of the second century bce, who took the title of kāren/ karanos and minted coins depicting the killing of a Macedonians/Seleucids, which signaled a break from their otherwise “peaceful” coexistence.8

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Fig 1: Fratarakā Coin of Wahbarz (3rd century bce) The exact sequence of the chronology of the Fratarakā is in some dispute, starting with D. Sellwood,9 M. Alram10 and J. Wiesehöfer.11 As we shall see, there have been modifications to the order of these Fratarakās by V. Sarkhosh Curtis,12 and by Klose/Müseler,13 Engels14 and most recently by Gholami.15 While some follow the earlier dating, connecting the Fratarakās to the beginning of Seleucid rule, others suggest a late dating. All of these matters have been succinctly discussed by S. Plischke, who presents the new sequence for the end of the third century bce with the following order: I. Ardaxšīr; II. Vahbarz; III. Baydād; IV. Vādfradād I; and V. Vādfradād II.16 It is believed that 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

Strootman 2015. For Wahbarz’s coin, see Alram 1987, pp. 147–155. For kārn < *kārāna- see Alram 1987, p. 148; Shayegan 2005 [2009], p. 171. Sellwood 1983, pp. 302–306. Alram 1986, pp. 162–187. Wiesehöfer 1994. Sarkhosh Curtis 2010, pp. 379–394. Klose/Müseler 2008. Engels 2017, pp. 247–296. The study is based on a hoard of 305 Fratarakā coins, see Gholami 2020, pp. 129–156. Plischke 2014, pp. 298–306.

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Vādfradād II’s coins were minted for a sub-king, having his allegiance to the Arsacid kings, after the defeat of Demetrius II.17 By the time of Vādfradād II (ca. 140 bce), the Arsacids were in control of Persis but allowed this Fratarakā to mint coins.18

© Classical Numismatic Group, Inc.

Fig 2. Fratarakā Coin of Vādfradād I (3rd century bce) Although the meaning of the Fratarakā is not consequential, it is instructive to briefly discuss the matter. P. O. Skjævrø suggests to take the title as “head,” “prior,” “superior,” “first,” with the legend on the coins to be read prtrk’ ZY ’LHY’ as “ahead of/outstanding among gods.”19 There were earlier suggestions, such as that of W. B. Hening, followed by H. Humbach, who took the legend to mean “the governor who is lord.”20 Wiesehöfer has also translated the legend as “Fratarakā (governor) of the Lords.”21 The most recent suggestion is by A. Panaino who takes the title to mean “the one (set) ahead (of others) of = by the gods.”22 But we should ask who are the Fratarakā referring to as the ‘lh’ / baγān? Are they stating that they are the governors of Ahuramazdā,23 or baγān is to be understood as a plural for Majesty (pluralis maiestatis),24 referring to kings to whom the Fratarakās were subjects (Seleucids), or to the Achaemenids? I am of the opinion that the Fratarakās, through the Hellenistic tradition, may have deified the Achaemenids, hence claiming power through the builders of 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

Wiesehöfer 1994, p. 129; Plischke 2014, p. 312. Wiesehöfer 2017, p. 2. Skjævrø 1997, p. 102. Humbach 1974, p. 238. Wiesehöfer 2017, p. 1. Panaino 2003, p. 271. Ito 1976, p. 51. Humbach 1988, p. 102.

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Persepolis.25 A. Panaino believes that we do not have compelling evidence showing that the Fratarakās became divine, nor claimed divine descent, after the fall of the Achaemenid dynasty.26 It is important to note that the palace complex of the Fratarākas, next to Persepolis, certainly suggests a reverence for those who built Persepolis (Parseh),27 and the artistic remains are indicative of this connection.28 The answer to this question is not easy, but for many it stands to reason to exclude the Seleucids as a point of reference for such veneration by the Fratarakās. Rather, one must either choose between the Achaemenids, who may have become deified as rulers, via the Hellenistic tradition, or revering Ahuramazdā,29 who may be seen on their coins hovering above Persepolis, or Ka’be-ye Zardošt, or over that of the Fratarakā palace.30 The question is what of this past memory resonated with the early Sasanian rulers? Whose heritage and history did the early Sasanians imagined to be continuing as kings of Ērānšahr? In the late Sasanian historical tradition there is some important information that gives us a glimpse into the memory of the past. In a chapter of the Bundahišn discussing the “historical” chronology of Ērānšahr and the calamities which befell it, we find the mention of the rule of Wahman, a descendant of Kay Goštāsp. It was during his rule that there seemed to be chaos in Ērānšahr and there was civil war. The text states that after all legitimate male heirs had been killed, a woman by the name of Homāy, the daughter of Wahman, became the ruler.31 The narrative mentions the king, Dārāy ī Dārāyān, who was presumed to be Darius III, who was defeated by “Alexander the Roman.” Alexander then burnt the sacred books of the Zoroastrians (Avesta) and sent a copy of them to Hrōm “Rome.”32 The Arsacids are briefly mentioned, then the focus shifts to Ardaxšīr I, the founder of the Sasanian dynasty, and the rest of the succeeding Sasanian kings.33 Ardaxšīr I, whose legitimacy may have been questioned at the time according to the Nāme-ye Tansar and Dēnkard IV,34 needed a solid genealogy. Ardaxšīr I’s genealogy is given in the following manner in a late Middle Persian epic romance (Kārnāmag ī Ardaxšīr ī Pābagān VI.18–19): 25 26 27 28 29 30 31

Daryaee 2008. Panaino 2003. Mousvi 2012. Callieri 2011, p. 196. Jacobs 1987, pp. 242–243. Genito 2012, p. 190. This scenario is echoed in the late Sasanian period: when all the male heirs were killed by Kawād II, his sister, Queen Bōrān took the throne. Agostini/Thrope 2020, p. 173. 32 The mention of Rome rather than Greece should tell us that we are dealing with Sasanian historiography, where past events are placed in the political context of Late Antiquity. This of course also demonstrates the static view of history of the Sasanians, perhaps accepting Roman propaganda that they were the continuation of the Greeks. Again the invasion of the Persian Empire by foreign enemies and the destruction of the sacred text and religion appear to be cyclical and the Sasanians recorded this. 33 Bahār 1375 [1996], p. 184–185. 34 For the Dēnkard IV, see Cereti 1994–1995, pp. 107–129; Adhami 2003, pp. 223–230.

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ardaxšīr ī kay ī pābagān ī az tohmag ī sāsān ud nāf ī dārāy šāh35 Ardaxšīr, the Kayānid, son of Pābag from the parentage of Sāsān and from the lineage of King Dārā.

The array of titulature and genealogical connections certainly reflects a late Sasanian perspective on ancestry. Here Ardaxšīr is known as a Kayānid ruler, corresponding with the late Sasanian preoccupation with the Kayānid dynasty.36 But, we also see that King Dārā is brought forth as an ancestor. What is important is that in Middle Persian texts another “Ardxašīr” exists, who precedes Ardaxšīr ī Pābagān. He is recalled in this fashion (Zand ī Wahman Yasn III.25): …xwadāyīh ī ardaxšīr ī kay kē wahman ī spandyādān xwānīhēd kē dēw az mardōmān judāg kunēd be pālāyēd hamāg gēhān dēn rawāg kunēd ...the rulership of Ardašīr, the Kayānid who will be called Wahman the son of Spandiyād, who will separate the demons from people, he will purify the whole world, (and) will make the religion current.37

It has been suggested that Ardaxšīr ī Kay is to be identified with the Achaemenid king of kings, Artaxerxes II,38 which has important implications for Sasanian historical memory of the past. This is significant because Artaxerxes II is associated with the establishment of the cult of Anāhīd in the Persian Empire.39 The Sasanians themselves were connected with the Anāhīd fire-temple, which was probably established by the Achaemenid king of kings. This center became the focal point of Persian warriors, and under the control of the Sasanians, a major center of anti-Arsacid activity.40 I would like to propose that it is possible to see in Ardaxšīr ī Kay of the Zoroastrian sources another Ardaxšīr and not the Achaemenid Artaxerxes. I believe that the Middle Persian texts are suggesting the first Fratarakā ruler. Recent studies on the sequence of the Fratarakās show that Ardaxšīr I was the first in the series of these governors/rulers.41 If my supposition is correct, then it would mean that the Sasanians in the province of Persis had a memory of Ardaxšīr I who was striking coins at the beginning or the end of the third century — early second century bce — during the rule of the Seleucids.42 It is important to note that on his coins, Ardaxšīr wore an upright tiara, which may suggest political aspirations, and this fact would not have been unnoticed by the Greco-Macedonians.43 If Ardaxšīr I was to be identified with Ardaxšīr ī 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43

Kārnāmag ī Ardaxšīr ī Pābagān, Nyberg 1964, p. 6.18–19; Grenet 2003. For all the references to the scholars see Shayegan 2005 [2009], p. 1, ft. 2. With minor changes Cereti 1995, p. 152; see also Rāšed-Moḥ� assel, 1370 [1991], p. 4. Amir-Arjomand 1998, pp. 245–248. Hultgård 2020. Boyce/Grenet 1991, p. 385. Hoover 2008, p. 214; Sarkhosh Curtis, 2010, pp. 387–388; Gholami 2020, pp. 136–137. Hoover 2008, p. 214; Sarkhosh Curtis 2010, p. 388; Wiesehöfer 2017. As early as Xenophon’s time, the wearing of the tiara upright was mentioned (Anabasis 2.5.23) as an attribute that symbolized the kingship of Persia, see Brock 2004, p. 255;

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Kay, we would be in the presence of a form of “Zoroastrianized history of Iran,” through priestly tradition. That is, it was not really the Achaemenids who took prominence within early Sasanian national history, but the more immediate Fratarakās, followed by the kings of Persis.

© Classical Numismatic Group, Inc.

Fig 3. Fratarakā Coin of Ardaxšīr I (Early-mid 3rd century bce) To give further weight to this localized “Persis history” hypothesis, we should look at the Persis king’s coinage, which clearly demonstrates Arsacid influence and is important to our study of early Sasanian memory of the past. The sequence of known coinage of these local rulers, known as kings of Persis, was established by M. Alram. On their early coinage one can see the transition from the Fratarakās to what came to be known as the Persis kings. The rulers of the second group were simply known as the MLK’ “king,” which may suggest an elevation in status vis-à-vis the Fratarakās.44 Their sequence begins with Dārēw I / Dārāyān, son of Vādfradād; then Ardaxšīr II, the son of Dārāyān, and Vahīxšahr, the son of Dārāyān,45 and includes Dārāyān II and Vādfradāt III. After these rulers, came a third series of coinage representing the kings in Persis, some with and some without patronymics, such as Nambed, Napād, son of Nambed, Vādfradād, Mančihr, Ardaxšīr III, Mančihr II, and Ardaxšīr IV.46 This sequence is important as it mentions the name Mančihr, which is really Manūčīhr, considered as the progenitor of the Iranians in the Avestan tradition.47 This shows that even before Ardaxšīr ī Pābagān’s first minting of the legend Ērān, 44 45 46 47

Olbrycht 2014, 177–190. Kolose/Müseler 2008, 43–44; Rezakhani 2013, p. 776. Alram 1986, pp. 172–174. Müseler/Rezakhani 2011, P. 268–271. See the discussion by Pirart 2010, p. 362.

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Eastern Iranian lore was connected with Aryans or Iranians in the province of Persis. The recent translation and work on the Coptic Manichaean Kephalaia Codex at the Chester Beatty Library also demonstrate that the stories and legends of the Kayānīds already existed in the early court of the Sasanians.48 Hence, the Sasanians did not need to go to the East to encounter Avestan lore and legends and to co-opt and adopt them in later centuries. Going back to the kings of Persis, there is evidence to suggest that the second group of these rulers were important in the construction of the commemoration of Sasanian rulers. Based on the orthographical evidence of the coinage, P.  O. Skjævrø has suggested that it was during the reign of Dārāyān II that major changes took place, including linguistic and religious ones.49 The representation of fire-altars on the reverse, which are the prototypes of Sasanian fire-altars, was of significance for demonstrating the religious orientation of these kings. Even earlier, during the rule of Dārāyān I, we observe a modification in the design of the bashlyk,50 or headdress, which again may signal political aspiration. The reign of Dārāyān I to Dārāyān II has been shown in a new light through the work of M. R. Shayegan, who in an impressive article based on the re-reading of an inscription on a silver bowl at the J. P. Getty Museum, suggesting a new dynastic line for the “Kings of Persis” and Iranian history. The inscription on the silver bowl reads as follows: Ardaxšahr šāh *ahīyān Dārāyānagān pus Dārāyān šāh šād hān ēn YNGDWN zarr asēm 50 statēr Wahīxšahr wispuhr xwēbaš

May I, King Ardaxšahr, of the earlier descendants of Dārāyān [II], be happy. This *hammered (bowl in) gold-and-silver (weighs) 50 staters (it) belongs to Prince Wahīxšahr.

Here Ardaxšīr makes a very important mention of his *ahīyān Dārāyānagān, that is the (Middle Persian) ahēnag, i.e., descendant of Dārāy. Hence, we may be viewing all-together a new dynastic line, now named Dāyāyānagān.51 The founder of this dynastic group being Dārāyān I, with his line concluding with Dārāyān II. This reading is now substantiated by another recent find of a silver bowl with an important inscription with an almost exact copy of the Getty bowl, made for Wahīxšahr. On this bowl as well king Ardaxšīr (II) claims connection to the Dārāyāns.52 Thus, we can suggest that the Middle Persian and Persian references to Dārāy ī Dārāyān (two Dārās and not three), may very well correspond to the Persis king Dārāyān II, whose reforms and importance were recognized and 48 On the circulation of Kayānīd legends in the third century ce at the Sasanian court see BeDhun 2014, pp. 147–157. 49 Skjævrø 1997, p. 103. 50 Sellwood 1983, p. 303. 51 Shayegan 2005 [2009], p. 171. 52 Sims-Williams 2021, pp. 6–7.

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remembered in the province of Persis and in the “national history” of the Sasanian period. It is true that the memory of Persid Dārāyān has been generally mixed with that of Achaemenid Darius III, to give place to the last of the Achaemenid rulers. However, the mention of Ardaxšīr I in the Kārnāmag ī Ardaxšīr ī Pābagān (VI.19) as being from the nāf ī dārāy šāh could be in connection with Dārāyān II of the Persis kings, and his conflation with Darius III of the Achaemenids.

© Classical Numismatic Group, Inc.

Fig. 4. Silver drachma of Dārāyān II, King of Persis (r. c. 1st century bce) Gh. Gnoli has tried to show the remanence of Achaemenids memory in the province of Persis after Alexander,53 but this memory appears to have been fused with the kings of Persis which had a much more immediate connection to the past. The suggestion that national memory in the province of Persis went back to the first Fratarakās corroborates the fact that there is no straightforward evidence of Sasanian memory of the Achaemenids. While one can make the case that the later Arsacids claimed to be the inheritors of the Achaemenids,54 the Sasanians initially did not make such claims. Then, the Dārāyānids, or what came to be known as Dārāy ī Dārāyān (Dārā, son of Dārā), might be seen under a very different light, that is, as a historical reference for the early Sasanians, who did not claim affiliation with the Achaemenids, but rather with the more immediate dynasts ruling over Persis, the very same province that they came from. Hence, I argue that the conflation between Darius III and Dārāyān II may be the key to our understanding of history and memory of the past in Ērānšahr. 53 Gnoli 1989, p. 124. 54 Neusner 1963, p. 46; Wolski 1988, p. 164; Wiesehöfer 1996, p. 59; Dabrowa 2008, p. 30.

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I also believe that Persepolis,55 as a monument, is a focal point of “Persianate” memory and an important location of memory for the early Sasanians. This monumental structure was seen as representing the grandeur of the past for Iranians, down to the modern period. However, their understanding of what this monumental building is, has not been the same throughout history. Not all Iranian dynasts through the ages thought of this monument as belonging to the Achaemenids. After Alexander set the palace on fire, the building was still seen as important for those living in the province of Persis. This is clear from the archaeological and material culture evidence found in the province, which has been the focus of P. Callieri in the past decade. This immediate respect for and emulation of Achaemenids heritage begins with the Fratarakā, who built their own structure next to Persepolis, some two hundred meters northeast of the terrace.56 The archaeological work undertaken on the so-called Fratarakā temple is of interest here, as it revealed evidence of a statue belonging to Lady Anāhīta, as far back as the time of Artaxerxes II.57 Equally important, has been the cubical structure minted on most coins of the Fratarakās, which has been described as either that of Zendān-e Soleymān (Solomon’s Prison) at Pasargadae, or that of K’abe-ye Zartošt at Naqš-e Rostam (Image of Rostam) (Fig. 5). It is most probable that the image on the coin referred to the terrace at Persepolis, where the merlons still stand (Fig. 6).58 Then, if we follow the Fratarakā chronology, beginning with Ardaxšīr I, it is possible that part of this structure was minted on the reverse of their coins as a symbol of reverence and memory. Whether the temple of the Fratarakās housed Lady © Classical Numismatic Group, Inc. Anāhītā or was an initiation center for kingship,59 it cerFig 5. Reverse of Fratarakā tainly suggests a link between Coin of Ardaxšīr I the Achaemenids and the Fra(Early-mid 3rd century bce) tarakās. I am in agreement with 55 56 57 58 59

Mousvi 2012. Callieri 2007, pp. 51–52. Callieri 2007, p. 34. Callieri 2007, p. 121. Panaino 2003, pp. 269–270; Potts 2007, pp. 296–297; De Jong 2012.

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Callieri that baγān to which the Fratarakās pay homage are their ahēnagān, a sort of cult center to remember their ancestry,60 which in all probability was connected to the Achaemenid kings. What this memory entailed and how its

Fig. 6. Persepolis Terrace with Merlons, photo by the author. celebration changed with time is another vexing topic, well beyond the focus of this study. What is important is that Persepolis acted as a “monument of memory” for the Iranians and the early Sasanians gave particular attention to it. This fact is clear from both the surviving early Sasanian graffiti at Persepolis which suggest a reverence for it.61 I believe that one of the graffiti in fact depicts Pābag, the father of Šāpur and Ardaxšīr (Fig. 7). Thus, we see that the early Sasanians were depicted at Persepolis, as they appeared on coins, where the kings and princes appeared on the reverse in order to legitimize their rule (Fig. 8). In conclusion, one can say that the early family of Sāsān were emulating what the Fratarakās had been doing several centuries earlier, suggesting a continuity of some sort. The appearance of early Sasanian figures at Persepolis reminds us of an episode mentioned in the Perso-Arabic sources, where Šāpur and Ardaxšīr I met at Persepolis for battle during which the older brother was killed by accident.62 The fate of the empire being decided at this sacred location, called the Palace of 60 Callieri 2007, pp. 129–130. 61 Razmjou 2005. 62 Bosworth 1999, p. 8.

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Fig. 7. Graffiti at Persepolis, photo by the author

© Classical Numismatic Group, Inc.

Fig. 8. Coin of Šāpur with the Portrait of Pābag (reverse) and Šāpur (observe), ca. 200-209

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Khumāy (Homāy), the same lady who is responsible for the transfer of rulership from the Kayānīds to that of the Fratarakās in Sasanian historiographical tradition which is in itself an interesting fact. The fate of Ardaxšīr’s rulership was decided is a conscious play on the Sasanian historiographical Ardašīr ī Kay Wahman. This Ardaxšīr the Kayānīd, whose daughter is Humāy, began the new series of dynasts, i.e., the Fratarakās. Hence, there appears to be a continuity of what we may call ancestors (Middle Persian) ahēngān, evidenced by both the Dārāyānīds on the inscription on the bowl at the Getty, and early Sasanian inscriptions. While Achaemenid monuments clearly suggest an attachment to and continuity with the tradition of kingship associated with Persepolis, it is not clear to whom the early Sasanians identified the structure. The reverence of Achaemenid monuments by the Sasanians does not convincingly suggest a historical celebration of the Achaemenid Empire, and that in the minds of the late Sasanian period, they may have belonged to the Kayānids,63 or as I would like to suggest, more probably to the Dārāyānīds. A connection between the Dārāyānīds and the Sasanians can be established in several ways. Sasanians were able to recognize and read the Aramaic legends on both Fratarakā coins and Dārāyānīd coins. This would have encouraged a connection with the native rulers of the Persepolitan monuments and Naqš-e Rostam. In fact, one may imagine that the Achaemenid tombs of kings such as Darius I (the Great) was seen to belong to those whose coins they saw, i.e., those who were from the lineage of Dārā-ye Dārāyan (Darāyān II), i.e., the Dārāyānids. Hence, it would be possible to make further assumption in regards to Šāpur I’s inscription about his ancestors (ŠKZ 30 Parthian version): W AHRN hštr L hštr ANw LN W ABYtr W ny’kn W hsynkn dst[krt] YHWt TME *YΘYBWt

And other cities to cities which we and our father and forefathers and ancestors had created, there they were settled64 It is very likely that the mention of (Parthian hasēnagān /MP ahēnagān / Greek προγόνων), refers to *ahīyān Dārāyānagān, that is, the Dārāyānīds. If this is the case, then the early Sasanians were more aware of the local history of Persis that we give them credit for. They simply drew a connection between themselves and the kings of Persis, and the Dārāyānīds before them. This lineage went back to the Fratarakās, and their founder, Ardaxšīr I. How far prior to the rule of Ardaxšahr did the Sasanians know is unclear, but the memory of the evil Alexander was remembered .65 However, knowing about the Achaemenids seems to be less likely for the early Sasanian memory.

63 Roaf 1998, p. 6. 64 Huyse 1999, p. 43 65 Wiesehöfer 2011.

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Panaino, A. 2003: “The baγān of the Fratarakas: Gods or ‘divine’ Kings?” In: C. G. Cereti/M. Maggi/E. Provasi (eds.): Religious themes and texts of pre-Islamic Iran and Central Asia.Studies in honour of Professor Gherardo Gnoli on the occasion of his 65th birthday on 6th December 2002 (Beiträge Zur Iranistik 24). Wiesbade, pp. 283–306. Plischke, S. 2014: Die Seleukiden und Iran: die seleukidische Herrschaftspolitik in den östlichen Satrapien (CleO 9). Wiesbaden. Potts, D. T. 2007: “Foundation Houses, Fire Altars and the frataraka: Interpreting the Iconography of some Post-Achaemenid Persian Coins.” In: IrAnt XLII, pp. 271–300. Rāšed-Moḥ� a ssel, M. 1370 [1991]: zand-e bahman-yasn: taṣḥīḥ-e matn, āvā-nevīsi, barhardān-e fārsī-o yāddāšt-hā. Tehran. Razmjou, S. 2005: “Herzfeld and the Study of Graffiti at Persepolis.” In: A. Clyburn Gunter/S. R. Hauser (eds.): Ernst Herzfeld and the development of Near Eastern Studies, 1900–1950. Leiden, pp. 315–341. Rezakhani, K. 2013: “Arsacid, Elymaean, and Persid Coinage.” In: D. T. Potts (ed.): The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Iran. Oxford/New York, pp. 767–778. Roaf, M. 1998: “Persepolitan Echoes in Sasanian Architecture: Did the Sasanians Attempt to Re-create the Achaemenid Empire?” In: V. Sarkhosh Curtis/R. Hillenbrand/J. M. Rogers (eds.): The Art and Archaeology of Ancient Persia. New Light on the Parthian and Sasanian Empires. London, pp. 1–13. Sancisi-Weerdenburg, H. 1985. The Death of Cyrus. In: Papers in honour of Professor Mary Boyce (AcIr 25), vol. 2. Leiden, pp.459–471. Sarkhosh Curtis, V. 1998: “Minstrels in Ancient Iran.” In: V. Sarkhosh Curtis/R. Hillenbrand/J. M. Rogers (eds.): The Art and Archaeology of Ancient Persia. New Light on the Parthian and Sasanian Empires. London, pp. 181–187. — 2010: “The Frataraka Cons of Persis: Bridging the Gap between Achaemenid and Sasanian Persia.” In: J. Curtis/St. J. Simpson (eds.): The World of Achaemenid Persia: History, Art and Society in Iran and the Ancient Near East. London, pp. 379–394. Schoeler, G. 1988: “Die Lücke in der epischen Überlieferung Irans.” In: D. Boedeker/J. Cobet/A. Esch (eds.): Vergangenheit in mündlicher Überlieferung (Colloquia Raurica 1). Stuttgart, pp. 149–150. Sellwood, D. 1983: “Minor Southern State.” In: E. Yarshater (ed.): The Cambridge History of Iran.Vol. 3: Seleucid, Parthian and Sasanian Periods, Part I. Cambridge, pp. 302–306. Shahbazi, A. S. 2001: “Early Sasanian Claims’ to Achaemenid Heritage.” In: NIB 1(1), pp. 56–68. Shayegan, M. R. 2005 [2009]: “Nugae Epigraphicae.” In: BAI 19 (Festschrift for P. O. Skjævrø), pp. 169–179. — 2011: Arsacids and Sasanians: Political Ideology in Post-Hellenistic and Late Antique Persia. Cambridge. Sims-Willisam, N. 2021: “Another pre-Sasanian Middle Persian inscription.” In: JRAS 31(3), pp. 609–616. Skjævrø, P. O. 1985: “Thematic and linguistic parallels in the Achaemenian and Sassanian inscriptions.” In: Papers in honour of Professor Mary Boyce (AcIr 25), vol. 2. Leiden, pp. 593–603.

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— 1997: “The Joy of the Cup: A Pre-Sasanian Middle Persian Inscription on a Silver Bowl.” In: BAI 11, pp. 93–104. — 1998: “Royalty in Early Iranian Literature.” In: N. Sims-Williams (ed.): Proceedings of the Third European Conference of Iranian Studies: Vol. 1. Old and Middle Iranian Studies (Beiträge zur Iranistik 17,1). Wiesbaden, pp. 99–107. Strootman, R. 2015: “s. v. Seleucid Empire.” In: E. Yarshater (ed.): EIr Online. Available online: https://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/seleucid-empire [Last accessed 31.03.21]. Wiesehöfer , J. 1986: “s.v. Ardašīr I. I. History.” In: E. Yarshater (ed.): EIr, vol. II, Fasc. 4. New York, pp. 371–376. — 1987: “Iranische Ansprüche an Rom auf ehemals achaimenidische Territorien.” In: AMI 19, pp. 177–185. — 1994: Die “dunklen Jahrhunderte” der Persis: Untersuchungen zu Geschichte und Kultur von Fārs in frühhellenistischer Zeit (330–140 v.Chr.) (Zetemata. Monographien zur klassischen Altertumswissenschaft 90). München. — 2005: “Rūm as Enemy of Iran.” In: E. S. Gruen (ed.): Cultural borrowings and ethnic appropriations in antiquity (Oriens et Occidens. Studien zu antiken Kulturkontakten und ihrem Nachleben 8). Stuttgart, pp. 105–120. — 2011: “The ‘Accursed’ and the ‘Adventurer’: Alexander the Great in Iranian Tradition.” In: Z. Zuwiyya (ed.): A Companion to Alexander Literature in the Middle Ages (Brill’s Companions to the Christian Tradition 29). Leiden, pp. 113–132. — 2017: “Fratarakā, Sub-Seleucid Dynasty in Persis.” In: T. Whitmarsh (ed.): The Oxford Classical Dictionary. Oxford. Wolski, J. 1988: Le titre de “roi des rois” dans l’idéologie monarchique des Arsacides.” In: AAASH 30(1–4), pp. 159–66. Yarshater, E. 1971: “Were the Sasanids Heirs to the Achaemenids?” In: La Persia nel Medioevo. Atti del Convegno Internazionale, Roma, 31.03.–05.04.1970 (Problemi attuali di scienza e di cultura). Roma, pp. 517–531.

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“Under the Banner of the Mane” Pahlavi Letters and the Sasanian Art of Epistolography An Unpublished Pahlavi Papyrus Letter from Sasanian Egypt, P.Pehl. 569 Shervin Farridnejad

Introduction The Middle Persian Documents on papyri and parchments, known also as Pahlavi Papyri, have been found in the ancient city of Arsinoe (Gr. Ἀρσινόη) in the Fayyūm oasis (Waḥet el Fayyūm), about 80 km south-west of Cairo in Egypt, and are mostly written in cursive Pahlavi.1 Together with those documents originating from Iran (the so-called Pahlavi Archive), they comprise a rather impressive corpus of mostly administrative and economic nature and of various contents.2 Weber distinguishes between private letters and those of official interest. The latter group covers various topics, from military communications and credentials to official and juridic documents (memoranda on transactions of money or natural produce and financial contributions to officers).3 The Pahlavi documents from Egypt belong to a ten-year period of Sasanian occupation of Egypt under the last 1

This paper is the result of the first international Summer School in Pahlavi Papyrology, 20 to 26 September 2009, which was organized by the Austrian National Library, Vienna. Specifically, I am much indebted to Dieter Weber, who generously shared with me his deep knowledge of deciphering and reading Pahlavi Papyri through four workshops between 2009 and 2012, as well as for his valuable comments and corrections on this paper. He kindly provided me access to Hansen (MS), as well as some of his unpublished studies. Furthermore, I would like to thank Philip G. Kreyenbroek (Göttingen), Rika Gyselen (Paris) and Arash Zeini (Berlin) for their valuable suggestions. I also have to thank the authorities of the Department of Papyri of the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek in Vienna for permission to publish this papyrus. Last but not least, I am indebted to A. B. Nikitin in St. Petersburg for the photograph to which I got access through D. Weber. 2 The Pahlavi Archive comprises ca. 300 documents, a considerable number of which are already published; cf. Gignoux 2010; Weber 2006 [2010]; Weber 2008b. For a recent overview on Middle Persian Papyri, Ostraca and Parchments cf. Zeini 2008. 3 Weber 2008b, p. 803. Sasanian Studies | Sasanidische Studien. Vol. I (2022). Ed. by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee doi: 10.13173/SSt.1.057

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If we put all fragments of Pahlavi papyri and parchments written in the course of ten years, numbering by at least 1.000 items, into an average time panel we will have about two fragments every week, a density of objects archaeologists could only dream of.7

Most of them are letters with names in Persian; they give evidence of titles, military ranks, and lists of food used as rations by the Persian army. The Pahlavi papyri from Egypt, together with many other letters and documents written on parchment and leather found in the Iranian Plateau, are of great importance historically. They present an invaluable source to study the historical, economic, legal, onomastic and religious issues from the late Sasanian through the early Islamic period, up to the 9th century ce. The Vienna Pahlavi Papyrus Fragment P.Pehl. 569, published in this article for the first time, was the object of investigation on the occasion of the First Summer School on Pahlavi Papyrology held in Vienna, from 20 to 26 September 2009. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

Harrassowitz Library for personal use only / no unauthorized distribution

great Sasanian king Xusrō II Parvēz (590–628 ce) and date mostly between 619 and 629 ce.4 This impressive corpus of more than a thousand fragments are scattered between different collections and museums,5 however only less than one-third of them have ever been published.6 D. Weber, the prolific pioneering scholar of Pahlavi documents, states regarding the Pahlavi documents from Egypt:

Pahlavi Letters and the Sasanian Art of Epistolography A conspicuous literary art in late antiquity, epistolography provides historians and scholars of the ancient world with a unique insight into the various aspects of the daily life of people living during the late antique period. While the large corpora of the late antique Pahlavi letter collections has been known since late 19th century,8 it was only in the past decades that they caught the attention of scholars of Iranian 4

None of these documents, expect for the Vienna parchment P. 373a (dated 625/626 CE), are dated ; cf. Weber 2002 [2003]. The only known dated Pahlavi document, P. 188, belongs to the Berlin collection (Papyrussamlung, Ägyptisches Museum), which shows a dating formula similar to that in use in more recent juridic documents originating from Iran. The Berlin document contains the dating: (1) ēn māh Šahrewar ī sāl (2) 35 rōz Amurdād “this month Šahrewar (6th month) of the year 35, day Amurdād (7th day);” cf. Weber 2007c, p. 727; Weber 2003, p. 77. For an overview on the dating of the documents, cf. Weber 2008a, pp. 230–234. 5 These important collections are kept in Vienna, Berlin, Heidelberg, Philadelphia und Moscow. For a detailed description of the documents and the collections, cf. Weber 2007c, p. 728. 6 The fragments P.PEHL. 584–594 are already published in Weber 1992, pp. 203–208. The fragment P.PEHL. 562 has recently been published in Zeini 2016. 7 Weber 2010a, p. 256. 8 Among the earliest scholarly studies cf. Schau 1878; Hansen 1938.

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studies. Previously, they had predominantly been studied by philologists.9 This is understandably due to the fragmentary nature of the documents, as well as the usage of an extremely difficult cursive Pahlavi script, which makes their deciphering a serious challenge. Most of the fragments have not yet been published at all.10 With the recent findings of new collections of Pahlavi letters, mostly through the black market, the number of these documents are increasing.11

Scribal Schools and Manuals The scribes and secretaries, namely the dabīrs,12 constituted an essential group within the third estate of the Sasanian society and even played important roles as political figures.13 They were responsible for official correspondence and served as multilingual interpreters, accountants, judicial secretaries, chroniclers and copyists for the kings and dignitaries at the Sasanian court. An important skill, which the dabīrs were expected to master, was the art of nāmag kardan or how to attain perfection “in composing a letter.” The idiomatic phrase is richly attested within the Pahlavi documents (P. 18 V 10; P. 44, 27–28; P. 74 V 3–5; P. 80, 6; P. 101 R2; P. 164, 5; P. 329, 5–6; P. Pehl. 562).14 The scribes, who were specially trained for nāmag kardan were referred to as frawardag or nāmag dibīr, “scribes concerned with letters” (ŠKZ, Parth. l. 28).15 A late Sasanian Pahlavi treatise abar ēwēnag ī nāmag-nibēsišnīh (“On the Manner of Letter Writing”)16 give us a short glimpse into the curricula of the Sasanian royal “scribal schools” (MP dibīristān),17 where the scribes were educated to learn writing skills 9

10 11

12 13 14 15 16 17

Beside the numerous and mainly philological pioneering studies by D. Weber and Ph. Gignoux, M. Macuch and very recently K. Rezakhani contextualized materials from Pahlavi documents in different legal, geographical and historical context; cf. Macuch 2019; 2020; Rezakhani 2020. The development of the Pahlavi script during the 6th and 7th centuries, as well as the complexity of the Pahlavi cursive script, is discussed in Weber forthcoming a. For previous studies cf. Weber 1993; 2007a; 2007b. Another important group of materials, which shows many similarities in script and structure, are the eighth-century legal texts from Tabarestān (Iran). The corpus of these unique collection of original legal documents testify how Sasanian jurisprudence and legal language continued to be practiced almost unchanged in northern Iran and during the early Islamic period; cf. Gignoux 2012; 2014; 2016; Gyselen 2012; Macuch 2019; 2020; Weber 2019; 2020. OP *dipīra (dipi- “inscription”), MP dibīr, NP dabīr. For the status and duties of the scribes and secretaries in the Sasanian period, cf. Tafazzoli 2000, pp. 18–37. Further discussions on the context of the Pahlavi documents are to be found in Zeini 2016, pp. 44–45. All evidence is discussed in Weber 2003, pp. 171–172. Cf. also Weber 2010a, p. 257. For P. PEHL. 562, cf. Zeini 2016. Tafazzoli 2000, p. 28. Jamasp-Asana 1897–1913, pp. 132–140; Zaehner 1937; Chunakova 2015. For textual and historical evidence and further bibliography, cf. Tafazzoli 2000, p. 27.

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and trained in the Pahlavi script. This is a know-how manual of epistolography, clearly demonstrating how epistolography developed into a prominent literary art in Sasanian Iran and showing how dabīrs and epistolographers were educated to compose proper letters and documents.18 It contains a list of the honorific and polite formulae, together with a list of their potential recipients, including those of high ranks and officials as kas az xwadāyān “various persons in high estate,” pādixšāyān ud mehān ud abarmānīgān “kings, nobles, and dignitaries” and kardārān “officials” up to the private recipients including pīd ud brād ud frazand “father, brothers and children” (§ 1). It clearly shows that “writing a letter in correct way” (sazīd-nibištan)19 was an everyday occurrence, a fact which is evidenced also by the abundance of Pahlavi letters discovered. Furthermore, the abar ēwēnag ī nāmag-nibēsišnīh provides us with detailed examples of the formal structure of letters, which is similar to the structure of the Pahlavi letters of both Sasanian times and the early Islamic period. In his study of the structures of the Sasanian letters as found on papyri and parchments from Egypt dating from c. 619 to 629 ce,20 Weber identifies three parts in each letter: part “A,” the introductory section or the addressing parts and generally contains numerous honorific formulae; part “B,” containing the actual message of the letter; and part “C,” which generally repeats the introductory address, though in a shorter form.21 Alongside phrases used for the opening formulas (2–4, 9, 13–17 etc.), the abar ēwēnag ī nāmag-nibēsišnīh also mentions special expressions used in the addressing part (§ 5–8, 10–12), the subject and the heading, the middle part, including dates and references to the previous letters (§ 31–32), as well as in closing sections (§ 40–41), which all fit appropriately into the threefold scheme of the Pahlavi papyri.

The Epistolary Script Abbreviated cursive script is a characteristic feature of Pahlavi letters (including ostraca, papyri and leather documents).22 It has a long tradition, known even to the post-Sasanian Muslim observers. The 10th century Iranian historian and philologist Ḥamza al-Eṣ�fahānī states in his book on lexicography (al-Tanbīh ʿalā ḥudūṯ al-taṣḥīf “On misspellings caused by the ambiguities of the Arabic script”) that a special script called frwrdh dfyrh (i.e. MP *frawardag-dibīrīh) was used to write Middle Persian letters.23 In a passage on “Discourse on Persian 18 For further considerations on the culture of writing Pahlavi, cf. Weber 2010a; Chunakova 2015. 19 Cf. Zaehner 1937, p. 101. 20 Weber 2008b. 21 Weber 1992, pp. 233–236; Weber 2008b, pp. 804–809. 22 For the general characteristic features of the Pahlavi Cursive script, cf. Weber 1993. 23 Ḥamza Al-Eṣ�fahānī/ed. Āl-E Yāsīn 1389 [1967], p. 64. cf. Ebn Al-Nadīm/tr. Tajaddod 1346 [1967], p. 16; Tafazzoli 1993.

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Writing” in his al-Fihrist, Ebn al-Nadīm gives information regarding a certain nāme dabīrih (MP *nāmag-dibīrīh): And the “epistolary script” (Ar. kitābat ar-Rasāʾīl) is similar to the language they speak; and the letters have no dots; and some of the characters are written in the old Syriac, which is the language of the people of Bābil, and is read in Persian; it has thirty-three characters and is called nāme-dibīrīh […].24

Ebn al-Nadīm’s description is followed by samples:

Fig. 1

The two different samples given here after Flügel’s edition are taken from two different manuscripts, which have undergone a long period of transmission, but represent clearly the Pahlavi cursive script. These scripts were either the same script as what we know from the Pahlavi documents, or versions of the Pahlavi cursive script reserved for the correspondences. The extremely abbreviated and simplified cursive nature of this script for the letters can be explained by the fact that such prompt and regular writing of letters demanded a quick way of writing, which still exists today in the form of abbreviations and shortcuts by writing in social media etc. In the Pahlavi treaties Husraw ī kawādān ud rēdag-ē “Khusrau, son of Kawād and his page” it is said that a qualified scribe should have a “beautiful and rapid handwriting” ( xūbnibēg ud rag-nibēg).25 Whether the script used to write the Phlavi documents is beautiful or not is beyond the scope of this paper, however it is a fact that writing was made faster using this abbreviated and simplified cursive script. Writing down the abbreviated and simplified form of the words, with which the scribes were probably as familiar as with the Pahlavi heterograms, facilitated a quick writing style. Furthermore, the scarcity and high expense of the writing material was probably another reason to make texts as short as possible. Using classical Pahlavi script, the content of the letters would have been twice as long.

24 Ebn Al-Nadīm/ed. Flügel 1871, p. 14; 1872, pp. 8–9; Ebn Al-Nadīm/tr. Tajaddod 1346 [1967], p. 24. Furthermore cf. Gray 1915, p. 27; Tafazzoli 1993. 25 Text and edition in Azarnouche 2013, here p. 45.

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Prosopography The Pahlavi letters also contain a good number of proper names, both of the receivers and senders of the letters, many of them known only from these documents. Often, the senders were the scribes themselves, following an old tradition which authorized them to mention their names during the Parthian and Sasanian periods.26 Bōxtag, the scribe of the Kirdīr’s inscription at Naqš-e Raǧab (KNRb l. 31, see below) and Hormezd, son of the scribe Ši-lag, the scribe of the Parthian version of the Šābuhr’s inscription at Kaʿbe-ye Zartošt [ŠKZ paI 304] are known by name and many other names are to be found on inscribed seals and bullae from the Sasanian through to the early Muslim periods (see below).

Pahlavi Papyrus Fragment P.Pehl. 569 Exhibition No.: 458 Height: 11cm, width: 14.5 cm, verso: free27 Fragment № 569 belongs to the colossal, yet mostly unpublished, Vienna collection of documents, currently kept in the Hermitage museum in St. Petersburg.28 Since this papyrus was discovered in Egypt, it can be dated with certainty to the period of the Persian occupation, between ca. 619 and 629 ce. This fragment is a rectangular piece of papyrus with five lines of preserved cursive Pahlavi in book script. Except for the end of the fifth line, damaged with holes, the document is well preserved. The papyrus displays a regular style of ductus, which is known from many other papyri of the huge corpus of documents both from Egypt and from Iran proper of early post-Sasanian Islamic times. The handwriting is a common thick hand due to the use of a broad qalam.29 It is written with black ink and is 11 cm long and 14.5 cm wide. This fragmentary piece of text is composed in the form of a letter, in which the bottom part of part “B” and all of part “C” are present.30 The structure of attributes for addressing in part “C” makes this fragment unique. This will be discussed in the Commentary section. The bottom, right and left edges can be regarded as the original edges, containing five remaining lines of Pahlavi script in a rather rough, but relatively clear ductus. The right and left margins are only slightly worn and ragged. However, it seems that small strips of the right and left edges of the document 26 The earliest attestations of the term dabīr are in the Parthian economic documents from the ancient city of Nisa (in today Turkmenistan); cf. Weber 2010b, pp. 494f. For some examples cf. Tafazzoli 2000, p. 18. 27 For the dimensions, cf. Hansen (MS). 28 For the Vienna Papyri collection, cf. Weber 2007c. 29 For the styles of writing and forms of qalam, cf. Weber 1993; 2010a, pp. 256–257. 30 For the threefold layout and structure of Pahlavi letters, cf. Weber 1992, pp. 233–35; 2008b, pp. 827–42.

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are missing. Generally, the syntactical coherence of the text suggests that losses on both sides of the document are not great.

Fig. 2

The top is broken off and incomplete. From the penultimate word only the feet and from the last word nothing is preserved; there are a few small holes and two broken parts in the papyrus.

Reading Transliteration (↑) …

Transcription …

1 lʾd ʾmṭ’ plmʾyt k(rtn’ ?) ………

rāy āmad framāyēd k(ardan ?) ………

2 (ẔN)Ḥ PRG MN kwstk’ PWN lʾmšn YḤWNyt (ē)n nēm az kustag pad rāmišn bawēd 3 ʿL yẕdʾn hmʾy pyṭʾk-dʾl krt’ 4 hwṭʾyk’ bwhtk’ Y bwšnyšʾn 5 nc ʾṭwrmʾhʾn Y yẕdṭpʾtʾn

C1 ō yazadān hamē paydāg-dār kard xwadāyīg Bōxtag ī Bušnišān namāz C2 Ādur-Māhān ī Yazadbādān

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Translation [1] … is to come he should order to make ……… [2] this half of the district will be at ease. [3] C1 to whom, the gods have made “keeper of the revelation” forever, [4] [namely] his Excellency Bōxtag (son) of Bušnišān, [5] reverence! C2 (From) Ādur-Māhān (son) of Yazadbādān.

Commentary Despite the fragmentary state of this document, key words can help us reconstruct the original message. The letter was most likely part of a legal or governmental correspondence regarding a juridical decision or order (the verb form framāyēd kardan, “to command” line 1) to turn over half of a lot or a region to someone whose name is to be read as Bōxtag, son of Bušnišān at the end of the line, who is probably of high social standing (title xwadāyīg, line 4), probably of military background. In this document, the bottom of part “B” (Lines 1–2) and the whole of part “C,” from the beginning of line three to the end of the document, are preserved. This includes C1, which contains the name and title of the recipient (Lines 3–5), as well as C2, containing the full name of the sender (Line 5). There exist only a few examples of letters whose central part “B” is completely preserved.31 Thus, this letter belongs to the group of those extremely rare letters, in which part “B” is partly survived (Lines 1–2). Line 1: The first letter of the penultimate word of the first line , here read as kardan, is well preserved and easy to recognize. The upper part of the letter is clear, but the rest of the word has to be reconstructed. It must be either the last or penultimate word of the first line. Line 2: The first word of line two, which is partially damaged due to a lacuna in the papyrus, is not easy to read until the last letter, which is obviously an . The whole word can be reconstructed as M 80 ēn “this”. Line one and two presumably represent the last part of the section “B” of a letter, as there is an obvious split between those lines and line three, where more space was left by the scribe. Aside from the common upright form of the final strokes, the letters are written in a horizontal level and accurately with a left to right movement direction of the ductus.32 This is evident in the word kustag “district” in which the horizontal otiose stroke occurs after the final . According to D. Weber, this feature can be attributed to a writing tradition from the 6th century, which can be seen in some letters from Afghanistan.33 31 For example, p. 19 contains a complete surviving part “B,” whereas p. 80, as well as p. 74 contains a large part of survived part “B”. Other samples with larger sections of the preserved central part are p. 44, Per. 1 and Per. 2.; cf. Weber 2008b, p. 808. 32 On vertical stroke in general cf. Weber 1997, pp. 605–606. 33 Weber 2009, pp. 545–546.

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The penultimate word of this line rāmišn “peace, ease, pleasure” is written without a final stroke (the otiose stroke). This is a rare variant with simplified (not abbreviated) spelling, as the word rāmišn is fairly attested within the Pahlavi papyri:34

P.Pehl. 569, 2

P. 136, 2

P. 142, 2

P. 80, 9

P. 125 b 2

Fig. 3

Fig. 4

Fig. 5

Fig. 6

Fig. 7

The phrase pad rāmišn bawēd “will be in peace; will be at ease” is attested in other Pahlavi letters (Berlin 11,6; 18.16; 22, 6–7; lA3, 10–11, lA6, 11–12), excepted the expected optative particle ē. In lA3, 10–11 the verb appears to be accompanied by no optative marker:



P.Pehl. 569, 2

Berlin 11, 6

Fig. 8

Fig. 9

lA3, 10–11

Berlin 18, 16

Fig. 10

Fig. 11

34 For an exemplary paradigm of the spelling cf. Weber 2007b, p. 436. Further evidence are to be found in Berlin 11, 6; 18, 4 & 16; 21, 6; 25, 1; lA 3, 3 & 11; lA 6, 11. It is also briefly referred to in Zeini 2015, pp. 70–71.

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The spelling of the heterogram būdan “be, become” with only two clear strokes, shows also a more abbreviated form, rather than the common writing of in Book Pahlavi.35 Despite this irregularity, the current reading is supported by the whole formula, which, as already seen is widely attested. Line 3: The beginning of line three to the end of fragment, with the key words ō in the beginning of this line and the shortened form of namāz in line five, clearly makes up part C1 of the letter, where the name and titles of the recipient are mentioned. Weber’s tentative reading ō Sām ī ...... man kard must be revised.36 In an earlier attempt, he read the line as ō sahm ī pahikār kard “will be given (literally: become) to [one who] disputed [in that] conflict.” The writing of pahikār “struggle, battle, dispute” (CPD 63) is fairly attested. The usage of the term pahikār is known from the Zoroastrian legal terminology in the context of Sasanian jurisprudence, e.g. within the compound pahikār-rad “a person involved in a juridical dispute” (Dk. VIII),37 though, it does not occur elsewhere within the studied Pahlavi papyri. A recent consultation with Weber led to the most current and rather different reading of the line. The second word can better read as yazadān, which shows an abundant attestation, both in Pahlavi ostracon (O. 1638) and Pahlavi letters, especially in the typical proper name yazadān-ayād “remembered by (the​) God(s)”:39

P. 44, 1

P. 141, 1

Per. 4, 1

yazadān-ayād Fig. 12

O. 16

Yazadān-…

Fig. 13

Fig. 14

Fig. 15

The following adverbial word 0! I! hamē “always” is easily legible. The horizontal stroke of the final is lengthened and followed by a gap after the word. A nice parallel is to be found in the Berlin 25:40

35 36 37 38 39 40

For a list of paradigms, cf. Weber 2008a, p. 225. Weber 2008b, p. 809. Macuch 2002. Weber 1992, pp. 19f.; Weber 2008a, p. 141. Weber 2008a, p. 63. Weber 2008a, p. 104–105.

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Berlin 25 < hmʾy ŠRM W lʾmšn’> hamē drōd ud rāmišn Fig. 16

The reading paydāg-dār seems to be an accurate reading. It is a compound word consisting of two parts: paydāg meaning ‘revealed’, ‘obvious’ or ‘visible’ (CPD 66), and dār, a suffix indicating ownership or custody. It must be noted that paydāg is an adjective, which doesn’t combine easily with the suffix dār, and the compound paydāg-dār is not generally attested. If the reading is correct and with the conjecture that the text is indeed the summons of a witness, a possible interpretation for the compound paydāg-dār would be “whom the gods have made a holder of evidence forever”, being a polite phrase for “as a witness”. Line 4: The reading of the first word is xwadāyīg “excellency, Sir,”41 the third letter is slightly washed away and therefore damaged. The letters after that are to be seen with three hooks instead of two before the final suffix -īg, and as in xwadāyīg, the suffix forms an adjective. In this case, it can be merely interpreted as a sequence. This form is comparable to other fragments of the Vienna collection of Pahlavi papyri and parchments, presented for the first time at the 23rd International Congress of Papyrologists in Vienna in 2001. Many other examples of this Papyri and their suggested translations are presented by D. Weber.42 The proper name Bōxtag, OIr. *Buxta-ka- “saved” (CPD 19) is known from various Parthian and Middle Persian sources.43 As a proper name it is attested on an inscribed seal found at the Ādur Gušnasp fire-temple: Bōxtag ī Āmihrān ī Ādur Gušnasp dibīr “Bōxtag, son of Āmihr, scribe of the fire-temple Gušnasp”.44 It is also used as a patronym whose oldest mention can be found in the name of the scribe (dibīr) of the inscription of Kirdīr (Kerdīr), the prominent Zoroastrian high priest at the court of the first five Sasanian kings in the second half of the 3rd century ce at Naqš-e Raǧab (KNRb l. 31).45 The name is furthermore attested in the patronymic of Wuzurgmihr ī Bōxtagān, the famous sage and counsellor of Xosrau 41 42 43 44 45

“Lordship, sovereignty” (CPD 95). Weber 2007a. Parth. , cf. Schmitt 2016, p. 84, No. 150; MP , cf. Gignoux 1986, p. 5, No. 254. Göbl 1976, p. 52, No. 601. KNRb l. 31 “Written by Bōxtag, the secretary of Kirdīr, the Lord;” cf. Back 1998, p. 487; Gignoux 1991, pp. 35–39. The

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I Anōšagruwān (501–579 ce), to whom the famous extant Pahlavi treatise Ayādgār ī Wuzurgmihr ī Bōxtagān “Memorial of Wuzurgmihr, son of Bōxtag” is ascribed.46 The last word, the patronym of Bōxtag, was initially read as būdāyān, which would suggest a patronym, part of the proper name with Buddhist background (anticipated in a most plausible Zoroastrian context). However, the preferred, yet tentative, reading for the name is Bušnišān “with a mane as characteristics.” As this patronym is an unlikely occurrence in this context,47 it could possibly reflect a high-ranked elite military denomination, e.g. “under the banner of the mane” (?). The Pahlavi term nišān “sign, mark, banner” (CPD 60) has a regularly clear attestation, referring both to the heraldic devices as banners and standards, as well as the symbolic figural motif or geometrically furnished modalities made out of the Pahlavi letters, with or without additional ornamental decorations.48 The iconographical evidence clearly shows that the widespread usage of nišāns as family insignia to demonstrate royal or specific noble hereditary connections was a common practice during the Sasanian period. So, does the title Bušnišān makes reference to a horse mane as a military banner? Two distinct lexical sets for “mane” are attested in Pahlavi, namely buš “mane” (CPD 20) and the cognate term bašn “top, peak; stature; mane” (CPD 17).49 The usage of both buš and bašn, as well as the Av. barəša- “neck, back (of animal/of horse)” in the domain of animals are closely related to the horses.50 We know that the Arsacid army was an all-horse army and Sasanian armies were also cavalrydominated.51 The existence of cavalries and horse-armies are fairly attested within the literary sources, iconographical evidence, as well as archaeological finds.52 The earliest literary depictions of horses in warfare can be found in

46 47 48 49

50 51

52

scribe and secretary Bōxtag was possibly active in the chancery of Kirdīr in the period of 276–293 CE; cf. Tafazzoli 1993, p. 534; Tafazzoli 2000, p. 23. Pahlavi text in Jamasp-Asana 1897–1913, pp. 85–101. See the discussion below under the name Ādur-Māhān in Line 5. Cf. Kröger 1982, Umm az-Zaʿtīr (Ctesiphon), 52–4; Maʿāriḍ I (Ctesiphon), 84–5; Maʿāriḍ IV (Ctesiphon), 127; Mesopotamia, 141; Taht-e Soleymān, 145; Kīš, 189; Dāmḡān, 193–4. Fillipone has recently discussed these two terms together with their cognates in other Iranian languages at length. One can agree with her that, in fact, there exist two separate (but related) semantic uses for these two sets of words, namely Av. barəšnu-, MP bašn “stature, figure, body, top, peak” and Av. barəša- “neck, back (of animal/of horse),” MP/ NP buš “mane, ringlet, tuft, fringe, crown (of tree);” cf. Fillipone 2015, pp. 337–338. Also Hübschmann 1895, p. 144. For an overview on the Sasanian military organization and combat units, cf. Tafazzoli 2000, pp. 1–17; McDonough 2013; Farrokh/Karamian/Maksymiuk 2018, specifically on Sasanian cavalry, cf. ibid, pp. 129–141. On the status of the horse in Ancient Iran, cf. Shahbazi 1987, updated and revised in Shahbazi 1375–76 1996]. Already the Achaemenid king Darius I the Great (r. 522–486) in his inscription on the facade of his tomb in Naqš-e Rustam introduces himself as a good equestrian (asabāra); DNb §9; cf. Schmitt 2009, p. 109. The Dēnkard VIII delivers also an account of a lost portion of the Sasanian Avesta, the Artēštārestān “warrior code,” dedicated to the Art

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the Avestan hymns.53 Descriptions of horse mane and tail are rare occurrences within the literary sources. However, their mention as outward features of horses are plentiful in iconographical materials,54 most notably, on Sasanian bas-reliefs.55 Among others, the demon of drought Apōš (Av. Apaoša), the demonic protagonist of the astral god Tištar (Av. Tišriia) to whom the eighth hymn (Tištar Yašt) is dedicated, appears in cosmic battle as a black, hairless and bridled horse, while Tištar manifests himself as a beautiful white stallion with golden bridle (Yt.8.18, 21).56 In fact, according to the Avestan description, Apōš is completely bald, without any hair on his head, neck or tail. So it is clear that the pomp and splendour of the combatant pairs in their demonic-divine manifestations as horses is to be confronted among others by the emphasis on the lack of Apōš’s splendid mane (Av. kauruuō.barəša- “bald-maned”).57 Reference to the panache of the horse mane (aspān bašn) is also evident in the Pahlavi epic text Ayādgār ī Zarērān “The Memorial of Zarēr,” a Sasanian adaptation of an Arsacid original. It is told that the army of the Iranian King Wištāsp, made up of numerous soldiers, elephant drivers, cavalrymen and chariots, set off to the battle-field in such a way that: tā panjāh rōz rōšn nē bawēd murw-iz nišēm nē windād bē ka ō aspān bašn nēzag-iz tēx ayāb ō kōf ī sar borz nišīnēnd (AZ 31), “for fifty days, there was no daylight, the birds found no (other) seat except on the manes of the horses and on the blade of the lance or on the high-picked mountain(s).”58 Again, the symbolic importance of the horse mane for the cavalry is stressed in this passage. Thus, it is reasonable to consider the military title Bušnišān as referring to the head of the cavalry units. Little is known about the material and form of the Parthian and Sasanian standards and banners (Av. drafša-, MP drafš), though the use of royal or military banners by the Achaemenid kings (Herodotus, The Histories

53 54 55

56 57

58

of War and instructions regarding the training, feeding, use and care of the horses; cf. Christensen 1936, p. 210.  Swennen 2004, reviewed in Schmitt 2005 and Skjærvø 2008. For a description of the horse’s mane in the Avestan and Vedic sources, cf. Swennen 2004, pp. 108–114. The equestrians are depicted among others on the rock reliefs at Fīrūzābād I (the Battle of Hormozdagān), the investiture of Ardašīr I. in Naqš-e Rostam (ANRm I), the investiture of Šābuhr I. in Naqš-e Rağab (ŠNRb. IV), the investiture of Warahrān I. in Bišāpūr (WB V), the lower register of the relief of the great Iwān of the Tāq-e Bostān, the reliefs of the Sasanian warriors in Bišāpūr etc.; cf. Callieri 2014; Farridnejad 2018, pp. 351, pp. 353–354, p. 356. Panaino 1990, pp. 44, 47. Cf. Panaino 1990, p. 47; “la crinière chauve,” Swennen 2004, p. 108; “hairless back,” cf. Martínez/de Vaan 2014, p. 109. Lubotsky reject the translation as such and suggest the translation “thin-haired mane;” cf. Lubotsky 1997, p. 142 (3.3) and n. 11. For further discussion on Lubotsky’s opinion, cf. Panaino 2009, pp. 30–31. For the edition and translation cf. Monchi-Zadeh 1981, pp. 17, 33, 43; review and corrections: MacKenzie 1984, p. 159. Monchi-Zadeh translates ō aspān bašn as “auf dem Schopf der Pferde,” while MacKenzie suggests “on the manes of the horses”. The phrase is also discussed in Fillipone 2015, pp. 336–337.

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9.59; Xenophon, Cyropaedia 6.3.4; 8.5.13)59 and custom of family standards of the Parthian and Sasanian royals and nobles are evidence on coins and reliefs and recorded in both historical as well as literary sources.60 However, the importance of the banners as a military sign is clearly reflected in the Parthian army unit of drafš, a division of 1,000 warriors with a specific banner and standard under the command of a drafš-sālār.61 A closer look at the iconographical materials from the Sasanian bas-reliefs provides visual evidence of the utilization of animal tails and manes as decorative parts of royal and military banners, standards, as well as the Sasanian

Fig. 17. Details of the zēn-abzār “horse-armour”, nišān and drafš “banner” from the Relief of the Ohrmazd II at Naqš-e Rostam (NRm V) 59 Editions and trasnlations of Goldley 1925; Miller 1014. 60 Cf. Shahbazi 1994, with further references. 61 Cf. Christensen 1919, pp. 23f.; tr. Christensen/Unvala 1925, pp. 22ff.

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Fig. 18. Standard of Šāpūr III at Naqš-e Rostam (Sarre 1903, p. 357, fig. 19).

71

Fig. 19. Standard from the relief of Ohrmazd II at Naqš-e Rostam V (Herrmann 1977, Fig. 1).

zēn-abzār “horse-armour.” Indeed, the depicted bushes are decorated the exact same way as the horse manes, tails and horse-armours are in the reliefs. This is evidence of title Bušnišān meaning “under the banner of the mane.” Mane and tail decorative elements can also be seen in the depiction of two standards of Ohrmazd II (Figs. 17 & 19), as well as on the standard of Šāpūr III (Fig. 18) and Warahrān IV, all located at Naqš-e Rostam (Fārs province, Iran). The use of animal tails and manes, especially from horses and cows, to decorate banners is attested in later periods, examples include parčam made with yak mane or tail (NP ġaž-ḡāv/Lat. Bos grunniens) Fig. 20. Standard or lances topped with horse tails among the Suljuqs of Warahrān IV and Mongols.62 from a relief at In light of this literary and iconographical Naqš-e Rostam; evidence, it is possible to suggest that the title of (Sarre 1903, Bušnišān possibly indicated an honorific military p. 357, fig. 20). title within the Sasanian noble equestrians (aswārān “knigts”) or the aswārān-sardār/aswārān šahryār “commander of the Cavalry,” with a corresponding standard. Line 5: This line is unquestionably the last line of the letter. The abbreviated key word namāz “reverence” at the beginning of this line marks the end of the letter, a common form for letters of this period. The abbreviated spelling of namāz as for Middle Persian namāz is well attested in the greeting 62 Pūrdāvūd 1331 [1952], pp. 288–289; Shahbazi 1999.

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formula of many Pahlavi documents.63 Generally, the fixed formula namāz is preceded with the preposition ō, as highlighted in many documents:64 Per. 6, 1–2: ō yazadān-ayād Xusrō-… | namāz P. 141, 1: ō yazadān-ayād Yazadāngird namāz Berlin 2, 1: ō anōš-ayād Xusrō-Gušn namāz P. Pehl. 571, R 1–2: ō [] anōš-ayād brād | Rašn namāz

However, even less frequent, the phrase without the prepositional support is attested at least in one document, namely lA 2, 2.65 The lack of preposition ō could presumably be understand as a stylistic feature, which will be explained later. The namāz formula is followed by the signature name of the sender, ĀdurMāhān son of Yazadbād. The proper name Ādur-Māh is a common name and can be found in various sources. Examples include the eponymous figures Wahrām ī Ādur-Māhān, on the sixth century sigillographic evidences of the Sasanian Spāhbeds in the Pahlavi inscription of a Sasanian bulla,66 as well as Wahrām ī Ādur-Māhān, a Zoroastrian scholar named in Pahlavi Rivāyat.67 It is most irregular, however to find the name Ādur-Māh together with the suffix -ān, which is usually used to form patronymic adjectives meaning “son of.” In New Persian, the suffix -ān functions as a diminutive suffix forming proper names. Even if such function for the suffix -ān is not known in Middle Persian, there are some Pahlavi proper names, ending with the suffix -ān, such as Pērōzān and Ohrmazdān.68 The suffix -ān can also be used to build “possessive” adjectives of names. Even though it seems to be grammatically misplaced here, the whole phrase thus could be translated as namāz Ādur-Māhān ī Yazadbādān “(sent with) the greetings by Ādur-Māh, son of Yazadbād”. This would also explain the absence of the expected preposition ō, which is accompanied by the possessive marker. The reading of the Ādur-Māhān’s patronym needs a closer look, as there are other possible forms. My prima vista reading was Dēnbādān, which was not the preferred reading. Weber initially suggested the tentative reading “dehbedān [?]” without further comments.69 However, we can clearly see the letter in . A relatively big lacuna has destroyed the beginning of this part read here as the proper suffix -bādān. The writing of dēn as the first part of compounds forming personal names is richly attested in the documents. Most evidence shows an abbreviated spelling in which the cluster is a simple amalgamation of two letters into a bow: 63 64 65 66 67 68 69

E.g. Berlin 1, 1; 2, 1; 3, 1; lA2, 2. On the evolution of cf. Zeini 2015. For a list of paradigms cf. Weber 2007b, p. 438. Weber 2008, p. 189. Cf. Gyselen 2001, pp. 37–38 (Seals 2a–2b); Gyselen 2007, p. 262. Cf. Cantera 2004, p. 211. Cf. Ṣādeqī 1399 [2020], pp. 12–19. See also Gignoux 1986, p. 139, No. 705; p. 174, No. 760. Weber 2008b, p. 809.

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Berlin 5, 3

Berlin 6, 6

Berlin 10, 4

Berlin 8, 7

Dēnabzūd70

Dēnbaragān

Dēnabzūd71

Dēnabzūd72

Fig. 21

Fig. 22

Fig. 23

Fig. 24

73

This variant was probably marked to distinguish between the amalgamed and more elaborate spelling. The clear writing of is also attested in some documents: 707172 Moreover, before the patronymic complementary suffix -bādān one would expect the names of Gods or Goddesses, which in this case fits into the reading of dēn. Despite a primary reading of , new evidence strongly suggest that the P.Pehl. 569, 5 patronym of the sender should be read

as Yazadbādān. The proper Dēnbādān name Yazadbād is fairly attested Fig. 25 in various Parthian and Middle Persian sources.73 The MP yz[d]pt, OIr. *Yazatapāta- “Protected by Yazatas/God(s)”74 occurs on an inscribed seal and its prominent attestation is in the name of Yazadbād, the royal counsellor of the Queens ( Yazadbād ī bānūgān handarzbed), mentioned in the mid-third century ce in Šāpūr I’s Inscription at Kaʿbe-ye Zardošt (ŠKZ 27).75

*** In conclusion, this letter provides us with the following information. It was written by a certain Ādur-Māh(ān), son of Yazadbād (C2) to a certain person 70 For this new reading see D. Weber’s contribution in this issue. 71 Cf. Weber 2015 [2019], p. 86. 72 Cf. Weber forthcoming b. 73 Schmitt 2016, p. 606, No. 247–248 & p. 249, No. 612. Further attestations Harmatta 1958, p. 126; Gignoux 1972, p. 68b; Weber 2010b, pp. 563–564. 74 Attested is furthermore the proper name Yazadān-bād “Protected by the gods,” cf. Gignoux 1986, p. 191, No. 1059. 75 Huyse 1999, §48, Vol. 1, p. 60; Vol. 2, pp. 164–165. Likewise, the name occurs in the Parthian () and Greek (Ἰησδιβαδ βασιλισσών ανδαρζαβιδ) versions.

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addressed as his Excellency Bōxtag, son of Bušnišān (C1). The letter seems to be an official demand to fulfil a judicial decision following a court trial. It delivers a verdict in which the befitted conflict party belongs to high society, addressed by a special praise and the term xwadāyīg “excellency” with a very high indemnity, namely a half of a certain district. Another remarkable information is the military title Bušnišān “under the banner of the mane,” which suggests that the person comes from military background. The title, deciphered here for the first time, probably refers to a particular troop within the Sasanian noble equestrians with a corresponding standard. Both literary and iconographical evidence found on Sasanian reliefs refer to the utilization of such banners and standards made with the mane and tale of warfare animals.

Sigla and Signs ↑ Direction of fibre Ar. Arabic Av. Avestan Dk. Dēnkard Berlin Berliner Pahlavi-Documents, Weber 2008a. KNRb Kirdīr’s inscription at Naqš-e Raǧab = Back 1978 lA Pahlavi Documents of Los Angeles, Gignoux 1998. Lat. Latin MP Middle Persian NP New persian O. Ostraka = Weber 1992 OIr. Old Iranian OP Old Persian P. Pahlavi papyri and parchments, Weber 1992, p. 1–124; 2003, p. 125-343 P. Pehl. Pahlavi Papyri and Parchments of the Papyrus Collection of the Austrian National Library, Vienna (original signature, for the most part unpublished Parth. Parthian Per. Pahlavi-Papyri und Pergamente, Perikhanian 1961. ŠKZ Šāpūr I’s Inscription at Kaʿbe-ye Zardošt = HUYSE 1999

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— 2012: ”Studies in Some Documents from the “Pahlavi Archive” (2).” In: BAI 29, pp. 79–116. — 2019: “Pahlavi Legal Documents from Tabarestān. Two Claims and a Re-Evaluation of Crop Yields: A Philological Study of Tab. 21, 22 and 24.” In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Sasanian Persia and the Tabarestan Archive (Res Orientales 27). Bures sur Yvette, pp. 91–116. — 2020: “Pahlavi Legal Documents from Tabarestān: The Documents Tab. 11, 28 and 27: A Philological Approach.” In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Persia (552 BCE–758 CE). Primary Sources, Old and New (Res Orientales 28). Bures sur Yvette, pp. 171–88. — forthcoming a: Development of the Pahlavi Script. Wiesbaden. — forthcoming b: “Studies in Some Documents from the ‘Pahlavi Archive’ (3).” In: BAI 30. Zaehner, R. C. 1937: “Nāmak-nipēsišnīh.” In: BSOAS 9/1, pp. 93–109. Zeini, A. 2015: “Preliminary Remarks on Middle Persian in the Pahlavi Documents.” In: A. Krasnowolska/R. Rusek-Kowalska (eds.): Studies in the Iranian World. Vol. I: Before Islam. Warszawa, pp. 67–73. — 2016. “A Unique Pahlavi Papyrus from Vienna (P.Pehl. 562).” In: 45/1, pp. 39–52. — 2018: “Middle Persian Papyri, Ostraca and Parchments: An Introduction.” In: SPS 1, pp. 1–6.

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“Sasanian Textiles” and the Tang Cosmopolitan Style Mariachiara Gasparini Since the beginning of the 20th century, late antique textiles with zoomorphic figures, floral motifs, or hunting scenes, often enclosed in roundels, arches, ogival or geometrical latticework, have gathered great attention in the academic world and been categorized as Sasanian (224–651 ce). Associated with the late Sasanian rock relief of Tāq-e-Bostān and stuccos from Ctesiphon, Iran, where similar iconographies are seen, these textiles are mostly found woven in silk and sometimes in cotton and wool. This article follows a more comprehensive study that I have recently published.1 It is also based on the results of personal microscopic and iconographic analysis of a group of textiles in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MET), a few specimens in the Yale University Art Gallery (YUAG), and of some examples of textiles, possibly from Qinghai, China, that have lately appeared on the art market.2 Here I do not discuss this material in detail but I examine some of its main technical and iconographic features and the role that it played in the creation of the “Tang cosmopolitan style” in the spreading of Buddhist art eastward and early Islamic art westward. I argue that this style was developed through a modular program applied to the weaving process once western materials and iconographies were acquired in the Tarim Basin, Xinjiang, China, in the 6th century, and eventually readapted as “late baroque Sasanian forms” in the early Islamic period.3 The iconographic repertory attributed to the Sasanians is based on oftenanachronistic textile evidence discovered in Greater Iran and, therefore, to those areas outside of Fars, mainly between Eastern Iran and Western China and between Egypt and Syria. In this regard, the lack of direct textile and textual evidence from central Sasanian territories cannot support the appellation of 1 Gasparini 2019. 2 In Summer 2019, the Dunhuang Academy in collaboration with the Pritzker Art Collaborative, organized the exhibition “Cultural Exchange Along the Silk Road: Masterpieces of the Tubo Period (7th –9th century)” (July 3–October 22, 2019. Exhibition Center of Dunhuang Caves, Mogao Grottoes). The exhibition included textiles, possibly from Qinghai of Central Asia, lately acquired by the Abegg Stiftung, which is currently preparing a related publication. 3 Ledderose 2000, pp. 1–7, 81–84. Boris I. Marshak described the style of later Iranianstyle metalworks as “late baroque.” Marshak 1986, pp. 62, 298–304. Sasanian Studies | Sasanidische Studien. Vol. I (2022). Ed. by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee doi: 10.13173/SSt.1.081

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“Sasanian” per se. Still, this article opens the path to a cross-cultural analysis that shifts the focus onto other areas, possibly to the East. The textile fragments held by the MET are particularly important because some of them are rare specimens discovered in Šahr-e Qumis, Iran and date to the Sasanian period, and others from 8th-century Central Asia and China.4 Those in the YUAG belong to two different periods: a group from Dura Europos, Syria, datable to the Parthian period (247 bce – 224 ce), and a couple of examples from Iran or Syria, dated to the 7th century (according to the Gallery). Finally, those from Qinghai constitute a group of textiles in the form of fragments and finished garments, datable to between the 7th and 8th centuries, which belonged to Türko-Tibetan and proto-Mongolian populations who inhabited the area. They might have initially acquired textiles, techniques, and motifs from the Hephthalites and Sogdians through the Koko-nor-Lhasa (Qinghai-Tibet areas) and the Kokonor-Miran (Qinghai-Xinjiang areas) routes to Eastern Iran, and began weaving a variety of new material.5 Among the first scholars who identified these textiles as Sasanian was Otto von Falke, who divided the textiles into two main groups: Northern (specifically North-Eastern) and Western Iranian textiles. He compared them to the Tāq-e-Bostān rock reliefs and Sasanian metalworks and coins, and also recognized a group of Chinese textiles made in “Persian style.”6 This division was supported and further analyzed by Henry Schmidt, who stated that “textile decorative forms of late Sasanian art are so manifest that it is difficult to dissociate these silks from Persia itself”.7 Between the end of the 1920s and the 1940s, Rodolphe Pfister attributed many of the textiles discovered in Egypt to Iran.8 In the same period, Phyllis Ackerman published an article about a few pieces in the Moore Collection at Yale University. A tapestry fragment from Egypt and two silk fragments from the same bolt acquired by the museum were later recognized and discussed by Ackerman as “unmistakably” Sasanian.9 In 1946, Ackerman wrote that Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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“Sasanian silks are all in all, the most valuable fabrics which exist. While they were being produced, they were famous from China to Europe; the Japanese copied them, and they furnished designs, and long determined styles, for the vaunted weavers of Byzantium.”10

4

The fragments from Šahr-e Qumis were analyzed and published by Trudy S. Kawami three decades ago. Kawami 1992, pp. 15–18. 5 Satō 1975, pp. 1–19. I have discussed the interaction between Hephthalites, Sogdians, Tuyuhun, and Tibetans in two forthcoming articles. 6 Von Falke 1913, pp. 78–92. 7 Schmidt 1930, pp. 284. 8 Pfister 1928, pp. 215–43; 1948, pp. 46–74. 9 Ackerman 1935, p. 4. 10 Ackerman 1946, pp. 42.

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Later, D. G. Shepherd, curator at the Cleveland Museum of Art, identified a group of these textiles as Sogdian and labeled them as zandanījī because they were believed to be woven in Zandana near Bukhara, Uzbekistan, which was renowned for its cotton rather than silk.11 In the 1960s, A. Geijer identified textiles from Antinoöpolis as Sasanian.12 Later, M. Dōmyō and K. Otavsky linked them to Tāq-e Bostān.13 At the same time, A. Ierusalimskaya traced many of the fragments from Moschevaya Balka, North Caucasus, to Sogdiana (present-day Uzbekistan).14 In 2003, E. Kageyama, building upon Ackerman’s and Shepherd’s scholarship, identified textiles from Turfan, Astana and Kara-Koja in Xinjiang as Sasanian (called “group A”), and as Central Asian or, more specifically, Sogdian (called “group B”). A year later, C. Bier published an interesting paper about the mathematical aspect of these textiles and the importance of the technique involved in their weaving. She argued that it was the main reason they were appreciated as luxurious goods.15 The volume Central Asian Textiles, published by the Abegg Stiftung in 2006, remains one of the most valuable multi-authored publications on the topic, and it distinguishes many aspects and evolutions of these textiles discovered in different areas of Eurasia.16 More recently, M. Compareti has offered an iconographic perspective. He discusses a composite zoomorphic figure termed simurgh, also commonly recognized as Sasanian, which he traces to early-Islamic Eastern Iran or Sogdiana.17 These textile iconographies are particularly interesting, not only because as a whole they are recognized as Sasanian, but because they are comparable to the earlier Iranian repertory of motifs and patterns that were acquired by Persian and Iranian dynastic groups over the centuries, and eventually inherited by the Sasanians. However, only at the end of the Sasanian period did they begin to appear on rock reliefs and stuccos in Iran and on Central Asian wall paintings (i.e. Penjikent, Afrasiyab, Balayk-Tepe, Bamiyan). Although no similarlypatterned textiles from the earlier Sasanian period have survived, other media — such as coins, seals and metalworks — can provide comparative examples. These iconographies began to reappear in systematic, modular textile registers in the 6th century (during the Sui dynasty in China, 581–618 ce) and continued to be developed throughout the 9th century (during the Tang period, 618–907 ce). Through the mediation of the Sogdians and Turks (who between 552 and 744 ce had established two Khaganates), these textiles reached the Byzantine 11 Shepherd 1959, pp. 21–37. I discussed the use and implication of the word zandanījī in my monograph. Gasparini 2019, pp. 45–54. 12 Geijer 1963, pp. 2–36; 1968, pp. 22–23. 13 Dōmyō 1981, pp. 49–75; Otavsky 1998. 14 Ierusalimskaya, 2012. 15 Bier 2004, pp. 144–153. 16 Schorta 2006. 17 Compareti 2020, pp. 115–138.

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Empire, which re-established its silk manufacturing. Still, during the Mongol period, between the 13th and 14th centuries, the same iconography reappeared but was woven into more complex structures.18 In this context, earlier Tibetan groups became familiar with this iconographic repertory and adopted it across the Trans-Himalayas. A comparative example can be traced between a gold plaque from the so-called Ziwiye Horde, dating back to the 7th century bce, and the dhotī (skirt) of the giant statue of Maitreya, located in one of the Mangyu complex’s temples in Ladakh (now India) datable to the 13th century. On both, we can see a similar type of latticework created with a rhomboid grid, or lozenges, that has every intersection jointed by a kind of feline (or griffin’s) head (Fig. 1a, b). While the heads on the plaque are created as single elements, those on the dhotī are components of two winged bodies that form the grid. A similar lion head shared by two winged bodies laterally portrayed is also found on another gold object allegedly from Ziwiye (Fig. 1c).19 A silk fragment from Antinoöpolis, dated to the 6th century and possibly Byzantine, shows a similar overall composition (Fig. 1d). But in this case, the latticework is made of different elements. The feline head is substituted by a circle enclosing a rosette from which branches with leaves create the lozenges. While the latticework on the plaque frames deer, the dhotī frames narrative Buddhist scenes. The silk fragment, however, alternatively frames medallions enclosing a palmette, or a pair of facing ducks, which became one of the most popular motifs of the Sasanian-Tang period. From the examples above, it appears clear that standardized patterns were reused to decorate different media over the centuries across Iranian borders. Nevertheless, not a single textile decorated with such motifs, or those depicted in Tāq-e-Bostān or Ctesiphon, has been discovered in Iran to date. With a couple of exceptions, the textile fragments from Šahr-e Qumis in the MET are plain wool or cotton fragments, showing colored bands or bands with small rosettes and dots that do not suggest additional larger compositions (Fig. 2). The other patterned fragments or garments labeled as Sasanian are of unknown provenance and are most likely datable to a later period. However, the wool and cotton fragment with rosettes and dots confirm the production of weft-faced woolen textiles in Iranian territories, as well as the use of two motifs that were primarily employed in the creation of the “Sasanian” textiles under discussion.20 By comparing this material with the one from Dura Europos, it looks as if textiles produced during the Parthian period were more colorful and decorated (with Hellenistic-Roman-inspired motifs) than those from the Sasanian period in Šahr-e 18 Gasparini 2019, pp. 21, 72–73. 19 Both objects from Ziwiye were part of the Thétis Collection, Geneva, Switzerland, and acquired prior to 1970. They were sold by Christie’s in London in 2012. https://www. christies.com/lotfinder/Lot/a-ziwiye-gold-plaque-fragment-circa-7th-5609583-details. aspx [Last accessed 31.08.2021] and https://www.christies.com/lotfinder/Lot/a-ziwiyegold-roundel-circa-7th-century-5609582-details.aspx [Last accessed 31.08.2021]. 20 A weft-faced compound is woven with a single set of warp and two sets of weft (one of which is binding). It can be woven in a tabby (called “taquete”) or twill (called “samite”) structure.

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Fig. 1. a) Above left: gold plaque with latticework with feline masks, enclosing elk and stags from Ziwiye, Iran, 7th cent.; b) below left: detail of latticework made of winged felines on the skirt of Maitreya in Mangyu, Ladakh, India, 13th cent.; c) above right: gold item with two winged lion bodies and one shared head, from Ziwiye, Iran 7th cent.; d) below right: possible Byzantine textile from Antinoöpolis, Egypt, showing a latticework enclosing roundels with a pair of ducks and/or a palmette motif, 6th-7th cent. Museé des Tissus, Lyon (#25.812/I). Drawings by author.

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Qumis (Fig. 3). Except for the garments in Taq-e-Bostan, Sasanian clothing, as portrayed on other media, generally does not show patterned compositions of this elaborate type. Compounds similar to those from Dura Europos excavated in the Shanpula and Yingpan cemeteries in Xinjiang, China, have confirmed technical and artistic exchanges between eastern and western territories since at least the Roman-Parthian-Han period, between the end of the last millennium bce and the beginning of the first millennium ce.21

Fig. 2. Textile fragments with rosettes and dots. Wool and cotton. From Šahr-e Qumis, Iran, 6th cent. MET (#69.24.35). Public domain. The variegate and ubiquitous material collected in museums and private collections that have been labeled as Sasanian suggests that hundreds of workshops across and beyond the borders of Eastern and Western Iran created and copied similar or identical patterns and motifs. In this regard, despite the lack of direct evidence, there is no reason to doubt that in Iran, weavings with a similar repertory were produced during the Sasanian period. This assumption, however, does not confirm the original development of these textiles in central Iranian territories. An iconographic and technical analysis of the so-called Sasanian textiles can only temptingly support the traceability of their possible provenance. But the overall pattern and outline of the various compositions can elucidate some aspects of their development. Although it is not exhaustive, a general and simplified differentiation can be made according to the following categories: 21 Keller/Schorta 2001; Li in Schorta 2006, pp. 251–253.

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– Material (wool, cotton, silk) – Technique (tapestry, warp- or weft-faced compound, embroidery) – Colors (blue or green ground preferred in western areas, variation or red and/or yellow preferred in eastern areas) – Overall composition (lozenge-pattern, roundel-pattern, arch-pattern, squarepattern, free-standing-element pattern) – Single elements in the composition (typology – i.e. a narrative scene; directionality)

Fig. 3. Fragment with colored bands and Hellenistic-Roman motif. Wool. 3rd cent. CE. From Dura Europos, Syria. Yale University Gallery (# 1933.490A). Public domain. The adaptation of a pattern or a motif, such as the most popular winged horse, can be traced by comparing a few fragments produced between the 6th and 8th centuries from different Eurasian areas (Fig. 4a, b, c, d, e). Most likely, the woolen tapestry from Egypt, now in the Abegg Stiftung (4a), was one of those textiles created in loco as a copy of a high-quality silk model imported from the East and included among “Coptic” textiles (4c).22 In China, woolen tapestries, which were referred to as a foreign product classified as ji 罽 since the Han period (202 bce–220 ce), would confirm the lack of production of textiles in such material and technique.23 Silk tapestries, however, began to appear around the 7th century, possibly as a local adaptation of imported woolen tapestry-models.24 The silk fragment from Egypt (4c), now in the Musée des Tissus in Lyon, which might have provided the basic pattern for the woolen tapestry of Egypt, shows an elegant, refined, and proportioned horse, with an overall naturalistic expression. 22 Schrenk/Schorta 2006, pp. 23–34; p. 32. 23 Wu in Schorta 2006, pp. 212–125. 24 Gasparini 2019, pp. 38.

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a) ©Abegg-Stiftung CH-3132 Riggisberg, 2012 c) ©Musée du Tissus g) ©Cotsen Textile Traces Study Collection, courtesy of The George Washington University Museum.

Fig. 4. a) above left: detail of a woolen tapestry from Egypt, 6th–7th cent. (#2191) (photo: Christoph von Viràg); b) above center: detail of a silk weft-faced compound, 6th–7th cent. MET (#2004.255). Public domain; c) above right: detail of a silk weft-faced compound from Egypt, 6th–7th cent. (#26.812/11) d) middle right: detail of a woolen and cotton weft-faced tabby, 7th–8th cent. MET (#48.43). Public domain; e) middle center: detail of a silk warp-faced compound tabby from Xinjiang, China, 7th cent. Private collection; f) middle left: detail of a silk weft-faced panel, possibly from Central Asia, 7th–8th cent. Private collection; g) bottom: detail of a weft-faced compound fragment, possibly from West Asia, 6th–7th cent. (#T-0952).

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In comparison, the horse portrayed on a silk fragment held in the MET appears as a bold and unrefined copy of the one in Lyon and suggests a different provenance (4b). The squared device that is seen four times in the roundel is one of those elements that can be found mainly on Central Asian textiles. Wu Min has argued that is a Chinese invention recalling the character hui 回, which means “to return.” 25 But it appears especially on warp-faced compounds rather than on weft-faced compounds such as the fragment from Egypt, and it is also seen in roundels depicted in the Bamiyan caves and on Sasanian stuccos.26 In the early Islamic period, however, all these elements were recombined into wool-cotton weft-faced compounds, to be seen in another fragment in the MET (4d). This fragment shows a grid of double-pearl squares, each jointed by a square device, enclosing a horse with no wings but a ribbon (of the type that characterizes Sasanian clothing). While roundels enclosing a single animal can be found across Eurasia, animals in pairs seem to be a feature of Central Asian textiles, and are rarely seen on weavings from Egypt and Syria (4e). On the contrary, mirrored hunting scenes, human busts, repeated unframed animals, or animals in action remain features of the Sasanian-Byzantine cultural sphere. When these latest appear on Central Asian textiles, they generally fit into the established local modular unit. The sequence of unframed drinking horses on a fragment from the Cotsen Collection (4g), for instance, appears again as facing pairs on a pedestal, enclosed into two beaded frames (a roundel and a square) on a textile that was most likely woven in Central Asia (4f). But the striking naturalistic and dramatic eye expression of the horse on the Cotsen fragment, which recalls the horse on the silk fragment from Egypt (4c), now in Lyon, suggests a western provenance and the existence of different-quality workshops across Eurasia. While horses, ducks and pheasants were among those patterns that were broadly adopted in Eurasia, others seem to be only preferred or transmitted across specific areas. The boar’s head, for instance, which appears among the Ctesiphon stuccos and on a tile from Bamiyan, is found on woolen tapestries, warp- and weft-faced compounds, and also embroidered on plain ground located mostly in the Tarim Basin, along the Northern Silk Road.27 Variations of stags, deer and ibexes appear especially in other Central Asian areas, which suggest a local creation that can be traced back to the Pazyryk carpet discovered in the Altai, possibly woven in Bactria in the 5th century bce.28 Interestingly, the simurgh, 25 Gasparini 2010, pp. 235. 26 A warp-faced compound employs two sets of warps (one of which is binding) that creates the pattern and a single set of weft. This type of weaving was replaced by weft-faced compounds around the 8th century. I could not microscopically analyze the fragment in the MET because, at the time of my visit, it was displayed in the Islamic Art Gallery. 27 Examples are a tapestry in the Cleveland Museum of Art (# 1950.509), a warp-faced twill and a weft-faced compound twill from Astana Tomb 138 and 335 in the Urumqi, Museum of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (cf. Wu in 2006, p. 240, Fig. 179) and an embroidered panel in the MET (# 2004.260). 28 Gasparini 2019, pp. 25–26.

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which can be seen from Sogdiana to the Mediterranean and in Southwest China, has not been found around the Tarim Basin, where many of these weavings were discovered, and thus it was not used in the local Buddhist context.29 A variation of this creature is seen on two unique specimens: on the lining of a shirt in a private collection, and on a fragment that I analyzed in the China National Silk Museum, possibly from Qinghai (Fig. 5).30 It appears mirrored and stands on a winged pedestal, which confirms the preference for figures in pairs in eastern areas. While in the first example, the couple of simurgh is enclosed in a simple beaded roundel, in the second, the roundel is framed by a floral medallion that is typical of 8th century-textiles. Such textiles were possibly created on a loom with a cord-lashes system and patterned pick-up on simple with lashes. Although it was not intended as a mechanical loom or a proper draw loom like the types that were developed later, either in Iran or China, it was a patterned loom, possibly evolved from an earlier and simpler loom where the cords were directly pulled by the weaver.31 The lashes system used for the Qinghai textiles would have permitted the weaver to create the pattern starting from the outline, moving to the inline, and finally to the rest of the ground (Fig. 6). This technique, which was not used for earlier or similar textiles discovered in West Asia or central China, once again suggests Central Asia as the place of origin.32 Recent discoveries, however, indicate the possible existence of a local production that was developed by Central Asian or early Tibetan people who inhabited Qinghai, and who inherited, combined, and developed Iranian iconographies through the Central Asian modular weaving process mentioned above. By the end of the 8th century, the pattern visible on the clothing depicted in Tāq-e Bostān or on the repetition of stuccos from Ctesiphon had changed. Textiles dated to this period have larger roundels framed by lobes, or extra roundels that sometimes include animals. In addition, the floral motifs between each roundel became substituted by other animals in pairs. In this regard, these textiles can be seen as later baroque forms of established Iranian iconographic models that became popular and dominated Eurasia in late antiquity. Without a doubt, the diffusion of these textile patterns was also due to the spreading of Buddhism eastward that reached its high during the Tang period in China. The Tang cosmopolitan style, which generally addresses the diffusion of Buddhist art in East Asia, can also be extended to these “late baroque Sasanian textiles.” Foreign patterns and motifs that had already been adopted in China during the Northern Dynasty period (386–618 ce) were re-elaborated through 7th–8th century Chinese aesthetics, which was based upon extensive use of variegate floral motifs.

29 30 31 32

Compareti 2020, pp. 116. Gasparini 2016, p. 91; Compareti 2015, p. 36, Fig. 2. Zhao in Schorta 2006, pp. 205–209. Schorta 2006, p. 206.

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©China National Silk Museum

Fig. 5. Textile fragment with a standing simurgh originally mirrored. Silk weft-faced twill. 7th–8th cent. (#3440.1-2). Reconstruction by author.

Fig. 6. Reconstruction of Central Asian weft-faced twill loom with cord-lash system pattern pick-up on simples with lashes. After Zhao Feng in Schorta 2006, p. 209, Fig. 148.

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Lotus flowers and peonies created new colorful and bold textile patterns that eventually were replicated in the Buddhist caves in the western regions of China.33 Early beaded roundels appear on the robes of the Tocharian knights, or as single decorative motifs in the Kizil caves between the 6th and 7th centuries, where the Iranian style resides with no evidence of Chinese influence. But in the same period, in Dunhuang, types of similar roundels began to appear on the skirts of bodhisattvas (i.e. cave 420) or on panels in the niches (i.e. cave 227). By the middle Tang period, the motifs in the caves became more complex. The cushion of the Buddha in parinirvana in cave 158, which was created during the period of Tibetan domination, is decorated with a sequence of large floral roundels enclosing a standing duck with a ribbon (Fig. 7d). Whereas the internal roundel is still beaded and recalls the sequence of roundels enclosing a duck in Kizil cave 60, the creation of a new floral style is confirmed by a silk fragment with floral roundels enclosing a duck with a ribbon in Dulan, Qinghai.34

b) © Dumbarton Oaks, Byzantine Collection, Washington, DC c) © Benaki Museum Athens

Fig. 7. a) On the left: fragment with baohua motif. Weft-faced twill, silk, 8th –9th cent. China. MET (#1996.103.1). Public domain; b) Second left: fragment with a floral medallion framing a palmette motif. Tapestry, wool, 8th cent. West Asia. (#BZ1945.1); c) Second right: fragment with floral medallions enclosing a bird. Tapestry, wool, 8th cent. West Asia. Benaki Museum (#15796); d) Detail of the cushion of Buddha in parinirvana; dry-fresco. Dunhuang Cave 158. (a, b, c, d: Public domain).

33 W. Watson referred to the Buddhist art of the Tang period as “Tang international style” or as the “jewel style.” Watson 1995, pp. 105. More recently, Dorothy C. Wong has re-discussed this style in relation to Buddhist pilgrim-monks in East Asia. Wong 2018. I prefer the term “cosmopolitan” over “international” because it better explains the phenomenon of acculturation that occurred in city-states across kingdoms and empires in antiquity. They are not to be intended as the present state-nations. 34 Gasparini 2016, pp. 86–87.

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The Tang cosmopolitan style enabled the diffusion of specific Buddhist models across East Asia. Iranian (or Türkic-Iranian) patterns were deconstructed and reassembled to fulfill the new Buddhist taste, which slowly detached from Central Asian models and was entirely Sinicized. In this transformative process, both Korea and Japan subscribed to the Tang cosmopolitan style through direct and indirect assimilation of motifs that were re-elaborated into textiles that became part of the local visual and material traditions.35 The well-preserved examples from the Shōsō-in and Hōryū-ji in Nara confirm the circulation of material during the diffusion of Buddhism, as well as the decline of the original beaded roundel by the middle of the 8th century.36 Large floral medallions (baohua 宝花 in Chinese, meaning “floral treasure”) or floral roundels framing zoomorphic figures were repeated on textile compounds, rugs, lacquerwares and musical instruments sent to Japan from China through Korea.37 Eventually, during the Heian period (794–1086 ce), the rigid Chinese modular sequence of floral motifs, constructed upon the original beaded roundels pattern, was simplified on Japanese textiles. The Tang cosmopolitan style, however, did not reach only eastern territories but was also reabsorbed into western areas that had been Islamized. Silk textile patterns were re-elaborated into traditional western woolen and cotton weavings. Thus, the floral medallion on early Islamic woolen tapestries from Egypt, which were likely woven in West Asia and are now preserved in collections worldwide, recalls the baohua motif that is also found as a single motif at the center of the canopies depicted on the ceilings of the caves in Dunhuang (i.e. cave 320).38 A comparison can be traced between a silk weftfaced fragment in the MET and a woolen tapestry fragment in the Dumbarton Oaks. Both these pieces, which are dated to the 8th century show a floral medallion (Fig. 7a, b). However, while the Tang medallion features a central open lotus flower, which evolved from an early Chinese rosette, the Islamic medallion portrays a pointed flower that recalls the palmette in the latticework on the Byzantine fragment from Antinoöpolis mentioned above (Fig. 1d).39 A similar palmette also appears in the coeval mosaics of the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem and on Sasanian reliefs; however, it can be traced back to the Achaemenid period (550 bce–330 bce). A seated ruler and a prince standing behind him on the Apadana in Persepolis, for instance, are holding a similar flower. Many of the textiles that have survived to date, without a doubt, confirm the contemporary production and diffusion of identical or similar floral patterns, often combined with zoomorphic figures, across Eurasia (7c, d). Silk woven compounds and woolen tapestries were often employed 35 36 37 38 39

Kim 2017, pp. 116–133. Matsumoto 1984. Atsuhiko 2012, pp. 3–4, Fig. 4, 5. Dopšel Williams 2019. Gasparini 2019, p. 18, Fig. 1.1.

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in the decoration of religious spaces; like the silk canopies depicted in the Buddhist caves, woolen tapestries were hung in Islamic interiors as additional architectural ornaments.40 It is not an exaggeration to say that while Buddhism enabled the transformation of the beaded roundel into a floral medallion and its acquisition in East Asia, it also provided Islam with a new iconographic modular unit. Most likely, floral medallions were acquired through western Central Asian areas, which in the 8th century were controlled first by the Umayyad and then the Abbasid dynasties (661–750 ce; 750–1250 ce). For instance, a polychromatic child’s silk coat with beaded roundels enclosing a pair of ducks, lined with a monochromatic textile with floral medallions (now held in the Cleveland Museum of Art) visually exemplifies such transfer and adaptation.41 But beaded roundels enclosing ducks and other animals still appeared among wall paintings in Samarra, Iraq, in the 9th century.42 Roundels and medallions also evolved into an octagonal latticework that continued to include traditional animals. Eventually, intricate geometrical frames enclosing hunting scenes began to appear and be woven as late as the 11th century, but they continued to be referred to as “Sasanian textiles,” or textiles in “Sasanian style.” 43 The lack of geometrical latticework in East Asian territories suggests that they were unique Islamic developments in the western areas, built upon earlier preIslamic motifs. A late Sasanian, or early Islamic, stucco from Barz-Qawaleh, Iran, for instance, shows two overlaid squares that frame a beaded roundel enclosing a duck. It might be seen as an early version of one of the intricate geometrical ornaments that by the 9 th century characterized Islamic art and architecture.44 The so-called Sasanian textiles with patterns of roundels were most probably created in Central Asia, where the weavers combined well-known Iranian motifs and new Chinese silk textile structures. The traditional Chinese systematic modular process that had been used to produce works of art in large quantities over the centuries was once again employed to include 40 41 42 43

Dopšel Williams, 2019. Cleveland Museum of Art (# 1996.2.1). Hoffman 2008, pp. 107–132. For examples a yellow silk with ducks from Central Asia, sold by Sotheby’s in 2018 (https://w w w.sothebys.com /en /auctions/ecatalog ue/2018/arts-of-the-islamicworld-l18220/lot.125.html [Last accessed 31.08.2021]); a woolen fragment with a similar layout but framing a standing pair of stags in front of a plant, possibly from Iraq or Syria, now in the YUAG (#1937.4544); a silk weft compound with an intricate geometric latticework enclosing either two mirroring Sasanian-style hunters riding a winged elephant or two mirroring lions in front of a tree, which has been dated to between 628 and 630 ce; and a fragment with a similar intricate latticework framing hares and two falconers riding a horse, which has been dated to the 10th century, in the Detroit Museum of Art (# 44.143). 44 Karamian/Farrokh 2017, pp. 69, 80. Abdullahi/Embi 2013, pp. 244–245.

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foreign motifs into new textile patterns. Eventually, the floral medallion, also combined with beaded roundels, became a feature of Tang Buddhist art and provided a model to build upon in Korea and Japan. The Islamization of Central Asia in the 8th century (whereas Buddhism also had reached a peak in East Asia) followed a similar process in western areas. Even though Byzantium had developed its silk manufacture around the 6th century, 8th-century woolen tapestries discovered in Egypt confirm the continuity of traditional woolen tapestries in the West. The rigid modular process applied to Central Asian silk weavings did not prohibit modifications and changes in the artistic and aesthetic evolution. It created a variety of units that were recombined and deconstructed once the loom, possibly with a lash system, had been mastered. The Tang cosmopolitan style, which does not distinguish Chinese art but the arts of China in a moment of cultural and artistic interaction with TürkoIranian and Tibeto-Mongolian populations, is recognized in the transformed registers of post-Sasanian textiles of the early Islamic period. The floral motif of later materials became a vehicle for transmitting previous iconographies and provided the foundations for new registers and layouts according to Buddhist and Islamic tastes, through which East and West discovered new cultural identities.

Bibliography Abdullahi, Y./M. R. B. Embi 2013: “Evolution of Islamic Patterns.” In: FAR 2, pp. 243–251. Ackerman, P. 1946: “An Unpublished Sasanian Textile.” In: BII 7/1, pp. 42–50. Ackerman, P. 1935: “A Sasanian Tapestry.” In: BAIPAA 4/1, pp. 2–4. Atsuhiko, O. 2012: “The Shoso-in Textiles of the Era of Emperor Shomu.” In: Textile Society of America Symposium Proceedings, pp. 1–10. Available online: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/tsaconf/720/?utm_source=digitalcommons.unl. edu%2Ftsaconf%2F720&utm_medium=PDF&utm_campaign=PDFCoverPages [Last accessed 31.08.2021]. Bier, C. 2004: “Pattern Power: Textiles and the Transmission of Knowledge.” In: Textile Society of America Symposium Proceedings, pp. 144–153. Available online: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/tsaconf/444/ [Last accessed 31.08.2021]. Compareti, M. 2015: “Ancient Iranian Decorative Textiles: New Evidence from Archaeological Investigation and Private Collections.” In: SR 13, pp. 36–44. — 2020: “Iranian Composite Creatures between Caucasus and Western China: The Case of the So-Called Simurgh.” In: Iran and Caucasus 24, pp. 115–138. Dōmyō, M. 1981: “The Classification and Reconstruction of Textile Designs in the Relief of Royal Boar Hunt at Taq-i Bustan.” In: Oriento 14/1, pp. 49–75. Gasparini, M. 2016: “Sino-Iranian Textile Patterns in Trans-Himalayan Areas.” In: SR 14, pp. 84–96. — 2019: Transcending Patterns: Silk Road Cultural and Artistic Interactions through Central Asian Textile Images. Honolulu.

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Geijer, A. 1963: “A Silk from Antinoë and the Sasanian Textile Art.” In: OS 12, pp. 2–36. — 1968: “An Iranian Riding Coat Reconstructed: Summary of Mrs. Agnes Geijer’s Speech.” In: BCIETA 27, pp. 22–23. Hoffman, E. R. 2008: “Between East and West: The Wall Painting of Samarra and the Construction of Abbasid Princely Culture.” In: Muqarnas 25, pp. 107–132. Ierusalimskaya, A. 2012: Moschtcevaya Balkha. An Unusual Archeological Site at the North Caucasus Silk Road. St. Petersburg. Karamian, G./K. Farrokh 2017: “Sassanian Stucco Decorations from the Ramavand (Barz Qawaleh) Excavations in the Lorestan Province in Iran.” In: Historia i Świat 6, pp. 70–88. Kawami, T. S. 1992: “Archaeological Evidence for Textiles in Pre-Islamic Iran.” In: IrSt 25/1, pp. 7–18. Kim, H. 2017: “An Analysis of the Early Unified Silla Bas-Relief of Pearl Roundel, Tree of Life, Peacocks, and Lion from the Gyeongju National Museum, Korea.” In: SR 15, pp. 116–133. Ledderose, L. 2000: Ten Thousand Things: Module and Mass Production in Chinese Art. Princeton. Marshak, B. I. 1986: Silberschätze des Orients: Metallkunst des 3.–13. Jahrhunderts und ihre Kontinuität. Leipzig. Matsumoto, K. 1984: Shŏsŏin-gire to Asuka Tenpyŏ no senshoku 正倉院裂と飛鳥天平の 染織 [7th and 8th Century Textiles in Japan from the Shoso-in and Horyu-ji]. Kyoto. Pfister, R. 1928: “La Décoration des étoffes d’Antinoë.” In: RAA 5, pp. 215–243. — 1948: “Le Rôle de l’Iran dans les textiles d’Antinoé.” In: ArIs 13/14, pp. 46–74. Satō, H. 1975: “The Route from Kokonor to Lhasa during the T’ang Period.” In: AcAs 19, pp. 1–19. Schmidt, H. 1930: “Persian Silks of the Early Middle Ages.” In: BMC 57/333, pp. 284–294. Von Falke, O. 1913: Kunstgeschichte der Seidenweberei. 2 vols. Berlin. Wong, D.  C. 2018: Buddhist Pilgrim-Monks as Agents of Cultural and Artistic Transmission: The International Buddhist Art Style in East Asia, ca. 645–770. Singapore. Watson, W. 2000: The Arts of China to 900 ad. New Haven/London.

Collections Dopšel Williams, E. 2019: “A Taste for Textiles: Designing Umayyad and ‘Abbāsid Interiors.” In: G. Buhl/E. Dopšel Williams (eds.): Catalogue of the Textiles in the Dumbarton Oaks Byzantine Collection. Washington, DC. Available online: https:// www.doaks.org/resources/textiles/essays/williams [Last accessed 31.08.2021]. Otavsky, K. 1998: Entlag der Seidenstraße: Frühmittelalteriche Kunst Zwishen Persien und China in der Abegg-Stiftung (Riggisberger Berichte 6). Riggisberg. Schepherd, D./W. B. Henning 1959: “Zandaniji Identified?” In: Aus der Welt der Islamischen Kunst. Berlin, pp. 15–40.

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Keller, D./ R. Schorta 200: Fabulous Creatures from the Desert Sands: Central Asian Woolen Textiles from the Second Century bc to the Second Century ad (Riggisberger Berichte 10). Riggisberg. Schorta, R. 2006: Central Asian Textiles and Their Contexts in the Early Middle Ages (Riggisberger Berichte 9). Riggisberg.

Online Sources Christie’s: https://www.christies.com Sotheby’s: https://www.sothebys.com

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The Coming of the Arabs to Iran James Howard-Johnston Among all the extraordinary achievements of the Arabs in the first phase of their expansion, none was more impressive than their defeat and destruction of the Sasanian empire. It was one of two long-established great powers in western Eurasia. At its heart were two massive territorial blocs, the Iranian highlands, generator of its military might, and the densely settled Mesopotamian lowlands, generator of much of its wealth. It was their conjoining, the harnessing of the resources of Mesopotamia to the political-military projects pursued by the Iranian governing elite, which created the empire in the early third century ad It was this which gave it the strength and resilience to more than hold its own over subsequent centuries, in the face of the challenges presented by steppe nomad states to the north and east and the Roman empire to the west. To its core territories were added large swathes of neighboring regions — (1) the major part of Transcaucasia, fronted by the Caucasus (the defence of which was a task carried out by the Sasanians on behalf of both great powers), (2) a large zone stretching east from the north-east corner of the Iranian plateau, extended to the Oxus from around 560, (3) an even larger zone of arid and mountainous terrain in the south-east (Sistan, Makran, Baluchistan), from which, in the first half of the fifth century, the Sasanians encroached on to the Indus plain, and (4) the Gulf coast of Arabia (from the third century) together with Yemen (from around 570), which enabled the Sasanians to project their influence over all of Arabia save the Hijaz and the Roman frontage of the desert. The population and resources of the Roman empire were undoubtedly greater, given its high degree of urbanization and the intensive medium- and long-distance exchange made possible by an inland sea. But there was no significant disparity in the military sphere. The Sasanian government was able to fund and to deploy forces totaling approximately 300,000 men. From the reign of Khusro I Anushirwan (531–79), they were organized in four commands, covering between them the whole territory of the empire. They were divided, as were Roman forces, between those garrisoning frontier defences and those serving in field armies, with a smallish central reserve.1 They were professional armed forces, standing armies, funded in peace and war by a state which possessed a developed fiscal apparatus. We may know much 1

Howard-Johnston 1995; Howard-Johnston 2012.

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less about the tax system than its Roman equivalent. But there is no question about its outreach across the empire and not much doubt about its down reach to the level of the village and individual householders within the village. The prime function of the Sasanian monetary system was to lubricate the processes of government, i.e. the extraction of taxes from the population, and expenditure on capital projects and the pay and salaries of soldiers and officialdom. Silver drachms were issued to a uniform standard and uniform design, the latter changing from time to time (mainly at accessions of new kings), from mints scattered across the empire (there were usually thirty to forty in production in the sixth and early seventh century). The authority of the king and the effective centralization of his government was made manifest, from the inception of the empire, in the coinage. The motivation behind reform of the tax system made by Khusro I in the 530s — a shift to a fixed assessment based on a cadaster, from a fixed share of the crop which would vary from year to year — is not made explicit in the sources, but may be inferred — to reduce corruption in the localities and to increase the average annual revenue of the state. It enabled Khusro to fund ambitious foreign ventures and grand building projects.2 For many years, the prevailing view among historians of ancient Iran — best expressed by Altheim and Stiehl — was that the Sasanian state was loosely knit and was dominated by the great aristocrats of Iran. In this scenario, the great regions constituting Iran — Persia proper, Media, Atropatene (Ādurbādagān) and Khurasan — were akin to gigantic fiefs under the control of a small number of magnate families. Those magnates and the main body of aristocrats owned most of the land and controlled most of the resources of the empire. It was they who raised and paid the bulk of the manpower, which fought Sasanian wars. The army was thus characterized as a late antique equivalent of a medieval host, but on a much larger scale.3 The contrary view — which is mine — rests on two solid types of evidence, the coinage and the governing capability of the Sasanian state, made manifest both in great infrastructure projects and in military action against its enemies. I agree with the traditionalists that the whole grandiose imperial project relied on the joint commitment of aristocracy and king, but I locate the driving force in the ruling Sasanian dynasty rather than the higher aristocracy. The active alliance of the two was absolutely vital. The key to good order on earth was preservation of the social order, ensured through the inheritance of status and property down the generations. The crown was committed to the hereditary principle and made sure that it was applied throughout society through the courts. The Sasanian legal system did indeed go to extraordinary lengths to prolong the lives of families with their property by ingenious, artificial means. The ruling dynasty thus made plain its commitment to upholding the social order, above all the position and wealth of Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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2 3

Howard-Johnston 2014; Rubin 1995, pp. 234–279. Altheim/Stiehl 1954.

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the aristocracy. That ensured, in normal times, the loyalty and active support of the latter, who could also rely on obtaining positions in the apparatus of government and army command commensurate with their status.4 There is much else that could be said about the Sasanian body politic — about the different components of the apparatus of government, judicial, financial, administrative, about the development of cities and of inter-regional and international commerce, and about the role of the merchant class, all of which added to its tensile strength. But a greater contribution was made at a higher, ideological level by the established Zoroastrian faith. It was this that gave real impetus to the striving of men on earth, engaged as they were in a millennial battle of good against evil. In a sense this paralleled the role of Christianity in the late Roman empire but it was far more tolerant. There was none of Christianity’s insistence on dogmatic purity, its determination to define orthodoxy in minute detail and to root out those with deviant beliefs. The established religion of the Sasanians was ready to embrace variation in specific doctrines within the framework of the dualist faith. It was also ready to co-exist with non-dualist faiths — namely, the three principal confessions (Nestorian, Chalcedonian and Monophysite) into which eastern Christendom was divided from the late fifth century, as well as Judaism, Buddhism and various brands of polytheism. Zoroastrianism, though, was the official faith of the empire. It helped define the essence of the state and gave impetus to its imperial project. It was vital that the correct rites be performed by individuals and groups at all levels of the state, to preserve the four elements of creation from pollution, to keep the powers of evil at bay, and to ensure the spiritual sturdiness of men. All over the empire, sacred fires were tended and protected from contamination within a thick masonry carapace, the function of each being akin to that of a small nuclear reactor within its protective shield, producing the spiritual power needed by the Sasanian state.5 Sasanian power reached three distinct apogees in late antiquity. The first came near its inception, in the middle decades of the third century, when Shapur I roamed at will over the Roman provinces of the Levant and eastern Asia Minor. Khusro I Anushirwan was responsible for the second and was long remembered as a great ruler in Islamic histories, as he should have been — for his programme of institutional reform (in the 530s), for his humiliation of the Romans in war (in 540), for his role (admittedly subsidiary) in the destruction of the Hephthalite empire by the Turk khaganate (in the early 560s), and for the brilliant way his armies fought back after coming under concerted attack from all sides in 572–3. His achievements, however, were overshadowed by those of his grandson Khusro II Aparwez (590–628), under whom the Sasanian empire crushed its rival and took over the Romans’ rich eastern provinces — western Transcaucasia in the 4 5

Howard-Johnston 1995, pp. 220–226; Corcoran 2011. Stauberg/Vevaina 2015; Shaked 1994; Wiesehöfer 1996, pp. 199–216; Payne 2015.

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north, the whole Roman Levant (north Mesopotamia, Syria and Palestine), and Egypt in the south. By 621 Khusro was poised to deliver the final blow, to Asia Minor and Constantinople, in alliance with the Avar khaganate in Europe.6 This third apogee was to be followed all too soon by disaster. Heraclius, ruler of the beleaguered rump of the Roman empire, behaved in a quite unexpected, foolhardy manner, and set off, in 624, on a forlorn, evidently doomed, expedition into Sasanian territory, where he managed to elude the traps set by three opposing Persian armies and to send off an embassy to the distant governing centre of the Turk khaganate. A brilliant Roman campaign in 627–8 achieved its aim of triggering a putsch against Khusro II (on 24th February 628) while allied Turk forces embarked on the conquest of Sasanian Transcaucasia. This sudden reversal of fortune came as a great shock to the Sasanian governing class, and triggered some years of political turbulence, during which it had to regurgitate all the gains made by Khusro II. Order was restored in 632, when Yazdgerd III (632–52), backed by the army of Persia (Fars), defeated his rivals and consolidated his position.7 From this point on, there is likely to have been a gradual recovery in the confidence of the governing elite. Doubtless the damage to the Sasanians’ imperial status had not been completely repaired a few years later when a new threat emerged from the south, but the will to resist remained strong, the organs of the state, both civil and military, continued to function, and — this is a crucial point — the two great armies which had destroyed Roman power in the Middle East remained in existence. They had not been defeated and forced out of the conquered provinces but withdrew in good order under the terms of an armistice negotiated in July 629.8 The Sasanian empire was well armed, when Muslim Arab forces first impinged on the periphery of Mesopotamia in 636. The bulk of the field armies which had lorded it over the Romans were still at hand. There was a defensive system to secure Mesopotamia from the desert: a long earthwork guarded by forts fronted the Euphrates; the Lakhm nexus of Arab clients, managed by the Nasrids from al-Hira, may have been forcibly dissolved during the war against the Romans, but a new nexus had been created, that of the Bakr b. Wa’il. The two great rivers of Mesopotamia formed serious barriers to invasion, as did the complex network of canals criss-crossing the irrigated alluvium of southern Mesopotamia. The heavily fortified capital, the twin cities of Veh Ardashir and Ctesiphon on the right and left banks of the Tigris, was a redoubt from which the military operations would be directed and was itself backed by the most formidable of all the natural and artificial defences of the empire, the long line of the Zagros mountains running

6 7 8

Daryaee 2009; Jackson Bonner 2011; Howard-Johnston 2021, ch. 1–4. Howard-Johnston 2021, ch. 6–10. Howard-Johnston 2021, ch. 10.3.

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south along the eastern edge of the plain. Neither Mesopotamia nor Iran were hanging fruit ripe for the taking in the middle 630s.9 In the relatively recent past, when skepticism was at its height about the value of sources written under the Abbasids, a century and a half or more after the events they purported to describe, in very different political and religious circumstances, the late A. Noth took the battle of Nihawand (642) as a case study of the formulaic battle narrative which bore little or no relation to reality.10 For a generation or so, it became almost an article of faith that there had been no continuity in the development of historical traditions, that what was narrated later was largely a concoction of later historians with current concerns in mind.11 Personally I found it hard to believe that the Muslim community suffered from collective amnesia about some of the most extraordinary events of human history, the conquest of almost the whole world within the horizon of vision of Arabia in less than a single generation (634–52). There was doubtless later embroidery on the bare record, elaboration above all through the introduction of anecdotal and moralizing material, but surely the bare outline of events and the order in which they were placed corresponded to reality. Doubts such as these have become much more prominent in the twenty-first century. They began to surface earlier: R. Hoyland and C. Robinson demonstrated that independently documented events could be discerned in the various accounts of Muslim historians, à propos of Byzantine dealings with the Arabs before the invasion of Egypt and north Mesopotamia, and military operations in Khuzistan.12 Following in their footsteps in my Witnesses to a World Crisis, I tried to make systematic use of five seventh-century Christian sources to reconstruct a narrative of the conquest, first of the Roman sector of the Middle East, then of the Mesopotamian heartland of the Sasanian empire and the two the brilliant campaigns which led to the handover of Egypt. Two of these sources were Syriac (material written around 640 included in the ragbag Chronicle to 724 and a continuation of the Khuzistan Chronicle, which was probably tacked on in the 660s), two Armenian (the History of Khosrov, wrongly attributed to Sebeos, written in the 650s with an updating scholium added in 661, and what I have called the History to 682, embedded in a tenth century history of Caucasian Albania) and one Coptic (the chronicle of John of Nikiu which survives in a 17th century Ethiopic translation of an early Arabic translation of the original).13 Within an armature of the various fixed chronological points provided by these sources, it is possible to reconstruct the first phase of conquest: (1) a little over two years of campaigning (from January 634 to early 636) which inflicted two serious defeats on Roman forces and drove them out of the Levant; (2) five 9 10 11 12 13

Donner 1980; Howard-Johnston 2012, pp. 96–98. Noth 1968. Conrad 1992, pp. 386–401; Robinson 2003, pp. 40–43, pp, 50–54. Hoyland 1997, pp. 574–590; Robinson 2004. Howard-Johnston 2010, pp. 59–137, pp. 181–189.

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years of full-scale warfare against the Sasanians (636–40), involving two sieges of Ctesiphon-Veh Ardashir, a fierce Sasanian counteroffensive which broke the first siege but was later halted and reversed at Qadisiyya on 6 January 638, and a botched evacuation of Ctesiphon which ended the second siege in the first half of 640; and (3) the brilliant campaigns which broke the Roman will to resist in Egypt (late 640–November 642).14 The notion, much derided by skeptical Islamicists, that Arab campaigns were subject (to a greater or lesser extent) to a central guiding authority, that strategies, perhaps even a grand strategy, might be discerned beneath the surface of events, is no longer outlandish. Indeed, A. Marsham has used it to help give shape to the wider history of Arab warfare in the seventh century.15 For Iran, we are thrown back on the evidence of Muslim sources to a greater extent than for the earlier conquests. al-Tabarī (d.923), the outstanding early medieval historian of Islam, a theologian and jurist, as well as historian, who came from Tabaristan in northern Iran, picked out Sayf ibn ‘Umar, a Kufan historian at work in the second half of the eighth century, as his main authority. ibn ‘Umar (d.796) had a low reputation with other historians at work under the Abbasids, basically because of an absence of bias against the Umayyads in his writing. His independence of mind (which is perhaps what impressed al-Tabarī), and the clear evidence that he intended to write history, not simply to collect a multitude of discrete historical notices, should gain him a more sympathetic hearing from us.16 There are other accounts of the conquest of Iran by diverse hands dating from the ninth and tenth centuries (for example, ibn A‘tham al-Kufī, at times a rather fanciful historian, and al-Dinawarī, a Persian who took pride in the Sasanian past and who wrote in New Persian, both active in the ninth century), but two can be singled out because of the details they give, including dates. Abu al-Hasan alMada‘inī (d. ca. 830–50) was a prolific akhbari interested in all aspects of Islamic history, who was at work in the late eighth century and first half of the ninth. He presented the historical reports which he gathered in thematic volumes. His works, especially those on the conquests, were highly appreciated and much quoted by later historians. A concern for chronological precision makes him a valuable complement to ibn ‘Umar. The same is true of al-Baladhurī (d.892), a high-flying Persian civil servant who seems to have been writing in the 860s, as crisis gripped the caliphate. His Futuh al-Buldan, a comprehensive survey of the conquests, organized by place rather than time, was intended for a bureaucratic readership, which needed to know how provincial administration was supposed to work. It was a history with a purpose, a historically enriched administrative handbook, paying special attention to jurisdictions and fiscal issues, with a light leavening of anecdotal matter. Sources were identified and their content summarized with 14 Howard-Johnston 2010, pp. 464–470; Booth 2013; Howard-Johnston forthcoming. 15 Marsham forthcoming. 16 Robinson 2003, p. 28, p. 32, pp. 35–36.

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meticulous care (as can be seen from the naming of individuals involved in the conquests and a liberal sprinkling of dates).17 Two Arab offensives were launched from Kufa and Basra, forward bases established in central and lower Mesopotamia.18 To judge by the forces mobilized and the co-ordination of their actions, they were directed from Medina. The first took place in the last years of the Caliph ‘Umar I (634–44), the second, after a pause of three years, under his successor ‘Uthman (644–56). There were two fronts, one in the north targeting western Iran and aiming for the Caucasus frontier, the other in the south aiming to break through the Zagros and enter Fars (Persia proper). The extraordinary successes achieved are to be attributed above all to careful planning and to the speed with which victory in the field was exploited. Like those rockets, which, fired into the sky, generate several aerial displays, a single field army might split into independent corps to carry out simultaneous operations against widely separated targets, leaving the defenders little time to reorganize and to regroup. A decisive victory was won in the first half of 642 in the plain of Nihawand at the head of a long and, in parts, difficult passage across the northern Zagros. Large forces were mobilized by both sides. It was followed by a thrust north to take Hamadan and occupy Media, while a smaller force marched east to take the twin cities of Jay and Isfahan on the southern edge of the Iranian plateau. A similar move, likewise designed to shield Media from attack from the east, was made either late that year or early in 643. The chief target was Rayy (the predecessor of Tehran) on the northern edge of the plateau. Rayy made terms, as did Qumis, the region of Jurjan to the east, and the Elburz highlanders of Jilan, Dumbawand and Tabaristan.19 A separate operation was taking place north-west of Hamadan, which took the form of a display of armed might and led, after two victories, to the formal submission of Azerbaijan. This was swiftly followed by the dispatch of three raiding forays which ranged over western Transcaucasia, from the northern edge of the Zagros in the south to Iberia and Albania in the north. There was resistance, but it was disjointed, localized and relatively easily overcome.20 By 644 the Arabs were ready to advance north to Derbend, a powerful fortress which, with its associated long wall, commanded the Caspian Gates at the eastern end of the Caucasus.21 There was no resistance. The governor recognized the brute fact of Arab power and submitted. With this penultimate campaign in western Iran, the Arabs not only took control of the Sasanians’ northern frontier, they also created a south-north corridor through the open 17 Robinson 2003, pp. 28–29, pp. 34–35, pp. 42–43; Lynch 2020. 18 A detailed reconstruction of the operations which led to destruction of the Sasanian empire, with citations of primary sources is appended. The references which follow are to Individual campaigns, which are numbered, from 1 to 17. 19 Campaigns 4–7. 20 Campaigns 8, 9. 21 Khan Mogomedov 1979, pp. 69–127, 207–227; Kettenhofen 1996.

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plains of Albania, south and north of the Kura, and thus cut off the highlands of Albania from the great Elburz range to the east. This led to the forcible separation of the most important allied contingent, led by Juansher prince of Albania, from one of two surviving Sasanian field armies, that of the “prince of Media” (ps. Sebeos), presumably the Spahbed of the North. Both fell back on their highland redoubts. A final campaign took place early in 645, a demonstration of force in the north Caucasus steppe.22 The action on the southern front was smaller in scale. It started earlier with an attack in 640 on Khuzistan, at the head of the Gulf to the east of the lower Tigris. The governor negotiated a truce which he then broke (for the second time) in 642, provoking the Arabs to invade and take over the whole region except for the city of Shushtar which held out for two years. Control of Khuzistan was needed if the Arabs were to gain access by land to the Persian coast of the Gulf and the main route into Fars (a series of small plains leading to the Persian Gates and the long pass over the main Zagros range beyond).23 Meanwhile the full length of the Gulf coast was raided by sea and an expeditionary force from south Arabia established two forward bases, first on the large island of Abarkawar (modern Qeshm, on the north side of the Strait of Hormuz) and second at Tawwaj on the mainland, far to the west-north-west (somewhere in the vicinity of modern Bushehr). The major push into Fars could then begin. Over the course of 644 and 645, Arab forces fought their way inland, gained control over the full length of the Persian Gates pass, and secured a swathe of territory in Fars where Darabgerd, Fasa and Bishapur submitted. This gave them command over the approaches to the pass from both sides.24 This reconstruction of the first offensive rests largely on the testimony of Sayf b. ‘Umar as transmitted by al-Tabarī. There are enough points of comparison with the fragmentary evidence of Christian sources to establish its general reliability — the Khuzistan Chonicle for the conquest of that region, and the Life of Juansher (embedded in the History to 682, which itself is embedded in Movses Daskhurantsi’s tenth-century history of Albania) for the withdrawal of Juansher from the northern field army in 644. Three other dates are supplied by the History of Khosrov: 641 for naval raiding across the Gulf; regnal years 10 of Yazdgerd III and 1 of Constans II, i.e. the first half of 642, for the Battle of Nihawand; and dawn of 10th August 643 for the defeat of the southern foray raiding Transcaucasia, after the occupation of Azerbaijan.25 Sayf, who may appear to have squeezed too many campaigns into a short period, is vindicated. He clearly had access to a source, presumably written, which presented the campaigns in chronological order, along with the names 22 23 24 25

Campaigns 10, 11. Naval Intelligence Division 1945, pp. 16–19, 69–70; Lane Fox 1973, pp. 254–256. Campaigns 1–3. References in nn.47, 49, 55, 71, 76.

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of senior and subordinate generals and summaries of what sound like authentic treaty agreements. What that source was is an open question. One possibility is a chronicle recounting the achievements of his home town of Kufa. ‘Uthman appointed new governors of Kufa and Basra, before the start of the second offensive. They took personal command. The main thrust came from Basra, which, so far, had only gained a bridgehead on the plateau in Fars, in contrast to the whole west of Iran overrun by the mainly Kufan army. The objective was to complete the conquest of Iran by defeating what remained of the southern and eastern field armies controlled by Yazdgerd, who had chosen to retreat south rather than north after the Battle of Nihawand. Yazdgerd was driven out of Kirman by an advance detachment while the Arab position was consolidated in Fars with the capture of Jur and Istakhr in 648/9– 649/50. The main attack was launched in 650/1 on both fronts. Kufan forces marched east along the northern edge of the plateau past Rayy, reasserting Arab authority over Qumis and Jurjan. They then turned back to attack Tabaristan from the east, capturing Tammisheh on the Caspian coast and thus taking control of the long wall which secured the eastern end of the great redoubt of the Elburz mountains.26 A clear strategic purpose can be discerned in these operations, in the course of which the Kufans established temporary control of the Namiah desert (probably north of Jurjan) — to prevent the ‘prince of Media’ from joining his forces to those of Yazdgerd in the east. There was thus no threat from the rear to distract the Basran forces as they advanced north from Kirman and set about the reduction one by one of the principal strongholds in Khurasan — Nishapur, Abarshahr (the regional capital), Sarakhs and Tus.27 Yazdgerd, bereft of support in what was left of Khurasan and of the help he had hoped to get from the Turks, took flight, only to be caught and killed not far from Merv in 651/2. With his death and the submission of Merv, Merv-ar-Rud and Balkh, the Arabs completed the destruction of the Sasanian empire. Their writ now reached the Oxus and embraced the principal cities south of Merv (Herat, Badaghis, and Bushanj) which negotiated treaties.28 Independent Christian sources are less forthcoming about the second offensive than the first. This is not surprising given their distance from the fighting. But three pieces of corroborative evidence are provided by the History of Khosrov: the “prince of Media” made his peace with Arabs and did not come to the aid of Yazdgerd; the death of Yazdgerd is dated to 651–2; and a massive redeployment of Arab forces from Iran to the western, Roman front was ordered in 652 and carried out in 653.29 This is perhaps just enough to show that al-Baladhurī and al-Mada‘inī, the most informative Arab writers about 26 27 28 29

Sauer et al. 2013, pp. 252–72. Campaigns 12–15. Campaigns 16, 17. References in nn.82, 89, 93.

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the second offensive, had access to reliable sources, which supplied succinct and dated material, like Sayf’s Kufa chronicle for the first. By the end of 652 Arab authority had been cast over the whole of Iran. It was far from intrusive, simply a light web of control with a very small number of points where the new imperial power was pegged to the ground. Ultimately its authority did not rest on territorial control, but on the presence of powerful, highly mobile military forces, capable of striking out wherever they chose, in both west and east. Already, at the earliest possible moment, in the formal treaties laying down the terms of submission of individual localities, the outlines of a new system of government were laid out. There is nothing, I should emphasize, in the terms of those treaties as summarized in our Arab sources to lead us seriously to question their authenticity.30 Three new areas were designated for Arab colonial settlement — in Azerbaijan, in Kirman and in Khurasan. Within a century, two of them, we know, developed into major Arab power-centres — one in the north, strategically well placed to watch over Transcaucasia and the Caucasus frontier (Azerbaijan) and the other in the east intended to uphold Arab power on the edge of central Asia (Merv and Merv-ar-Rud in eastern Khurasan). A smaller colonial area to the west (the future emirate of Manzikert) performed a similar function vis à vis Armenia and the Euphrates frontier of the rump Roman empire from the late eighth century.31 Elsewhere the social order and administration were left as they were, save for the appointment of new governors, Persian nobles who had come over the Arab side in the cases reported to us. Apart from annual payments in tribute of what would, in future be termed jizya, namely a given sum per adult male, the main requirement laid down by the Arab side was for free movement, accommodation and guidance of travellers/Muslims. Initially these were probably agents of the higher power, sent to monitor the administration and to report back on local conditions and attitudes. But, in the longer run, this was the key clause which authorized the migration of Arabs into the subjected regions, a process which gathered pace over the next few generations. The Arabs who came congregated in the cities, which were gradually transformed into Arab and Muslim centres, from which the new imperial culture percolated into the surrounding countryside. 32 There is very little information about the distribution of Arab garrisons at this early stage, save for the key frontier stronghold of Derbend (Arab Bab alAbwab). The Arab garrison was reinforced by local auxiliaries, who performed military service in lieu of paying poll-tax.33 We may surely presume that the Arab-appointed governors of strategically placed cities — like Hamadan, 30 Contra Noth/Conrad 1994, pp. 63–76. 31 Bal., 328.11–17, 329.7–331.13, 392.1–4, 405.18–406.1, 409.17–410.1, 410.8–14 (transl., Murgotten 1924, pp. 23, 24–28, 137, 163–164, 170, 171); Daniel 1979, pp. 19–22; Crone 2012, pp. 46–47, 52–61; Ter-Ghevonyan 1976, pp. 27–33. 32 de Planhol 1968, pp. 24–35, 46–48, 59–60. 33 Tab., 2663.17–2665.1 (transl. Smith 1994, p. 35).

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Isfahan, Rayy, and others in Fars and inner Khurasan — were accompanied by Arab military missions, but the approach taken was fundamentally conciliatory — to welcome the populations of these cities and their notables into the ArabMuslim body politic and to rely on time for the culture of the new ruling elite to seep into the ambient Persian culture. The garrisons of which we hear later were to be found mainly in frontier areas and in the capitals of semi-independent regions (for example, Tiflis for Iberia, Dvin for Armenia). There were holes in the web of control, areas which remained impervious to the Arab presence. Those of which we know were in the highlands of Transcaucasia and the Caucasus, where relations were those of client to patron, contributions in kind and cash being handed over by the client to keep the patron at a distance.34 There were other holes — the Zagros hinterland of Fars in the south, and the Bactrian highlands in the east — but the largest hole by far was the Elburz mountain range which frames the Iranian plateau to the north and separates it from the Caspian. The rulers of Jilan, Dumbawand and Tabaristan were granted complete independence in treaties agreed after the Arab seizure of Rayy in 643, subject to two conditions — payment of a token sum in tribute and prevention of highland raiding of the plains. The key condition of welcoming travellers/Muslims is conspicuous for its absence.35 As a result, this northern region remained a bastion of Iranian culture deep into the eighth century — as is shown by a cache of court documents from Tabaristan, which show that Pahlavi remained the official language, that Sasanian law was applied by the courts, that dehganan continued to run the villages, and that supreme authority was vested in a spahbed.36 I shall end with a few remarks on the principal changes brought about by the coming of the Arabs to Iran. I have deliberately avoided using the word conquest, because, to my mind, the Arabs did not conquer Iran, they inserted themselves into a huge upland territory with a distinctive character, a rich cultural endowment (religious and secular) inherited from the deep past, and an enduring consciousness of its special role in human history. There could be no question of Persian culture’s being overwhelmed by one which had matured in the recent past in the hot southern deserts. Arabic was for a while — in the Abbasid era — the language of cities, courts and administration, but then began yielding ground to New Persian. This was adopted as the official language at the court of the Samanids in Transoxiana in the tenth century. It spread throughout Iran proper in the eleventh century with the coming of the Seljuqs, wiping out older regional dialects. It is most likely to have developed in two milieux, that of the merchants who flourished under 34 References in n.84. 35 References in n.66. 36 Texts, translations and commentaries by D. Weber, M. Macuch, in R. Gyselen 2016, 2017, 2019.

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Islam and of the army in which Arab colonists and Persians served side by side from the first.37 New Persian, it should be stressed, is Persian, inheriting its syntax and grammar along with most of its vocabulary from Middle Persian or Pahlavi. The chief contributions of Arabic were the script (infinitely superior to Pahlavi) and a substantial lexical component — chiefly words for administrative, judicial and philosophical concepts. These Arabic words upgraded Persian intellectually (the role performed by the Latinate in English) and helped it adapt to a new, Islamic world order. The resulting largely Persian amalgam proved remarkably successful as a language of administration and diplomacy, and even more so as a literary language, helping to spawn that series of medieval poets, from Firdawsi to Hafez and beyond, who are so venerated in Iran.38 New Persian is emblematic of the relations of Persians and Arabs. Well before its adoption by the Samanids, the intelligentsia of Iran was asserting the independence and importance of Persian culture, in the Shu‘ubiyya movement of the ninth century. Interest in the Persian past grew. Tenth-century rulers, great (Buyids, in central and western Iran) and small (in the fastnesses of the Elburz), prided themselves on their descent from Sasanian kings and magnates, and strove to give their rule a Persian colouring.39 The legendary history of humanity, in which Iran had the leading role, and the great feats of mythical (Kayanid) and historical (Sasanian) kings were recorded in prose and verse. Much else was conserved from the Persian past: basic architectural forms, most notably the iwan; an administrative class proud of its probity; many aspects of court ceremonial; and an ideology of service, rulers having the right to extract taxes so as to protect their subjects and promote their welfare …40 The main loss suffered was that of Zoroastrianism. Yes, it clung on in places, notably in Fars and the Elburz, and has indeed survived in pockets within Iran to this day. But as a dualist faith with polytheistic vestiges, it proved far more vulnerable to the austere monotheism of Islam than Christianity. Not that the deep-embedded culture of Iran was without effect on Islam — one only has to think of the continuing annual celebration of Nowruz, or of the way a religion of triumph was remoulded into one of mourning and embraced the cult of saints. But the paradox remains that Islam made larger advances in a region resistant to Arabic, than it did in the thoroughly Arabized regions of Iraq, Syria and Egypt.41 The ability of Islam to penetrate the most formidable of terres d’insolence, (a term used by the colonial authorities in north Africa and applied by X. de Planhol to much of the Islamic world) is striking. There was little coercion or state-sponsored missionary work. The dissemination of the third, true, pure monotheist revelation was left to the free market in ideas and to individual holy 37 38 39 40 41

Treadwell 2012, pp. 10–11; Peacock 2011, pp. 59–60, 65–66. Kennedy 2009, pp. 13–14, 23–25. Kennedy 2009, pp. 14–17; Bosworth 2009, pp. 30–43; Khalidi 1994, pp. 102–104. Huff 1993, pp. 45–61; Schippmann 1993, pp. 131–141; Kennedy 2009, pp. 22–27. Bulliet 1994, pp. 37–43, 70–79; Daryaee 2015; Shaked 2015.

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men. It was greatly aided by increased exchange between city and hinterland in an era of rapid economic growth. It reached deep into the terres d’insolence of Iran, namely the highlands and zones of semi-desert which separated city territories (under firm government control), and even more impressive, into the Caucasus with its multitude of refractory peoples. The principal change in the material conditions of existence in Iran was economic. Iran was incorporated into a huge single market, extending from central Asia to the western Mediterranean, initially under a single political authority, with a single currency and no barriers to trade. While there was plenty of economic activity in late antiquity and merchants had considerable lobbying power, the coming of the Arabs to Iran inaugurated a period of unprecedentedly rapid growth.42 There were several virtuous circles at work. Growing specialization in production, best exemplified in textiles, prompted increased exchange within and between the main component parts of the caliphate. City populations grew as production and trade increased, thus boosting demand for goods and produce of all sorts and stimulating further exchange. As new commodities came on the market — cotton, sugar and sweetmeats, medicinal plants, paper — new demand was created. Growth of urban elites generated new demand for higher priced, rarer commodities, which acted as an additional stimulus to commerce.43 M. Lombard still gives the best picture of this highly commercial world and its booming cities. He drew mainly on geographical works written in the tenth century for the information and delectation of city notables. Their evidence can now be filled out with the results of excavation, which show how Roman and Persian cities were gradually reconfigured over the seventh-ninth centuries — covered marketplaces and funduqs for out-of-town traders multiplying (with increasing specialization) and growing in size, extramural production rising and increasingly separate from retail, a general re-orienting of cities around the Friday mosque and the administrative centre (the dar al-umara). In the same period the merchant emerged as a dominant figure in urban society, acted as the principal driver of economic growth, and became increasingly involved in government.44 What did this mean for Iran? A new salience of the merchant class. Large-scale urban growth, which extended to the Caspian coastlands and stimulated a rapid development there of wet rice cultivation. An end to the cleavage between inner Iran and outer Iran so marked in late antiquity, between the Sasanian autocratic and militarized state and the plurality of Sogdian city-states, governed by their aristocracies and committed to trade. The transformation of inner Iran from a military behemoth into outer Iran’s partner, and the development of both into the commercial and intellectual powerhouse of the caliphate. In effect a longdelayed advance to a higher level of civilization. 42 Howard-Jonhston 2017; Bianquis/Guichard 2012. 43 Lombard 1971; Bulliet 2009. 44 Bessard 2020.

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Appendix: Arab Operations in Iran 640–652: a Reconstruction The non-Muslim sources cannot, alas, provide as useful a chronological armature for the advance of Arab forces into and over Iran as they can for Syria and Mesopotamia, but they do supply a few pieces of hard data. These fix the start and conclusion of the two major Arab thrusts, against which to check the narratives of Sayf ibn ‘Umar (for the first thrust) and of al-Mada‘inī and alBaladhurī (for the second). In what follows I break down the process of conquest into a series of campaigns (numbered), beginning with operations in Khuzistan and on the Persian coast of the Gulf.45 (1) The continuation of the Khuzistan Chonicle places the Arabs’ seizure of the rich, irrigated lowlands between the Zagros and the lower Tigris after their first successes. This gives a rough terminus post quem of the middle of 640. The final operations in Khuzistan were preceded by a truce negotiated by the Persian governor after a first Arab invasion. It was he who broke it two years later, thereby provoking a second Arab attack. Of the two main cities still in Persian hands, Susa fell after a short siege but Shushtar held out for two years until it was betrayed. No date is specified for its fall or preceding events, but the most likely sequence would be the following: first attack in 640, after Arab forces completed their conquest of Mesopotamia; truce 640–2; second attack in 642, with the siege of Shushtar dragging on until 644.46 This accords with the order of events in the majority of early Arab sources, which are also corroborated as regards several particulars, not least the name of the Arab commander, Abu Musa al-Ash‘ari, and one of two dates (ah 23 [643–4]) given for the fall of Shushtar.47 Sayf, it should be noted, appears to go astray on two not unimportant matters — the identity of the general in charge at the siege of Shushtar (for him Abu Sabra, briefly governor of Basra before Abu Musa’s predecessor) and the order of the final two sieges (he implies that Susa fell after Shushtar) — but, alone among the early Arab sources, he reports that the Sasanian commander asked for and obtained a truce (from Abu Sabra’s predecessor as governor of Basra, ‘Utba ibn Ghazwan) and that it was renewed after he broke it for the first time.48 45 Substantial revisions are made to the chronology and interpretation presented by B. Spuler, rev. R. G. Hoyland 2014, pp. 9–19. Given my reliance on the same Arab sources, my account tallies in general with that of H. Kennedy 2007, pp. 126–131, 170–192, but is buttressed and given greater chronological precision by the non-Muslim sources. 46 Khuzistan Chronicle: Chronicon anonymum 1903, 35.20–37.14 (transl. Nöldeke 1893, pp. 41–44). The passage is also translated by Robinson 2004, pp. 17–18. 47 Robinson 2004, citing Sayf in Tab., 2551.8–2556.11 (transl. Juynboll 1989, pp. 132–136). 48 Robinson 2004, pp. 22–23, 25–26. Tab., 2538.3–9, 2540.16–2541.9, 2542.10–2543.15 (transl. Juynboll, pp. 119, 121–122, 123–124).

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(2) From Khuzistan, the Arabs could push south down the coastal plain to the linked basins which led to the narrow defile of the Persian Gates. This opened on to the long pass over the Zagros, which provided the most direct, militarily feasible invasion route into Persia proper. Independent of operations in Khuzistan but almost certainly co-ordinated with them, were certain raiding expeditions sent across the Gulf to attack the crucial sector of the coastal plain below the Persian Gates as well as provinces to the south. They were preparing the way for the take-over of the whole coastal plain. They are reported briefly in the History of Khosrov, in conjunction with a “royal” (i.e. caliphal) campaign within the “original borders of the territory of Ismael” (i.e. Arabia).49 The same two actions are conjoined by al-Baladhurī. He has presented Bahrain and Oman as governed by the ‘umma (Muslim community) from the time of Muhammad, with a brief hiatus during the ridda wars following his death.50 But now he prefaces his account of the conquest of Fars with a notice about the appointment of a new governor of Bahrain and Oman, ‘Uthman b. Abi‘l‘As, who, he says, “subdued them and brought their inhabitants into obedience,” before sending his brother, al-Hakam to attack Fars by sea. With a large force under his command, al-Hakam seized an offshore island, Abarkawar (the large island of Qeshm, on the north side of the Strait of Hormuz), and a bridgehead at Tawwaj on the mainland, not far from the main route into Fars (far up the Gulf, somewhere near Bushehr). After the defeat of a Persian counterattack under the marzban (military governor) of Fars, ‘Uthman came to take personal charge and made Tawwaj the base for future land operations.51 The date of 641 for the naval expedition which may be inferred from the position of the notice in the Armenian text corresponds loosely to those extracted from the Muslim sources — namely initial raid and conquest of Abarkawar in 639, seizure of the bridgehead on the mainland and defeat of the Persian counterattack in 640, formal establishment of a base at Tawwaj in 642.52 (3) Once the forces at Tawwaj could be reinforced by land from Khuzistan, they set about fighting their way inland to Fars. It seems that they gained control of the Persian Gates and the pass beyond by the end of 644. The prime source for operations on this southern front is al-Baladhurī who places the capture of a number of fortresses and fortified towns commanding access to the plateau before the assassination of ‘Umar in December 644.53 The bridgehead in Fars was then enlarged with the seizure, with or without initial resistance, of Darabgerd (described as a centre of science and religion), Fasa and Bishapur. Baladhuri was uncertain about the date, hesitating between ah 23 (643–4) or ah 24 (644–5), the 49 50 51 52 53

Ps.Sebeos, 139.13–20 (transl. Thomson 1999, p. 102), with Historical Commentary, n.56. Bal., 76.1–77.5, 78.4–81.20 (transl. Hitti 1916, pp. 116–117, 120–124). Ahmad ibn Yahya al-Baladhurī, 386.5–13 (transl. Murgotten 1924, p. 127). Bal., 386.13 –387.16 (transl. Murgotten 1924, pp. 128–129). See Hinds 1984, pp. 41–44. Bal., 387.16 –388.10 (transl. Murgotten 1924, pp. 129–130). See Hinds 1984, p. 46.

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latter being much more likely.54 At this point, towards the end of 645, operations were halted. Major gains had been made — Khuzistan which opened the main route to Fars, the long pass over the Zagros from the Persian Gates, and a swathe of territory in Fars proper which secured the eastern approaches to the pass. The Arabs had established a strong, defensible frontier along the Zagros, behind which they could consolidate their rule over the lowlands of Mesopotamia, Khuzistan and the Gulf coast. (4) While these campaigns were being fought, Arab forces were active elsewhere. A second front was opened against Iran in 642. The forces involved were mobilized, we are told, from the new forward bases of Kufa and Basra in Mesopotamia, the majority coming from Kufa. Their target was the western half of Iran. They attacked a weak point in the northern Zagros, where it can be crossed by a pass which eventually debouches into the plain of Nihawand. The significance of the battle fought there is signaled in the History of Khosrov by the size of the forces engaged (supposedly 60,000 Persians against 40,000 Arabs), by the three days it lasted, and by the double dating, in regnal years of Yazdgerd III (no.10) and Constans II (no.1).55 This places it in the first half of 642, a date which accords with al-Tabarī’s ah 21 (10.12.641–30.11.642).56 al-Tabarī corrects Sayf’s earlier dating of ah 18 on the basis of the testimony of Ibn Ishaq and al-Waqidi.57 (5) The crushing victory won by the Arabs did not, of itself, break the Persian will to resist. It was the operations undertaken immediately afterwards, the speed of Arab movement, the geographical scope of their operations and the uninterrupted success of those operations, which must have daunted the provincial authorities and Yazdgerd himself. The Arab expeditionary force divided into independent corps (as is shown by the careful identification of the different generals in charge). Two generals, Nu‘aym b. Muqarrin and al-Qa‘qa‘ b. Amr, led one corps north into Media (Mah). The defeated Persian general was caught and killed, as he fled from Nihawand along the road to Hamadan.58 At the Arabs’ approach, Hamadan capitulated, followed by the governors of the two provinces of Media.59 There was resistance, organized by the authorities in Daylam (western Elburz), Rayy and Azerbaijan. They joined forces and launched a counterattack. Victory over this formidable combination of provincial armies at Waj al-Rudh sealed Arab control of Hamadan and Media.60The two provinces 54 Bal., 388.10 –389.2 (transl. Murgotten 1924, pp. 130–131). See Hinds 1984, pp. 46–47. 55 Ps.Sebeos, 141.10–22 (transl. pp. 104–105), with Hist.Com., n.59. 56 Sayf material: Tab., 2605.11–2608.11, 2610.15–2614.16, 2615.12–2631.1 (transl. Juynboll 1989, pp. 189–193, 195–199, 200–214). 57 Tab., 2596.1–7 (transl. Juynboll 1989, p. 179). 58 Tab., 2626.2–10 (transl. Juynboll 1989, pp. 209–210). 59 Tab., 2626.10–15, 2627.16–2628.7 (transl. Juynboll 1989, pp. 210, 211–212) 60 Tab., 2650.10–2651.13 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 21–22). This passage is preceded by a doublet of Sayf’s account of the initial phase of the operation up to the submission of provinces around Hamadan (Tab., 2648.14–2650.4 [transl. Smith 1994, pp. 19–20]).

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of Media were offered generous terms — a modest annual tribute and provision of hospitality (guidance for travellers, accommodation for Muslim soldiers).61 (6) So far, so good. Sayf goes on to report several other Arab successes under ah 18, a date again corrected by al-Tabarī (turning to the same two sources, Ibn Ishaq and al-Waqidi) to ah 21 and 22 (30.11.642–19.11.643).62 Given Sayf’s penchant for writing connected history, it is tempting to suppose that he has squeezed several campaigns into a single notice, giving an exaggerated impression of the speed and range of the Arabs’ advance. But Sayf, as transmitted by al-Tabarī, makes it plain that the various operations targeting different cities in western Iran were co-ordinated and overlapped. A second corps, comprising reinforcements sent from Kufa, was commanded by the governor ‘Abdallah b. ‘Abdallah. He marched east to the twin cities of Isfahan and Jay. There was resistance from both, led respectively by an ostandar (a governor who doubled as manager of crown lands) and a regular governor, before the ostandar capitulated on terms marginally different from those offered to Media.63 (7) A third thrust came later. It is dated to ah 22 by al-Tabarī, so either at the very end of 642 with winter imminent or, more probably, in spring 643. Nu’aym was in command. So it was an operation which followed the subjection of Media and presumably involved the same corps. He set out, like ‘Abdallah b. ‘Abdallah, to shield Arab-controlled Media from attack from the east, but this time from the northern edge of the plateau. His prime target was Rayy (near modern Tehran). The governor, a grandson of the pretender Bahram Chubin, who ousted Khusro II from his throne in 590–1, refused to surrender and appealed for help to Dumbawand, Tabaristan, Qumis and Jurjan. A small cavalry force entered the city under cover of night, guided by a leading aristocrat (al-Zinabi) who was at odds with the family of Bahram Chubin. The main Arab army then attacked at night, drawing out the Persian defenders. They broke and fled when they came under attack from their rear by al-Zinabi’s Persian and Arab troops.64 The Arabs then sought to minimise opposition in future by offering Rayy (and later Qumis when it surrendered and Jurjan when the governor submitted) similar terms to those agreed with Isfahan. Their ally, al-Zinabi, was appointed marzban. 65 As for the highlanders of the Elburz who had fought against the 61 Tab., 2632.14–2633.16 (transl. Juynboll 1989, pp. 216–217). 62 Tab., 2647.5–12 (transl. Smith 1994, p, 17). 63 Tab., 2637.13–2641.11 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 6–9): guidance and accommodation were to be provided for Muslims, presumably civilians; those travelling on foot were to be provided with mounts. Ostandar: Tab., 2638.8. 64 Tab., 2653.7–2655.4 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 24–25). 65 Terms: Rayy - Tab., 2655.8–15 (transl. Smith 1994, p. 26); Qumis - Tab., 2656.11–2657.12 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 27–28); Jurjan - Tab., 2657.13–2659.2 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 28–30). There was no reference to mounts in any of these agreements; in the case of Jurjan, tribute could be paid in the form of service. Al-Zinabi made marzban: Tab., 2654.12–2655.1 (transl. Smith 1994, p. 25).

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Arabs (from Jilan in the west, Dumbawand in the centre, and Tabaristan in the east), their independence was guaranteed (there was no requirement to look after travellers/Muslims) in return for payment of modest amounts of tribute and restraint on marauding ventures into the lowlands.66 (8) It should be noted that Nu‘aym divided his forces after the settlement with Rayy, sending one detachment (under Suwayd b. Muqarrin) east to impress Arab power on Qumis, Jurjan and Tabaristan,67 and seconding another (under Simak b. Kharashah al-Ansari) to join a third corps commanded by Bukayr b. ‘Abdallah who was operating further north, in Azerbaijan (Adurbadagan/ Atropatene).68 There had been fighting, from which Bukayr benefited greatly. For the defeated Persian general — evidently treated well — gave him useful advice and helped him extend Arab authority over Azerbaijan by persuasion rather than coercion.69 Its full submission followed a second victory, won by Bukayr’s fellow general ‘Utbah. The terms varied significantly from those offered previously: instead of guidance and accommodation for travellers/ Muslims, the inhabitants were required to provide billets and guidance for passing troops, and might be called up for military service (in which case they would be exempted from paying tax).70 (9) The conquest of Azerbaijan can be firmly dated to late spring or early summer 643 from a notice in the History of Khosrov. For it was from Azerbaijan that three forays from Bukayr’s army set about raiding Transcaucasia that summer. The prime target seems to have been Nakhchawan, on the Araxes where the valley is squeezed between the mountains of Siwnik‘ (modern Nagorno Karabakh) and a range to the south. One division marched straight there. Another set off a grand sweep, west into Ayrarat, the plain of Dvin, then north and east through Iberia and Albania, and finally south to join the division already at Nakhchawan. The third division had the toughest assignment, to begin to impose Arab authority on the southern Armenian highlands. Two fortresses held out. The precise time of the capture of a third is given — dawn on Sunday 10th August 643 — because it was soon to be followed by a surprise Armenian attack which routed the Arab force and recovered all the prisoners and booty.71 It is this date which confirms Tabari’s chronology up to this point and thus documents the extraordinary scale of Arab offensive operations after Nihawand. 66 Dumbawand: Tab., 2655.15–2656.10 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 26–27). Tabaristan and Jilan: 2659.5–2660.2 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 30–31). 67 Tab., 2656.11–2659.8 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 27–30). 68 The original intention (supposedly a caliphal order) was to send Simak to Azerbaijan immediately after the subjection of Media, but, in the event, Nu‘aym delayed it until the submission of Rayy (Tab., 2651.15–16, 2655.7–8, 2660.4–7 (transl. Smith 1994, p. 22, p. 26, p. 31). 69 Tab., 2660.9–2661.11 (trans. Smith 1994, pp. 31–32). 70 Tab., 2661.11–2662.15 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 32–34). 71 Ps.Sebeos, 145.6–147.2 (transl. Thomson 1999, pp. 109–111), with Hist.Com., n.62.

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The aim was not simply to take hold of key administrative centres but to induce awe and submissiveness on the part of the whole Persian social order, civilian and military, townsmen and rural dwellers, aristocracy, gentry and peasantry. Persians were left in no doubt about the striking power of free-range Arab forces, which formed the ultimate source of Arab authority, but this was allied to a general policy of conciliation. Aristocratic collaborators played a key role in facilitating the extension and initial acceptance of Arab authority. Power was delegated, but attitudes and actions would be monitored by those Arab ‘travellers’ who were authorized to go wherever they wanted. The deals struck with the highlanders of the Elburz mountains, which lowered over all these Arab-controlled lowlands, created a peripheral zone of attenuated but nonetheless real Arab influence. The Arabs thus created, in little more than a year, a huge zone of control in western Iran, shielded from attack from the east by the fortified cities of Isfahan and Rayy which had submitted and received pro-Arab governors. They succeeded in dividing Iran in two, thereby making it harder for Yazdgerd to coordinate its defence, and forcing him to choose between the virtually impenetrable mountain redoubt of Tabaristan in the north and the old heartland of Persia in the south which was more vulnerable to attack but from which he could maintain communications with the Turks and other peoples in the steppes and the Tang in the far east. (10) The Arabs were not content to halt once Azerbaijan was under their control. To judge by their actions, their aim was to extend their authority over eastern Transcaucasia right up to the Caspian Gates, the key pass between the Caucasus and the Caspian. It looks as if they were seeking to swallow the Sasanian empire whole and to secure its northern frontier against attack by establishing a strong presence in the great fortress of Derbend (Arab Bab al-Abwab) — to be followed (see below) by a similar thrust to its eastern frontier beginning in 645 or 646. The advance north involved a larger army than Bukayr’s in 643. A new commander, Suraqah b. ‘Amr, was appointed by the Caliph ‘Umar. Bukayr remained in the theatre as one of four subordinate generals. Reinforcements were sent from the Jazirah under a fifth general. At the Arabs’ approach, the Persian governor of the frontier, a member of the family of the great general of Khusro II, Shahrbaraz, offered to submit and to collaborate in the tasks of defending the frontier and controlling the adjoining highlands. His offer was accepted and a treaty agreed, under which Armenian highlanders were expected to perform military service when called up by the governor, in return for exemption from tribute.72 (11) Detachments were sent off promptly to stretch a light Arab authority over several distinct neighbouring areas, which are itemized — “the mountains surrounding Armenia,” the region of Tiblisi in Iberia, both sides of the 72 Tab., 2663.2–2665.1 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 34–35). Terms for Armenians: Tab., 2665.1– 2666.2 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 35–37).

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mountainous zone of Albania (modern Nagorno Karabakh), and the Mughan steppe between the south bank of the Araxes and Iranian Azerbaijan.73 Only the lowlanders of the Mughan steppe agreed formally to submit to Arab authority. An expedition was also sent north, through the Caspian Gates as far as Balanjar, in a peaceful demonstration of Arab power to the nomads of the region (soon, in the 660s, to be brought under Khazar control).74 These actions, following up the seizure and garrisoning of Bab al-Abwab, brought operations in the Iranian north-west to a close. Two main centres of Arab authority had been created, one in Azerbaijan where Arabs would be encouraged to settle in the future, and the other in the north where Arab troops garrisoned the fortified city of Derbend, commanding the chief pass across the Caucasus. Control of the lowlands south of the Caucasus, between the Caspian and the mountains of Iberia and western Albania, was cemented by the treaty agreed with the inhabitants of the Mughan steppe.75 The Arabs thus secured a broad corridor connecting the two centres of their power and, at the same time, drove a wedge between the two principal potential centres of resistance in the north-west, highland Albania and the Elburz mountains. This was a major strategic gain, which rendered what remained of the Sasanian empire more vulnerable than before. If it could be replicated on the grander scale of Iran as a whole, with the forces commanded by the Spahbed of the North kept apart from those of the south and the east commanded by Yazdgerd, Sasanian power would be snuffed out without much difficulty. The withdrawal of the important contingent from Albania, led by Juansher, from the main field army in western Iran under the Spahbed of the north (called “the prince of Media” in the History of Khosrov) is dated to 644 in the History to 682.76 This corroborates the dating of the Bab al-Abwab campaign implied by Sayf’s account. For the enlargement of the expeditionary force and appointment of a set of new commanders implies that it went into a new campaigning season, which cannot be dated later than 644, given that ‘Umar, who made the new appointments, was assassinated at the end of the year. It should be noted, though, that al-Tabarī firmly places Sayf’s narrative in his ah 22 (30.11.642–19.11.643) year-entry. He was, I suspect, misled by the flow of Sayf’s narrative, in what may have been a long cast-forward (into the caliphate of ‘Uthman, when there was fighting north of the Caucasus). He evidently supposed that the crucial campaign which secured control of Azerbaijan (correctly dated by Sayf) was immediately followed by the expedition to the northern frontier. 73 Tab., 2666.3–7 (transl. Smith 1994, p. 37). 74 Tab., 2667.4–2668.1 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 37–39). Zuckerman 2007, pp. 417–431. 75 Tab., 2666.15–2667.4 (transl. Smith 1994, pp. 37–38). The terms were the familiar ones — a requirement to pay tribute (specified here as the large sum of one dinar per adult male) and to provide guidance and hospitality for Muslims — but with an additional clause requiring them to hand over any who “act perfidiously.” 76 Daskhurants‘i, 176.15–23 (transl. Dowsett 1961, pp. 112–113).

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* A historiographical parenthesis. Sayf’s history of the invasion of Iran, from the Battle of Nihawand to the take-over of Bab al-Abwab and subsequent flagwaving operations, has been vetted with the aid of the two seventh-century Armenian sources. The positive result will doubtless shock those Islamicists who have held onto their skeptical views. His absolute chronology was wrong, but the substance and relative chronology of his narrative have been corroborated.77 There are no external checks from which to test the historical worth of the summaries of treaty documents which Sayf includes, but they make good sense in the circumstances. An army of conquest could not afford to take direct control of provincial administration over so huge an area nor to levy heavy taxes — hence the appointment of high-ranking Sasanians who were ready to collaborate with a new Arab regime as marzbans, military governors, and the modest sums in tribute demanded. The role of the travellers/non-military Muslims who were to be given hospitality and guidance was, as has been suggested, probably to keep the new regime apprised of local affairs. There are also significant variations in some of the treaties — notably the possibility of raising troops in Azerbaijan, encouragement of military service from Armenians, and the insistence that there be no brigand raids from Jilan, Dumbawand and Tabaristan, which were not required to receive Arab travellers/Muslim civilians. Verisimilitude does not indicate use of texts of the original compacts dating from the 640s — something of which Islamicists would find it very hard to conceive. But an ultimate documentary origin is surely a possibility which should be given serious consideration.78 I would hazard that Sayf had access to sources in the provincial administrations of north-west Iran, and that they were able to provide him with official material on current practices, headed with background historical material. How on earth, though, did Sayf obtain apparently authentic campaign narratives, which make good strategic sense? It is highly unlikely that military dispatches were archived from this early period. He could not possibly have pieced together such lucid accounts from orally transmitted materials — given the time which had elapsed and the natural human propensity to embroider and transmute what was transmitted. There is one clue, however, the careful attention paid to appointments to command, and indeed to other caliphal actions. This suggests that he gained access to some sort of official record. This, I would surmise, was put together and kept in his home city, Kufa, which was the base for these operations in the northern theatre of war. It would then have been some sort of urban chronicle, a record of the extraordinary achievements of 77 This section of Sayf’s history is therefore not susceptible to the criticisms of muddle and bias levelled by Hinds (1984, pp. 47–49) against his two notices about operations on the Gulf coast and the first push into Fars. 78 Vacca 2017, pp. 182–193.

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Kufans in Iran, dated not by years of the hijra but by tenures of governors of the city (this would explain Sayf’s chronological errors). The detailed description of Kufa’s foundation and its first public buildings, picked up by al-Tabarī from Sayf, would have been a natural subject for such a chronicle.79 There is no analogous account, it should be noted, of the foundation of Basra. To those who might regard this as an outlandish proposal, I can point to the identification of a similar, but much more laconic source, the ta‘rikh of al-Layth b. Sa‘d (d.791), a famous Egyptian hadith scholar. This was an annalistic chronicle, covering the rule of the rashidun caliphs and their Umayyad successors. AlLayth’s interests were similar to Sayf’s, in the first place campaigns, battles and conquests, in the second official appointments and dismissals of governors. The chronicle has not survived, but its debris can be picked up from notices included in later texts, principally Ibn Abd al-Hakam’s history of the conquest of Egypt and north Africa, and a twelfth-century history of Damascus.80

* It looks as if the invasion of Iran was very much a policy of the Caliph ‘Umar. For his death inaugurated a pause in operations on both northern and southern fronts, from the end of 644 and 645 respectively. His successor ‘Uthman first took stock, we may guess, and then, when he resolved to press on, made preparations for a massive second assault involving co-ordinated attacks on both fronts.81 For these operations which were spread over several years (ah 28–32) we must fall back on Arab sources without any external control, save for the date (651–2) given in the History of Khosrov (i.e. ps.Sebeos) and the History to 682 (embedded in Movses Daskurants‘i) for the murder of Yazdgerd III and the demise of the Sasanian empire.82 The two fronts were managed from the two forward military bases in Mesopotamia, the northern from Kufa and the southern from Basra. New governors were appointed, ‘Abdallah b. ’Amir b. Kurayz at Basra in ah 28 (al-Baladhurī) or 29 (al-Tabarī), and Sa‘id b. al-‘As at Kufa in ah 30.83 Given that Sayf, a Kufan, wrote a shorter, less informative account of operations in the Basran sphere, where the most dramatic gains were made, a modern reconstruction can do little more than list the chief successes achieved in the order in which they are reported and with such dates as are attached to them in other Arab historical texts. The most useful material is that extracted from 79 Tab., 2481.11–2496.12 (transl. Juynboll 1989); cf. Kennedy 2007, pp. 23–24, pp. 132–136. 80 Zychowicz-Coghill 2021. 81 Marsham (forthcoming) doubts whether the Basran and Kufan campaigns of ah 30 were coordinated as suggested below (campaign 14). 82 Ps. Sebeos, 163.29–164.6 (transl. Thomson 1999, p. 135), with Hist.Com., n.67; Movses D., 180.13–16 (transl. Dowsett 1961, p. 115) 83 Tab., 2828.4–6, 2840.1–2 (transl. Humphreys 1990, pp. 33, 45); Bal., 403.7–8 (transl. Murgotten 1924, p. 159).

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al-Mada‘inī by al-Tabarī (which was chronologically ordered) and the various historical notices which make up al-Baladhurī’s account of the conquest of Fars. It is chiefly on al-Baladhurī, more informative than al-Mada‘inī, that a skeletal narrative can be built. He clearly had access to early sources, as is shown in his detailed treatment of Arab dealings with east Caucasus rulers,84 and there is no serious divergence between his account of earlier Arab operations in western Iran (as it can be pieced together from different sections on Rayy, Qumis and Azerbaijan) and Sayf’s, save for the names of leading generals.85 (12) It took five years for Arab forces, chiefly those operating in the Basran sphere, to destroy what remained of the Sasanian empire. The opening attacks took place under the personal command of the new governor of Basra, Ibn ‘Amir: he negotiated the surrender of Istakhr, the chief city of Fars, in ah 28 (25.9.648–13.9.649), and followed it up with the capture of Jur in ah 29 (14.9.649– 3.9.650); that same year the local nobles and army officers raised up the city of Istakhr, which was only brought back under Arab control after a siege and fierce fighting.86 (13) The main offensive thrust in ah 29 was carried out by a detachment under Mujashi‘ ibn Mas‘ud as-Sulami which entered Kirman in pursuit of Yazdgerd, who had been based there. Despite suffering heavy losses in a snowstorm at Bimandh, Mujashi‘ managed later to capture the principal strongholds and thus prepared the ground for the climactic campaign, the invasion of Khurasan to which Yazdgerd had fled.87 (14) Kufan forces joined in the following year, ah 30 (4.9.650–23.8.651), under the command of their governor, Sa‘id, according to al-Mada‘inī. Sa‘id reasserted Arab authority over Qumis and Gurgan, evidently marching east along the northern edge of the plateau past Rayy, and then attacked Tabaristan from the east, capturing Tammisheh on the Caspian coast. A clear strategic purpose can be discerned in these operations and the temporary control gained by the Arabs of the Namiah desert (probably north of Gurgan).88 Sa‘id was interposing himself and his forces between the great redoubt of the Elburz mountains, to which a powerful army under the command of the Spahbed of the North had withdrawn in 644, and the main theatre of war, where the Basran forces were operating in Khurasan. Its success is noted cursorily in the History of Khosrov which reports

84 See, for example, his long notice about the governorship of Marwan ibn Muhammad, covering operations against the Khazars and the establishment of tributary relations with small principalities – Bal., 207.17–209.10 (transl. Hitti 1916, pp. 325–327). 85 Bal., 317.1 –318.11, 325.15–326.6 (transl. Murgotten 1924, pp. 3–5, 19–20). 86 Bal., 389.6–390.3 (transl. Murgotten 1924, pp. 132–133). 87 Bal, 391.10–392.1 (transl. Murgotten 1924, pp.136–137). 88 Tab., 2836.9–2837.6, 2837.14 (transl. Humphreys 1990, p. 42).

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that “the prince of the Medes” (Khorokhazat) went out from the place where “he had fortified himself” … “into the desert in submission to the Ismaelites.”89 (15) Ibn ‘Amir was not distracted by a threat from his rear as he advanced north from Kirman into Khurasan. After sending off a detachment to conquer Sistan, he took his time in what looks like a systematic campaign to take out the strongholds one by one. al-Baladhurī is our chief source. Ibn ‘Amir captured a number of places around Nishapur (and Nishapur itself). He besieged the regional capital, Abarshahr, and gained the formal submission of the city when the marzban who was holding out in its quhandiz (citadel) submitted and agreed to pay an annual tribute of a million drachms. More fighting followed at Sarakhs before the local marzban submitted, as also at Kif, and Binah. The marzban of Tus submitted without offering any resistance.90 (16) It was against this background of the steady, remorseless advance of Arab power that the last act of the Sasanian era was played out in ah 31 (24.8.651– 11.8.652). Yazdgerd’s hopes of fighting on rested on the commitment to his cause of the population of eastern Khurasan, and an alliance with the Turks of Transoxiana. Both hopes were dashed. The notables of Merv, the chief city of this north-eastern extremity of the Sasanian empire, turned against him and seem to have prompted the Turks into refusing to provide military aid. There was a fair amount of embroidery in the versions of his death picked up by later historians, but they agree that he was murdered as he was fleeing towards Turkish territory.91 (17) The Arabs did not halt until they reached the Sasanian frontier on the Oxus. The marzban of Merv submitted, agreeing to pay 2.2 million drachms in tribute and to assign land for the construction of accommodation for Arab settlers. His colleague at Merv-ar-Rud held out at first (he had Turkish aid), but then submitted. There was fighting in Bactria, before the main city Balkh submitted, like Merv-ar-Rud on relatively generous term. The only failure was against Khwarezm. Treaties were also made (at a distance, it seems) with distant outliers of the Sasanian empire — Herat, Badghis and Bushanj.92

*** The Sasanian empire had been swallowed whole. The frontiers of the new great power of western Eurasia had been pushed out to the Caucasus and the edge of the steppe. It was now time to turn west and to complete the task of destroying 89 Ps.Sebeos, 164.1–4 (transl. Thomson 1999, p. 135), with Hist.Com., n.67. Khorokhazat’s election to the Median command: ps.Sebeos, 137.20–2 (transl. Thomson 1999, p. 99), with Hist.Com., n.54. 90 Bal., 392.19–394.6, 403.7–12, 403.19–405.8 (transl. Murgotten 1924, pp. 141–143, 159, 160–163). 91 al-Mada‘inī in Tab., 2872.1–8, 2873.6–2875.1 (transl. Humphreys, pp. 78, 79–81). 92 Bal., 405.8–408.9 (transl. Murgotten 1924, pp. 163–167).

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the familiar world order by conquering what remained of the East Roman empire. The orders for a massive redeployment of forces were issued before the end of 652 and carried out over the following months. At the beginning of the 654 campaigning season, two armies and two fleets moved forward, targeting Asia Minor, the main resource-base of the Romans, and Constantinople, the nerve centre of their empire.93

Bibliography Primary Sources al-Baladhurī, Ahmad ibn Yahya: Liber expugnationis regionum. de Goeje, M. J. (ed.) 1866: Leiden. Hitti, P. K. (transl.) 1916: The Origins of the Islamic State. New York. Murgotten, F. G. (transl.) 1924: The Origins of the Islamic State Part II. New York. Khuzistan Chronicle: Chronicon anonymum. Guidi, I. (ed.) 1903: In: Chronica Minora, CSCO 1, Scr.syri 1. Paris. Nöldeke, T. (transl.) 1893: Die von Guidi herausgegebene syrische Chronik, Sitzungsberichte der kaiserlichen Ak. Wiss., Phil.-Hist. Cl. 128. Movses Daskhurants‘i: Movses Kaƚankatuats‘i: Patmut’iwn Aƚuanits‘. Arak’eljan, V. (ed.) 1983: Erevan. Dowsett, C. J. F. (transl.) 1961: The History of the Caucasian Albanians by Movses Dasxuranc‘i. London. Ps.Sebeos: Patmut‘iwn Sebeosi. Abgaryan, G. V. (ed.) 1979: Erevan. Thomson, R. W. (transl.): 1999. In: R. W. Thomson/J. Howard-Johnston (eds.): The Armenian History Attributed to Sebeos. Liverpool. al-Tabarī: Taʾrīkh ar-rusul wa-l-mulūk. Albany. de Goeje, M. J. (ed.) 1893: Annales quos scripsit Abu Djafar Mohammed ibn Djarir al-Tabari, I.5. Leiden. Juynboll, G. H. A. (transl.) 1989: The History of al-Tabari, XIII: The Conquest of Iraq, Southwestern Persia, and Egypt. Smith, G. R. (transl.) 1994: The History of alTabari, XIV The Conquest of Iran. Albany. Humphreys, R. S. (transl.) 1990: The History of al-Tabari, XV: The Crisis of the Early Caliphate.

Secondary Sources Altheim F./R. Stiehl 1954: Ein asiatischer Staat: Feudalismus unter den Sasaniden und ihren Nachbarn. Wiesbaden. Bessard, F. 2020: Caliphs and Merchants: Cities and Economies of Power in the Near East (700–950). Oxford. Bianquis T./P. Guichard 2012 : “Vitalité des échanges et des cités dans le premier espace musulman.” In: T. Bianquis/P. Guichard/M. Tillier (eds.): Les débuts

93 Ps.Sebeos, 164.7–12, 169.18 –170.15 (transl. Thomson 1999, pp. 135, 143–144), with Hist. Com., nn.68, 74, 75.

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du monde musulman VIIe-Xe siècle: De Muhammad aux dynasties autonomes. Paris, pp. 515–530. Booth, P. 2013: “The Muslim Conquest of Egypt Reconsidered.” In: C. Zuckerman (ed.): Constructing the Seventh Century, TM 17, pp. 639–670. Bosworth, C. E. “The Persistant Older Heritage in the Medieval Iranian Lands.” In: V. Curtis-Sarkosh/S. Stewart (eds.): The Rise of Islam (The Idea of Iran 4). London, pp. 30–43. Bulliet, R. W. 1994: Islam: The View from the Edge. New York. — 2009: Cotton, Climate and Camels in Early Islamic Iran: A Moment in World History. New York. Conrad, L. I. 1992: “The Conquest of Arwad: A Source-Critical Study in the Historiography of the Early Medieval Near East.” In A. Cameron/L. Conrad (eds.): The Byzantine and Early Islamic Near East, I: Problems in the Literary Source Material. Princeton, pp. 317–401. Corcoran, S. 2011: “Observations on the Sasanian Law-book in the Light of Roman Legal Writing.” In: A. Rio (ed.): Law, Custom, and Justice in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. London, pp. 77–113. Crone, P. 2012: The Nativist Prophets of Early Islamic Iran: Rural Revolt and Local Zoroastrianism. New York. Daniel, E. 1979: The Political and Social History of Khurasan under Abbasid Rule, 747–820. Minneapolis. Daryaee, T. 2009: Sasanian Persia: The Rise and Fall of an Empire. London. — 2015: “Zoroastrianism under Islamic Rule.” In: M. Stausberg/Y. S.-D. Vevaina (eds.): The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Zoroastrianism. London, pp. 103–118. Donner, F. M. 1980: “The Bakr b. Wa’il Tribes and Politics in Northeastern Arabia on the Eve of Islam.” In: StIs 51, pp. 5–38 Golden, P., Ben-Shammai, H., Róna-Tas, A. 2007: The World of the Khazars: New Perspectives. Leiden. Jackson Bonner, M. R. 2011: Three Neglected Sources of Sasanian History in the Reign of Khusraw Anushirvan (Cahier de StIr 46) Paris. Hinds, M. 1984: “The First Arab Conquest in Fars.” Iran 22, pp. 39–53. Howard-Johnston, J. 1995: “The Two Great Powers in Late Antiquity: A Comparison.” In: A. Cameron (ed.): The Byzantine and Early Islamic Near East, III States, Resources and Armies. Princeton, pp. 157–226. — 2006: East Rome, Sasanian Persia and the End of Antiquity. Aldershot. — 2010: Witnesses to a World Crisis: Historians and Histories of the Middle East in the Seventh Century. Oxford. — 2012: “The Late Sasanian Army.” In T. Bernheimer/A. Silverstein (eds.): Late Antiquity: Eastern Perspectives. Exeter, pp. 87–127. — 2014, “The Sasanian State: The Evidence of Coinage and Military Construction.” In: JAH 2/2, pp. 144–181. — 2017: “The India Trade in Late Antiquity.” In: E. Sauer (ed.): Sasanian Persia: Between Rome and the Steppes of Eurasia. Edinburgh, pp. 284–304. — 2021: The Last Great War of Antiquity. Oxford.

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— forthcoming: “The Arab Conquest of the Roman Levant.” Proceedings of a conference on the battle of Yarmuk and the Arab conquest of Syria, held at Tübingen in June 2017). Hoyland, R. G. 1997: Seeing Islam as Others Saw it: A Survey and Evaluation of Christian, Jewish and Zoroastrian Writings on Early Islam. Princeton. — 2014: Iran in the Early Islamic Period: Politics, Culture, Administration and Public Life between the Arab and Seljuk Conquests, 633–1055. Leiden. Huff, D. 1993: “Architecture sassanide.” In: Splendeur des Sassanides: L’empire perse entre Rome et la Chine [224–642]. Brussels, pp. 45–61; K ennedy, H. 2007: The Great Arab Conquests: How the Spread of Islam Changed the World we Live in. London. — 2009: “Survival of Iranianness.” In: V. Curtis-Sarkosh/S. Stewart (eds.): The Rise of Islam (The Idea of Iran 4). London, pp. 13–29. K ettenhofen, E. 1996: “Darband.” In: EIr. VII, pp. 13–19. K halidi, T. 1994: Arabic Historical Thought in the Classical Age. Cambridge. K han M agomedov, S. 1979: Derbent. Moscow. Lane Fox, R. 1973: Alexander the Great. London. Lombard, M. 1971: L’Islam dans sa première grandeur (VIIIe–XIe siècle). Paris. Lynch, R. J. 2020: Arab Conquests and Early Islamic Historiography: The Futuh alBuldan of al-Baladhuri. London. Macuch, M. 2016: “The Legal Context of the Tabarestan Court Records (Tab. 1-8, 10).” In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Words and Symbols: Sasanian Objects and the Tabarestān Archive (Res Orientales 24). Bures sur Yvette, pp. 145–170. — 2017: “Pahlavi Legal Documents from Tabarestan on Lease, Loan and Compensation: The Juristic Context (Tab. 13, 14, 15, 17, 18 and 23).” In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Sasanian Coins, Middle-Persian Etymology and the Tabarestān Archive (Res Orientales 26). Bures sur Yvette, pp. 165–195. — 2019: “Pahlavi Legal Documents from Tabarestān: Two Claims and a Reevaluation of Crop Yields: The Juristic Context of Tab. 21, 22 and 24.” In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Sasanian Persia and the Tabarestan Archive (Res Orientales 27). Bures sur Yvette, pp. 117–150. Marsham, A. forthcoming: “Were there Strategic Considerations in the SeventhCentury Arab Conquests?,” proceedings of the Yarmuk conference. Naval Intelligence Division 1945: Persia (Geographical Handbook Series). Oxford. Noth, A. 1968: “Isfahan-Nihawand: Eine quellenkritische Studie zur frühislamischen Historiographie.” In: ZDMG 118, pp. 274–296. Noth, A./L. I. Conrad 1994: The Early Islamic Historical Tradition: A SourceCritical Study. Princeton. Payne, R. E. 2015: A State of Mixture: Christians, Zoroastrians, and Iranian Political Structure in Late Antiquity. Oakland. Peacock, A. C. S. 2011: “Early Persian Historians and the Heritage of Pre-Islamic Iran.” In: E. Herzig/S. Stewart (eds.): Early Islamic Iran (The Idea of Iran 5). London, pp. 59–75. de Planhol, X. 1968 : Les fondements géographiques de l’histoire de l’Islam. Paris. Robinson, C. F. 2003: Islamic Historiography. Cambridge.

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— 2004: “The Conquest of Khuzistan: A Historiographical Reassessment.” In: Bulletin of SOAS 67, pp. 14–39. Rubin, Z. 1995: “The Reforms of Khusro Anushirwan.” In: A. Cameron (ed.): The Byzantine and Early Islamic Near East: States, Resources and Armies. Princeton, pp. 227–297. Sauer, E. et al. 2013: Persia’s Imperial Power in Late Antiquity: The Great Wall of Gorgan and Frontier Landscapes of Sasanian Iran. Oxford. Schippmann, K. 1993: “L’influence de la culture sassanide.” In: Splendeur des Sassanides: L’empire perse entre Rome et la Chine [224–642]. Brussels, pp. 131–141. Shaked, S. 1994: Dualism in Transformation: Varieties of Religion in Sasanian Iran. London. — 2015: “Islam.” In: M. Stausberg/Y. S.-D. Vevaina (eds.): The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Zoroastrianism. Oxford, pp.491-498. Stausberg, M./ Y.  S.-D. Vevaina 2015: The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Zoroastrianism. Oxford. Ter-Ghevonyan, A. 1976: The Arab Emirates in Bagratid Armenia. Lisbon. Treadwell, L. 2011: “The Samanids: The First Islamic Dynasty of Central Asia.” In: E. Herzig/S. Stewart (eds.): Early Islamic Iran (The Idea of Iran 5). London, pp. 3–15. Vacca, A. 2017: Non-Muslim Provinces under Early Islam: Islamic Rule and Iranian legitimacy in Armenia and Caucasian Albania. Cambridge. Weber, D. 2016 a: “Court Records of Lawsuits in Tabarestan in the Year 86/7 PYE (737 CE): A Philological Examination.” In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Words and Symbols: Sasanian Objects and the Tabarestān Archive (Res Orientales 24). Bures sur Yvette, pp. 121–144. — 2016 b: “Two Documents from Tabarestan Reconsidered (Tab. 12 and 26).” In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Words and Symbols: Sasanian Objects and the Tabarestān Archive (Res Orientales 24). Bures sur Yvette, pp. 185–192. — 2017: “Pahlavi Legal Documents from Tabarestan on Lease, Loan and Compensation: A Philological Study (Tab. 13, 14, 15, 17, 18 and 23).” In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Sasanian Coins, Middle-Persian Etymology and the Tabarestān Archive (Res Orientales 26). Bures sur Yvette, pp. 131–164. — 2019: “Pahlavi Legal Documents from Tabarestān. Two Claims and a Re-Evaluation of Crop Yields: A Philological Study of Tab. 21, 22 and 24.” In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Sasanian Persia and the Tabarestan Archive (Res Orientales 27). Bures sur Yvette, pp. 91–116. Wiesehöfer, J. 1996: Ancient Persia from 550 bc to 650 ad. London. Zuckerman, C. 2007: “The Khazars and Byzantium — The First Encounter.” In: P. Golden/H. Ben-Shammai/A. Róna-Tas (eds.): The World of the Khazars New Perspectives. Selected Papers from the Jerusalem 1999 International Khazar Colloquium (Handbook of Oriental Studies 17). Leiden, pp. 399–403. Zychowicz-Coghill, E. 2021: The First Arabic Annals: Fragments of Umayyad History (Studies in the History and Culture of the Middle East 41). Berlin.

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Überlegungen zur Avesta-Transmission in der Sasanidenzeit Götz König Die bisweilen übersehene Tatsache, daß die Beschreibung der 21 Nasks in Dēnkard 8 nicht, wie es nach der Einleitung des Buches zu erwarten stünde, deren Umgruppierung durch die Edition Xosrō I, sondern einer dieser zeitlich vorausliegenden, freilich verwandten Ordnung folgt,1 welche man mit guten Gründen für die des Ādurbād ansehen darf,2 wirft nicht nur die Frage nach dem Stellenwert des Avesta des Xosrō innerhalb der sasanidischen Transmissiongeschichte des Avesta auf, sondern sie legt auch nahe, daß das Referat Dk 8 auf einem Zand des 4. Jh. gearbeitet wurde, welches wiederum ein vorgängiges Avesta-Original zu fordern scheint. Bekanntlich hat man sich seit den Tagen Westergaards dem Thema ‘Sasanidisches Avesta’ auf unterschiedlichen Wegen genähert, über die Sammlung und Kritik der einheimischen Nachrichten oft unter Vergleich mit jenen der Nebenüberlieferung; über die Rekonstruktion der Schriftgeschichte; über den Versuch, die Handschriften der beiden großen Sammlungen (Lange Liturgie / Kurze Liturgien [insbesondere Yašts]) auf Archetypen zurückzuführen; über die Analyse des Zand sowie über die Schriftgeschichte. Alle diese Annäherungsweisen besitzen ihren Fluchtpunkt aus unterschiedlichen, gleichwohl sich gegenseitig verstärkenden Gründen in der Sasanidenzeit, auch wenn sich bisweilen durchaus wirkmächtige Versuche finden, die Konfigurationsfrage “des Avesta” (bzw. der Avesta-Sammlungen) auf jenseits der Sasanidenperiode zu verschieben, wobei das Gravitationszentrum dieser Bestimmung nicht erst das Bekanntwerden des Überlieferungsberichts in Dēnkard 4 bildete,3 sondern schon die bis auf Henry Lord zurückreichenden Kenntnisse über das Avesta der 3x7 Nasks.4 So sind es die einheimische Tradition, deren unkritische Akzeptanz in der Entstehungsphase einer europäischen Zoroastrismus- und Avestaforschung wie schließlich deren spätere kritische Akzeptanz und bisweilen starke Affirmation, wo sie Nachrichten über die Sasanidenzeit bietet zumindest 1 2 3 4

Siehe König 2012. Nicht zufällig dürfte in Dk 8.1 die Erwähnung des Ādurbād sein, vgl. schon Cantera 2004, S. 156. Der Begriff nask wird im Transmissionbericht zur Bezeichnung des Avesta erstmals für das Ādurbād-Avesta angewendet. Haug 1870. Siehe Anquetil I.1, S. 479, Fn.

Sasanian Studies | Sasanidische Studien. Vol. I (2022). Ed. by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee doi: 10.13173/SSt.1.127

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dort, die einen auf diese Tradition hin ausgerichteten, verdichteten Diskurs um jene Konfigurationsfrage geschaffen haben, der kaum sich durchbrechen läßt. Der genannte Transmissionbericht Dēnkard 4 war vielfach Gegenstand der Lesung, Deutung und kritischen Wertung.5 Die letzte große Untersuchung findet sich in den bekannten Studien zur Pahlavi-Übersetzung von A. Cantera, die im Rahmen der Frage, aus welcher Zeit die älteren Teile der Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Avesta stammen, ausführlich auch jene einheimischen Nachrichten zur Tradierung avestischer Texte bzw. (was dem nicht gleichbedeutend ist) zur Geschichte der der Konfigurationen “des Avesta” beleuchtet hat. Betrachten wir Canteras kritische Auseinandersetzung mit dem Überlieferungsbericht aus Dk 4 näher, so fällt auf, daß zwei Passagen des Berichts, die m.E. zum einen von entscheidendem Wert für die gesamte Rekonstruktion der Geschichte des Avesta in der Sasanidenzeit sind, zum anderen aber auch Hinweise geben könnten für erstaunlichen Konzeptionen der zoroastrischen Theologie, wie sie uns scheinbar unvermittelt in der frühislamischen Periode begegnen, nur relativ flüchtig bzw. unvollständig behandelt sind: a) der Bericht über die Avesta-Ausgabe unter Šābuhr I; b) Teile der Rede des Xosrō I anläßlich seiner Neuausgabe des Avesta. Die eingangs noch einmal erinnerte Beobachtung der kanonischen Bedeutung des Ādurbād-Avesta für die späteren Jahrhunderte hat jedoch in der immanenten Betrachtung des Transmissionsberichtes zur Folge, daß sein Dargestelltes nicht als eine bloße historische Abfolge sich begreifen läßt, sondern als ein historisch dynamisches Bezugssystem. Das aber hat Konsequenzen für die Quellenkritik und die Verhältnissetzung von Quelle und an sie herangetragenen kritischen Werkzeugen. Vergegenwärtigen wir uns vor einer Betrachtung der Nachrichten zu den Editionen des Šābuhr I und Xosrō I die Etappen der Avesta-Transmission gemäß jenem Bericht in Dk 4, der bekanntlich sein nah verwandtes Gegenstück im Bericht Dk 3.420 über die Überlieferung des Dēnkard besitzt. Beide Berichte behaupten nicht nur einen gleichen Ursprung beider Texttransmissionen; vielmehr stellt die Avesta-Edition des Xosrō I den Abschluß der Bildungsgeschichte des Großen Avesta6 dar, dessen Geschichte in islamischer Zeit dann mit den Avestareferaten in Dk 8 + 9 in die des Dēnkard einmündet: Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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128 Götz König

5

6

Zum Bericht Dk 4 siehe u.a. Haug 1870, S. 145–147, 149–152; West 1892, S. 412–418; Bailey 1943, S. 81ff.; Wikander 1946, S. 134–142 (Konkordanz Dk 4 / Dk 3.420); Zaehner 1955, S. 7–9, 31–34; Shaki 1981, S. 116/119; Shaki 1999, S. 176f.; Shaki 2003, S. 323; Cantera 2004, S. 109. Kellens 1998 hat, wenn nicht die Existenz des Großen Avesta, so doch dessen Bedeutung für die Avestaforschung in Frage gestellt, und zwar aus der Erkenntnis heraus, daß Yasna und Lange Liturgie nicht aus diesem abzuleiten sind. Problematisch an Kellens weiteren Überlegungen ist aber m.E. die Übertragung dieser Erkenntnis auf die von ihm sog. Kurzen Liturgien, denn die für Yasna und Lange Liturgie korrekte Argumentation ist nicht notwendig auf das Xorde Avesta zu übertragen. Als Parallelfall wäre einzig eine Sammlung aller Texte für die Monatstage in Betracht zu ziehen, die nicht im Nask Bayān vollständig enthalten gewesen sein kann. Doch besteht die Mißlichkeit, daß diese Sammlung

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Überlegungen zur Avesta-Transmission in der Sasanidenzeit

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78910

Zeit des Zardušt und seiner ersten Schüler (fradom hāwišt) = Poryōtkēšān der Guten Religion)

erste Texterstellung

literarische Tradition Zerstörung, Zerstreuung, Verschriftlichung Übersetzung vorachämenidisch bzw. alexanderzeitlich vorreichszeitlich und achämenidisch

orale Transmission

Bericht Dk 47: Transmission des Avesta

Bericht Dk 3: Transmission des Dēnkard

Dēnkard < “Manifestation der dēn” (dēn māzdēsn paydāgīh), verfaßt mittels Befragung und Erhörung (pad pursišn ud āšnawišn)

Wištāsp Šāh sendet nach dem Krieg mit Arjāsp die “Bücher” (nibēgīhā) der dēn māzdēsn an “Oberhäupter” (sar-xwadāy).

Niederschrift der Fragen unter Kay Wištāsp; Übergabe der Niederschrift an das “šspykʾn Schatzhaus,” Dārāy, Sohn des Dārāy, läßt zwei Verbreitung von Kopien, so Kopien des Avesta und Zand an das diz ī nibišt. aufbewahren, im špykʾn’Schatzhaus und im diz ī nibišt. Zerstörungen unter Alexander: Zerteilung des Textes; Teile verbleiben bei einzelnen Dastūren.

Schaden der iranischen Religion/Herrschaft durch Alexander: Kopie des “Archivs” verbrennt8 , die des “šspykʾn Schatzhauses” gerät in “hrōmāische” Hand.9 Übersetzung ins Griechische10.

nur ein Postulat ist. Grundsätzlich scheint mir, daß Kellens seine Behauptung zweier liturgischer Sammlungen stillschweigend mit der Annahme verbindet, daß die Nasks des Großen Avesta nicht zelebriert werden konnten; tatsächlich aber existiert in einem Pahlavi-Riwāyat eine Angabe über eine (offenbar interkalierende) Rezitation aller Nasks (im sog. Hamāgdēn-Ritual), s. RĀF 144.2 (TD2 400.14–401.10). 7 B 320.16ff. (DkM 411.17ff.) (s. Cantera 2004, S. 106–124). 8 Vermutlich eine Erinnerung an den Brand von Persepolis. 9 Vom “zand” ist hingegen nur in GrBd 33.14 die Rede, da gesagt wird, Alexander habe diesen an sich genommen, nach Hrōm geschickt und das Avesta verbrannt (vgl. bes. AWN 1.5–18 [s. Cantera 2004, S. 116]). 10 Es folgt die Angabe pad āgāhīh ī az pēšēnīgān paywastag “ nach der Überlieferung der Vorfahren.” Das Folgende, das die Sasanidenzeit betrifft, scheint auf einer anderen (schriftlichen?) Quelle zu beruhen.

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Bericht Dk 3: Transmission des Dēnkard

Walaxš läßt die zerstreuten Texte (nibištag) des Avesta und Zand anhand von mündlichen Textüberlieferungen überprüfen (nigāh dāštan) und in die Provinzen ayādgārs zu schicken.

-

Zusammenführung der zerstreuten Schrift (“dieses Buches ” [im nibēg]) Ardaxšīr reklamiert (xwāst) unter Ardaxšīr. die “zerstreute Lehre” Der pōryōtkēš ahlaw Tansar ī für den dar unter der hērbed vergleicht (abāz Leitung des Tansar. Dieser handāxtan) sie mit dem Avesta, führt eine Säuberung (?) vervollständigt demgemäß den Text. durch.11 Aufbewahrung im špykʾn‘Schatzhaus, Verbreitung von Kopien.

Šābuhr I

parthisch, sasanidisch: Ardaxšīr/Tansar

Bericht Dk 47: Transmission des Avesta

Šābuhr I fügt dem Schriftkorpus naturkundliche und philosophische Schriften bei, vergleicht sie (abāz handāxtan) mit dem Avesta, läßt korrekte Kopien im špykʾn-Schatzhaus aufbewahren.

Šābuhr II/ Ādurbād

inner-iranische Rekonstruktionen

literarische Tradition inner-iranische Rekonstruktion: Vergleich literarische und mündliche Tradition

iranisch-griechische Rekonstruktion des Schriftenkorpus

literarische Tradition

130 Götz König

Šābuhr II veranstaltet ein Konzil, sammelt “alle (Lehr -[?])-Texte” (hamāg gowišn). Ordal des Ādurbād: Kanonisierung.

Xosrō I

Konzil unter Xosrō I

11

11 Tansar abarmad ān ī ēk frāz padīrift ud abārīg az dastwar hišt “Tansars Anordnung nahm den einen Text an und beseitigte den anderen vom Kanon.”

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Treten wir an diesen Bericht bzw. die beiden Berichte in der Vormeinung heran, es handele sich bei ihnen um “Narrative” in einem starken Sinne, d.h. um Konstruktionen, die uns vor allem etwas über die historischen Perspektiven ihrer Verfasser verraten, so lassen sich drei Konstruktionsmomente bestimmen:





a) die Avestatransmission folgt der Rekonstruktion iranischer Geschichte als einer von großen Reichen, die weltgeschichtliche Etappen darstellen (vgl. das Transmissionsschema mit den Millennienschemata Dk 9.8 und ZWY 1.6–11 sowie ZWY 3.19–29, die sich wiederum teils an der religiösen Überlieferung, teils an der Reichsgeschichte orientieren [und bemerkenswerterweise Šābuhr I nicht erwähnen]); b) dieses Etappenschema ist der Bogenförmigkeit des allgemeinen Weltschemas entlehnt: Ursprung im Guten-Wahren — Entfernung zum Guten-Wahren — Rückkehr zum Guten-Wahren, was sich zugleich als eine historische Kurve “iranisch — griechisch (Einfall des Alexander) — iranisch” darstellt; c) das Schema dient zugleich als die historische Realisierung eines der Transmission übergeordneten Problems, dem von Mündlichkeit und Schriftlichkeit.

Nähere Betrachtung sämtlicher Punkte läßt allerdings Momente erkennen, die zur Durchführung eines starken Narrativs (wie es etwa die Weltalterschemata darstellen) nicht notwendig sind: während die Erzählung zunächst suggeriert, daß mit den iranischen Reichen ein mündlicher zu einem schriftlichen Text wurde, zeigt sich z.B. in der Ādurbād-Edition, daß offenbar eine mündliche und eine schriftliche Tradition nebeneinander bestanden;12 im welthistorischen Bogenschema vertritt Alexander, im weiteren Sinne ‘das Griechische’, den ahremanischen Pol, die Unordnung etc., was jeoch fragen läßt, wie sich hierzu die Šābuhr I Edition verhält, die doch offenbar auf ein integratives Modell, den Anbau griechisches Wissenselemente an das Avesta, setzt; und während die vor-achämenidisch/achämenidische und die parthische Zeit durch je eine Edition markiert werden, begegnen in der sasanidischen Zeit gleich vier Avesta-Editionen, was nach Maßgabe eines starken Narrativs eine problematische Redundanz darstellt. Daraus ist der Schluß zu ziehen: die Transmissionsberichte sind — wie alle Berichte — natürlich subjektive Konstrukte, Narrative; gleichwohl sind sie es nicht in einer derart starken Weise, daß sie das Besondere, das nach Hegel “historisch Zufällige,” gänzlich dem Begriff unterstellen könnten. Darum ist für die Kritik des Berichts nicht allein sein Schema von Interesse, als vielmehr auch 12 Obgleich sich der Bericht äußerlich als eine Folge Oralität → Schriftlichkeit darstellt, treten in ihm immer wieder Momente einer fortdauernden Mündlichkeit auf, beim Niederschreiben einer Avesta-Edition (abastāg zand bei Darius; abastāg bei Šābuhr I; nask bei Šābuhr II) bzw. der mündlichen Überlieferung (s. unter Walaxš: cē uzwān abēspārišnīg pad dastwar; bei Xosrō I [s.u,]; möglicherweise auch bei Šābuhr II, wo der schillernde Begriff gōwišn verwendet ist), sowie von abhängigen Textformen.

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132 Götz König die Momente, in denen das Schema Unebenheiten, Widersprüche etc. aufweist. Schließlich ist für die Verwendbarkeit des Transmissionsberichtes als Dokument für die Historizität des Dargestellten und nicht der Darstellung allein anzuführen, daß er, wie schon Bartholomae glaubte feststellen zu können, in der Rede des Xosrō vielleicht ein Originaldokument führt. Während die heutigen Gelehrten gegenüber einer Historizität der vorsasanidischen Editionen grundsätzlich skeptisch eingestellt sind — der Gedanke einer parthischen Edition leidet noch immer unter (den Folgen) der AndreasTheorie (Andreas 1903) —, sind sie bezüglich der Existenz der insgesamt vier sasanidenzeitlichen Editionen, wenn auch nicht durchgängig oder bezüglich aller vier Editionen positiv, so doch zumindest zur Diskussion gestimmt.13 Eigentümlicherweise hat man im Rahmen dieser Diskussion des Dk 4-Berichtes nie ernsthaft die Frage aufgeworfen, warum das Avesta zwischen Ardašīr I und Xosrō I, also in ca. 300 Jahren, nicht weniger als vier Mal bearbeitet werden mußte (in einem sich freilich als zusammenhängend verstehenden Kanonisierungsprozeß14):15 Zeit

Edition

Zentrale Ansätze der Editionen

Zentrale historische und religionshistorische Erscheinungen

frühes 3. Jh.

Ardašīr I/ Tansar15

Sammlung des in Iran Zerstreuten

Arsakiden → Sasaniden

Aufnahme griechischer + indischer Texte

Mani

↓ mittleres 3. Jh.

Šābuhr I ↓

Ermordung des Mani /Aufstieg des Kirdīr

13 Siehe dazu Cantera 2004, S. 106–163, insbesondere S. 162f. Auch Kellens 1998, der sich letztlich überhaupt ablehnend gegenüber den Nachrichten des Dk 4 Berichtes ausspricht, zieht von den erwähnten Avesta-Redaktionen nur die sasanidischen ernsthaft in Betracht. 14 Besonders Humbach 1991 I, S. 49ff., hat die vier Bearbeitungen als einen aufeinander aufbauenden Arbeitsprozeß verstanden. Mir scheint jedoch, daß es sich eher um Korrekturen bzw. Verwerfungen handelte. 15 Tansar, unter dessen Namen das Tansarnāme (Editionen Darmesteter 1894; Minowi 1930; Übersetzung Boyce 1968) geht, ist eine kaum fassbare Gestalt der vorislamischen Kirchengeschichte Irans. Das Dēnkard erwähnt ihn noch im dritten und siebenten Buch. Masʿūdi, Murūǧ II, S. 161, sagt, daß Tansar “ein Platoniker” war (s. Peters 1968, S. 45). An der Nachricht mag historisch wertvoll sein, daß Historiker der frühislamischen Zeit die Meinung vertraten, der oberste Klerus der älteren Sasanidenzeit sei durchaus griechischem Denken zugeneigt gewesen, was mit der Nachricht über die Šābuhr I Edition harmonieren würde.

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Überlegungen zur Avesta-Transmission in der Sasanidenzeit

Zeit 4. Jh.

Edition

Zentrale Ansätze der Editionen

Šābuhr II/ Abgrenzung einer Sphäre des “jud;” Ādurbād Edition des Avesta wie in Dk 8 beschrieben ↓

6. Jh.

Xosrō I

Modifikationen des Ādurbād-Avesta

133

Zentrale historische und religionshistorische Erscheinungen Christen im Reich Mazdakbewegung

Die Existenz von vier sasanidischen Editionen ist umso erstaunlicher, als die vom Text behaupteten Textzerstörungen jenseits der Sasanidenzeit, in der Zeit des Alexander wie auch in der der späten Arsakiden und (im Dk 3 Bericht) in der Übergangszeit zum Islam liegen. Die Gründe für die Vielzahl sasanidischer Editionen kann folglich nur in einer auf die Sasanidenzeit sich beschränkenden kritischen Perspektive liegen: intern, in bezug auf die jeweils vorangegangene Edition; extern, in bezug auf bestimmte kulturelle, religiöse Bewegungen (s. das Schema). Während die interne Perspektive kontinuierend oder diskontinuierend ausgerichtet sein konnte, so die externe adaptierend oder refüsierend. Im Transmissionbericht selbst wird, zumindest bis zu einem bestimmten Zeitpunkt, als Grund für die Neueditionen stets angeführt, einen “zertreuten” Charakter der Texte aufheben zu wollen: Bei Walaxs gilt die Tradition, wohl als Folge der Alexander-Zerstörungen, für pargandag “zerstreut.” Das Abestāg ud Zand wie auch die (daraus gewonnene) “Lehre” (hammōg) liegen schriftlich und mündlich vor. Bei Ardaxšīr gilt nurmehr die “Lehre” als pargandag. Diese wird dem schon existierenden Kanon (dastwar(īh)) eingegliedert, anderes wird ausgegliedert. Bei Šābuhr I gelten dann (ausländische) “Bücher” als pargandag, die dem “Abestāg” wieder anzupassen (handāxtan) sind. Bei Šābuhr II besteht die Aufgabe darin, hamāg gōwišn ō uskār ud wizōyišn āwurd “das gesamte gōwišn kritisch zu reflektieren.” um schließlich die definitive Nask-Ordnung festzulegen.

Šābuhr I Unsere Kenntnisse der iranisch-zoroastrischen Intellektualität der Sasanidenzeit sind i.d.R. dürftig. Auch über die Einstellung des Šābuhr I dem Zoroastrismus gegenüber wissen wir relativ wenig. Jedoch hat die Tatsache von Manis Anwesenheit am Hof des Šābuhr und seine Abfassung einer Religionsdarstellung für den König im Šābuhragān, sowie Manis nur wenige Jahre nach Šābuhrs Tod erfolgte Ermordung darauf schließen lassen, daß die Dominanz des Zoroastrismus bzw. einer bestimmten Ausrichtung des Zoroastrismus — denn den zoroastrischen Klerikern galt der Manichäismus keineswegs als

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134 Götz König eine andere Religion denn vielmehr als eine Häresie — und seiner weiteren institutionellen Organisation erst seit den 270er Jahren bedeutend gefördert wurde.16 Zu einer bedingt offenen religiösen Situation in der sasanidischen Frühzeit scheint zu stimmen, was Dk 4 über die Šābuhr I Edition berichtet. Die bekannteste Nachricht diesbezüglich findet sich im Transmissionsbericht am Anfang von Dk 4. Sie notiert die Aufnahme indischer und griechischer naturwissenschaftlicher und philosophischer Lehren im Rahmen eben jener Edition.17 In dem Bericht begegnen eine Reihe von Fachbezeichnungen, die vermutlich Lehnübersetzungen griechischer Termini sind18:

B 321.13–322.18 (DkM 412.17–413.2) šābuhr ī šāhān šāh ī ardaxšīrān nibēgīhā-iz ī az dēn bē abar bizeškīh ud stargōwišnīh ud candišn ud zamān ud gyāg ud gōhr jahišn bawišn ud wināhišn ud *jadag-wihīrīh19 ud gōwāgīh ud abārīg kirrōgīh ud abzār andar hindugān hrōm abārīg-iz zamīgīhā pargandag būd abāz ō ham āburdān ud abāg abestāg abāz handāxtan ... Šābuhr, König der Könige, Sohn des Ardašēr, befahl, auch die nicht der dēn zuzählenden20 Schriften über die Heilkunde, die Sternenkunde, Bewegung, Zeit und Raum, Wesen und Akzidens21, über Entstehen und Vergehen und Form-/ Stoffwandlung, über Logik (?)22 und andere Techniken und Fertigkeiten, die über

16 Zu Šābuhrs I Verhältnis zu Mani s. Gnoli 1985, S. 77f.; Kreyenbroek 2008. Von besonderem Interesse ist der Chester Beatty Kephalaia Codex, der seit einigen Jahren bearbeitet wird, s. Gardner/Beduhn/Dilley 2014; 2019. 17 Ein Echo dessen, vermutlich der Versuch einer Zuschreibung der in Dk 4 genannten Lehrinhalte, findet sich in dem (wenig zuverlässigen) Bericht des Nawbaxt: “After him (Ardašīr [GK]), his son Šābūr did the same until all these books had been copied in Persian in the way in which they had been [compiled by] Hermes the Babylonian who ruled over Egypt, Dorotheus the Syrian [of Sidon], Qaydarūs the Greek from the city of Athens which is famed for its science, Ptolemy the Alexandrian, and Farnāsb the Indian. They commented upon them and taught them to the people in the same way in which they had learned from all those books which originated in Babylon.” (Gutas 1998, S. 39f.). 18 Vgl. Shaki 2003, S. 323, in Nachfolge von Bailey 1943. 19 B ytk‘ ʾylyh/jadag-ērīh. Zu jadag-wihīrīh s. Dk 3.369 (B 271.5–272.2; DkM 352–352); Bailey 1943, S. 204f.; Zaehner 1955, S. 33, mit Hinweis auf Aristoteles, Ph. i.7 (190b5); Cael. 270a27; GC 319b10; Meta. 1022b15; Cereti 1994–95, S. 125. 20 Nach Shaki 1999, S. 176, 177, bedeutet az dēn bē “säkular;” Cantera 2004, S. 109, übersetzt “außer den religiösen.” 21 Jahišn ist die Lesung in Shaki 1981, S. 116. Bailey und ältere Gelehrte lasen dahišn “creation.” Zu jahišn “accident” (germ. “Zufall”) (← gr. συμβεβηκότως “bei-läufig” > “zufällig” [see Meta V 30, esp. 1025a14f.]) s. Shaki 1975, S. 258. 22 Bailey liest gavākīh “growth” (zu einer Wurzel gu-) und zieht das Wort mit dem vorherigen zusammen (“change and growth”); vgl. Zaehner 1955, S. 55.

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Indien, Rom und andere Länder zerstreut waren, zu sammeln und mit dem Abestāg zu vergleichen,23 ...24

Der Text listet also eine Vielzahl — die genaue Anzahl schwankt bei den Bearbeitern — von Wissensdisziplinen bzw. von Kategorien auf, die Grundbegriffe solcher Disziplinen sind: bizeškīh “Medizin;” star-gōwišnīh “Astrologie;” candišn ud zamān ud gyāg “(Lehre von) Bewegung, Zeit, Raum;” gōhr jahišn “(Lehre von) Substanz/Wesen und Akzidenz;” bawišn ud wināhišn ud *jadag-wihīrīh25 “(Lehre vom) Werden26 und Vergehen und vom Wandel (der Elemente);” gōwāgīh “Logik.” Die genannten Sparten candišn ud zamān ud gyāg, gōhr jahišn, bawišn ud wināhišn ud *jadag-wihīrīh, sowie gōwāgīh lassen an zentrale Lehrinhalte der aristotelischen Wissenschaftslehre denken. Wie wohl erstmals von Bailey erkannt,27 ist bawišn ud wināhišn die Übersetzung des Titels der Elementenschrift περὶ γενέσεως καὶ φϑορᾶς / de 23 Zu abāz handāxtan s. besonders Shaki 1981, S. 121ff.; Cantera 2004, S. 120, Fn. 68; Saadat 2014. Vgl. in Dk 4.100 auch den Ausdruck ōh handāxtan, Dk 5.22.7 har kē handāzišn kāmag ārāst ēstēd (s.u.). Die griechischen Texte wurden wahrscheinlich ins Mittelpersische übersetzt und dann, wohl kommentarhaft, dem Übersetzungstext dort, wo es den Gelehrten passend schien, beigegeben. Man vergleiche die Passage aus Dk 3.420 andar nigerišn ud handāzišn ī ō weh-dēn Abestāg ud Zand ud pōryōtkēšān gōwišn “in der Begutachtung (nigerišn) und im Abgleich (handāzišn) mit (ō) dem wehdēn Avesta und Zand und den Worten/Schriften (gōwišn) der Pōryōtkēšān.” Übersehen wird bei Überlegungen zum Zand allgemein, daß es offenbar den Zand, als das Produkt einer einzigen philologisch-hermeneutischen Technik, für lange Zeit gar nicht gab. Wie aus einer Stelle Dk 3 (B 306.15ff.) hervorgeht, gab es einen Zand, der auf der Grundlage der bekannten “Übersetzungstechnik” (s. Cantera 2004, S. 240–341) sich erhob, und einen “wörtlichen (?) Zand,” der — seine Prinzipien sind bis heute unerforscht — als eine quasi esoterische Ausdeutung der avestischen Wörter den Textausbau in ganz andere Richtungen ermöglichte. 24 Vgl. Bailey 1943, S. 81ff.; Wikander 1946, S. 134–142; Zaehner 1955, S. 8; Shaki 1981, S. 119; Cereti 1994–95, S. 125; Cantera 2004, S. 109. Eine Passage, die eng mit der Šābuhr-Nachricht in Dk 4 zusammenhängen dürfte, ist Dk 4.70ff. Dk 4.70–71 (B 328.7–15) kommt auf Astrologen (star-ōšmārān) (mit Erwähnung eines vielleicht astrologischen Werkes Nibēg ī zamīg-paymānīh) sowie auf Ärzte (biziškān) zu sprechen, die in verschiedener Weise die Wissenschaft vom Menschen betrieben. In Dk 4.71 werden weitere Wissensgebiete genannt: ud ciyōnīh bawišn wināhišn ud candišn jumbišn ī tisān ud zamān gyāg šnāxtan “Und Wissenschaften (ciyōnīh šnāxtan) von Sein und Zerstörung und Wandel und Bewegung der Dinge und Zeit und Raum,” in Dk 4.42 wird sodann der Stoff-/Form-Wandel besprochen. 25 Ms. ytk‘ ʾylyh/jadag-ērīh. In Dd 36.106 begegnet ein grafisch sehr ähnliches jadag-xīrīh (oder jadag-ērīh?), nach Jaafari-Dehaghi 1998 “fortune (lit. distributing good things”). 26 Zur Diskussion des in Dk 3 ganz zentralen kosmologischen Begriffs bawišn und davon abgeleiteter Komposita s. besonders Shaki 1970, S. 292f., 302f.; Shaki 1973, S. 136f., 140–145; Shaki 1999, S. 177; Shaki 2003, S. 324; de Menasce 1973, S. 125, 202. 27 Bailey 1943, S. 82; zuletzt: Panaino 2012. Ins Syrische kam der Text in frühislamischer Zeit erstmals durch Ḥunain (809/10–76[?]) (Baumstark 1922, S. 228f.; Bailey 1943, S. 82).

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136 Götz König generatione et corruptione “über Werden und Zerstörung;” hinzuzuziehen dürfe das nachfolgende *jadag-wihīrīh28 sein, das auch Bailey als ein Calque (gr. μετασχημάτισις “change of form” [s. Aristoteles Ph. 190b5, Cael. 305b29, Sens. 446b6; s.a. GC 335b26]) ansieht29: analysiert Buch I von de generatione et corruptione die nämlichen Begriffe als die zentralen der Substanzveränderung, so Buch II die Veränderungsprozesse (jadag-wihīrīh “Form-bzw. StoffWandlung”) der vier Elemente.30 Candišn31, zamān, gyāg “Bewegung, Zeit, Raum” sind (neben Ursache, Natur, Zufall, Unendlichkeit, Leere, Kontinuität, unbewegter Beweger) (aufeinander verweisende32) Zentralbegriffe der aristotelischen Physik. Ist gōhr ein häufig in der Pahlavi-Literatur gebrauchter Terminus, der wohl schon im Altiranischen eine “abstrakte” Bedeutung “Wesen” besaß,33 so ist die Verbindung gōhr ud jahišn “Wesen und Akzidens” nur hier bezeugt. Die Unterscheidung in Substanz (= οὐσία “Seiendheit” [im 5. Jh. v. Chr. “Eigentum“] → sub-stantia [Seneca; Quintilian]) und das Akzidentielle “Zufallende” 28 Der Terminus wird wohl auch in Dk 4.72 verwendet. Zu wihīrīh vgl. pahl. whyl- “change” (whylšn’ “change”), mmp. whwr-; zu jadag “form, property” CPD, S. 46 (ytk’). Die Wörter, die im Šābuhr-Bericht nahe zusammenstehen, jadag und jahišn, zeigen eine Austauschbarkeit in den ihnen gewöhnlichen Phrasen (meist in Kolophonen und Segnungsformeln) in der Pahlavi-Literatur (jadag ī nēk ud farroxīh, jadag nēk tan-drustīh / jahišn ī nēk bawād, pad nēk jahišn(īh) xūb murwāg xwāham, murwāg jahišn ī nēk tandrustīh; hujadag / hujahišn, hu-jahišn ud xūb-murwāg); während im Šābuhr-Bericht jahišn offenbar “Akzidenz” meint (s. a. Fn. 34,35), so ist die Bedeutung von jadag weniger klar, weder “Form” (so Bailey 1943, S. 82f. + [zur Etymologie] Fn. 5.) noch “Stoff” scheinen ganz angemessen; die Phrasenparalleltät deutet darauf hin, daß beide Wörter “Zufallendes,” also “Eigenschaft, Prädikat” meinen. 29 Gleichwohl äußert sich Bailey 1943, S. 157, skeptisch der gesamten Nachricht gegenüber: “It is somewhat difficult to believe that Aristotle’s philosophy had received a Persian dress so early.” Der Grund für seine Skepsis scheint dadurch bedingt, daß er den iranischen Aristotelismus an syrische Vermittlung koppelt. 30 Dk 3.369 überliefert einen Text, der sich dem Problem des jadag-wihīrīh widmet. Dabei geht es jedoch nicht eigentlich um den elementaren Wandel, sondern um eine Differenzierung des Wandlungsbegriffes mittels der Kategorien “natürlich” (cihrkārīg) und “künstlich” (kāmkārīg). Am Textende greift der Verfasser, vermutlich Ādurfarrbay auf eine ältere Autorität zurück und zitiert dessen Satz “Form-/Stoffwandel findet sich in allen Prozessen.” Das zeigt, daß sich bereits vor dem 9. Jh. bei den zoroastrischen Gelehrten ein Denken finden läßt, in welchem der Wandlungsbegriff zu einem fundamentalen der Natur- und Kulturphilosophie wird, der letztlich sogar die ontologische Differenz materiell/immateriell überspannt. Man vergleiche zum Thema auch den Passus in Dk 4.72 (B 328.15–20). 31 cand- “tremble, quake;” mmp. cn-. 32 “Wir messen nicht nur die Bewegung mittels der Zeit, sondern auch mittels der Bewegung die Zeit und können dies, weil sich beide wechselseitig bestimmen” (Ph. IV 12, 220b 14–16). 33 Mp. gōhr “Wesen, Natur, Herkunft;” sogd. γwš “Wesen, Substanz” < air. *gau̯ ϑ ra“(Kuh-)Stall” mit semantischer Entwicklung “Abkunft, Ursprung” > “Wesen; Materie” (vgl. ved. gotrá- “(Kuh-)Stall!” > Abkunft, Familie” (EWA I, S. 497).

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(gr. συμβεβηκός) geht auf Aristoteles zurück, der in der Kategorienlehre eine Substanz und neun Akzidentien unterscheidet (s. zu den Akzidentien Quantität, Qualität und Relation Meta. V 13, 14, 15). Der Ausdruck jahišn (wörtl. “das Zukommende, Geschehende”34) wird im Pahlavi i.d.R. im Sinne von “Glück; Zufall” verwendet.35 Der Ausdruck star-gōwišnīh “Sternenkunde; Astrologie” ist in der PahlaviLiteratur lediglich hier bezeugt. Er dürfte ein Calque des griechischen (seit Xenophon, dann auch bei Aristoteles belegten) Astro-logia sein. Üblichere Begriffe im Pahlavi sind axtar(ā)mārīh; *star-ōšmār(īh) (s. Dk 4.70, 71 starōšmārān); kundāgīh. In gōwāgīh ist vielleicht eine Wiedergabe von “Logik”, bzw. von λογικὴ τέχνη, ein seit dem 1. Jh. v. Chr. gebrauchter Terminus, zu sehen (und vielleicht weniger der Begriff “Rhetorik”). Freilich ist der Ausdruck gōwāgīh in der Pahlavi-Literatur nicht selten gebraucht und meint i.d.R. eine Art oder Technik der Rede36, jedoch nicht notwendig “Logik”;37 Dk 4 könnte hier eine spezialisiertere Verwendungsweise eingeführt haben, vgl. B 325.19 cim-gōwagīh “logica” (Cereti 1994–95, S. 113). Gleichwohl begegnet in der Passage Dk 4 nur ein Ausschnitt aus dem Kanon der griechischen bzw. aristotelischen Philosophie. Es ist auffällig, daß unter den drei loci der hellenistischen Wissenseinteilung (Plato-Schule; Stoa), Logik — Physik — Ethik, die letztere fehlt. Šābuhrs Redaktion achtete offenbar darauf, daß die herangezogenen Texte einen nicht praktischen, sondern wissenschaftlich-theoretischen Charakter hatten. Die Passage des Überlieferungsberichts besitzt am Ende von Dk 4 (Dk 4.98–109 [B 334.20–336.12]) eine gewisse Ergänzung, die in den Sätzen 100 + 103 das aus dem Bericht bekannte bun-nibēg ī pad ganj ī špykʾn erwähnt. 34 Nyberg 1974, S. 107f., liest (eine Südwestform) jāyišn; nach MacKenzie ist jahišn zu jastan, jah- “happen, occur, chance (to be)” zu stellen; vgl. JP jhyšn-; Sanskrit-Übersetzung siddeḥ. 35 Siehe z.B. GrBd 0.0 pad nēk jahišn xōb murwāg (vgl. MX 0.0; cf. ĀZ 0; Šnš 1.0); Dk 6C82 jahišn-ayārīh (vgl. AARAM 104, 154 jahišn-ayār; ĀWM 125 tuxšāg-mard ī jahišn-ayār [CPD, S. 46]); KN 1.20; KN 12.1 jahišn ud zamān brēhēnišn; ĀWM 61 (xrad weh ayāb jahišn); ĀWM 146 (jahišn pad kār ud dādestān nēktar), ĀWM 252 (dānāg ī wad-jahišn); ĀWM 254 hujahišn; WīC 33 nēk jahišn; WZ 30.47. 36 Siehe z.B. Dk 3.81.7 (B 59.18) gōwāgīh ud kirrōgīh “Rede und Technik” (vgl. in der Dk 4 Passage gōwāgīh ud abārīg kirrōgīh); Dk 3.126.6 handēšišn-gōwāgīh zōr “Kraft der Reflexionsrede” (Dk 3.126.7 handēšišn ī gyān pad gōwāgīh nērōgīh “Reflexion der seele durch die Kraft der Rede”); Dk 4.37 cim-gōwāgīh “Vernunftrede”; Dk 9.65.7 kū-š pad gōwāgīh uzwān frahanjēnīd bawēd kē pad xrad wizēngar bawēd “seine Zunge wird durch die Redeweise belehrt, wie sie mittels xrad entschieden ist”; KN 10 adānīh ud agōwāgīh “Unwissen und Unlogik”. 37 Dd 38.29 cašm ud gōš uzwān mazg ī kē hēnd xānag ī wēnāgīh ud āšnawāgīh ud gōwāgīh ud ōš ud wīr “Auge und Ohr und Zunge und Hirn, die die Behausung von Seh-, Hör-, Sprachvermögen und intellektuellen Vermögen sind”.

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138 Götz König Der Text ist schwierig zu verstehen. Dk 4.98 scheint zu einem interreligiösen Dialog aufzurufen: pṯ’šʾn ptkʾlʾn’ y MDM dyn’ ktʾmyʾnc AYŠ dʾtstʾnʾwmnd krtn’ W ʿD ʾdlwgyh pytʾkynytn’ ʾhlmwk’c y nsk ʾwšmwltn’ pʾtplʾs krtn’ LA plmwt’. pad-išān pahikārān ī abar dēn kadāmiyān-iz kas dādestānōmand kardan ud tā a-drōyīh paydāgēnīdan ahlomōγ-iz ī nask ōšmurdan pādifrāh kardan nē framūd. Er (Šābuhr I38) ordnete an, mit all denjenigen (kadāmiyān-iz kas), die urteilsmächtige Personen sind, religiöse Streitgespräche zu führen, und um das NichtFalsche (a-drōyīh) aufzudecken, und auch die ahlomōγs, die die Nasks memorierten/rezitierten39, nicht zu bestrafen.

Der folgende, terminologisch oft dunkle Passus Dk 4.99 scheint sich nun nicht, wie vormals bisweilen angenommen, auf die jüdische,40 sondern auf die indische logische Literatur (hindūg dibīrīh), insbesondere Logik (tark41) zu beziehen. Der Passus Dk 4.100 gibt sodann Hinweise auf das Verfahren, wie Texte adaptiert wurden. Erwähnt wird ein indisches astronomisches sowie das berühmte Werk des Ptolämeus Magistīg.42 Die Bücher werden — vermutlich nach einer Übersetzung, man beachte die mp. Form Magistīg — in Hinsicht auf deren wirāyišn abāg cim durchgesehen und offenbar exzerpiert, die Exzerpte dann den “Anordnern” (ārāstārān) vorgelegt, deren Aufgabe in durch verändertes Arrangement (Dk 4.101 nōg ārāstan-ē) gewonnener Text-/Wissenssynthese (ham-āgāhīh) bestand. Dk 4.103 scheint zu besagen, daß man eklektisch verfuhr insofern, als man nicht einfach die gesamten ausländischen Werke integrierte, sondern in der Avesta-Edition 38 Siehe die dem vorangehende Sätze Dk 4. 39 Das ist möglicherweise eine Anspielung auf die Manichäer, denen die Zoroastrier ja Mißbrauch der Avestaliteratur vorwarfen. Vgl. hierzu im Avesta-Überlieferungsbericht auch die jud-ristagān ud nask-ōšmurdārān-iz ī jud-ristagān, die in Opposition zu Ādurbād und dem Avesta unter Šābuhr II stehen (Dk 4.20). Vgl. im Avesta den spiegelverkehrten Ausdruck Yt 14.51, 52, Aog 81b “aṣ̌ā uuō, der die Gāϑā nicht singt, (asrāuuaiiaṯ.gāϑā- → pad srāyišn gāhān, asrūd gāhān; AWN 7.4 [vgl. 12.5] kē-šān pad gētīg yašt nē kard ud gāhān nē srūd [gegenteilig ZWY 5.4 kē-š yašt kard ēstēd ud gāhān srūd ēstēd]). 40 Arbeiten zu den Notizen im Pahlavi-Schrifttum, die sich auf Juden bzw. jüdische Lehre beziehen: Darmesteter 1889; de Menasce 1969; Gray 1905, 1940; Cereti 2012–2013; Thrope 2012. Zu jüdischen Materialien in Dk 3 s. Dk 3.80, 3.150, 3.166, 3.173, 3.291. 41 So die Lesung von Shaki 1981, S. 116, Fn. 8, < skr. tarka-. Zu weiteren Termini in Dk. 4.99 s. Cereti 1994–95, S. 121. 42 Das Wort in Dk 4.100 läßt sich mgstyk oder mystyk, also magistīg oder majistīg lesen; vgl. arab. al-majistī. Ein /g/ dürfte vor-arabisches μεγάλη/μεγίστη σύνταξις (also μαϑηματική σύνταξις) reflektieren, vgl. im Syrischen mygysṭy, mgysṭy (Bailey 1943, S. 86). Der Name des Ptolemaios ist bei Manušcihr erwähnt (NM 2.2.9,11): ptlmyws/Ptalamayus (Bailey 1943, S. 80). Ins Arabische kam das Werk erstmals unter Yaḥyā ibn Khālid ibn Barmak, Hārūn’s berühmtem Wizier († 805) (s. Dodge II, S. 639).

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nur diejenigen Textteile, für die man im angestammten Schrifttum nichts Entsprechendes fand:

Dk 4.100) *kʾlkwšʾk43 y hn’dwk’ mgstyk y hlwmʾy ʾpʾryk y MN ZK šwn’ LWTH̱ bwn npyk y pṯ’ gnc y špykʾn ḴN hndʾh(ʾ)tn’ MH̱ BYN yzdʾn’ wylʾdšn’ LWTH̱ cm ʿL ʾlʾstʾlʾn y hmʾkʾsyh ḴN nmwt’ *Kālakōšāk ī hindūg Magistīg ī hrōmāī abārīg ī az ān šōn44 abāg bun-nibēg ī pad ganj ī špykʾn ōh handāxtan. cē andar-šān wirāyišn abāg cim ō ārāstārān45 ī ham-āgāhīh ōh nimūd. 46 Das indische Kāla-Kōšak47 das hrömaische Magistīg andere von jener (Literatur-)Gattung dem Ur-Buch aus dem ganj ī špykʾn nach Möglichkeit anzugleichen48.49 Was in diesen eine sinnvolle (“begründete”50) Darstellung51

43 B dʾlkwšʾk. 44 Zum Wort vgl. ŠGW 6.42 (pāz. šun). 45 Weniger wahrscheinlich ist eine Lesung xwāstārān, das gern in Komposita auftritt (AWN 91.3 wizīr-xwāstārān (so Shaki 2003, S. 323: “seekers”); GrBd 1.34, 31.30 sūdxwāstār) und wie ein Übersetzungswort aussieht (zu iš-). Als ārāstār werden i.d.R. Männer bezeichnet, die für die Überlieferung der dēn bedeutsam waren: Dk 5.3.4 dēn ārāstārān winnārdārān āwurdārān ciyōn Ardašīr Ādurbād Xusraw ud Pišyōtan ud Ušēdarān Ušēdarmāh Sōšāns abārīgān; Dk 7.7.4 pas ō ārāstārān dēn ud gēhān rasīd; Dk 7.7.19 ud pad dēn ārāstār Ā̄durbād ī Mahraspandān. In Dk 3.420 werden als letzter Editionsschritt die Kapitel “geziert und angeordnet” (ārāst rastagēnīd), vgl. auch den Ausdruck ārāstan im Folgesatz. 46 Transkriptionen/Übersetzungen dieses Passus finden sich in: Bailey 1943, S. 83; Zaehner 1955, 8–9, 32–34; Shaki 1981, S. 123; Shaki 2003, S. 323 (in dieser Wiedergabe gehen bei Shaki dem Passus die Worte voran: “That which was necessary was adopted from foreign lands such as various sciences, teachings, instruments of craftmanship and know how (hunar) as well as ...”, die ich mit dem Text in B nicht in Verbindung bringen kann). Vgl. damit B 321.13–322.18. 47 Zu diesem Ausdruck s. West 1896–1904, S. 93; de Menasce 1958, S. 27; Shaki 1981, S. 123, Fn. 28; Shaki 2003, S. 323, “treasury of astronomy.“ 48 Vgl. im Šabuhr I-Bericht die Wendung abāg abestāg abāz handāxtan; vgl. auch Dk 3.420. 49 Das Vorgehen ist insofern plausibel, als gemäß Dk 3.420 gerade die Kopie des Ganj nach Rom ging. 50 Zur Bedeutung von cim bei der Anfertigung von (theologischer Literatur) s. Dd Intr. 7, 16–18, 22. 51 wirāst- hat ungefähr dieselbe Verwendung wie ārāst-, s. Dk 7.1.38 ud mad ō KaySiyāwaxš ī bāmīg padiš dēsīd Kang-diz ī abdkard pad andar-dārišnīh pānagīh was warz xwarrah ud rāz ī dēn ī aziš wirāyišn ī āwām ud abāz ārāstārīh ērān xwadāyīh abāz paywandišnīh ī amāwendīh pērōzgarīh ō ān ī Ohrmazd dēn paydāg; Dk 7.8.27 xwāstag druwand-iz ēdar Zarduxšt pad mēhan mānišnīh pad anārāstān buland wirāyišnīh; Dk 8.7.2 ciyōn wirāyišn kē pad cē abestāg frāz barišn; ZWY 3.25 dēn rāst wirāstār.

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140 Götz König , wurde den Redakteuren eines ‚ allgemeinen Wissens’ vorgelegt.52

Problematische (warōmandān) ausländische Schriften (Dk 4.102 bē-kišwarīg nibēgīhā) sollten also überarbeitet werden; grundsätzlich aber habe man sich um diese Schriften integrativ zu bemühen und sie nicht allein aufgrund ihrer “Fremdnamigkeit” (bēgān(ān)ag-nāmīh rāy) von vornherein abzulehnen:

Dk 4.103) ʾywk’ šʾn npyk W mʾtgdʾn pṯ’ bwndklyh y KRA ʾkʾsyh W dʾnšn’ y BYN npykyhʾ W mʾtgdʾnyhʾ pytʾk LA ʿḆYDWNt BRAšʾn ywdt’ ywdt’ MN bwn npyk W mʾtgdʾn y NPŠH̱ BʿYHWNst W hngltyk KRYTWNd npyk-1 y pṯ’ gnc’ y špykʾn MDM hmʾk MRYA ēk-šān nibēg ud mādayān pad bowandagarīh ī har āgāhīh ud dānišn ī andar nibēgīhā ud mādayānīhā paydāg nē kard/kunēd. bē-šān jud-jud az bun-nibēg ud mādayān ī xwēš xwāst. ud hangirdīg xwānēnd nibēg-ē ī pad ganj ī špykʾn abar hamāg saxwan. Nicht eines von ihren Büchern und Schriftwerken wurde im Zuge der Vervollständigung des gesamten in den Büchern und Schriftwerken enthaltenen Wissens veröffentlicht. Vielmehr sonderte man das dem (kanonischen) UrBuch53 und den eigenen Schriftwerke Entgegenstehende aus. Und nennt man “Summa”54 das Buch, das im Schatz des špykʾn über alle Texte (saxwan) .

Wie Dk 4.108 schließlich zu berichten weiß, wurde das Ergebnis dieser über Iran hinausgreifenden kritischen Wissenskompilation allgemein, “von den 52 Vgl. Shaki 1981, S. 123: “He collated the Kāla Kośa of the Indians and the Megistē of the Greeks and other (writing) of that sort with the fundamental book (…) which was in the Royal Treasury; and whatever in them were adaptable (lit., adjustable) and reasonable he presented to the respective seekers of that knowledge. He revised (lit. re-arranged) those of their writings which were dubious, and deliberated and examined that which he had brought from foreign lands, and did not neglect them nor any the less adopted them because of their inferiority and foreign name.” Shaki 2003, S. 323 “He [i.e., the king of kings] did not neglect or avoid them because of their … foreign name.” Anders Zaehner 1955; Bailey 1943, S. 83. 53 Vgl. Satz 100. 54 Vgl. dazu Shaki 2003, S. 323. Zum Literaturbegriff hangirdīg vgl. z.B. Dk 5.1.2f. panjom abar gōwišn ī hufraward Ādurfarrbay ī Farroxzādān ī hudēnān pēšōbāy būd pad-iz nibēg ī Simrā xwānīhēd hangirdīg passox Ādurfarrbay ī Farroxzādān hudēnān pēšōbāy “Das 5. die Schriften (gōwišn) des gesegneten Ādurfarrbay ī Farroxzādān, der der Führer der Mazdayasnier war, man bezeichnet sie auch als das ‘Buch Simrā (?)’. das Kompendium (hangirdīg) der Antwort(en) des Ādurfarrbay ī Farroxzādān, Führer der Mazdayasnier.” WZ 3.57 az ham sardagīhā ciyōn pad Dāmdād gōkān ōšmurd u-m andar nibēg ī tōhmag-ōšmurišnīh hangirdīg nibišt ēn gyāg hangirdīg-ē ast ī nimāyīhēd “Betreffs eben dieser Arten, wie sie im Damdād detailliert referiert werden, habe ich in der Schrift Tōhmag-ōšmurišnīh eine Zusammenfassung (hangirdīg) geschrieben; diese Stelle (WZ 3.56) ist eine Zusammenfassung , was gezeigt wird.”

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Philosophen in Hrōm, von den Weisen in Indien und den Weisen und Wissenschaftlern anderer ,” “höchst gelobt und gebilligt” (abērdar stāyīd … passandīd ēstād).

Von Šābuhr I zu Xosrō I Ādurbād ist für den Zoroastrismus die nach Zaraϑuštra/Zardušt bedeutendste Figur, nach dessen “Kanon” sich die Zoroastrier zumindest bis um die Mitte des 2. Jt. formelhaft bekannt haben.55 Die Pahlavi- und np. zoroastrische Literatur überliefert eine Vielzahl von Nachrichten zu diesem Priester, seinem Wirken und Nachwirken, seiner Avesta-Edition sowie einige Texte und Aussprüche, die unter seinem Namen gehen, welche man leider bis heute monographisch zu sammeln und kritisch auszuwerten verabsäumt hat.56 Der Eindruck, den der Überlieferungsbericht bezüglich des Ādurbād-Avesta hinterläßt,57 ist den älteren Bemühungen geradezu entgegengesetzt. Der Bericht über die Walaxš- und Ardaxšīr/Tansar-Editionen Dk 4 scheint darauf zu weisen, daß es Ziel beider Editionen war, die zerstörten und zerstreuten Schriften zu sammeln und editorisch zu vereinen. Demgegenüber strebt, wie gesehen, Šābuhr I bei der Herstellung (Wiederherstellung?) des Abestāg über die Reichsgrenzen hinauszugreifen: šābuhr ī šāhān šāh ī ardaxšīrān nibēgīhā-iz ī az dēn be […] andar hindugān hrōm abārīg-iz zamīgīhā pargandag būd abāz ō ham āburdān ud abāg abastāg abāz handāxtan Šābuhr, König der Könige, Sohn des Ardašēr, befahl, auch die nicht-religiösen Schriften […], die über Indien, Rom und andere Länder zerstreut waren, zu sammeln und mit dem Abestāg abzugleichen.

Gegenüber dieser Erweiterungstendenz ist es darum einigermaßen überraschend, wenn der Bericht über die nachfolgende Šābuhr II/Ādurbād-Edition mit den Worten beginnt: 55 Man siehe z.B. im Originalkolophon des Dēnkards von 1020 wie auch in dessen zweitem Kolophon (s. B 644.11–645.20) aus dem späten 15. Jh. die Formulierung andar āstawānīh pad abēzag weh-dēn ī māzdēsnān abar aštagīh ī ahlaw frawahr Zarduxšt ī Spitāmān rāst-passāzišnīh ī Ādurbād ī Mahraspandān “in der Glaubenszugehörigkeit an die Reine Gute Religion der Mazdayasnier, gemäß der Botschaft des Zarduxšt Spitāmān seligen frawahrs, dem rechten Kanon (passāzišnīh) des Ādurbād Mahraspandān.“ 56 Die Nachrichten zum Ādurbād-Avesta sind gesammelt in Cantera 2004, S. 120–122, die zu seinem Ordal in Macuch 1981. 57 Auffällig ist das mutmaßliche Fehlen der Ādurbād-Edition — also der zentralen sasanidischen Avesta-Edition — im Kitāb an-Nahmuṭān, wo es sogar ausdrücklich heißt: „After Ardašīr and Šābūr, Kisrā [Chosroes I] Anūširwān [531–78] collected these books” etc. (Gutas 1998, S. 40).

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142 Götz König

B 321.19–21) Šābuhr ī šāhān šāh ī Ohrmazdān hamāg kišwarīgān pad pahikārišn kard(an) hamāg gōwišn ō uskār ud wizōyišn āwurd. Šābuhr (II), König der Könige, Sohn des Ohrmazd, machte alle Regionen bei einem Disput theologischen Reflexion und dem Studium59 zur Disposition.

Das zur kritischen Disposition stehende “gesamte gōwišn” dürfte nämlich nicht ohne Beziehung auf das Avesta des Šābuhr I sein. Der Text gibt uns keinen Hinweis darauf, warum eine solche umfangreiche Revision notwendig geworden war. Wir erfahren jedoch die Zwecksetzung der Edition: die Beschneidung des Einflusses der “Lehrer und Gläubigen anderer religiöser Richtungen” (judkēšān ud judwurrōyišnān, AWN 2.13, judristagān im Bericht Dk 4), also all desjenigen, was Šābuhr wie dann Xosrō (mit freilich je anderer Bewertung) mit dem eher politisch gefärbten Begriff des “Fremden” (bēgānag) bezeichnen.60 Zeitgeschichtlich bleibt darauf hinzuweisen, daß das 3. Jh. eine Periode der Umbrüche ist: es ist das Jahrhundert des Aufstiegs und Falls des Mani und des Aufstiegs des Kirdīr und einer religiösen Intolleranz. Mani zeigte bei seinem Religionsentwurf eine dem Šābuhr I durchaus verwandte Geisteshaltung: Wissen war und ist nicht auf die Grenzen des Iran beschränkt. In Kirdīr werden indes erstmals Tendenzen innerhalb der Geschichte des spätantiken Zoroastrismus sichtbar, die sich auch im Bericht über die Editionen des 4. und 6. Jh. wiederfinden: die Restriktion des Wissens auf eben diese “nationalen” Grenzen.

Die Avesta-Edition unter Xosrō I Jenseits der Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Avesta ist vielleicht nur ein BuchpahlaviDokument überliefert (mit einer gewissen Parallele in Dk 5.22, s.u.61), das sich in die späte Sasanidenzeit datieren läßt. Es handelt sich um die Proklamation des Xosrō I anläßlich der Fertigstellung der von ihm initiierten (bzw. revidierten) Avesta-Edition.62 Grundlage der Rede ist der Abschlußberichts des Obermo58 Zu den verschiedenen Lesungs- und Deutungsversuchen s. Cantera 2004, S. 110, Fn. 26; Cereti 1994–95, S. 125, liest abē-wihānag “senza precedenti”. 59 Vgl. Dk 4.24 pad wēš wizōyišnīh ud wēš uskārdan. 60 In dem wenig bekannten historischen Bericht des ŠGW (ŠGW 10.64-77) erwähnt Mardānfarrox eine Gruppe von „mächtigen Heretikern“ (*mazaṇtum. āšmōgą.), die āβāiiastagą. “Deterministen (?)” genannt wurden. Deren Einfluß sei nach ŠGW 10.70f. durch das “Ordal des Ādarpāṯ Māraspəṇdąs unter Baγ Šāhpūr II”, also durch die Avesta-Redaktion des 4. Jh., gebrochen worden. 61 Weitere Dokumente zur Aktivität des Xosrō I bei Cantera 2004, S. 122ff. 62 Cantera 2004, S. 122, hat bemerkt, daß die “Edition” des Xosrō wohl einen anderen Charakter als die vorgenannten Editionen besaß, schreibt der Text Dk 4 dem Xosrō “nirgends ausdrücklich eine Textsammlung und die Herstellung eines Kanons zu”; vgl.

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beds (Dk 4.22 “Und wir verkünden das, was unser Ohrmazd-Mowbed verkündet hat, durch den bei uns mēnōg-Einsicht eröffnet wurde”). Das Dokument ist in Gänze eher wenig beachtet worden.63 Wie die Nachrichten zur AvestaEditionen unter Šābuhr II zeigt auch Xosrōs Rede zunächst an, daß seine Edition vom Gedanken einer strikten Wendung zum Avesta-Text und der kritischen Wendung gegen alles “Fremde” (bēgānag) geleitet wird. Andere Passagen in der Pahlavi-Literatur stützen diesen Eindruck. So verweist Manušcihr im ersten seiner Briefe auf einen Teilnehmer an Xosrōs Konzil, den Obermobed Wehšābuhr64, der strikt auf die Gültigkeit der Lehrmeinungen älterer Dastūren pocht (NM 1.4.15–1665; vgl. auch ZWY 2.1–4). Xosrō skizziert in seiner Rede Dk 4 (Dk 4.21–25 [B 322.4–323.15]) eine Theologie, die sich zwar rationaler Mittel bedient (wizōy-; uskār-)66 und sich auch auf den “Analogieschluß” (hangōšīdag) beruft, die aber unter “philosophisch-theologischem Wissen” (dānāgīh) nur solches akzeptiert, das auf die Avestatradition, das “dēn-āgāhīh” bezogen bleibt; es gilt (Dk 4.25): harw dānāgīh bun dēn “Fundament allen Wissens ist die dēn.” Doch zeigt das Xosrō-Avesta laut Dk 4.23–24 auch eine synthetisierende Absicht, und zwar in zweifacher Hinsicht: 1) “Synthese (āmēzišnīh) des akkumulierten (hangad) Wissens der uns Vorangegangenen” (pēšēnīgān hangad-dānāgīh āmēzišnīh); 2) Synthese von Avesta-Sprachlichem mit Nicht-Avesta-Sprachlichem: ān ī āgāhān pad juttarīh pahikār nēst. ōwōn wasīhā abestāg ēwāzīg pad abēzaggōwišnīh nibēg payrāyišnīg az mādayān ayādgārīh ud pāyram-iz ēwēnag *ēwāzīg67 andar gōwišn āgāhēnišn dāšt ēstēd pas-iz hamāg xānīg dānāgīh ī dēn mazdēsn. “Die Gelehrten streiten nicht über Differenzen; so viel in avestischer Sprache hat sich im ‚Buch

63

64 65

66 67

Cantera 2004, S. 113, wo er Xosrōs Wirken beschreibt als “Neuer Impuls für das Studium des Avesta und seiner PÜ,” und S. 162: “Ein Ziel des Konzils war folglich wahrscheinlich die Etablierung einer kanonischen Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Avesta.“ Zaehner 1955, S. 8–9, gibt eine (teilweise recht freie) Übersetzung; Nyberg 1964, S. 109f., gibt die Edition des Anfangs des Xosrō-Textes, s. a. Cantera 2004, S. 110f.; zum Alter des Dokuments B 322.4ff. s. Bartholomae 1920, S. 9, Fn. 2 (zustimmend Cantera 2004, S. 106ff. [“Ein Dokument aus der Zeit von Xōsraw I: DkM.411.17–414.15“]). Zu ihm s.a. mit weiterer Literatur Cantera 2004, S. 129. Über die im Konzil des Xosrō I angewendete Verfahrensweise unterrichtet besonders die schwierige Passage NM 1.4.14-18, die von Bailey 1943, S. 173 (1.4.15-17), und wiederum von Cantera 2004, S. 122-124 (1.4.14-17), behandelt worden ist. Insbesondere die Sätze 15+16 scheinen die zentralen Momente darzustellen, wie ein diskussionswürdiger, zur Abstimmung vorgelegter Text (bōzišn) in dem Konzil behandelt wurde. Leider ist der Text NM 1.4.14-18 nicht nur sprachlich schwierig, sondern inhaltlich und terminologisch so voraussetzungsreich, daß er nicht überzeugend auf kurzem Raum zu behandeln ist. Vgl. 250 Jahre später die Prinzipien des Manušcihr in Dd 0.1 xrad-xwāhišnīh ud kirbag-uskārišnīh ud dēnīg-wizōyišnīhā. Die mit uskār- bezeichnete Tätigkeit führt auf “Urteile” (dādestān), s. Dd 0.8. B ʾnʾpyk

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144 Götz König von reiner Rede‘68 erhalten ist in bezug auf Rede und Wissensproduktion (andar gōwišn āgāhēnišn) durch Schriftwerken (mādayān) und Memoranden69 und auch durch Volkssprachliches (pāyram ēwēnag ēwāzīg) erweitert worden (? payrāyišnīg), daß es also die vollständige Quelle des Wissens der Dēn Mazdēsn darstellt.“70 Zugleich wird die kritische Haltung gegenüber allem “Neuen” und “Fremden” hervorgehoben, welches nie den Wert des Tradierten erreichen könne: ēd-iz rāy ī-mān šnāxt ēstēd kū ka hamāg *warōmand71 (ud) uskārišnīh ī bēgānag az dēn mazdēsn gēhān (?)72 ō ēd gyāg rasēnd pad nōg-*xwāyišnīh73 ud uskārišnīh bēgānag az dēn mazdēsn and dānišn ayāftan -paydāgēnīdan ō sūd-nihādkārīh ī gētīgān74 āwurd nē šāyēnd cand andar ōšmurišn ī rad-ēw pad wēš wizōyišnīh ud wēš uskārdan wād75 “Darum ist von uns auch erkannt, daß sich, wenn ganz zweifelhafte Reflexion, die eine Welt fremd derjenigen der Dēn Mazdēsn darstellt (?), zu diesem Ort hinkommt, durch ein aus der Dēn Mazdēsn Neuerungsbegehren und durch der Dēn Mazdēsn fremdes Reflexionsverhalten nicht so viel an Wissen zu entdecken und zu eröffnen und der Nutzanwendung76 für die Irdischen beizubringen ist, wie es im Studium (ōšmurišn) eines einzigen Rads durch eine weitere Untersuchung der bzw. weitere Reflexion auf existieren vermag.” Einzig Dk 4.25 scheint ein Tor zur Wissenserweiterung zu öffnen, das auch in den 68 Abēzag ist gewöhnliche Pahlavi-Übersetzung von ərəzu-, vgl. im Zusammenhang mit dem Ausdruck des Redens Y 20.2 (s. AirWb 354f.); siehe auch Dk 7.7.8 Arzwāg ī-š wizārišn nām ī abēzag gōwišn (dazu König 2015, S. 144–147). Möglicherweise ist der Ausdruck abēzaggōwišnīh nibēg Umschreibung für ‚Großes Avesta‘: in WZ 1.4 ist es das abēzag gōwišn ī dādīg, durch welches Ahreman in die 3000jährige Ohnmacht fällt, welches GrBd 1.28 als das Yaϑā ahū vairiiō bestimmt. Dk 3.300.4 kennt das mānsr abēzag-gōwišn ī Ohrmazd dēn māzdēsn “Mānsr der reinen Rede des Ohrmazd, die Mazdayasnische Religion.” 69 Im Bericht zur Walaxš-Edition (B 321.3–8) heißt es, daß Ayādgārs der Edition in die Regionen geschickt worden waren: ō šahrīhā (ī) ayādgār kardan framūd “er befahl, für die Reichsprovinzen Memoranden (ayādgār) anzufertigen.” 70 Vgl. zu dieser für die Art der Transmission des Avesta-Textes wichtigen Stelle die Übersetzungen Cantera 2004, S. 111: “So hat sich vieles erhalten in der avestischen Sprache durch das reingehaltene Sprechen und durch geschmückte Schriften aus Büchern (und) Memoranden, sowie in (der mündlichen) Überlieferung und in Berichten in der Sprache des Volkes.” ; Zaehner 1955, S. 9: “…, for we (ourselves) possess so much both in the Avestan language through pure oral transmission or reduced to writing in books and memoranda and in the vulgar idiom through oral transmission — in short the whole original wisdom of the Mazdayasnian religion.” 71 B wylʾwmnd 72 Cantera 2004 liest yazdān. 73 B hwyy’šnyh. Cantera verbessert in handēšišnīh. 74 Cantera verbessert in gētīg *ōh. 75 Lesung nach Cantera 2004; der Text gibt uskārd ud agar. 76 Cantera liest wišādkārīh. Ein Ausdruck sūd-nihādkārīh (wohl auch sūd nih-) ist (wie sūd wišāy-) weiter nicht bezeugt.

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Konstitutionsphasen der islamischen Theologie und Rechtsschulen viel diskutiert war, der Analogieschluß:

Dk 4.25) awēšān kē gētīgān ō šnāxtan ī dādār abdīh mēnōgān ciyōnīh ī gēhān az dādār fradom ayāftan nē šāyistan ayāb hamāg ayāftan šāyistan guft pad (pad) kam dānišn warunīg Diejenigen Irdischen (?), die hinsichtlich des Erkennens des Schöpfers der Wunderbarkeit der geistigen Wesen des aus dem Schöpfer stammenden Verfaßtseins (ciyōnīh) der Welt sagten, es sei prinzipiell (fradom) nicht aufzudecken, bzw. es sei vollkommen aufzudecken, sind durch geringes Wissen als warunīg77 zu beurteilen. awēšān kē paydāgīh ī az dēn ēdōn weh ud pad-iz hangōšīdag ast ī šnāxtan šāyistan guft pad uskārgar ud ān kē rōšn nimūdan pad dānāgīh dēn-āgāhīh dāštan. Diejenigen , die sagten, die Eröffnung aus der Dēn sei diesbezüglich gut, und darüberhinaus sei auch ein Erkennen (Gottes?) mittels Analogieschluß möglich, sind für Denker zu erachten und für solche, die das Licht zeigen durch Wissen und Religionskenntnis.78 ud kē ān ciyōn harw dānāgīh bun dēn ham pad nērōg ī mēnōgīg ud ham pad paydāgīhēnīdārīh gētīyīg ān ī kas dānāgīhā guft ka-iz-iš az kadām abestāg paydāgīh hamist nē dāšt ēg-iz pad paydāgīh ī az dēn hangārd kē xwēškārīh pad hammōg frāz ō *gēhān79-zādagān burd Und weil das Fundament allen Wissens die Dēn ist, das sich sowohl auf die Potenz des Geistigen (nērōg ī mēnōyīg) wie auch auf die Manifestierung des Materiellen (paydāgīhēnīdārīh gētīyīg) bezieht, spricht auch einer “wissend” (dānāgīhā);80 wenn es (das Gesprochene) auch ohne irgendeinen stützenden Beleg im Avesta ist, so wird es (das Wissen) gleichwohl für ‚aus der dēn manifest’ angesehen, das in der Pflicht steht, den Weltkindern (?) durch Unterweisung beigebracht zu werden.

77 Zaehner 1955, S. 9, “free-thinkers.” 78 Peters zitiert Zaehners Übersetzung (1955, S. 48): “Those who say that it is possible to understand Being through the revelation of Religion and also by analogy, are to be deemed Researchers (after truth),” und kommentiert: “Here we see raised the question of reason and revelation, a question that wa to plague Islam during all of its dealings with the falāsifah, and Khusraw’s settlement of it by admitting analogy, the Greeks’ syllogistike, and the Arabs’ qiyas, as a source of religious truth.” 79 B yazdān. 80 Bemerkenswert an der Schlußformulierung von Dk 4.25 ist zweierlei: 1. Als die Fundamentalien (die dō-bun) der dēn gelten gewöhnlich das Gute und das Böse, an unserer Stelle wird indes auf die Seinsscheidung in geistig/materiell verwiesen (B 169.5f.); 2. diese ins Zentrum gerückte Seinsscheidung wird offenbar aristotelisch reformuliert: das Geistigen/Materielle wird als potentia/actus verstanden.

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146 Götz König Die Annahme, daß das Xosrō-Avesta nicht eigentlich das Avesta des Ādurbād ersetzte, läßt sich auch aus einer wenig beachteten Stelle vom Ende der ersten Hälfte Dk 5 ablesen. Seine Antworten an den arabischen Zoroastrier Yākōb beschließt Ādurfarrbay mit einer Notiz über die Editionen Šābuhr II und Xosrō I, welcher in dem als Vision angesehenen Bericht (wie in Dk 4) gleichwohl “im bay” und “anōšag-gyān” (Dk 5.2.77) (und nicht anōšag-ruwān) genannt wird — obgleich, wie Dk 5.22.4 zeigt, der Text erst post-sasanidisch ist. Nach diesem Text stellt die Xosrō-Edition lediglich eine Art Wiederberichtigung der älteren Ādurbād-Edition dar, die nach ihrer Fertigstellung durch das bekannte Ordal gleichwohl Zielpunkt von Angriffen war: Dk 5.22.3–7) (B 354.19–355.12; DH 261 v 6–262 r 2)

5.22.3 ud mēnōy-wēnišnīh ud āškārag-paydāgīhā ciš ī81 andar āwām āwām pad dēn-dastwarān ī az ān frāz wēnīhist. Und die Dēn-Dastwaren sahen — durch die Fähigkeit zur mēnōg-Schau und zu einer Erlangung klarer Evidenz — die Angelegenheiten in den verschiedenen historischen Epochen:

5.22.4 ud pad widāxtag-rōy-passāxtan ī hufraward Ādurbād ī Mahrspandān bōxtan ī-š pad pahikār-handāzišn ī82 hām-xwanīrah pahikārdārān andar xwadāyīh ī ōy bay Šābuhr šāhān šāh ī83 Ohrmazdān abdīhā paydāgīh az any cand ēwēnag nērang ī war ī tā frāz az frazām xwadāyīh ī84 ōy bay85 Yazdgird šāhān šāh ī Šahriyārān andar kadag dāšt ēstād. Durch das mittels eines Ordals mit geschmolzenem Metall durch den seligen Ādurbād Mahrspandān erzielte ‚Freisprechen‘ des durch die Diskussionen (pahikār-handāzišn) der über das vereinigte Xwanīrah86 (?) Disputanten in der Herrschaftszeit des damaligen Herrn Šābuhr, König der Könige, Sohn des Ohrmazd, ist die Eröffnung ( durch einige andere Formen des nērang ī war) bis zum Ende der Herrschaft jenes einstigen Herrn Yazdegird, König der Könige, Sohn des Šahriyār, im Haus (kadag) wunderbar erhalten geblieben.

81 82 83 84 85 86

BØ DH Ø BØ BØ BØ Der Ausdruck hām-xwanīrah (ohne bezeugte avestische Parallele) ist nur hier und in der Thronrede des Xosrō belegt.

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5.22.5 …

5.22.6 nūn ān ēwēnag nigēzišn rāy pahikārdārān gumānīgīh ī padiš guftan rāh ēg-iz abestāg frahist (ud87) an-hambedīg awiš gōwišn was88 nibēgān pad *dēnīg89 wizīrgarīh ī90 xrad ī-š padiš jud-dādestān nē bawišn abāg-iz (ud) ān zruftagīh(ā) *nizārēnīd91 ēstēd ī92 nūn93 abestāg jādag-gōwān ud wālīdagīh94 ī-š ham95-pahikārān. In der Folgezeit die Diskutanten in Hinsicht auf jene Weise des nigēzišn einen Weg, um ihren Zweifel daran (an dem Kanonisierungsmittel) auszudrücken; zwar das Avesta bezüglich der Texte vieler Bücher allermeist unbestritten (an-hambedīg), beruhten sie auf religiösen xrad-Entscheidungen96, in Hinsicht auf die es keine abweichenden Urteile gibt (= geben kann); dennoch wurde dadurch eine Schwächung der zeitgenössischen Verteidiger des Avesta sowie eine Stärkung seiner Bestreiter erzielt.

5.22.7 pas-iz ka im97 xwābar bay anōšag-gyān abardar-xwarrah98 šāh ī šāhān framān dahēd padīrag murnjēnīdārān ud99 zandīgān jud az100 srāmānān (slʾmʾnʾn) abārīg har kē handāzišn kāmag ārāst ēstēd rāstīh nērōg ī awiškinn dēn māzdēsn paymān-gōwišn mānsarspand was-xwarrah ud spurrān101 abestāg-nēkīh zand102-wizīdār āgāh abzōnīg bawē. Als dann dieser (im!) Herr, dessen Lebensseele (!) unsterblich der von höchstem xwarrah ist, der König der Könige, , ordnet er 87 88 89 90 91

Nur DH. BØ B, DH gyāg. Korrektur nach Amouzgar/Tafazzoli 2000. BØ B nzlynyt‘, DH nzwlynyt‘; vgl. mp./np. nezār “schwach, mager.” Amouzgar/Tafazzoli lesen nizōrēnīd “rendre faible” (vgl. parth. nyzʾwr). Eine Lesung als *wizerēnīd scheint von der Bildung wie von der Schreibung (mit z) her unwahrscheinlich. Die Lesung nizārēnīd ist jedoch, da sich das Verb auf beide Satzglieder beziehen müßte, semantisch schwierig (wālīdagīh ī-š ham-pahikārān ). 92 B Ø 93 B Ø 94 DH wʾlytkkyh 95 B Ø 96 Vgl. den beliebten Buchtitel Dēnīg Wizīrgard. 97 LZNH̱ 98 B gibt statt anōšag-gyān abardar-xwarrah: anōšag-gyāndar. 99 DH Ø 100 DH wiederholt MN; B läßt überhaupt aus, also ywdt‘-slʾmʾnʾn/jud-srāmānān. 101 Amouzgar/Tafazzoli 2000 verbessern in nibegān. 102 DH wiederholt nach Zeilenbruch Zeichenfolge nd.

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148 Götz König gegen die Zerstörer und die Zandīken (außer den Buddhisten103 [?]) und andere an: All das, was in komparatistischer Zwecksetzung (handāzišn kāmag) textlich geordnet worden ist (ārāst ēstēd),104 möge die Wahrheit und die unzerteilte Stärke der Mazdayasnischen Religion, die Lehre vom Maß105 und das xwarrah-habende Heilige Wort, die Vollkommenheit (?) des Avesta und das Wissen aus den Zand-Entscheidungen stärken.

Stärker als in Dk 4 wird in Dk 5 das Avesta des Xosrō als gegen Häresien gerichtet beschrieben. Ein positiver Impuls, die Wissenserweiterung durch Analogiebildung, wird nicht genannt. Soweit wir nicht grundsätzlich die Existenz eines Großen Avesta in Frage stellen und damit den Transmissionbericht in Dk 4 als bloße Fiktion fassen wollen — ein Versuch, der m.E. nicht nur an der Detailkenntnis (welche man bei skeptischer Einstellung freilich als anachronistisch bewerten könnte), sondern vor allem an der (nur schlecht kaschierten) Unebenheit des Dargestellten scheitert, zu der keine Fiktionalität sich bereitgefunden hätte —, können wir in ihm einen Spiegel der iranischen Religionsgeschichte der Sasanidenzeit erkennen. Er zeigt die Polarität zweier historischer Haltungen, einer, die “dem Fremden” gegenüber integrierend (das Avesta des Šābuhr I), und einer, die diesem gegenüber exkludierend (das Avesta des Šābuhr II) formuliert ist, die innerhalb der sasanidischen Avesta-Tradition ein polemisches Verhältnis erzeugen. Mag man das Avesta des Xosrō im wesentlichen auch als eine Affirmation des ĀdurbādKanons verstehen, so lassen sich doch einzelne Momente im Sinne einer Öffnung lesen, die vielleicht bereits seit dem 6. Jh. eine Reformulierung der zoroastrischen Theologie unter Einbezug aristotelisch-neoplatonischer Momente ermöglichte, welche dann in den Schriften des frühen 9. Jh. so stark zu greifen sind. Es dürfte kein Zufall sein, daß, wie man dies immer wieder in jüngerer Zeit am Beispiel der Astronomie/Astrologie zeigen konnte106 — eine wissenschaftliche Schlüsseldis103 Die Schreibung slʾmʾn(ʾn) könnte für skr. śramaṇa- (Pali śamaṇa-) stehen, ein Wort, das mehrfach in mitteliranische Sprachen entlehnt sich findet (s. sogd. šmn, šmnʾnʾk, vielleicht auch srmʾn; baktr. šmn [M 1224], vgl. auch die Erwähnung bei Clemens von Alexandria [2. Hälfte 2. Jh. n. Chr.] Σαμαναίοι Βάκτρων; šmny bei Kirdir in KKZ 9f [vgl. KNRm 30] — wo diese, wie alle anderen dort erwähnten religiösen Gruppen, “geschlagen = getötet” [zad] wurden). Allerdings ist die Entlehnung von śr — als sl /sr/ —, wie die anderen Lehnformen zeigen, ungewöhnlich und müßte als sekundäre Lehnform betrachtet werden. 104 Zu einem technischen Zusammenhang von handāxtan und ārāstan s. Dk 4.100. 105 Man beachte, wie hier, aber auch im Einschub im Šābuhr-Bericht (Dk 4.104–107), die Maß-Lehre möglicherweise griechische ins Zentrum der Charakteristik des Avesta gerückt wird. Die paymān-Lehre wurde jedoch als iranische angesehen (s. Dk 4.107), und sie durchzieht dann nicht nur Dk 3, sondern die Pahlavi-Literatur weithin. 106 Raffaelli 2010 mit den Hinweisen auf die einschlägigen Arbeiten Panainos, die jetzt gesammelt vorliegen in Gariboldi, A. (Hrsg.), A. Panaino — Sidera viva. studi iranici di storia della mitologia astrale, dell‘astronomia e dell‘astrologia antica : Iranian studies in history of ancient astral mythology, astronomy and astrology. Mimesis.

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ziplin, die eng verzahnt war mit der (entlehnten) Physik und der Medizin —, die Herrschaften des Šābuhr I und Xosrō I diejenigen Zeiten waren, in denen Iran die wesentlichen Impulse für das wissenschaftliche Denken erhielt; daß dabei die Avesta-Editionen eine Rolle gespielt haben dürften, ist angesichts der engen Bindung von Thron und Kirche seit dem 3. Jh. wahrscheinlich. Ist aber die sasanidische zoroastrische Religions- und Avesta-transmissions-Geschichte als ein Spannungszusammenhang zu begreifen, der unterschiedliche und einander bisweilen opponierende Ausrichtungen dessen hervorbrachte, was als “das Avesta” sich verstehen lassen sollte, so lassen sich nicht einzelne Stücke als glaubwürdig, andere als nicht glaubwürdig markieren und sondern. Akzeptieren wir das Xosrō-Avesta, so müssen wir auch das Avesta des Šābuhr II wie dann auch des Šābuhr I und des Ardašīr akzeptieren. Das aber provoziert schließlich die Frage, wie diese von der Tradition behaupteten Editionen “technisch” machbar waren.

Zur Frage der schriftlichen Überlieferung eines Avestakorpus Die Kritik des Transmissionsberichtes Dk 4 ist im 20. Jh. mit der Frage nach der Entstehung der Avesta-Schrift verbunden worden, welche sich bekanntlich an die Frage der Datierung der vollständigen Ausbildung der Pahlavi-Kursive knüpft, über die bis heute unter den Gelehrten wohl keine Einigkeit erzielt werden konnte. Den Hintergrund für diese Verbindung bildet die Annahme, daß eine Verschriftlichung des Avesta von der Existenz der Avestaschrift abhängt. Dieses scheinbar logisch begründete Postulat ist tatsächlich jedoch ein forschungshistorisch erwachsenes. Die Abkehr von der die ersten Jahrzehnte des 20. Jh. dominierenden Andreas-Theorie107 seit den 1940er Jahren hat die Tendenz entwickelt, den Gedanken, daß die Avestatexte einmal in einer Konsonantenschrift fixiert waren, überhaupt zu verwerfen. In der zweiten Jahrhunderthälfte sind darum die Themen “Verschriftlichung des Avesta” und “(Entstehung der) Avestaschrift” aufs engeste verzahnt. Daraus war aber wiederum notwendig zu folgern, daß, da (außer dem Griechischen) in Iran vor der Avestaschrift keine vokalnotierende Schrift verwendet wurde, avestische Texte zwischen ihrer Entstehung und dem modifizierbaren Pahlavi-Alphabet (d.h. der Avestaschrift) ausschließlich mündlich tradiert wurden. Das erklärt, begünstigt durch die allgemein steigende Aufmerksamkeit auf die Oralitätsforschung um die Mitte des letzten Jahrhunderts und schließlich auch durch die sich ergebende Parallelität zu den indischen Verhältnissen, die Dominanz der Oralitätsforschung für die Rekonstruktion der frühen Avestatransmission in den letzten Jahrzehnten. 107 Zu deren Rekonstruktion s. Schleraths Beitrag in Lentz/MacKenzie/Schlerath 1985, wo sich auch die Darstellung der Kritik an der Theoie samt zugehöriger Literatur findet.

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150 Götz König Freilich gründet die gesamte Argumentationskette auf der Kritik eben jener Annahme, die man in der ersten Hälfte des 20. Jh. weithin machte, der Schwierigkeit, a) das Avestische mit seinem feingliedrigen Vokalismus und seinem reichen System von Plosiven und Frikativen in einer Konsonantenschrift, gar einer so ärmlichen wie der des Buchpahlavi, zu notieren, und vor allem b), es daraus wieder in jene Lautung des Avestischen zurückzuverwandeln, in der dieses in den Handschriften begegnet. Doch inwieweit existiert diese Schwierigkeit tatsächlich? Mir scheint, daß sich das Problem mindert, wenn man orale und schriftliche Überlieferung nicht als einander ausschließende Transmissionsweisen erachtet, und tatsächlich scheint im Rahmen der Andreas-Kritik auch der erste Teil der Theorie, das konsonantische Notat des Avestische, für weniger problematisch erachtet worden zu sein. Ich möchte darum Cantera 2004, S. 129f., zustimmen, wenn er gegen Bailey einwendet: “Trotz der unleugbaren Wichtigkeit der mündlichen Überlieferung schließt diese keineswegs das Vorhandensein schriftlicher Texte aus. Praktisch alle Pahlavi-Quellen erwähnen neben der mündlichen Tradition auch Geschriebenes und behaupten, bei der Kompilation des Kanons habe man beide Arten von Quellen berücksichtigt. In Iran hat die schriftliche Verfassung des Avesta dessen mündliche Überlieferung nicht unterbrochen.”108 Schreiben und Auswendiglernen sind denn auch — belegt für die Xosrō-Zeit (s. XR 8–10) — Ausbildungsinhalte der Priesterschüler gleichermaßen. Das Schreiben aber hing, so Cantera, nicht notwendig von der Avestaschrift ab: “Grundsätzlich wurde das Avesta mündlich überliefert. Dies schließt aber keineswegs das Vorhandensein schriftlicher Texte in relativ frühen Zeiten aus. Nur impliziert letzteres keinen arsakidischen Archetypus, der andererseits auch von keiner Pahlavi-Quelle nahegelegt wird. Es handelte sich höchstens um kleinere Texte für den internen Gebrauch der Priester, die sicher nicht für Überlieferungszwecke bestimmt waren. Der Gebrauch der Pahlavischrift war vermutlich verbreiteter als wir uns vorstellen, und nichts spricht gegen die Möglichkeit, daß Stücke des Avesta oder seiner Übersetzung niedergeschrieben wurden. Es ist sogar wahrscheinlich, daß unter Ardaxšīr zoroastrische Texte schriftlich vorlagen, wie Mani in der Kephaleia berichtet. Nichts spricht dagegen, daß darunter auch richtige Avesta-Fragmente und nicht nur Pahlavi-Übersetzungen waren, wie Skjærvø109 vermutet. Sie wären alle freilich in einer der Pahlavi-Kursive oder dem Alphabet des Psalters ähnlichen Schrift verfaßt gewesen.” 110 Wie Hoffmann/Narten (1989, S.34–35), erkannten, 108 Cantera 2004, S. 129f. Cantera 2004, S. 130: “Das gleichzeitige Vorhandensein schriftlicher und mündlicher Überlieferung kann also inzwischen nicht mehr ernsthaft bezweifelt werden.” 109 Skjærvø 1991; Skjærvøs Beitrag zur Forschungsdiskussion ist besprochen in Cantera 2004, S. 148–152. 110 Cantera 2004, S. 163. Soweit man eine schriftlich-mündliche Überlieferung akzeptiert, ist es hinsichtlich der Überlieferungsnachrichten der zoroastrischen Literatur nicht län-

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muß eine solche ältere Notation die Funktion einer “Gedächtnisstütze” be�sessen, kann diese jedoch nicht überschritten haben, weil ansonsten die Existenz der Avestaschrift nicht zu erklären wäre, deren Voraussetzung gerade die Tatsache mündlicher Überlieferung111 ist.112 Dem seien hier drei Beobachtungen hinzugefügt, die weitgehend nur wieder jene Vermutungen in Erinnerung rufen, die schon Spiegel seiner Yasna-Edition voranstellte113: 1) Betrachtet man das die Avestaschrift verwendende Pāzand in seiner Form, wie es seit der Mitte des 2. Jt. in indischen und seit dem 18. Jh. (sehr vereinzelt und mit einigen Differenzen) in iranischen Handschriften zur Notation mittelpersischer oder neupersischer Texte verwendet wird,114 so fällt eine Ähnlichkeit mit Avestahandschriften, insbesondere den indischen auf: die Unzuverlässigkeit der Vokalnotation bei relativ hoher Konstanz in der Tradierung der Konsonanten. Im Pāzand gründet die Differenz ganz klar darauf, daß es sein Wesen und Funktion ist, einen konsonantisch geschriebenen Text zu vokalisieren. 2) Die Annahme einer als „Gedächtnisstütze“ des Avesta eingesetzten Konsonantenschrift hat ein inverses Gegenstück im Memorierungsverfahren des Pahlavi. Jenseits jenes Pāzands, das genannte Funktion einer sprachechten ger nötig, diejenigen Berichte für Fabeln zu erklären, die sich auf Überlieferungsepochen vor der Konstruktion der Avestaschrift beziehen. 111 Es war der Fehler der Andreas-Theorie, im Modell der Tradierung des Avesta Oralität weitgehend auszuschließen. Das führte (bei der vermuteten Konsonantennotation) auf Probleme in der Erklärung des komplexen Vokalismus der Avestaschrift. 112 Allerdings impliziert diese Deduktion wohl die Annahme, daß alle oder doch zumindest der Großteil der Avesta-Texte, also das gesamte ‚Große Avesta‘, über eine mündliche Tradition verfügte, d.h. Gegenstand von Rezitation war. In der Tat gibt es in der Pahlaviund np. Literatur Indizien für eine liturgische Einbindung aller Nasks; sollten sich diese Indizien in Zukunft erhärten lassen, so nötigte dies zu einer Reformulierung von Kellens‘ Hypothese einer starker Abtrennung eines Liturgischen Avesta vom Nask-Avesta. 113 Mit Referenz auf das Xorde Avesta konstatiert Spiegel in der Vorrede die Gepflogenheit der modernen Zoroastrier, die Avestatexte auch in nicht-avestischer, etwa neupersischer oder Gujarāti-Schrift zu notieren (S. 15). Daraus leitet er die generelle Möglichkeit einer Avesta-Notation in Konsonantenschrift ab, die er aus dem Erscheinungsbild der für alle Avestatexte typischen (allerdings nach Schicht unterschiedlich stark ausgeprägten) insignifikanten Varianten erhärtet sieht: “Man denke sich nur bei der Prüfung der einzelnen Varianten eines Wortes das Wort in neupersischer Schrift geschrieben …” (S. 17), so erklärten sich die Varianten im Avestatext als minimale Differenzsetzungen in der über reichere orthographische Möglichkeiten verfügenden Umsetzung in Avestaschrift. Parallelfall dessen sei das Erscheinungsbild des Pāzand (Spiegel: “Pārsi”), das ja auf solcher Umsetzung nachweislich gründet. Die Annahme wird weiter erhärtet vom Charakter der typischen orthographischen Schwankungen im Vokalismus und Konsonantismus. Die orthographischen Schwankungen scheinen aber Reflex auf kleine phonetische Schwankungen zu sein, also auf Aussprachevarianten, was Spiegel annehmen läßt, daß man die Avestahandschriften i.d.R. nicht abgeschrieben, sondern diktiert habe (S. 20). 114 Siehe König i.E a.

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152 Götz König Transkription des Pahlavi darstellt, kennen wir noch eine zweite Form des Pāzands, die als Codierung des Pahlavi verwendet wurde, und zwar hauptsächlich aus Handschriften des Frahang ī Pahlawīg. Das dabei verwendete Pāzand hat die Aufgabe, einer Sprechform zu ermöglichen, das Schriftbild des Pahlavi mit all seinen Ambiguitäten und seinem Heterogrammwesen festzuhalten und reproduzieren zu lassen.115 Wir wissen nicht, wie alt die Methode ist. Doch zeigen einige ins indische Pāzand des ersten Typs eingegangene Eigenarten (pāz. -š für pahl. -yh, ajaš für APš [u-š]), daß die Praxis um Jahrhunderte älter sein muß als die i.d.R. jungen Handschriften des Frahang. 3) Die Fixierung der jüngeren Avestaforschung auf Handschriften in Avestaschrift hat dieser weitgehend das Bewußtsein entzogen, daß es eine nicht geringe Zahl von Avesta-Handschriften in neupersischen (wie auch in Gujarati-)Buchstaben gibt. Diese Notate, die sich in Indien und Iran leicht voneinander unterscheiden, 116 sind, obgleich sie ideenreich im Alphabet fehlende Laute ersetzen und auch einige Kurzvokale notieren, außerordentlich schwierig zu lesen.117 Weniger bedeutsam an diesen Handschriften scheint mir deren Nachweis zu sein, daß sich das Avestische in einer Konsonantenschrift notieren ließ (denn die eingesetzten Mittel versuchen ja gerade, den konsonantischen Charakter der neupersischen Schrift aufzulösen); eher ist aus deren Leseschwierigkeit abzuleiten, daß sie bei ihren Benutzern schon eine gewisse mündliche Vertrautheit mit den Texten voraussetzen, die sie in der Rezitation unterstützend begleiten. Möglicherweise kamen sie in einer Zeit auf, da bei den Laien — denn es handelt sich um Xorde Avesta Handschriften — die Sicherheit in der mündlichen Wiedergabe der Tagesgebete brüchig wurde, zugleich aber auch keine Lesefähigkeit der Avestaschrift vorhanden war. Keine dieser Beobachtungen hat irgend zwingenden Charakter für eine Behauptung eines Avesta-Korpus in konsonantischer Schrift in der Sasanidenzeit. Sie zeigen gleichwohl, daß keine Notwendigkeit herrscht, starre Grenzen zwischen der Mündlichkeit und Schriftlichkeit der Avestatransmission zu ziehen. Wenn es möglich ist, das Pahlavi-Notat eines mittelpersischen Textes in sprechbaren Kunstformationen aus Avestbuchstaben festzuhalten, so dürfte es von geringerem Genie zeugen, einstmals konsonantische Hilfsnotate — Erinnerungshilfen — von Avestatexten abgefaßt zu haben, von denen zumal nicht zu fordern ist — wie es einst Andreas tat —, daß sich aus ihnen der Avestatext lautlich korrekt remodulieren lasse. 115 Siehe König i.E. b. 116 Siehe König 2021; Martínez Porro 2020. 117 Bisweilen scheint es zu Retranskriptionen in die Avestaschrift gekommen zu sein, siehe den sec. man geschriebenen Yt 14 in K36. Eine genaue Analyse steht noch aus.

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Kehren wir schließlich zu unserem Ausgang zurück, der Beobachtung, daß Dk 8 nicht das Nask-Avesta des Xosrō, sondern (sehr wahrscheinlich) das NaskAvesta des Ādurbād referiert. Da das Referat spätestens mit dem Ersteditor (frühes 9. Jh.) des Dēnkard oder mit dem Zweiteditor (spätes 9. Jh.) vorlag,118 läßt sich annehmen, daß die Referatsvorlage Texte in Avestaschrift mit Zand-Beigabe waren. Die sich daraus ergebende Frage lautet: Wenn sich aus paläographischen Gründen herausstellen sollte, daß die Avestaschrift um die Mitte des 4. Jh. noch nicht vorgelegen haben kann119, in welcher Schrift war dann das Nask-Avesta des Ādurbād notiert? Das Problem verschärft sich schließlich dahingehend, daß das Ādurbād-Avesta in seiner Motivation wohl die Existenz des Avesta des Šābuhr I voraussetzt, und daß unter allen Nachrichten des Dk 4-Berichtes die über das Avesta unter Šābuhr I die verläßlichsten zu sein scheinen, erstens weil sie einem bedeutenden König eine Handlungsweise zuschreibt, die für die spätere Orthodoxie offenbar ein Problem darstellte; zweitens, weil ihre Details so überraschend genau sind, daß die Absprache ihrer historischen Wahrheit wohl problematischer zu begründen ist als deren Akzeptanz. Freilich werden die Texte, die dem Avesta aus Griechenland und Indien zugefügt wurden, Anhänge zum Zand gewesen sein. Doch wollte man die Existenz eines notierten Avestatextes hier bestreiten, so bliebe nur die Alternative, die Existenz eines reinen Zand-Textes zu postulieren.120

Abkürzungen AARAM ĀWM AWN ĀZ Dd Dk DkM GrBd KN MX RĀF

Andarz ī anōšagruwān Ādurbār Mahraspandān Ayādgār ī Wuzurgmihr Ardā Wīrāz Nāmag Ayādgār ī Zarērān Dādestān ī dēnīg Dēnkard Dēnkard Madan Greater Bundahišn Kārnāmag Mēnōg ī xrad Riwāyat Ādurfarrbay Farroxzadān

118 Analysen der verwendeten Begrifflichkeit in Dk 8 lassen mich dazu neigen, die Referate dem Ersteditor Ādurfarrbay zuzuschreiben; damit ist aber nicht gesagt, daß die neun Bücher des Dēnkard bereits von Ādurfarrbay in der uns bekannten Weise zusammengestellt wurden. Mir scheint, daß das kolophonartige Schlußkapitel von Dk 3 (Dk 3.420) mit seinem Verweis auf die “1000 Kapitel” sich eher auf die Bücher 1–3 bezog, denen erst vom Zweiteditor weitere Schriften und Schriftenreste des Ādurfarrbay angehängt wurden. 119 Die zeitlichen Ansätze eines schriftlichen Avesta sind zusammengetragen in Hoffmann/Narten 1989, S. 34 120 Tatsächlich kennen wir eine reine Zand-Überlieferung, nämlich im Traktat Zand Fragard Juddēwdād.

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154 Götz König Šnš WīC WZ Y

Šāyest-nē-Šāyest Wizārišn ī Catrang Wizīdagīhā ī Zādspram Yasna

Bibliographie Amouzgar, J./A. Tafazzoli 2000: Le Cinquième Livre du Dēnkard. Paris. Andreas, K. F. 1903: “Die Entstehung des Awesta-Alphabetes und sein ursprünglicher Lautwert.” In: Verhandlungen des XII. Internationalen Orientalisten-Kongresses in Hamburg 1902. Leiden. Anquetil Duperron, A. H. 1771: Zend-Avesta: Ouvrage de Zoroastre I-II. Paris [Reprint New York/London 1984]. Bailey, H. W. 1943: Zoroastrian Problems in the Ninth-Century Books (Ratanbai Katrak Lectures). Oxford. Bartholomae, C. 1920: Zur Kenntnis der mitteliranischen Mundarten III. Heidelberg. Baumstark, A. 1922: Geschichte der syrischen Literatur. Bonn. Boyce, M. 1968b: The Letter of Tansar. Roma. Cantera, A. 2004: Studien zur Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Avesta. Wiesbaden. Cereti, C. 1994-1995: “Prolegomena allo studio del quarto libro del Dēnkard.” In: Studi Orientali e Linguistici 5, pp. 107–129. — 2012–2013: “Mardānfarrox ī Ohrmazddādān’s Škand Gumānīg Wizār on Judaism and Christianity.” In: NIB 12/1–2, pp. 47–66. Darmesteter, J. 1889: “Textes pehlevis relatives au Judaisme.” In: REJ, pp. 1–15, 18–19, 41–56. — 1894: “Lettre de Tansar au roi de Tabaristan.” In: JA IX 3, S. 185–250, 502–555. Dodge, B. 1970: The Fihrist of al-Nadīm. A Tenth-Century Survey of Muslim Culture. 2 vols. New York/London. Jaafari-Dehaghi, M. 1998: Dādestān ī Dēnīg. Part I: Transcription, Translation and Commentary (Cahier de StIr 20). Paris. Gardner, I./J. Beduhn/P. Dilley, P. 2014: Mani at the Court of the Persian Kings. Studies on the Chester Beatty Kephalaia Codex. Leiden. — 2019: The Chapters of the Wisdom of MyLord Mani. Leiden. Gnoli, G. 1985: De Zoroastre à Mani. Quatre leςons au Collège de France. Paris. Gray, L. H. 1905: “The Jews in Pahlavi Literature.” In: JE IX, pp. 462–65. Haug, M. 1870: Essay on the Pahlavi language. Stuttgart. Humbach, H. 1991: The Gāthās of Zarathushtra and the Other Old Avestan Texts. In collaboration with J. Elfenbein and P. O. Skjærvo. Part I: Introduction — Text and Translation. Part II: Commentary. Heidelberg. Kellens, J. 1998: “Considérations sur l’histoire de l’Avesta.” In: JA 286, pp. 451–519. König, G. 2012: “Das Nask Bayān und das Xorde Avesta.” In: A. Cantera (Hrsg.): The Transmission of the Avesta. Wiesbaden. pp. 355–394. — 2015: “Zur Überlieferungsgeschichte der Yašts: Reste der exegetischen Tradition. Die Pahlavi-Übersetzungen von Yt 13 in Dk 7.” In: EIT 1, Fs Pirart, pp. 131–149.

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— 2021: “Remarks on the Iranian XA Sāde manuscripts 6135 (YL2–17) and 6187 (MZK6) (Notes on the Xorde Avesta VIII).” In: JRAS 3/31, pp. 573–590. ́ ‘Schützen sollst Du den Menschen’ (Yt — i.E. a: “Der Avestatext Nipāiiōiš mašīm 1.24–32) und seine Pahlavi-Übersetzung.” In: EIT. — i.E. b: “From Written to Oral? The encoded Pahlavi in the Frahang ī Pahlawīg.” In: Fs Jaafari-Dehaghi. Kreyenbroek, Ph. 2008: “How Pious was Shahbuhr I: Religion, Church and Propaganda under the early Sasanians.” In: V. Sarkhosh Curtis/S. Stewart (eds.): The Sasanian Era (The Idea of Iran 3). London/New York, pp. 7–15. Lentz, W./D. N. MacKenzie/B. Schlerath 1985: “Andreas, Friedrich Carl.” In: EIr, II/1. pp. 27–30. MacKenzie, D. N. 1971: A Concise Pahlavi Dictionary. London. Mayrhofer, M. 1992–2001: Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Altindoarischen. 3 Bde. Heidelberg. Macuch, M. 1981: “Die Erwähnung der Ordalzeremonie des Ādurbād i Māraspandān im Ardā Wīrāz Nāmag.” In: AMI 20, pp. 319–322. Martínez Porro, J. 2020: The Orthography and the Recitation in the Avestan Manuscripts. Freie Universität Berlin (Unveröffentlichte Doktorarbeit). de Menasce, J. 1958: Une Encyclopédie mazdéenne, le Dēnkart. Paris. — 1969: “Jews and Judaism in the Third Book of the Dēnkart.” In: Cama Oriental Institut Golden Jubilee Vol. Bombay. pp. 45–48. — 1973: Le troisième livre du Dēnkart. Traduit du pehlevi. Paris Minowi 1932: Tansar nāme. Nāme-ye Tansar be Gošnasp. Tehrān. Nyberg, H. S. 1964: A Manual of Pahlavi. Part I: Texts, Alphabets, Index, Paradigms, Notes and an Introduction. Wiesbaden. Panaino, A. 2012: “Aristotelian Corpus. Translations into Pahlavi (200–900 CE).” In: P. T. Keyser/G. L. Irby-Massie (eds.): Encyclopedia of Ancient Natural Scientists: The Greek Tradition and its Many Heirs. London/New York. Peters, F. 1968: Aristotle and the Arabs: The Aristotelian Tradition in Islam. New York/London. Raffaelli, E. G. 2010: „L’Astrologie dans le Zoroastrisme d’Epoque Sassanide: L’Example de la 5e Section du Bundahišn.“ In: StA XI, S. 63–87. Saadat, Y. 2014: “Middle Persian abāz-handāxtan.” In: JPS 7/1, pp. 137–148. Shaki, M. 1970: “Some Basic Tenets of the Eclectic Metaphysics of the Dēnkart.” In: ArOr 38, pp. 277–312. — 1973: “A Few Philosophical and Cosmological Chapters of the Denkart.” In: ArOr 41, pp. 133–164. — 1975: “An Appraisal of the Glossary of A Manual of Pahlavi.” In: ArOr 43, pp. 256–263. — 1981: “The Dēnkard Account of the History of the Zoroastrian Scriptures.” In: ArOr 49, pp. 114–125. — 1999: “Falsafa I. Prs-Islamic Philosophy.” In: EIr Vol. IX, Fasc. 9, pp. 176–182. — 2003: “iv. Greek influence on Persian thought.” In: EIr Vol. XI, Fasc. 11, pp. 321–326. Skjærvø, P. O. 1991: “Besprechung von Hoffmann/Narten 1989.” In: Kratylos 36, pp. 104–109.

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156 Götz König Spiegel, F. 1853, 1858: Avesta, die heiligen Schriften der Parsen. Zum ersten Male aus dem Grundtext sammt der Huzvâresch-Übersetzung herausgegeben. Bd I: Vendidad (1853); Bd. II Vispered und Yasna (1858). Leipzig. — 1856–1860: Einleitung in die traditionellen Schriften der Parsen. 2 Teile. Wien/ Leipzig [Neudruck Osnabrück 1971]. Thrope, S. F. 2012: Contradictions and Vile Utterances; The Zoroastrian Critique of Judaism in the Škand Gumānīg Wizār. Ph.D. Dissertation, University of California, Berkeley. Available online: https://escholarship.org/uc/item/14b43599#page-14 [Last accessed 30.08.2021]. West, E. W. 1892: Pahlavi Texts. Part IV: Contents of the Nasks (SBE 37). Oxford. — 1896–1904: “Pahlavi Literature.” In: GrIrPh II.3, pp. 75–129. Wikander, S. 1946: Feuerpriester in Kleinasien und Iran. Lund. Zaehner, R. C. 1955: Zurvan. A Zoroastrian Dilemma. Oxford.

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Zur Bedeutung der Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Avesta für die Zoroastrismusforschung Notizen zu Arash Zeinis Studie über das Pahlavi Yasna Haptaŋhāiti Götz König Unter dem Titel Zoroastrian Scholasticism in Late Antiquity. The Pahlavi version of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti hat A. Zeini eine Neubearbeitung der mittelpersischen “Version”, d.h. der Übersetzung wie Interpretation, des “aus sieben Abschnitten bestehenden Yasna” vorgelegt.1 Wie der Titel anzeigt, bildet die Textarbeit lediglich das zentrale Segment einer über diese hinausgreifenden geistesgeschichtlich orientierten Studie zum Themenfeld “Scholasticism”, welcher nicht nur, so die These, auch vom post-avestischen Zoroastrismus gepflegt wurde, sondern dessen Begriff zugleich, so dürfte zu schließen sein, den Horizont beschreibt, in dem ein Verständnis selbst noch der Übersetzungsarbeiten aus dem Avesta für uns erst möglich wird. Der Ansatz ist für die ältere Iranistik, die i.d.R. noch immer arbeitsteilig verfährt und Philologie von Interpretation zu trennen sucht, neu und verdient allein darum unsere Aufmerksamkeit. Mit seinem Material aber bewegt sich die Studie in einer Zeitschicht, über deren Ausdehnung wir nicht willkürlich verfügen, sondern die erst u.a. durch Materialanalyse zu sondieren wäre, und deren spezifischer Charakter im zoroastrischen Iran vielleicht weniger von dem antiker Späte bestimmt wird als von Zeichen einer intellektuellen Erschütterung, von der dann die theologischen Traktate des 9. Jh. das zweite große Textmonument des Zoroastrismus sein werden.  * Um die Mitte des 19. Jh. hatte der europäische Kenntnisstand jener Sprachen, die zum Verständnis zoroastrischer Texte von der Antike bis in die Neuzeit von Bedeutung waren, einen Grad erreicht, welcher es der Forschung erlaubte, sich von einheimischen Deutungsvorgaben, auf denen Anquetils Werk nicht unwesentlich erwachsen war, zu emanzipieren. Mit seiner Studie Om Zendsprogets og Zendavestas œlde og ægthed, Kopenhagen. In der dt. Übersetzung = Über das Alter und die Echtheit der Zend-Sprache und des Zend-Avesta, und Herstellung des Zend1

Arash Zeini 2020: Im Text geführt unter “Zeini”.

Sasanian Studies | Sasanidische Studien. Vol. I (2022). Ed. by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee doi: 10.13173/SSt.1.157

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Alphabets (Berlin 1826) hatte Rask die letzten Zweifel an der Echtheit der Anquetilschen Dokumente beseitigt und damit der noch jungen Indogermanistik zur sprachhistorischen Analyse des Avestischen einen sicheren Grund bereitet. Spiegels umfangreiche Studien aus den 1840–1860er Jahren hatten das Zoroastrisch-Mittelpersische näher erschlossen, einen ersten Überblick über die post-avestische Literatur gegeben und diese ins Verhältnis zum sog. Zend-Avesta gesetzt. Schließlich waren die (gegenüber den Altiranischen Studien verspäteten) Altindischen Studien soweit fortgeschritten, daß das Veda bereits die Deutungshoheit im sich formierenden Bild von den Indo-Iranern in Methode wie historischer Perspektive übernehmen konnte, wie es Benfeys 1852–1853 publizierte Rezension der beiden zeitgleich erscheinenden Avesta-Editionen von Spiegel und Westergaard zeigt. Galt Herder einst das Avesta für die Älteste Urkunde des Menschengeschlechts (I+II [1774, 1776]), so avancierten nun die Veden zur “frühste(n) Urkunde des indogermanischen Geistes”, mit welcher, so Benfey, sich “nichts auf dem gesammten Gebiet des indogermanischen Alterthums” messen könne, es sei denn “die ältesten Theile der heiligen Schriften der von Zoroaster gegründeten Religion,” — Benfey dürfte unter diesen bereits die Gāϑās verstanden haben — “welche bezüglich der Sprache und der — wenn gleich reformatorisch umgestalteten — Grundlage der Religion in dem allerinnigsten Verhältnis zu den Veden stehn”, an deren “Würde” sie “in einem gewissen Grad Antheil (nehmen)”; die (ältesten?) avestischen Texte gewönnen aber “eine neue, den Veden fremde, Bedeutung für uns dadurch, daß sie ein Verbindungsglied zwischen der indogermanischen und semitischen Entwicklung wurden”, ja, “den bedeutendsten Einfluß auf das Judenthum und dessen weitre Gestaltung gewann, sie somit in ununterbrochener Beziehung noch mit dem heutigen Leben stehen.” (Th. Benfey, Göttingische Gelehrte Anzeigen, 6.12.1852, S. 1954f., Rezension der ersten Faszikel der Avestaeditionen von Spiegel und Westergaard). Jene Zeilen versammelten gedrängt Perspektiven auf das Avesta und den Zoroastrismus, die sich in den folgenden 170 Jahren weiten, verengen und bisweilen einander verstellen sollten. Offen ließen sie letztlich, wie mit dem Avesta zu verfahren sei: als Anhängsel zum Veda, oder aber als Ausgangspunkt einer Entwicklung, die den iranischen vom indischen Geist zutiefst abscheiden sollte. Die Forschung hat sich durch den Aufstieg der Sanskritstudien im 19. Jh. für den ersten Weg entschieden, nicht nur in der linguistischen Frage (bei der darauf hinzuweisen gilt, daß die methodische Komplexität, die Burnouf 1833 in seinem Commentaire sur le Yaçna, l’un des livres liturgiques des Parses skizzierte, gerade durch Benfeys methodische Vereinfachung nie wieder erreicht wurde), sondern damit einhergehend, methodisch freilich ungedeckt, auch dort, wo nicht der Träger von Bedeutung entscheidend ist, als vielmehr diese selbst. Gewöhnlich wird spätestens seit Geldners Artikel im Grundriss das Ringen um die rechte Art, das Avesta zu verstehen, als Auseinandersetzung einer “iranisierenden” und einer “vedisierenden” Schule dargestellt. Vergessen wird dabei, daß auch Spiegel, Vertreter der ersteren, der Tradition nie einen primären Charakter dem Tradierten gegenüber zusprach: auch bei ihm folgt “Tradition” aus einer Primärsituation, Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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158 Götz König

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ist diese nicht selbst immer schon Resultat des Tradierens. Die Übersetzung des Avesta, das Zand, und alles, was auf dieser aufbaute, stand vor allem im Lichte des philologischen Hilfmittels, dessen sich auch Spiegels Gegner bisweilen bedienten. Bis heute ging der philologische Streit lediglich um die Güte der Übersetzungen (vornehmlich der Pahlavi-Übersetzungen), von welcher man abhängen ließ, ob der Tradition überhaupt ein gewisses hermeneutisches Recht eingeräumt werden sollte. Benfeys Sichtweise war indes eine weit radikalere Möglichkeit eingeschrieben. Der Hinweis auf das Avesta “als ein Verbindungsglied zwischen der indogermanischen und semitischen Entwicklung” ist nicht nur ein Echo von Anquetils erstem Fürsprecher in Deutschland, Herder, sondern deutet die Inversion der von der Forschung bevorzugten Methodologie an. Er weist darauf, daß die Bedeutung des Avesta vor allem darin liegt, was in ihm und durch es aus dem “indogermanischen Geiste” wurde. In der Sprache der Philologie ausgedrückt: Mag in bestimmter Weise das Avesta ein Anhang zum Veda, die Pahlavi-Übersetzung (PÜ) wiederum ein Hilfsmittel zum Verständnis des Avesta sein, — so ist das Avesta a) doch auch die erste Verwirklichung von Tendenzen, die in vormaliger Stufe nur angelegt waren, und die im Zand schließlich explizit und strukturbildend wurden, und b) in seinem Verständnis immer schon durch Tradition geprägt. Da man das Zand stets nur als ein Abhängiges begriff, unterlagen die Studien zum Zand jenseits der Parsen-Gemeinde gewissen Zyklen von Interesse und Desinteresse. Nach Bartholomaes späten Arbeiten und der Zerstörung philologischer Tradition seit den 1930er Jahren, erschienen zwischen 1980 bis ungefähr 2010 einige gründliche Studien zum Zand, um seitdem wieder zurückzutreten. Ein Grund für Letzteres mag darin liegen, daß auch diese Arbeiten trotz aller Detailerkenntnisse über die Alten kaum hinausgekommen sind: es gibt frühe, d.h. sasanidenzeitliche Übersetzungen, deren Güte sie in den Rang von Hilfsmitteln der Avesta-Studien versetzt, und spätere, im Alter oft unklare Übersetzungen, aus denen die Avesta-Philologie keinen rechten Gewinn zu ziehen vermag. Was also mit diesen problematischen Übersetzungen tun? Es ist rätselhaft, warum die denkbar einfachste Antwort auf diese Frage höchst selten gegeben wurde: gerade jene offenbar nicht ‘alten’ Übersetzungen — insbesondere handelt es sich um Teile des Pahlavi Xorde Avesta — sind weniger als ein Hilfsmittel, sondern vielmehr als ein Dokument eigenen historischen Wertes zu lesen, welcher vor allem in der Interpretation des übersetzen Textes besteht. Wenn aber, so läßt sich weiter folgern, jene jungen Übersetzungen vor allem in sich einen Wert haben, so mag man Nämliches auch, vielleicht nur in geringerem Grad, für die älteren Übersetzungen behaupten. Dem hier zu besprechenden Werk, Zeinis Zoroastrian Scholasticism in Late Antiquity, haftet darum etwas Befreiendes für die alt- und mitteliranischen Studien an, weil es vielleicht erstmalig an einem größeren Text des Zand, dessen PÜ ebenfalls schlecht beleumundet ist, eingelöst hat, was ältere Studien bestenfalls streiften verspricht: “Zeini challenges the view that considers the Zand’s study an auxiliary science to Avestan studies, framing the text instead within the ex-

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160 Götz König egetical context from which it emerged” (Klappentext). Die darin angezeigte Verschiebung der Perspektive der Textbehandlung ist eine grundlegende. Weder wird der Avesta-Text zum Richter über das Zand erhoben, noch dessen Lesung auf das Avesta hin gezwungen; entscheidend für diese sei vielmehr der “exegetical context”, aus dem der “Text” überhaupt erst hervorgeht. So müssen wir also nachzuzeichnen versuchen, wie Zeini die Frage nach diesem “exegetische Kontext”, dem “Text” und dem Verhältnis beider beantwortet hat.

* Zeinis Buchtitel Zoroastrian Scholasticism in Late Antiquity. The Pahlavi version of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti. hat zwei Implikationen: erstens, daß die Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Yasna Haptaŋhāiti historisch innerhalb eines Epochenbegriffs “Spätantike” zu diskutieren, zweitens, daß sie systematisch als Teil eines zoroastrischen Scholasticism zu betrachten ist. Beide Implikationen werden von Zeini in unterschiedlichem Maße entfaltet. Während die zweite die Materialarbeit und -reflexion, damit die gesamte Struktur des Buches prägt, wird erstere doch nur wenig Thema. Darum seien an dieser Stelle einige Anmerkungen zum Begriff der “Spätantike”, namentlich der iranischen, gegeben. Insbesondere in der englischsprachigen Welt ist die Anwendung des Begriffs der Spätantike auf den Iran beliebt. Die von ihm erfaßte Zeit spielt meist zwischen der seleukidischen (bisweilen auch nur spätparthischen) und dem frühen Islam und dient den Historikern vor allem zur epochalen Zusammenfassung der den Römern (und Oströmern) zeitgleichen Reichsbildungen der iranischen Welt. Damit hat der Spätantikebegriff für die iranische Welt zunächst einmal ein doppeltes Negativ formuliert: nicht nur nicht eigentliche Antike, sondern auch: nur das Andere Roms zu sein. Aus dieser mißlichen Position sich zu befreien, ist in verschiedenen Arbeitsbereichen der Iranistik mit unterschiedlicher Methodik und Zielsetzung zu beobachten. Ganz besonders schwierig ist dieser Weg für die geistesgeschichtliche Rekonstruktion. Denn dieser steht für die iranische Spätantike an primären Zeugnissen jenseits der religiös-theologischen fast nichts zur materialen Verfügung, und von den letztgenannten gehören die meisten der zoroastrischen in die spätantiken Randbereiche: Während die Autorentexte der Pahlavi-Literatur, also die großen theologischen Traktate, im 9. Jh. verfaßt wurden und nur über ihr Quellmaterial, das Zand, vor die islamische Zeit Fäden spinnen, in sich aber bereits zutiefst durch die interreligiöse Diskussion nach 750 n. Chr. konstituiert sind, so fallen die jungavestischen Texte, für die m.E. weniger entscheidend ist, ob sie “alte” Materialien führen, als daß sie eine allgemeine Partizipation an nicht-altavestischen Termini und Konzepten zeigen, welche zum Vergleich mit spätantiken — ein Vergleich, der seit der Darmesteter-Theorie in der Iranistik tabu ist — auffordern, spätestens in die frühere Partherzeit. Klammern wir den Bereich der Rechtsliteratur aus und gehen wir auch am wohl epochenübergreifenden Handarz vorüber, so bleibt uns nur eine wesentliche geistesgeschichtliche

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primäre Quelle: die Pahlavi-Übersetzungen von Texten des in der Liturgie verwendeten Avesta, und, allerdings bereits in sekundärer Überarbeitung, Referate des Nask-Avesta. Unter eben jenem Zand zeigen sich, wie seit langem erkannt, sprachliche, technische und literarische Differenzen, die auf eine historische Verschiedenheit hinweisen. Während das Pahlavi besonders des Vīdēvdāds aus einer Zeit vor dem 9. Jh. stammen muß,2 so ist m.E. bei jenen Texten des Xorde Avesta, die nicht um 1000 n. Chr. bereits dem liturgischen Pflichtprogramm angehörten, das Pahlavi sekundär und offenbar ein Produkt Indiens aus dem späten 18. Jh. Zwischen diesen beiden Schichten der Pahlavi-Übersetzung steht vermutlich die des Yasna/Visparad. Das ist darum relativ sicher, weil mit den Hss. K5 und J2 des Mihrābān ein Datum ante des frühen 14. Jh. gesetzt ist, das durch stemmatische Rückführung noch um einiges versetzt werden kann. Folgen wir dem klassischen Modell (Prol. xxxiv), so muß die Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Yasna vor 1000 n. Chr. angesetzt werden, zumal aus ihr in Texten zitiert ist, die man spätestens dem 9./10. Jh. zuschreiben möchte (s.u.). Ihr Datum post aber ist m.E. aus Kellens‘ Dekonstruktion der Hypothese von Yasna-Stammhandschriften des 10. Jh. zugunsten des Postulats einer früheren Edition im Rahmen einer allgemeinen liturgischen Avesta-Edition gegeben: Eine PÜ Yasna kann erst nach einer Kreation eines avestischen Yasna liegen, dessen relatives Datum ante wiederum das Nērangestān bietet. Was an der PÜ Yasna allgemein hervorsticht, ist kompositorische, auch sprachliche Differenz sowohl zur PÜ Vīdēvdād — einem klar ‘spätantiken’ Zand — die wie zur PÜ des Xorde Avesta, die, wie gesagt, in großen Teilen aus viel späterer Zeit stammt.3 Die Datierungsfrage ist darum von so großer Bedeutung, als mit den neuen Herren des 7. Jh. in Iran die Allianz von Thron und zoroastrischer Kirche, einem zentralen Baustein der iranischen Spätantike, zerbricht. Mag auch das lokale oder regionale ökonomische, teilweise politisch-soziale Leben Irans im 7./8. Jh. den Herrschaftswechsel noch wenig gespürt haben, so ist das Geistesleben der zoroastrischen Priester zutiefst erschüttert: immer offensichtlicher wird, daß das 2 3

Siehe Cantera 1999. In Hinsicht auf die Korrektheit der Übersetzung des Pahlavi Yasna verblüfft immer wieder, daß neben richtigen Wiedergaben schwieriger Formen und der Bewahrung alter, unerwarteter Traditionen (s.u. die Wiedergabe von 1.Pl.Ind. als 3.Sg.Opt./Konj.) ‘volksetymologische’ Übersetzungen stehen. So wird in Y 39.2 von den drei Zeitformen zum Verb van- (vanaiṇtī. vā. və̄ṇghən. vā. vaōnarə̄. vā.) nur die erste etymologisch richtig gedeutet (wānīdār), die zweite indes auf das Verb vi(n)d- “finden” bezogen (windišn), die dritte (3.Pl.Ind.akt.Perf.) aber als Kompositum aus vohu + nar verstanden: weh mard “guter Mann” (s. Zeini S. 267–269). Auffällig ist, daß der Übersetzung die Ausdeutung āsrōn “Priester” folgt, wie die beiden vorangehenden Formen glossiert sind mit artēštar “Krieger” und wāstaryōš “Bauer”. Die falsche Folge (Krieger-Bauer-Priester statt Priester-Krieger-Bauer) dürfte dafür sprechen, daß der Bezug des Textes auf die überkommene Klassenstruktur tatsächlich von jenem mißverstandenen vaōnarə̄. seinen Ausgang nahm. Diese Verquickung von quasi volksetymologischer Übersetzung und deren pseudo-gelehrter Absicherung erinnert an Übersetzungen des Xorde Avesta aus viel späterer Zeit.

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162 Götz König Heilsversprechen sich nicht erfüllen, der Boden, auf dem es einst gegeben, schwankend wird. Die Auswege aber, die man aus solchem Dilemma sucht, verfestigen dieses nur immer mehr: gerade indem die Priester das Kontinuitätsmoment zur älteren Zeit demonstrieren wollen, kommt es zum Bruch mit der Spätantike — in der Theologen-Literatur des 9. Jh. wird er uns sichtbar. Tatsächlich entstehen die bedeutendsten Arbeiten zoroastrischer Priester überhaupt wohl nicht zufällig in jener kurzen Zeit, da der Zoroastrismus zur theologischen Selbstbesinnung gezwungen war, wollte er auf dem in Bagdad verlangten Redeniveau sich halten können. Gleichwohl ist bei sondernder Analyse der Materialien des 9. Jh. zu vermerken, daß etwa das philosophische Dk 3 und ein umfängliches, stark rituell ausgerichtetes Riwāyat von ein und demselben Autor stammen, was von Sprache, Stil und konzeptionellem Vermögen her kaum glaubhaft scheint. Das erlaubt den Schluß, daß man in verschiedenen ‘Registern’ formulierte, deren eines das Zand war. Darauf scheint der anonyme Dastwar (Ādurfarrbay?) in der Einleitung zu Dk 8 anzuspielen, wenn er sagt, er habe dieses Referat “geschrieben in der der dēn (= Zand) eigenen Sprache” (pad xwad ēwāz ī dēn nibišt).4 Denn auffällig ist doch: so sehr Ādurfarrbay und Manušcihr im 9. Jh. auch theologische Gegenspieler gewesen sein mögen, beiden Autoren ist als auffälligstes sprachliches Phänomen ihre Liebe zum komplizierten Kompositum, der Begriffsneuschöpfung, gemein. Nichts davon in den Riwāyats oder im Zand. Darum stimme ich Zeini zu, die PÜ Yasna nicht primär im Rahmen der (wie ich sie nenne) ‘Neuen Theologie’ des 9. Jh. zu behandeln, die gerade das Ende der Spätantike bei den Zoroastriern markiert, sondern — zunächst einmal — als spätantiken Text, selbst soweit er erst im 9. Jh. entstanden sein sollte; in einem zweiten Schritt bedürfte es allerdings der Prüfung, ob auch diesem Zeichen des Bruchs bereits eingeschrieben sind. Ich glaube, daß unsere Interpretation von Pahlavi-Texten grundsätzlich von wenigstens zwei Parametern und deren Verflechtung abhängen sollte: der Zeitschicht und dem “Register” der Texte (Vokabular, Redeweise, Form). Hinsichtlich des methodischen Vorgehens scheint es mir grundsätzlich fruchtbarer, Differenzen zu notieren als, wie traditionell geschehen, meist nur auf der Oberfläche spielende Übereinstimmungen zu konstatieren. Im Falle der Übersetzungen der altavestischen Texte dürfte es in Zukunft sinnvoll sein, diese kritisch zu vergleichen mit den Übersetzungen jener Perspektivierungen, wie sie die drei Kommentare des anonymen pāyram dastwar (Dk 8.1.3) vorstellen.

* Das führt uns nun zum eigentlichen Thema von Zeinis Buch, dem (engl.) “Scholasticism” — was dt. “Scholastik”, nicht “Scholastizismus” entspricht — wie er sich am Beispiel der Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Yasna Haptaŋhāiti darstellt. Die Falluntersuchung nimmt dabei im Buch den größten Teil ein. Sie umfaßt von 4

Siehe den Text Dk 8.1.2–3 (B 526.5–8).

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den vier “Parts” des Buches die Teile I.5 (ein einleitendes) “Precis: yasn ī haft hād”; II “Text and translation”, und zwar des avestischen und des Pahlavi-Textes; III “Miscellaneous observations”, d.h. Kommentare i.d.R. zur Übersetzung avestischer Wörter, Phrasen etc.; IV (ein ausleitendes) “Epilogue”, bestehend aus verschiedenen “Reflections on the Zand”. In den Appendices werden sodann vor allem die Pahlavi-Transliterationen und der kritische Apparat nachgetragen. Stärker abgerückt davon stehen Teile der “Introduction”. Teil I.1–4 umfaßt einerseits philologische Prolegomena (I.1),5 berührt sodann ein erstes Mal in I.2 das Zand-Problem (vgl. damit Part IV), vor allem in seiner Forschungsperspektive, geht dann zu dem theoretischen Zentrum des Buches über (I.3 “Scholasticism”), dem in I.4 ein Kapitel “Fire in Zoroastrianism” folgt (s.a. Appendic C “Fire in the Older Avesta”), das zwar in seiner historischen Anlage des Problems zunächst wie ein unerwarteter Gast im Buch erscheint, jedoch wohl als ein großer Exkurs zu einer ‘scholastischen’ Behandlung des Feuers, welches in Y 36 bekanntlich seinen prominentesten Ort in der Priesterliturgie hat, zu verstehen ist. Soweit ich die Architektur von Zeinis Buch verstehe, dient dieser Exkurs zum Feuer der Affirmation des Postulats, das Zand als scholastischen Text der Spätantike lesen zu dürfen und zu können, und dabei im Besonderen aufzuspüren, was allgemeine Kategorien zu fordern scheinen.6 In methodologischer Hinsicht referiert Zeini zunächst auf den Indologen Bronkhorst, dessen Position eines “paradigm of the invisible interpreter” (S. 39) und einer ‘Nicht-Domestizierung’ alter Texte durch deren Anmessung an moderne Kategorien, bei gleichzeitiger Vermeidung eines “cultural relativism”, auf die Ausweitung kontextueller Informationen führe, m.E. also letztlich zu einer Wiederaufnahme 5

Zeini entscheidet sich nicht, wie traditionell geschehen, für K5/J2 als einen “base text”, sondern für das (wesentlich später bezeugte) IrPY (Pt4 und Mf4). Als Gründe führt er u.a. an “Pt4’s provenance, which through the colophon can be traced back beyond 1020 CE” (S. 11), sowie Skepsis an Geldners Meinung, a) daß IrPY und IndPY einen gemeinsamen Vorläufer haben, b) daß es im frühen 11. Jh. zu einer Kombination aus Sāde Text und existierendem Zand kam (S. 12–13). Zeini stützt sich dabei vor allem auf Cantera / de Vaas Neulesung (2005) des Kolophons des Hošang Siyāwaxš, die mir aber anfechtbar erscheint. Die grundlegende, zumindest für das Erkenntnisinteresse des Buches grundlegende Frage scheint mir doch die zu sein, ob im sog. IndPY — in Wahrheit handelt es sich bei K5/J2 um den Text, wie er in einer ostiranischen Priesterfamilie tradiert ist — und im IrPY zwei eigenständige Übersetzungen vorliegen. Das aber scheint nach Ausweis des kritischen Apparats nicht der Fall zu sein. Zu beachten aber bleibt, daß Pt4 auf Glossen in Paralleltexten reagiert hat, zur Aufnahme einer Glosse aus PahlNy 1.5 in PahlY 36.6b Pt4 s. Zeini S. 213. 6 In jüngerer Zeit orientiert sich auch die Alt- und Mitteliranistik an dem weithin geübten Verfahren, andernorts entwickelte Kategorien aufzugreifen und den eigenen Materialien zu konfrontieren. Das Verfahren hat den guten Sinn, unterschiedliche Traditionen einander vergleichbar, Gemeinsamkeiten und Differenzen sichtbar zu machen. Gleichwohl besitzt das Verfahren eine Agentialität, der m.E. stets von “unten” entgegenzuarbeiten bleibt: Kategorien der Wissenschaft sind heuristisch, als Universalia bestenfalls “in rebus”. Kraft wächst ihnen vom Besonderen zu.

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164 Götz König ‘schwacher’ hermeneutischer Positionen, wie sie seit dem 19. Jh. immer wieder vertreten wurden. Zeini leitet daraus ab: “Thus the aim of the invisible interpreter is not objectivity of research. Rather, the invisible researcher will attempt to present ancient works in their own context as much as possible.” (S. 39) 7 Was aber ist dieser den Texten spezifische Kontext? Zeini geht hier relativ schnell über den systematischen wie historischen Bestimmungs- und Begründungsprozeß hinweg — verständlicherweise, denn eine eigentliche Geschichte der Pahlavi-Literatur, die mehr wäre als eine Inhaltsbeschreibung einzelner Werke und deren Manuskriptlage, ist nie vorgelegt worden (eine gewisse Ausnahme bildet Tavadia 1956) —, und benennt diesen Kontext als den einer “vast number of MP texts, including the Zand”, denen ein “scholastic approach to the Avesta” gemein sei (39). Er richtet unter Anleitung der vom Buddhologen Cabezón herausgestellten Kategorien (“framework of a decontextualised scholasticism” [S. 39]) sein Augenmerk auf die Frage, was “scholasticism” in bezug auf diesen Kontext meine. Dabei versucht er zu zeigen, daß sich die von ihm ins Auge gefaßte Literatur tatsächlich dem durch jene Kategorien gezogenen allgemeinen Horizont einfüge, also als “scholastisch” angesprochen werden könne. Zeini zieht den Schluß: “Rather than conceiving of the MP translations of the Avesta as a problematic translation project at a time when knowledge of Avestan was unsatisfactory, we can approach the Zand as an hermeneutic undertaking which found further reflections in the non-translation Pahlavi literature.” (S. 61). Die Position bleibt insofern traditionell, als das Zand als Scholientext, als “hermeneutic undertaking” zwar weit über den Rang des Hilfsmittels hinausgehoben, die Pahlavi-Literatur ihm aber linear bloß nachgeordnet wird, siehe z.B. Zeini S. 192 zur Passage Dk 9.57.1, in der er eine “direct reference” auf PY 35.1 sieht und einen Beweis dafür, daß das Zand “authoritative” für die “wider Pahlavi literature” sei. Inkorrekt ist sie darum freilich nicht. Zeini gibt in der Tat wichtige Hinweise auf exakte Parallelen in Avesta-Pahlavi-Texten, s. FO 222, welches “contains a verbatim quote of Y 35.5a and its Zand” (Zeini S. 198), sowie Pur 18 mit Zitat PY 35.5c, 35.6a (Zeini S. 198, 199), Pur 19 mit Zitat PY 35.8, 9. Allerdings sind Frahang ī Oīm und Pursišnīhā schlecht datierbar, so daß aus diesen kein Beweis dafür zu erbringen ist, daß das Zand des Yasna älter als der Dēnkard-Text ist. Im Fall des sehr interessanten Verhältnisses von Y 38.3, dessen Zand und GrBd 11b.1 (s. Zeini S. 253–257) und der Liste der “17 Wasserarten” läßt sich m.E. nicht erkennen, daß GrBd direkt von PY 38.3 abhängt (so jedoch Zeini S. 255), eher scheinen mir GrBd 11b.1 und PY 38.3 Versionen einer älteren Liste zu sein. Ein Hinweis auf eine schon sasanidenzeitliche 7

Die Hermeneutik ist umso komplizierter, je mehr ‘Deutungshorizonte’, subjektive Vermittlungsstufen, in ihr ineinandergreifen. “Objektivität” ist nur durch die Interpretation hindurch, niemals jenseits von ihr. “Text-Kontext” und “Text-Interpret” sind keine strikten Opponenten, kein Entweder-Oder, sondern aufeinander bezogen. Ein “invisible interpreter” ist nicht durch Schrumpfung zu erlangen, sondern gerade durch dessen gleichsam kritische Expansion ins Objekt hinein.

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Anfertigung der PÜ der altavestischen Texte sei hier noch beigebracht. In dem einzigen in iranischen Xorde Avesta Handschriften geführten Āfrīn, dem Āfrīn Rapitwin, findet sich im Hamāzōr das Gedenken u.a. an: hamāzōr. frauuahrə. āδirbāṯ. mąϑraspṇdąn. bāṯ. aβā. hmā. frauuahre. paoiriiō. ṯkaēṣ̌ą n. maiinuąn. hmā. piδąn. dīn. bāṯ. hamāzōr. frauuahre. ādarbāṯ. zaraϑuštrąn. bāṯ. aβā. hmā. frauuahre. mōβδąn. dāuuarąn. u. dastūrąn. dīn. bāṯ. hamāzōr. frauuahre. anuša. ruuąn. x́asruui. kubāδąn. bāṯ. aβā. hmā. frauuahre. uruuaṇdąn. dādaštąn. dāδārąn. dīn. ẏōždāϑrīδārąn. u. x́hāδāhī. pīrāstārąn. bāṯ.

Soweit der Text chronologisch verfährt, müßte der genannte Ādurbād Zardušt zwischen dem Ādurbād Māraspand (4. Jh.) und Xosrō I (6. Jh.) gelebt haben, seinem Namen zufolge könnte Ādurbād Zardušt Enkel jenes berühmten Ādurbād Māraspand sein. Es ist wohl dieser Ādurbād Zardušt, der auch als Kommentator in der Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Ahuna-Gebets erwähnt wird (s. West 1880, S. 159 Fn. + 304, Fn. 3, 1892, S. 6 Fn.), auf den Dk 6 D8–9 referiert (Shaked 1979, S. 184–185), dem einer der Pahlavi Texts, S. 81f., zugeschrieben wird und vielleicht auch das Pandnāmag entstammt (Pahlavi Texts, S. 41ff.; s. mit Lit. Shaked 1979, S. 302). Nach Dk 3.137 gehört er der Zeit Yazdegird I an (s.a. Justi 895, S. 393).

Fallenlassen der Schultradition Lassen sich im Text des Pahlavi Yasna Haptaŋhāiti (PYH) aber Spuren eines Traditionsbruchs erkennen? Eine fundamentale Aufteilung des Zand kann nach dem Kriterium erfolgen, ob dieses die älteren (vermutlich der Sasanidenzeit zugehörigen) Gelehrten kennt, also die “drei Lehren (cāštag)” (zu diesen s. bes. Šnš 1.3), oder nicht. Das Kriterium läßt sich auch über das Zand hinaus anwenden: auch theologische Texte, die ohne Rekurs auf diese Lehrtradition auszukommen suchen, haben einen Traditionsbruch vollzogen, der sich offenbar im 9. Jh. zutrug. Da es zum allgemeinen Methodenunglück auch in der Iranistik gehört, das Augenmerk stets nur auf das Positive-Vorhandene zu richten, das Negative, Abwesende aber weitgehend zu vergessen, ist bis heute nicht aufgefallen, daß im Werk des Ādurfarrbay, insbesondere in Dk 3, die “drei cāštag” keine Erwähnung finden (stattdessen ubiquitär das ominöse “nigēz”), daß indes Jahrzehnte später Manušcihr in seinen Briefen, die wohl insgesamt von einer rückwärtsgewandten Tendenz geprägt sind, auf diese “drei cāštag” als verpflichtende Überlieferung pocht. Wie z.B. in Dk 3 erscheinen auch im Zand des Yasna Haptaŋhāiti (YH) keine Kommentatoren, im Zand von Yasna und Visparad lediglich aus den in Šnš 1.3 genannten Schulen der Kommentator Abarag (Y 65.9), sowie (bevorzugt im Hōm Yašt — vielleicht weil dessen Zand aus anderer Quelle stammt –) die Kommentatoren Māhwindād (Y 9.10, 10.18, 11.7, 19.11), Māhgōšasp (Y 9.10) und

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166 Götz König Dād-Ohrmazd (Y 10.18, 11.7). Die Abwesenheit von Kommentatoren teilt das Zand des Yasna mit dem des Xorde Avesta (auch in dessen älteren Teilen; eine Nennung des Abarag in PYt 1.10). Wenn also die PÜ Yasna nicht länger Ergebnis einer Bearbeitungsprozedur ist, in welcher offenbar eine wortwörtliche Übersetzung gemäß schulischen Vorgaben eine syntaktische Interpretation erhielt und mit erklärenden Bemerkungen versehen wurde, insgesamt also aus verschiedenen Händen/Strata sich fügte, sondern offenbar einer einheitlichen Genese entstammt, dann hat Zeini vollkommen recht, wenn er gegen ein nach der PÜ Vīdēvdād ausgerichtetes Analyse- und Darstellungsverfahren der syntaktischen Ergänzungen fragt: “The question is to what extent these additional words represent a secondary layer by a later hand.” (S. 15) Mein Eindruck ist, daß unter obiger Beobachtung auf die Annahme einer zweiten Hand verzichtet werden kann. Es ist, wie Zeini schreibt, wahrscheinlich, daß es dem Übersetzer freistand, gewisse Ergänzungen vorzunehmen, die dem “natural flow” und einer “scribal tradition” (16) entsprachen. (Man könnte die Richtigkeit der Annahme, das sei hier angemerkt, leicht überprüfen durch eine Analyse, wie Zand-Text in der Pahlavi-Literatur adaptiert wurde.) Allerdings kennt PYH auch eine ganze Reihe von Zusätzen, die gerade die Rede unterbrechen, und die traditionell mit kū markiert sind. Auch bei diesen hat Zeini die [ ] Markierung, wie sie seit dem 19. Jh. bei Parsen und Nicht-Parsen sich eingebürgert hat, fallengelassen. Zeinis wesentliches Argument diesbezüglich ist, daß es sich bei den Klammerungen um eine Praktik der Philologie des 19. Jh. handele “reflecting the time’s understanding of the originality of text and authorship” (S. 16). Dem mag zwar so sein, gleichwohl leisteten die Klammern m.E. stets eine gute Lesehilfe: was ist Übersetzung, was Explikation. Doch aus einem wesentlicheren Grund würde ich nicht auf die Einklammerungen zumindest der explikativen Glossen verzichten. Der Sog der oralen Perspektivierung alter Literatur hat in den vergangenen Jahrzehnten teilweise auch die mitteliranische Literatur erfaßt, obgleich diese doch bereits Epochen angehört, für die das Schreiben von Text jenseits der Dichtung konstitutiv war. Für die Pahlavi-Literatur kann nicht genug betont werden, daß deren wesentliche Texte sämtlich Autortexte sind und als solche zunächst behandelt werden sollten. Wie das Beispiel des ZWJ zeigt, wurden auch Kommentare zum Zand von einzelnen Autoren (der Name des Autors des ZWJ entzieht sich [noch] unserer Kenntnis, der Text aber redet von einem “Ich”) verfaßt. Nehmen wir nun einmal an, die PÜ Vīdēvdād ist das Ergebnis der Neuedition des Ādurbādischen Avesta im Rahmen von Xosrōs Konzil, welches sorgsam die Abweichungen der “drei cāštag” in den Text integrierte, so stäche hiervon das Pahlavi Yasna stark ab, und die Annahme liegt nahe, daß die PÜ Yasna nicht das Ergebnis jener Konzilredaktion ist. Sollte der Text also weitgehend aus einem Guß, einer Hand sein, so böte das Pahlavi Yasna gerade ein gutes Beispiel dafür, wie ein hoher Priester den Avestatext bzw. dessen Übersetzung verstanden wissen wollte. Ich glaube, daß uns die Einklammerung dabei hilft, nicht Stratifikations-, sondern Explikationsstufen zu erkennen. Der “Scholasticism” des Autors

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macht sich den mit den Sprachen Vertrauten in der Differenz von Avestatext und Pahlavi-Übersetzung kenntlich; die kū-Glossen aber lassen solche Differenzen ausdrücklich werden. Sie bieten uns Einblick in die explizite Theologie des Textes.

Reflexionen des Feuers: vom Fallenlassen meta-liturgischer Rede Zu welchem Zweck gibt es eine Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Yasna? Während die PÜ des Xorde Avesta dazu dient, obligate Gebetstexte den Laien zugänglich zu halten, ist eine Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Yasna praktisch unnötig.8 Die PÜ Vīdēvdād zeigt, daß bei Textausgaben zum nicht-liturgischen Gebrauch das Pahlavi Trägermedium für Reflexionen vornehmlich zur Klärung von Aussagen des Grundtextes ist. Betrachten wir indes die PÜ Yasna, so lösen sich in ihr, insbesondere im Falle des altavestischen Grundtextes, die Reflexionen von einer engen Textbindung und ziehen ins weite Feld der Theologie. Die PÜ Yasna ist damit in einem eminenteren Sinne als alle anderen Pahlavi-Übersetzungen ein, wie Zeini es nennt, “hermeneutic undertaking”, und damit, wie er dies ausdrückt, “a shift from ritual practice to perhaps a more organised form of religion and religiosity” (S. 4). Das (weitgehende) Absehen der PÜ Yasna Haptaŋhāiti vom rituellen Charakter des Grundtextes läßt sich beispielhaft an Y 36 demonstrieren. Y 36 ist im Grundtext vor allem ein Stück Ritual, Praxis — nach der 72er Zählung des Yasna dessen Mitte — ein zoroastrischer Zentraltext an das Feuer, und er hat zu vielen Spekulationen über das altavestische Feuerverständnis und über die jungavestische Ritualbildung Anlaß gegeben (s. dazu Zeini S. 69–72, 208–209).9 Es ließen sich also Texterweiterungen erwarten, die auf Praxis anspielen. Doch ist dies der Fall? Die Textexegese scheint eher einen anderen Weg einzuschlagen. a) Nach dem Ergebnis des Scholatizismus-Kapitel, das Zand als “hermeneutic undertaking” behandelt wissen zu wollen (s.o.), folgt in Kap. 4 “Fire in Zoroastrianism”, also die dieser Forderung gewidmete Falluntersuchung von 35 Seiten. Ihr ist Kristevas Satz “Any text is the absorption and transformation of another” vorangestellt, ein Kernsatz postmoderner Literaturtheorie. Zeini zeichnet darin sehr instruktiv nach, wie sich “Feuer” in den verschiedenen Textschichten zoroastrischer Literatur darstellt, welche Aspekte und systematischen Ordnungen 8 9

Auf Rezitationszwecke des Pahlavi Yasna weisen jedoch Angaben zur Strophenwiederholung, s. Zeini S. 273, 281. Ich möchte kurz darauf hinweisen, daß sich das YH grundsätzlich in zwei Verlaufsphasen scheidet: die Verehrungsphase Y 35–39, geprägt durch die 1.Pl., insbesondere yazamaidē.; die Forderungsphase Y 40–41 nə̄. dāidī. (Imp.Aorist) “Gib uns!”. In der ersten Verlaufsphase steht Y 36 insofern separiert, als in diesem Lied das Wort yazamaidē. ersetzt ist durch pairī.jasāmaidē. “laßt uns umschreiten/begrüßen”.

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168 Götz König zwischen den Texten entwickelt werden. (Mir scheint, daß diese materialreiche Darstellung der Geschichte des Feuers in Zukunft einmal einer parallel geführten Untersuchung bedarf: “Feuer” ist ja nicht nur begrifflich-literarischer Gegenstand, sondern Teil der sog. ‘materiellen Kultur’, ohne deren Referenzpunkt die Texte nur leeres Spiel wären: Hätte man nicht, vermutlich in nach-achämenidischer, vielleicht erst sasanidischer Zeit, die Opferfeuer in dauerhaften, für sich stehenden Gebäuden untergebracht — ein Rätsel ist bis heute der zentrale Tempel im medischen Nuš-e Jān —, damit eine allmähliche Trennung von Opfergaben stimuliert,10 so hätte der Zoroastrismus in einer Vielzahl von Aspekten samt seiner Textgeschichte einen ganz anderen Verlauf genommen.) In Zeinis Feuerkapitel geht der Nachverfolg des intertextuellen Prozesses von Y 36 aus und führt instruktiv über Y 17 zu dessen Zand und dann in Texte der Pahlavi-Literatur hinein. Beschrieben sind die fortwuchernden Spekulationen über bestimmte ‘mythische’ Aspekte des “Feuers des Ahura Mazdā” (Y 36.3), die Teilstücke der kosmographischen und naturwissenschaftlichen Theoriebildung werden. Dieser Nachverfolg ist jedoch stark von außen gesetzt, nicht eigentlich in der PÜ enthalten (ansonsten wäre in PY 36.3 ein Exkurs zum vāzišta-Feuer zu erwarten). b) Betrachten wir den (vom avestischen nicht unwesentlich abweichenden) Übersetzungstext PY 36.3 genauer, wobei ich zur besseren Übersicht Klammerungen setze: a) ātaxš pad ān ī ohrmazd [āgāh] ast [pad dēn ī ohrmazd ud] pad mēnōyīgīh [āgāh] ast [ān ka-š pad wahrāmīh be nišānēnd] / b) abzōnīg ast xwad tā ka ōy ī tō nām ciyōn ī wāzišt / c) [ō] ātaxš ī ohrmazd ī tō [pad ān ī harw dō] be rasom [kū-š hixr ī mēnōy ud gētīy aziš abāz dārom]11 (zur Übersetzung s. Zeini S. 139) 10 Noch zur Zeit der Komposition des Textes PRDd 18e20, welcher (zitierend einen älteren “Dastwar”) den Akt des pad warhrānīh be pādixšā nišāst mittels der Sammlung von “1001 Feuer” (hazār ud ēk ātaxš) kennt (vgl. die neuzeitliche Gründungszeremonie), dessen Datum ante durch MHD 94.3–6 gesetzt ist, wird dem Gläubigen anempfohlen, harw gāh ud gāhānbār zōhr ī pāk be tuwān dād “er könne zu jedem Gāh und zu jedem Gāhānbār ein reines Zōhr geben”. 11 Durch die Unterteilung der Haitī-Sektionen in Prosa-Verszeilen, die mit a, b, c markiert werden, kann der Leser sich ein Bild des Aufbaus der exegetischen Handschrift machen, der die Einteilungen entnommen sind (während die Übersetzung im Pahlavi Yasna dem Modell folgt, werden die Unterteilungen bei der Übersetzung des Avestatextes indes fallen gelassen). Da in der Forschung die Meinung überwiegt, daß das YH eher als Prosadenn als Versdichtung anzusehen sei, sind die Unterteilungen in den Handschriften von großem Wert: sie lassen zum einen die Prinzipien untersuchen, nach denen Priester ihren Rezitationstext periodisierten, zum anderen, wie sie ihn syntaktisch verstanden, schließlich, ob Rezitation und Auslegungsprozess einander deckungsgleich sind. Betrachten wir z.B. den Fall Y 36.3a–b (ātarš. vōi. mazdā ̊. ahurahiiā. ahī. maińiiuš. vōi. / ahiiā. spə̄ništō. ahī. “You are truly the fire of the Wise Lord. You are truly his most bounteous spirit.” (Zeini ) → ātaxš pad ān ī ohrmazd āgāh ast pad dēn ī ohrmazd ud pad mēnōyīgīh āgāh ast ān ka-š pad wahrāmīh be nišānēnd / abzōnīg ast xwad “The fire is knowledgeable in that which belongs to Ohrmazd, in the religion of Ohrmazd, and is knowledgeable in the mēnōy. It has that (knowledge) when they establish it as Wahrām

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In den Zusätzen fallen drei Momente auf: a) die Beziehung des Feuers auf “das Wissen des Ohrmazd” (ohrmazd āgāh); b) die Installation des Feuers pad wahrāmīh, c) die Bewahrung des Feuers vor hixr. Punkt a) scheint, vielleicht in Ausdeutung bereits der jungavestischen puϑra-Theologie, auf die kosmologische Idee anzuspielen, daß auch das Feuer zunächst als ein Geistiges existierte (s. PRDd 18d1 az wārom ud *menišn ī xwēš “[erschaffen] aus [Ohrmazds] eigenem Sinnen und Denken”); b) scheint auf den Gedanken der Wahrām-Konsekrierung als Transformation in die Stoffwelt zu verweisen (s. GrBd 18); c) weist auf die Reinerhaltungspflicht diesem transzendent-immanenten Feuer gegenüber. Punkt c) könnte indirekter Verweis auf das verschiedentlich in der zoroastrischen Literatur aufscheinende Motiv der Klage des Feuers vor Ohrmazd sein, nicht in die mit Bösem vermischte Stoffwelt hinabzusteigen, s. dazu etwa den Kommentar des Sūdgar Nask zu Y 36 in Dk 9.12.2ff., vgl. PRDd 18d, ṢDB 18. Ob die Momente der kosmologischen Verortung und des Reinheitsproblems vom Zand Y 36 erst entwickelt sind, halte ich für zweifelhaft; wahrscheinlicher ist, daß PYH hier (nach Kristevas Terminologie) ‘absorbierender’ Text ist. Bezüglich der These eines Desinteresses des PYH an der rituell-performativen Dimension des Yasna ist Punkt b) etwas weiter zu verfolgen. Enthält die Glosse ān ka-š pad wahrāmīh be nišānēnd “soweit/wenn sie es (das zum Wissen des Ohrmazd gehörende Feuer) als Wahrām (pad wahrāmīh)12 installieren” eifire. Bountiful it is indeed, …” [Zeini]), dann erkennen wir, daß in der Übersetzung und Explikation das zusammengehörige maińiiuš. … spə̄ništō. offenbar auseinandergerissen wird. Ein ähnlicher Fall ist PY 38.4 (s. dazu Zeini S. 258). 12 Boyce (1968a, S. 58–64; 1982, S. 223; 1987, S. 2; vgl. noch 1968b, S. 288f.; vgl. Stausberg 2004, S. 137, bleibt schwankend [“siegreich bzw. als Wahrām-Feuer”]) war vermutlich fälschlicherweise der Auffassung, der Ausdruck pad warhrānīh/wahrāmīh habe die Bedeutung “in Sieghaftigkeit”. Die Pahlavi-Literatur zeigt an, daß der Akt einer Feuerkonsekrierung pad warhrānīh/wahrāmīh zu der Installation eingehauster großer Feuer führt. Diese Feuer (Ādur Farrbay etc.) sind ō/pad dādgāh nišāst (s. GrBd 18.10,12,13f.; vgl. IndBd 17; Patit Xwad 5). Die Installation erfolgt (GrBd 18.16) ka 1000 ātaxš ī gētīg ō ān ēk kunēnd ud ud pad ān nērang ī paydāg zōhr kunēnd. Ihr Sinn besteht darin, ein ādurōg “Feuerbrand”, handelt es sich nun um ādurān ud ātaxšān (Patit Xwad 5), mit der Wahrām-Weihe zu behandeln: ud ka-š hazār ud ēk ātaxš be cīd pad ān zamān pad warhrānīh be pādixšā nišāst “Und wenn man 1001 Feuer gesammelt und dann als Warhrān-Feuer gesetzmäßig installiert hat” (PRDd 18e20). Der Ausdruck des “ō dādgāh” kann, wie gesehen, verändert vorliegen (be pādixšā). In GrBd 33.28, das von Pēšyōtan ī Wištāspāns Ersetzung von Götzen durch Feuertempel erzählt, finden wir ātaxš ī wahrān pad gōharīg nišānēd “er installiert das Wahrām-Feuer ‘substantiell’ (= dauerhaft?)” (vgl. dazu wie auch zu GrBd 18.16 die historische Praxis, wie sie MHD 94.3–6 beschreibt). MHD, das als Rechtstext näher zur historischen Wirklichkeit als z.B. das Bundahišn steht, erweitert die Formel zu (ādurōg … kē) pad warhrānīh ō dādgāh nišāst (s. MHD 26.17–27.1, 27.5–9, MHD 94.3–6, MHD 110.5–11), die wiederum verkürzt sein kann zu warhrānīh … be nišāst (PRDd 46.34–35). PRDd 18d19 erzählt, wie die Amahraspanden dem Ohrmazd raten: ātaxš stān u-š pad warhrānīh andar mān nišān “Nimm das (immaterielle) Feuer und installiere es pad warhrānīh im Haus/Tempel!” (was zur Installation des Ādur Guš(n)asp führt).

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170 Götz König nen Hinweis auf Praxis? Die Antwort muß lauten: tatsächlich nur indirekt. Bekanntlich werden besonders konsekrierte Feuer als Wahrām-Feuer bezeichnet. Bis heute ist es weder gelungen, die Wahl des Wahrām-Namens für diese Feuer, noch die historische Genese dieser Feuer (deren erste Erwähnungen in den sasanidischen Inschriften des 3. Jh. zu finden sind, welche auch die Konzeption eines im Himmel möglicherweise “gegründeten” [nišast] “Wahrām” kennen, s. KNRm 71, KSM 49) überzeugend zu klären. Sie sind jedoch seit der Pahlavi-Literatur wie dann im 2. Jt. prägend. Auch wenn sich aus der Feuerreinigungsliste V 8 implizit ergibt, daß es reine Feuer “am gesetzlichen Ort” in der Antike gegeben haben muß (und d.h. auch: Feuer ohne weiteren praktischen Gebrauch, auch den des Opfers) — von der PÜ als Wahrām-Feuer bestimmt —, so ist von einem Vərəϑraγna/vərəϑragan-Feuer im Avesta keine Rede. Wenn im Zand also vom Wahrām-Feuer gesprochen wird, so kann dies nur jenseits der eigentlichen Übersetzung geschehen.13 Im YH entspricht dem PÜ-Ausdruck vom ‘Feuer im Wissen des Ohrmazd, installiert als Wahrām’ die schlichte Formel ātarš. mazdā .̊ ahurahiiā., der im Jungavesta fortgebildet ist zum (tauua-) ātar- puϑra- ahurahe. mazdā.̊ 14 Nun steht in auffälligem Gegensatz zu PHY 36.3, daß die PÜ des jungavestischen Ausdrucks zur Bezeichnung des Feuers dieses niemals als das der Wahrāme bestimmt15 — ich vermute, weil die Trennung von Yasna-Ritual und Kammer zur Zeit der PÜ Yasna funktional bereits vollzogen, und nicht jedes Feuer, an dem Yasna geübt wurde, ein Wahrām-Feuer war. Wenn also PYH 36.3 von der Wahrām-Installation redet, so nicht, weil das “Feuer des Ohrmazd” in PY 36 notwendig mit einem Wahrām zu tun hat, sondern weil die Wahrām-Theologie auch den geistigen Horizont der Yasna-Reflexion erobert hat. Dieses nur intellektuelle Verweisspiel differiert übrigens merklich von Ny 5, dem einzigen Text jenseits von Yasna/ Visparad, welcher signifikant die Formel vom ātar- puϑra- ahurahe. mazdā .̊ verwendet. Unter den Mss. U1, U3, D findet sich ein vorgeschalteter Passus (PNy 5.0), der das verehrte Feuer als ātaxš/ādurīh Warharām/Bahrām ādur wuzurg/ bozurg anruft. Auch in dem in einigen jungen indischen Hss. angehängten RōzMāh (PNy 5.18) (MR=T10; A=T11; U2, U3, D) begegnet die Wahrām-Anrufung aus PNy 5.0, gefolgt von der Liste der: ādurān pāduxšā pērōzgar ādur Gušasp ud 13 Im PV begegnen Hinweise auf das (die) Wahrām-/Warharān-Feuer nur in einigen Kommentaren: so in PV 5.4, wo es im Kontrast zum Feuer “des Feuerhauses” (ātaxš ī kadag) steht; in den Exkursen zum Feuer bzw. zur Feuerreinigung V 8.74ff. mit der Identifizierung des “gesetzlichen Platzes” (des Feuers) (V 8.81 [vgl. dazu PNy 5.18]) als Platz des Warharān; PV 5.51 zur Asche des Warharān-Feuers (vgl. N 40.17). Siehe noch N 47.16. 14 Siehe die beiden Formeln Y 0.2 āϑrō. ahurahe. mazdā ̊. puϑrahe., tauua. ātarš. puϑra. ahurahe. mazdā ̊. 15 Bemerkenswert aber ist in Šnš 13.26 nach dem Referat des YH der Hinweis auf Vr 16.1 ātrәmca. mit der Bemerkung: 2 bār stāyišn ī Ādur ī Farnbag ud Ātaxš ī Wāzišt rāy “mit doppelter Darbringung bei dem Ādur ī Farnbag und dem Ātaxš ī Wāzišt”: das Ādur ī Farnbag war das Reichsfeuer der Persis und als Wahrām installiert. Die Glosse ist ohne Parallele im PVr.

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ādur Xurdad ud ādur Burzēnmihr ud abārīg ādorān ud ātaxšān kē pad dādgāh nišānistag estēd … Mēnōy-Karkū. Diese Zusätze weisen darauf hin, daß man Ny 5 offenbar als Verehrungstext für die Wahrāme verstanden wissen wollte. Allerdings sind die Handschriften sämtlich indisch und jung.

Tendenzen der Interpretation Liegt nun die Pointe der PÜ Yasna, insbesondere der PÜ der altavestischen Texte, darin, den Grundtext als zu entfaltende Theologie (und nicht als zu kommentierende Praxis) zu verstehen — eine Haltung dem Text gegenüber, die auch Nicht-Parsen fast stets den Gāϑās gegenüber geübt haben —, so fragt es sich, welche inhaltlichen Grundzüge die von der PÜ geleistete Hermeneutik dirigieren. Vor 25 Jahren hat Shaked (1996) einen solchen generellen Zug des Zand des Yasna in der eschatologischen Gāϑā-Interpretation finden wollen, auch wenn sich diesbezüglich die alte Frage stellt, wie eschatologisch die Gāϑās ‘selbst’ sind, d.h. zumindest deren jungavestische ‘Edition’, und möglicherweise jene Autoren Recht haben könnten, die die Differenz für nicht bedeutend ansehen (zur Diskussion Zeini S. 291f.). Ein Fundstück Zeinis, welches man Shakeds Sichtweise angliedern könnte, ist die Beobachtung, daß das Zand fast aller auf das Feuer referierenden Gāϑā-Passagen einen Konnex zum “judgement” herstellen (Zeini S. 77). Wenn Zeini, S. 4, schreibt: “in the Zand the fire is the agent that will grant the requested reward to the participants of the ritual”, so wäre zu ergänzen, daß das Modell des Do-Ut-Des zwar ebenso für das Avesta gilt, daß aber der einst erwartete Lohn, z.B. das Futter für die Tiere, damit die eigene Speise, nun vollständig transzendiert wird. Tatsächlich hatte Boyce in Studien zu Miϑra16, m.E. jedoch ohne starke Argumente, das Feuer bereits im Avesta vor allem im richtenden Kontext betrachtet wissen wollen. Die Tatsache, daß es gerade die Gāϑās sind, welche doch angeblich kritisch zu Miϑra stehen, die das Feuer in die Perspektive von Gericht und Heil stellen, spricht weniger für ungebrochene Tradition, denn für sekundäre Interpretation. Um nun den scholastischen Charakter des PYH herauszuarbeiten, sind m.E., um bei Kristevas Begriffen der Absorption und Transformation zu bleiben, zwei Wege zu gehen: die Untersuchung der Transformation verwendeten Textes (also vor allem des Avesta-Textes), und die der Absorption anderer Texte. Als diese “anderen Texte” wären vor allem solche der weiteren Pahlavi-Literatur zu verstehen. Da Zeini von einem linearen Modell Avesta → Zand → PahlaviLiteratur ausgeht, bleibt eine Untersuchung der Frage, ob nicht das PYH Diskurse der Pahlavi-Literatur absorbiert, z.B. von Kommentaren, wie sie Dk 9 überliefert, abhängt, ausgeschlossen. So fällt alles Gewicht der Analyse auf die des Verhältnisses von Avesta- und Zand-Text. Um die Schwierigkeiten der Ana16 Boyce 1969; 1975.

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172 Götz König lyse, die aus ihr erwachsenden interpretatorischen Möglichkeiten und Risiken zu demonstrieren, möchte ich abschließend auf zwei Probleme im von Zeini als Y 35.0 (früher: Y 35.1) geführten Text eingehen, die vom Autor entweder berührt, aber offengelassen, oder aber nicht diskutiert werden. In diesem Text scheint es nämlich zu einer ganz eigentümlichen Verdrehung der Verhältnisse gekommen zu sein: Das avestische vīspąm. aṣ̌a ōnō. stīm. yazamaide. “laßt uns opfernd verehren das gesamte Dasein des Aṣ̌ahaften” wird übersetzt mit harwisp ān ī ahlawān stī yazom, was scheinbar meint: “ich verehre opfernd das gesamte Dasein der Ahlawhaften” (s. Zeini S. 126).

Zwei Fallstricke des Pahlavi: Eine Wendung zum Ich? Zeinis erstes diskutiertes Wort ist pahl. yazom (S. 173–175), welches in der PÜ für das nach Hunderten im Yasna zählende yazamaide “wie verehren (ein Opfer darbringend)” steht. Diese 1.Pl. yazamaide bildet nicht nur die allgemeine Strukturklammer des YH, welche diesen Text für das Jungavesta literarisch wegweisend macht, sondern fächert sich in eine Vielzahl weiterer Verben in 1.Pl. semantisch auf. Sind die Gāϑās ein ‘Ich-Text’ (auch wenn teilweise das Ich mit dem Wir alterniert), so ist im YH dieses “ich” = Ich nahezu gelöscht: ein “wir” (vermutlich von Priestern) wendet sich an die Gottheit(en), deren Objekt das Wir (“uns”) wiederum ist. Die Übersetzung yazamaide → yazom hat, weil sie eine 1.Pl.(med.) scheinbar singularisch wiedergibt, ob des konstitutiven Wir-Charakters des YH stets verwundert. Die Tendenz, Plural- (scheinbar) als Singularformen zu übersetzen, ist nicht auf das yaz-Wort beschränkt, sondern zeigt sich im gesamten YH, einige Beispiele: pairijasāmaidē. → be rasom (Y 36.4(5), 5(6), 39.5); āuuaēdaiiamahi.→ niwēyēnišn dahom (Y 36.6(7), 41.1; zur PÜ Zeini S. 215f.); mit Wendung auf 2./3. Person: (friiąmahī.) … nəmax́iiāmahī. … išūidiiāmahī. → niyāyišnēnē … abāmēnē, franāmād … niyāyišnēnād … abāmēnād, (Y 36.5(6), 38.4, 39.417; zur PÜ Zeini S. 210f.), also “laßt uns” > “du mögest/er möge” (zur Wiedergabe 1.Pl. adhortativ s.u.); zu 1.Pl.Opt. x́iiāmā. (Y 40.4) → hād (3.Sg.Konj.) s. Zeini S. 194. In Y 38.2 korrespondiert yaz → yazom mit einer Formulierung ā-m dahēd “may you … give me”. In Y 41.4a werden die schwierigen Formen hanaēmācā. zaēmācā. (Zeini: zəmācā.) tatsächlich als Verbalformen erkannt und ebenfalls singularisch mit Bezug auf ein “ich” übersetzt (arzānīgēnē-m … zēnāwandēnē …); wo indes Personalpronomen begegnen, werden diese nicht im Numerus versetzt: Y 41.4c tū.nə̄. → tō 17 Zu abāmēn- (ābāmēn-?) s. Zeini S. 210f.

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ō amā … ā-mān dahē). Das YH scheint in seiner Übersetzung also zu einem ‘Ich-Text’ geworden zu sein. Sollte pahl. yazom ausschließlich für eine 1.Sg. stehen, so würde dies auf eine tiefe Wandlung im Verständnis des Rituals, des Gottesbezugs, der Selbstwahrnehmung hinweisen. Daß es eine solche Wendung zum Ich als generelle Tendenz durchaus gab, darauf deutet z.B. die Beliebtheit der Monāǧāt-Form besonders im indischen Xorde Avesta hin, vielleicht auch das Absterben einer Yašt-Zelebration im Priesterkollektiv mit Nērang, wie sie ZWY 7.24 noch kennt, und das Überleben von Yašts ausschließlich als Gebet. Doch es stellt sich die Frage nach dem Ausmaß dieser Wendung, d.h. philologisch konkret: die Frage, ob es sich bei yazom (stets) um eine 1.Sg. handelt. Obgleich Zeini auf die SÜ ārādhaye (1.Sg.med.) hinweist, die positiv in diese Richtung zeigt, will er die Frage offenhalten: das im IndPY und IrPY gleichermaßen bezeugte ycwm könnte auch repräsentieren “an older stage of the language in which yazom would have been a 1pl” (S. 175). Eine nähere Erläuterung wird jedoch nicht geben.18 Mir scheint nun vielmehr, daß die in Frage stehende Form eher aus späterer Zeit sich herleitet. Im (Pahlavi-)Vīdēvdād finden sich nur sehr wenige Belege von yazamaide: einmal im Text der PÜ V 2.5 und zweimal in V 11.5/6. In PV 2.5 gibt L4 yazamaidi. (fol 13 r 2) mit yzm oder yzym (fol 13 r 3), in V 11 yazamaide. mit (üblicherem) ycm19, in K1 fol. 136 r 4 ideographisch mit YDBHWNm wieder. Im Nērangestān finden sich wohl nur zwei Belege yazamaide. mit PÜ, in N 52.6 → yazēd, N 52.7 → yazād, Wiedergaben (mittels Optativ-, Konjunktiv-Formen) eines Adhortativs20 mit auffälliger Versetzung in den Singular (“man”?). In den Listen des FP der Verbalideogramme, deren mittelpersischen Entsprechungen und der Pāzand-Merkaussprache in FP Kap. 18–23 (K25 fol. 60 r 7 ff.), da Infinitiv sowie Präsensformen in -yt(‘) und -ym (?) gegeben werden — Formen, die man offenbar als hinreichend zum Ausdruck aller gängigen Personalendungen ansah —, wird vom Pāzand -yt‘ durch -īt̰, -ym21 (?) jedoch durch -əm wiedergegeben. 18 Das Problem besteht darin, daß durch die Restriktion von yaz- auf das Medium kaum Möglichkeiten der Erklärung geboten werden. Man könnte etwa annehmen, ycm sei ein altes Pahlavi-Kürzel (aus einer Pahlavi-Umschrift des Avesta) für yazamaide (gesprochen yaz(a)m > yazəm [yazom]), so wie yaz oder yaza das Wort in Avestahandschriften abkürzen. 19 Vgl. die Parallele im ZFJ yazom ēn zamīg mādagān TD2, S. 652. 20 Im Jungavesta findet sich die Asymmetrie, daß die 1.Pl. im Indikativ auftritt, die 1.Sg. aber fast immer im Konjunktiv (yazāi.). Unter dem Eindruck der aufgeführten Übersetzungen im Nērangestān schlage ich vor, die 1.Pl. weit häufiger als üblicherweise getan, adhortativ zu übersetzen, was die Asymmetrie aufhöbe (“laßt uns verehren” — “ich will verehren”). Im Yasna wird übrigens Konj. yazāi ebenfalls mit ycm, ycwm, YDBHWNm wiedergegeben (vgl. FO4g274). 21 So bei Utas 1988, MacKenzie 2000. In den Pahlavi-Büchern ist die Bezeugung von yazēm generell unsicher. In der Pahlavi-Literatur gibt es eine Reihe von Stellen, die yazam mit einer Einzahl verbinden, keines, wo sicher ein Kollektiv anzunehmen ist. Häufig bezeugt sind jedoch Plurale in 3.Pers. (yazēnd, -šān yašt).

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174 Götz König

Fig. 1. K25 fol. 62 v 9ff. Betrachtet man die Pahlaviendung der 1. Pers. näher, so fällt hier (wie durchgehend) die Differenz zur Schreibung des y in -yt(‘) auf. Die Merksprache war yazbahōnəm bzw. yazəm. Die genaue Aussprache von pāz. ə ist (wie auch die von av. ə) schwierig zu bestimmen und scheint u.a. nach lautlicher Umgebung zu schwanken. Vor /m/ scheint ə eher dunkel gefärbt zu sein, man siehe z.B. pahl. -twm (mmp. -dwm), av. -təma- (Nom.m. -təmō), ap. -tama; pahl. wārom < av. vārəm(a), vgl. ai. váram. Von solcher Färbung mag wiederum Pahlavi -wm ein Zeuge sein. So scheint es in der Tat, daß auf der Ebene philologischer Analyse keine eindeutige Antwort auf die Frage gegeben werden kann, ob yazom = yazəm nicht nur für die 1.Sg.Ind. (so die Interpretation der SÜ), sondern auch für die 1.Pl. stehen kann. Vermutlich wird man das Problem in einer weit umfänglicheren, sozio-linguistischen Untersuchung zur Verwendung von “ich” und “wir” in Iran/Indien, spezifisch im Zoroastrismus, angehen müssen.22

22 Mein zerstreuter Eindruck ist, daß Sg./Pl. der Person oft der festen Grenzziehung entbehrt. Ein Beispiel aus dem PYH: Anrede des Ohrmazd mit -tān in PY 40.1a (zu ašmā als Referenz auf Ohrmazd s. Zeini S. 200), doch tō in PY 40.1b. Vielleicht läßt sich soviel sagen, daß wir in Iran zum einen auf ein “starkes” Ich (des Mächtigen) stoßen (s. das initiale “adam” des Darius, “an” des Kirdīr), das in der Absorption der von ihm Beherrschten zum “Wir” sich ausweitet; zum anderen aber auf ein ‘schwaches Ich’ (wie im Falle des man ī dēn-bondag/man dīn-bande der Kolophone), das die Tendenz hat, sich als Teil einer Gruppe zu verstehen.

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Eine Wendung zu den Gläubigen? Die oben aufgeführten Verbalformen zeigen, daß zwischen Quell- und Zieltext auffällige Differenzen im Numerus begegnen. Solche Numerus-Unterschiede begegnen auch bei Substantiven. So läßt sich eine Tendenz zur Ersetzung avestischer unbelebter Plurale durch kollektiven Singular beobachten (s. dazu Zeini S. 232), wie m.E. auch die umgekehrte Tendenz bei Belebten (s. Fn. 24; s.a. Y 46.11, 32.5 maṣ̌īm. → mardōmān). Vorderhand könnte man auch Y 35.0b (Y 35.1) (vīspąm. aṣ̌aōnō. stīm. yazamaide. maińiiəuuīmcā. gaēϑiiąmcā. “We worship the entire spiritual and material existence of the truthful one” [Zeini] → harwisp ān ī ahlawān stī yazom kē mēnōy ud kē-iz gētīy “I worship the entire existence of the righteous ones, which is both mēnōy and also gētīy” [Zeini]), welches das erste im Kapitel 20.1 “Reflections on the Zand” behandelte Übersetzungsbeispiel ist, im Licht dieser Wandlungen betrachten. Zeini ist der Meinung, eine strenge Wort-fürWort Übersetzung der avestischen Zeile müsse lauten: harwisp ahlawān stī yazom mēnōy ud gētīy. (was einer Übersetzung entspräche, wie sie die oft in Handschriften eingefügten Interlinearübersetzungen geben könnten). Mir scheint jedoch, daß eine Übersetzung ohne die kleinen Wörter, welche im Pahlavi ja die syntaktischen Relationen ausdrücken, die im Avestischen morphologisch kodiert sind, nicht nur sinnentstellend wäre — “das Dasein aller Ahlawhaften”, nicht “das gesamte Dasein der Ahlawhaften” wäre dann verehrt —, sondern, folgen wir Zeinis Übersetzung, zu einer Ersetzung der Gottheit durch die Gläubigen führen würde. Tatsächlich ist eine solche Ersetzung im theologischen Denken seit dem Jungavesta und dessen Entwicklung mit der Akzentuierung des universal-historischen Aspekts keineswegs ganz abwegig. Hinweisen möchte ich auf eine Passage in Yt 19.53, die in Yt 19 eine Wendestelle darstellt. Nachdem der Text von dem (gestaffelten) Pantheon zu den Herrschern über die “siebenteilige Erde” übergegangen ist, schließlich die Zerteilung des xvarənah erwähnt hat, heißt es Yt 19.53: āat̰. vō. kascit̰. maṣ̌iiānąm. uiti. mraōt̰. ahurō. mazdā .̊ āi. aš ̣āum. zaraϑuštra. xᵛarənō. axᵛarətəm. isaēta. Da möge ein jeder der Menschen, so sprach Ahura Mazdā, o seliger Zaraϑuštra, das xvarənah axᵛarəta zu erlangen suchen!

Es folgt eine “historische Großaufnahme” — Zaraϑuštras Kampf mit Fraŋrasiian (s. Karde VIII) und die Beschreibung der Helmand-Region (Karde IX) —, die über die Kauui-Geschichte zum universalhistorischen Bild der Heilands-Zeit führt. Damit ist nicht nur das Gewicht von den Weltenherrschern auf die “Menschen” verschoben, sondern das später wichtige Motiv, daß die Rettung der Welt nicht von Gott, sondern seinen Geschöpfen abhängt, hier schon vorbereitet.

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176 Götz König Der eigentlich heikle Punkt der Übersetzung scheint mir darum nicht in den kleinen Wörtern zu liegen, sondern in der Wiedergabe des (auf Ahura Mazdā verweisenden, possessiven) Gen.Sg. aṣ̌aōnō. mittels des (scheinbaren) Plurals ahlawān, welcher auf die Geschöpfe jenes Ahlawhaften Gottes referiert. Die Formel vīspā- aṣ̌aōnō. sti- findet sich vielfach (meist im Yasna) belegt (AIrWb 1592f.), die Übersetzung lautet stets (harwisp) ān ī ahlawān stī Y 11.15 = Y 52.8 (vgl. Y 61.5 vīspaiiā .̊ druuatō. stōiš. → ān ī druwandān stī). Die Formel ist auch in der Literatur des 9. Jh. verbreitet: im Kommentartext Dk 9 (Dk 9.19.9 harwist ān ī ahlawān stī; Dk 9.37.5 ān ī ahlawān stī)23, vermutlich auch in GrBd 29.3 Zarduxšt ēn kišwar ī Xwanīrah harwisp-iz ahlawān stī rad. Im Avesta-Pahlavi-Wörterbuch wird die Formel FO 26.728 cat̰ca aṣ̌aonō stōiš → cēgām-iz ēw ān ī ahlawān stī mit der grammatikalischen Erläuterung versehen: harw kas ēw rāy guftag “für alle Personen zu verwenden”. Es findet sich tatsächlich kein Beleg *harwisp-iz ahlaw stīy*. Ich vermute darum, daß ahlawān nicht Pluralform ist, sondern für einen Singular steht (s. die Übersetzung von Dhabhar 1963 von Yt 1.21),24 entweder mittels Bildung eines Zugehörigkeitssuffixes (av. -āna-) oder eines Obliquus Sg. aus generalisiertem Akk.Sg. ap. (?) *ạrtāvānam > *ạrtāvān unter weiterem Einfluß des av. LW ahlaw. Eine analoge -ān-Formulierung im AWN beweist den singularischen Charakter von ahlawān: AWN 4.10(21) ud pursīd ān ī ahlawān ruwān az ān kanīg kū “Und es fragte des Seligen Seele vom Mädchen:”.

* Mit Zeinis Buch ist ein Neuanfang in den Studien zum Zand begründet, dessen Ansatz zugleich eine Neubetrachtung des Verhältnisses von Avesta, Zand und Pahlavi-Literatur fordert. Der von Zeini gewählte Begriff des “Scholasticism”, einstweilen unter Anleitung eines disziplinfremden Werkes skizziert, scheint mir die Forderung nach einer methodischen Beschreibung jenes Verhältnisses zu chiffrieren, und zwar derart, daß dem Zand des (altavestischen) Yasna, und wohl diesem Zand allein, die zentrale Vermittlung eines Ritualtextes und seiner gelehrten Reflexion zukommt, die diesen zum wesentlichen Objekt der Theologie transzendiert (wie dies Dk 9 zeigt). Zwar habe ich den Eindruck, daß Zeinis vorgelegte Studie noch zu stark in einem linearen, vom Abstammungsdenken geleiteten Textdiskurs steht, auf dessen Kritik sie doch letztlich geht, doch weist das Buch eben in dieser Kritik bereits über solchen hinaus. Die Datierungsfrage sollte m.E. noch einmal stärker in den Blick genommen werden. Zwar könnte ein Text wie PYH im “Register”, wie oben ausgeführt, dem spätantiken Redemodus der Hohepriester entsprechen, und doch wird zur inhaltlichen Beurteilung von Bedeutung sein, ob der Text vor dem Traditionsbruch der zoroastrischen Gei23 In den Vergleichsfällen Dk 9.30.7 ān ī gētīyān stī und Dk 9.30.9 ān ī mardōmān axwān dürften Plurale übersetzt sein. 24 Zur Übersetzung eines Dat./Gen.Sg. durch scheinbaren Plural s. Y 35.3(4) gauuōi., Y 35.6(7), 39.1 gə̄uš → gōspandān; aber Akk. gąm → gōspand Y 37.1.

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stesgeschichte im 7./8. Jh. entstand, oder ob ihm eine Geist- und Weltverfassung, die man als die “spätantike” überschreiben mag, nur als eine schon vergangene, lediglich erinnerte zukommt.

Bibliographie Boyce, M. 1968a: ”On the Sacred Fires of the Zoroastrians.” In: BSOAS 31, pp. 52–68. — 1968b: “The Pious Foundations of the Zoroastrians.” In: BSOAS 31, pp. 270–289. — 1969: “On Mithra’s part in Zoroastrianism.” In: BSOAS 32, pp. 10–34. — 1975: “On Mithra, Lord of Fire.” In: Monumentum H.S. Nyberg I (AcIr 4), pp. 69–78. — 1982: A History of Zoroastrianism. Vol. 2. Under the Achaemenians. Leiden. — 1987: “Ātaš.” In: EIr Vol. II, Fasc. 1, pp. 1–5. Cantera, A. 1999: “Die Stellung der Sprache der Pahlavi-Übersetzung des Avesta innerhalb des Mittelpersischen.” In: StIr 28, pp. 173–204. Cantera, A./M. de Vaan 2005: “The colophon of the Avestan manuscripts Pt4 and Mf4.” In: StIr 34, pp. 31–42. Justi, F. 1895: Iranisches Namenbuch. Marburg. MacKenzie, D. N. 2000: “Frahang i Pahlawīg.” In: EIr Vol. X, Fasc. 2, pp. 123–125. Shaked, Sh. 1979: The Wisdom of the Sasanian Sages. (Dēnkard VI) by Aturpāt-i Ēmētān. Boulder. — 1996: “The Traditional Commentary of the Avesta (Zand): Translation, Interpretation, Distortion?” In: La Persia e l‘Asia Centrale da Alessandro al X Secolo, pp. 641–656. Stausberg, M. 2004: Die Religion Zarathushtras. Geschichte – Gegenwart – Rituale (Bd. 3). Stuttgart. Utas, B. 1988: Frahang i Pahlavīk. Edited with transliteration, transcription and commentary from the posthumous papers of Henrik Samual Nyberg. Wiesbaden. West, E. W. 1880: Pahlavi Texts. Part I: The Bundahis-Bahman Yast, and Shāyast lāShāyast (SBE 5). Oxford. — 1892: Pahlavi Texts. Part IV: Contents of the Nasks (SBE 37). Oxford. Zeini, A. 2020: Zoroastrian Scholasticism in Late Antiquity. The Pahlavi version of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti. Edinburgh.

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‘Ganymede and the Eagle’:

Representations of Spiritual Ascent in the Greater Iranian World from Late Antiquity to the Medieval Period Sara Kuehn From time immemorial humans have tried to communicate with the world beyond, attempting to link the immediate, temporal world with the universe and eternity in order to acquire the spiritual vision during their lives. In Die Himmelsreise der Seele (The Ascent of the Soul to the Heaven), published over one hundred years ago, the German theologian W. Bousset (1865–1920) points out that there is always a relation between visionary journeys to heaven and the supposed journey of the soul after death.1 This, in turn, is always related to mythical cosmologies. Ritual pathways for the ascent of the soul, a characteristic expression of Zoroastrian piety, often arose during times of crisis when the traditional understanding of the universe came into question. The literature of the Sasanian period informs us of methods used in order to achieve certainty in faith, which involved such journeys and visions along with a return or descent, experiences which were often triggered by narcotics. Both in the ancient Vedic rites of India and in the rites preserved by the surviving representatives of the ancient Iranian religion, the Zoroastrians, a ritual potion (Ved. sōma, Av. haoma) appears as a central element.2 The sacred haoma plant was thereby regarded as chief among the medicinal herbs.3 The drink, made of the haoma seed, intoxicated the drinker and imbued him or her with heightened divine powers and mantic wisdom.4 It is believed that the use of this intoxicant arose among speakers of Proto-Indo-Iranian while they were living somewhere within the area of 1 2 3

4

Bousset 1960, pp. 156–157. According to ṚgVeda panegyrics, the imbibing of extracts of the sōma plant induced a state of “ecstasy.” Flattery/Schwartz 1989, p. 7, §11, see however also the caveat in n. 8. Cf. Barnett 1928, p. 706. Boyce 1975, p. 161. Flattery has demonstrated that the weed harmel or wild rue (Peganum harmala L. (Zygophyllaceae) which grows in the Central Asian steppes and the Iranian Plateau was the original intoxicant plant identified in the Iranian religious tradition by the term haoma (Flattery/Schwartz 1989). Boyce 1975, pp. 158–159.

Sasanian Studies | Sasanidische Studien. Vol. I (2022). Ed. by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee doi: 10.13173/SSt.1.179

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Central Asia, that has been predominantly Iranian in culture from the earliest period of recorded history.5 According to tradition, Zoroaster,6 as well as his legendary disciples king Vištāsp7 and the wise minister Jāmāsp, experienced visions and ecstasies (from Gr. ekstasis, literally meaning “to be placed outside,” “to be displaced”), regarded as the separation of the soul from the body. Other examples of such visions include the heavenly ascent and descent undertaken by the highly influential third-century Zoroastrian high priest Kirdīr.8 He undertook the quest for the gods to show him personally, in bodily life, the truth of the anticipated celestial journey of the soul after death. His visionary account is documented by four monumental stone inscriptions written about 300 ce. Kirdīr underwent this ordeal in a condition outwardly resembling sleep, in which specific visions of what was believed to be a spirit existence were pursued. It is probable that Kirdīr, like Zoroaster, used narcotic means to achieve his vision.9 A comparable voyage is described in the much later fictional Ardā Wīrāz Nāmag (Book of the Righteous Wīrāz). This text, as it has come down to us, was probably written in the ninth century10 but there are some reasons to believe that its original composition may go back to some time before the third-century establishment of the Sasanian dynasty, a time when Zoroastrianism was facing many challenges.11 The journey of the pious Wīrāz was a ‘round-trip’ involving both ascent and descent and his is the most detailed surviving narration of intoxication for religious purposes. After having undergone purification rituals, a drug called the ‘mang of Vishtāsp’12 was administered to the protagonist, providing the means by which his soul was released. He remained asleep for seven days and seven nights and during this time went ‘to the other world.’13 When he awoke,14 he gave the assembly of priests an account of his pharmacologicallyPowered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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5 6 7 8 9

10 11 12 13

14

Flattery/Schwartz 1989, p. 10, §18. For a discussion of other cross-cultural contexts of drug-induced ‘afterlife journeys’ in early civilisations, see Shushan 2011, ch. 10. Bahman Yašt 4. 1–66; 5. 1–10; 6. 1–13; 7. 1–39; 8. 1–8 and 9. 1b–8; Bundahišn 34. 4–5; Dēnkard 8. 8.22, 23–31, 32–43, 51–59, 9.6, 10.11 and 14.13. The Avestan Kavi Vīštāspa was given the illuminating beverage hōm and mang (Pahl.; hemp) when he accepted Zoroaster’s teachings (Dēnkard 7.4.84–86). Gignoux 1984, pp. 191–206; Skjævrø 1983, pp. 269–306. Gignoux (1981, p. 258; cf. 2001, p. 73) proposes that Kirdīr, like Ardā Wīrāz, may have used a drug to go into trance. Cf. Grenet 2002, p. 18; Flattery/Schwartz 1989, p. 23, §34. For a more cautious stance on this hypothesis, see Skjævrø 1983, pp. 269–306, especially pp. 291–292. Ardā Wīrāz-nāmag, 1984; 1986. Belardi 1979, p. 121. See n. 7 supra. Likewise, the duration of Zoroaster’s heavenly voyage, as described in the Bahman Yašt 3, lasted for seven days and seven nights. The parallels between Zoroaster’s and Vīštāsp’s journey lead G. Widengren (1968, pp. 88–91) to suggest that the prophet used a technique of intoxication to go into a trance. Cf. Gobrecht 1969, pp. 382–409.

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induced soul-journey. Wīrāz’s vision of movement between the realms of heaven and earth was the highly privileged experience of an initiate who was willing to undergo a journey fraught with risk. The dangers of treading the path of the dead were manifold and culminated in an encounter with the highest powers of the celestial world. Indeed, it was only after being revived and brought back from virtual death that the traveller could return to this world.

Early Examples of the Symbolism of Birds and Flight In the ancient world there was a widespread belief that the human soul could fly out of the body by means of celestial and aerial symbols, often involving the invocation of the power of the wing to lift the soul to Paradise through flight.15 Escape from the bonds of earthly life was later cast in terms of the soul being carried by a bird, which served as a mount and the vehicle of ascension.16 This gave birth to the visual and textual mythic theme of the magic flight of a bird soaring heavenwards bearing the soul. The Middle Persian texts of the lost Avestan biography of Zoroaster include allusions to hōm (Av. haoma), stating that frawahr (Av. frauuaṣ̌ ī-), the ‘spirit form’ of Zoroaster, resides in hōm (haoma).17 According to the Hōm Yašt (hymn dedicated to Haoma), the abstract deified notion18 is transported by means of ornithological imagery:19 The beneficent god has placed thee [haoma] upon High Haritī. From there the learned spәnta-20 [full of blessing] birds carried thee in all directions, to the peak above the eagles, to the Hindu Kush, to the star-topped peaks, to the white-coloured mountains. There on whose mountains thou growest, Haoma, who art of many sorts, rich in sap, verdant. Thy healings are connected with the joys of Good Thinking. 15 For a discussion of antique conceptions of the ‘winged soul’ and the ‘soul bird,’ often symbolised by the eagle, the Sun bird, see Cumont 1949, pp. 293–302; L’Orange 1982, pp. 69–70. For similar imagery in other traditions, see MacCormack 1981, pp. 98–100, 137; Cumont 1910, pp. 119–164, and Cumont 1917, pp. 35–118. 16 For instance, MacCormack 1981, p. 100 and pl. 26 (plaque with a solar deity being carried upwards by two eagles from the ancient Semitic sanctuary at Baalbek); see Seyrig 1929, pp. 335–348, and pl. 82.1. 17 All material forms and beings exist at the same time in ‘spirit form,’ which includes the ‘double’ or frawahr of each person, guardian spirits that give prosperity and fertility to their righteous protégés. Flattery/Schwartz 1989, pp. 19–20, §30. 18 See Boyce 1975, pp. 81, 147, 159 and 161–164. 19 Yasna 10.10–12. Transl. Schwartz 1989, p. 57, §82. 20 On the status of the Amahraspands (Aməsha Spəntas), the positive creatures or ‘Bounteous Immortals,’ who together with Ahura Mazdā constitute the highest heavenly authority, see Duchesne-Guillemin 1966, pp. 25–39.

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In the Vedic myth recorded in the ṚgVeda (4.26–7) the sōma/haoma is likewise associated with a bird, an eagle (Sk. śyená-, suparṇá-) who takes the intoxicant from the atmospheric gandharvas and brings it to Indra.21 The Avestan fraša-, meaning ‘conspicuous, spectacular, splendid, wondrous,’22 has been identified as an epithet of haoma23 thus associating it with the Old Persian phrase *frašamṛga- (spectacular bird, peacock), which yielded the Parthian *frašamarg, Pahl. frašemurw and, interestingly, was replaced by New Persian firišta-murγ.24 Perhaps the most iconic depiction of the hieratic movement of being taken up to heaven appears on a well-known, yet still enigmatic sixth- or seventh-century Sasanian gilded silver plate, discovered as part of a hoard near the village of Anikovskoye in Perm province (Fig. 1). It shows the visual motif of a giant bird of prey, depicted from the front, adorned with a beaded necklace, head turned in profile, with upright pointed animal ears and outspread wings. It flies through the air with a nude female adorned with a torque, bracelets and anklets, gently supporting her hip with its talons, her upper body being secured by what seems to be a cord. She reaches up to offer a plate with circular, presumably edible substances, at which the bird appears to peck with its beak. Two small nude figures flank the airborne motif on either side, armed with a bow and axe respectively and flowering trees spring up behind each figure. A scrolling plant issuing flowers — probably of beneficent — life-giving significance, frames the scene. V. Lukonin associates the iconography with a myth recorded in the Ābān Yašt, a hymn dedicated to the goddess Arəduuī Sūrā Anāhitā, the goddess of fruitfulness.25 The hymn’s protagonist Pāuruua is referred to as vifra- in Avestan, corresponding to the Vedic vipra-, which may be explained by its root ‘to tremble, to shake.’ According to Ph. Gignoux, it suggests the trembling of someone preparing to go into an ecstatic trance, or, as mentioned earlier, the separation of the soul from the body, often described as a transcendent state of awareness.26 Pāuruua, the vifra, was shipwrecked, but the hero Thraētaona, in the shape of a raptor, threw him into the air. For three days and three nights — the length of time during which the soul remains with the body before venturing on its perilous passage towards Paradise or Hell — Pāuruua was incapable of returning to earth but at the end of the third night Anāhitā brought him back to the ground. Anāhitā, who, in a poem which forms part of the Hādōkht nask of the Avesta and dates probably from the sixth to second century bce — described in similar terms 21 22 23 24

Cf. ṚgVeda 1.93.6. See Barnett 1928, pp. 705–706. Junker 1929, pp. 157–158, §15–16. Yasna 10.14 and 10. Junker 1929, p. 150, §13; Flattery/Schwartz 1989, pp. 111–112, §172–5. Iranian evidence of the continued use of haoma and perhaps other intoxicants into historic times is also reflected in the use of ‘wine birds’, which in medieval Islamic poetry are associated with Zoroastrian tradition. Melikian-Chirvani 1995, p. 43. 25 Ābān Yašt 5.61–65. For a discussion of the complex unsolved problems associated with the iconography of Anāhitā, see Bier 1989. 26 Gignoux 2001, p. 74.

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to those used for the daēnā27 that guides the soul in its extra-terrestrial voyage — was carried by the raptor, the agent of the magic flight.28 The poem also relates that the soul (Av. uruuan) of the just man remains close to his body for three days. Towards the end of the third night a perfumed wind rises from the South and:29 …his own daēnā appears in the form of a maiden, beautiful, queenly, white-armed . . . as beautiful as the most beautiful of creatures . . . (proclaiming) . . . “Youth of good thought, good words, good deeds, good inner self (daēnā). I am your very own inner self.”

© The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, photograph by Vladimir Terebenin.

Fig. 1. Silver-gilt plate. Sasanian Empire. Late 6th or early 7th century ce. St. Petersburg, The State Hermitage Museum, S 217. 27 The Hādōkht nask alludes to the age-old belief that every human has a daēnā, a feminine personification or live illustration of the soul in the other world whom he or she will see and meet for the first time after death. This daēnā is made either beautiful or ugly and frightful by the deeds performed by the bearer of the soul during his or her sojourn on earth. For an in-depth discussion of the daēnā, see Sundermann 1992, pp. 159–173. 28 Hādōkht nask 2.11. 29 Emphasis added by the author. Transl. Gignoux 2001, p. 74.

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The conceptualisation of this female figure may be a relic of the pagan past, a myth recounted in the Wīdēvdād.30 Presuppositions concerning the heavenly ascent of the soul were probably already present in Iranian thought in the earliest Avestan evidence. According to J. Kellens the concept of the daēnā owes its origin to the Indo-Iranian dawn. Indeed, as Ph. Gignoux has shown, the dichotomy of day and night is the very foundation of the Indo-Iranian religion. The two nude figures were interpreted by V. Lukonin — followed by B. Marshak — as representing the sun and the moon, day and night, alluding to the idea that “a person, by his or her continuous good deeds, will attain heavenly bliss.” The plants are seen as a reference to the Zoroastrian “tree of all fruits.” Marshak underlines the symbolism of the nudity of the female who is borne aloft by associating it with the depiction of a naked child on a Sogdian ossuary which represents the soul as it is about to enter Paradise.31 While the deciphering of the visual representations on the plate is still ongoing, its generic iconographic content probably symbolised or embodied spiritual messages that effected a transformation in the beholder. Although it is rarely seen in pictorial arts, the theme of a bird lifting a human to the heavens must have been a well-known subject in Sasanian times as it also appears on glyptic (perhaps it was due to its esoteric content that it was not often illustrated?). Among the few visual expressions that survive is an image preserved on a clay sealing.32 The iconography is closely comparable to what we have seen on the above-discussed silver plate (Fig. 1). The bird’s tail, spread fanwise, is visible behind the woman’s legs. Its talons hold her waist. Her arms stretch up towards the bird’s wings. Hellenistic and Roman versions of this type of iconography entered the Iranian world at the beginning of the Christian era, as is evidenced, for instance, by an imported first-century glass goblet of the Kushan treasure from Begrām in Afghanistan (Fig. 2). It shows a scene from the familiar myth of the Trojan youth Ganymede, who in typical classical manner wears a Phrygian cap. He is being swept up diagonally by an eagle, the messenger of the god Zeus or his theriomorphic form, to serve in heaven as the cupbearer of the gods.33 The mortal Ganymede was thus believed to have been deified through seizure and translation.34 30 Wīdēvdād, 19.30. 31 Marshak 2002, p. 146. 32 The bulla bears a Pahlavī inscription, “ostāndār Verozan,” Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale and Musée du Louvre, 1983.358.1; see Gyselen 1993, pp. 201, 206, no. 14.a.1.g and 233, fig. 33.1. 33 Apollodorus 3. 12. 2; Virgil, Aeneid 5. 253; Ovid, Metamorphoses 10. 255; Pliny, Natural History, 34. 79; Lucian, Dialogi Deorum, 4. For visual examples, see for instance, the depiction of the theme on a first-century ce ceiling plaster stucco in the south-east corner of the tepidarium, Forum Thermae, in Pompeii, cf. Spinazzola 1953, fig. 605. For further examples in late antique Mediterranean art, see Sichtermann 1988, n. 170– 256 and commentary; Phillips 1960, pp. 243–262. 34 A parallel legend exists concerning the abduction of the nymph Aegina by Zeus. See Bivar 1961, p. 317; Panofka 1835, pp. 152–176. For a description of this theme in art, see

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The great tradition of Sasanian Iran was made up by its ability to accommodate multifarious mythological and religious trends. Of great importance in the greater Sasanian world were the religions of India, and Buddhism in particular, which spread via trade routes. The same motif we have seen on the Sasanian examples was also popular in the visual art of the Buddhist school of Gandhāra, which arose under the Kushans in the first and second centuries ce. A Gupta-period clay sealing, dated to the fifth century, shows the dynamic movement of a giant raptor carrying through the air what seems to be a female figure, nude except for a girdle, who clings to the bird.35 This bird is evidently a garuḍa (Sk. suparṇa or suparṇin, the golden-winged bird), a race of giant, mythic birds of immense strength and speed with a terrifying, aweinspiring appearance.36 It holds a human figure thought to be an anthropomorphic form of the female serpentine deity nāgiṇī (which is occasionally replaced © Musée Guimet, Paris by its male counterpart, nāga, in Fig. 2. Enamelled glass goblet. other depictions).37 The antagonism Begram Hoard, Hackin Expedition, between the mythical bird or bird1937 (Site 2, Chamber 13), presentlike creature (often an eagle-like day Afghanistan. Putative origin: predatory bird), garuḍa, and the Mediterranean world, probably nāgas is a favourite theme in Indian Alexandria. 1st century ce. Paris, literature. It finds its origin in the Musée Guimet, MG 21228. ancient fable of the rival sisters, Kadrū, the mother of the nāgas, and Vinatā, the mother of garuḍa, recorded in the Mahābhārata.38 Though similar to human beings, the Nāgas were thought to possess behind their shoulders the neck and head of a serpent, which appeared under special circumstances, such as during moments of agitation. It is this serpentine element, Nonnus, Dionysiaca 13. 214. 35 Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, acc. no. 36.622. Cf. Raven 1995, pl. 19; Azarpay 1995, p. 110, fig. 16. 36 Mahabharata 1.26.6–9. 37 Raven 1995, pp. 17–21, 141–50; Jayawardhana 1961, pp. 311–312. 38 Ādi-parvan 25–34. Vogel 1926, pp. 51–53. Cf. Eugene 1977, pp. 170–171, as cited by Strong 1992, pp. 200–201, with further examples on pp. 29, 188–189, and 200–208.

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the hood of the serpent, that the bird clutches in its mighty bill, while it holds the human form in its claws. As a creature of the sky “who easily eclipses the splendour of the sun,”39 the garuḍa is the symbolic eternal adversary of the forces of darkness embodied in the nāgas that prowl in the earth and lurk in the waters.40 While the sacred birds carry away the haoma from Haritī to the mountains of the earth in the above-cited Yasna 10.10–12, this representation also alludes to the old Indo-Iranian myth of the Rape of the Sōma by garuḍa. The subject was carved into turban emblems that adorned the highest points of the headdresses of some Gandhāran Bodhisattvas (Fig. 3),41 a place generally reserved for miniature Buddha images. However, it also appears in sculptural form, in which garuḍa holds a nāgiṇī while preparing to rise skywards, all set against rays of light.42 This evocative symbolism can be traced to Mathura and once again shows the half-avian, half-human garuḍa, with a somewhat anthropomorphised head with characteristic © Central Museum, Lahore human ears and earrings (Sk. kuṇḍalas), grasping the Fig. 3. Schist turban emblem. creature’s hood in his bill and Gandhāra, Sanghao. 2nd or 3rd century ce. supporting a proportionately Lahore, Central Museum, 1045. small nude female wearing the usual necklace, earrings and bracelets who is attached to his body with a thin belt slung across her hips.43 In his discussion of the subject, A. Coomaraswamy summarises the scene as follows:44

39 Raven 1995, p. 18. 40 Vogel 1926. 41 For further examples of such turban emblems, see Kurita 2003, pl. 7; von Drachenfels/ Luczanits 2008, cat. 208–209; RHI 2009, pp. 148–149, fig. 1–2. 42 A second- to fourth-century ce grey schist Gandhāran relief of garuḍa and a nāgiṇī from Rhode Tope, Sanghao, in Peshawar district in present-day Pakistan is preserved in a photograph taken in 1883 by M. Serrot. See Tissot 1986, fig. 190 (central relief). For related sculptures of the same subject, see Azarpay 1995, p. 106, fig. 9, p. 109, figs. 13–14; for an example of garuḍa and a female yakshi or yakshini, see Azarpay 1995, p. 110, fig. 15. 43 Mathura Archaeological Museum, 41.2915, Joshi 1973, p. 240, fig. 177. 44 Coomaraswamy 1937, pp. 39–41. It is noteworthy that according to the Atharvaveda, the disciple of a Brahmin can transform himself into a bird and carry out a magic flight. See Gignoux 2001, p. 75.

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There is … something more than a simple opposition of the solar-angelic and lunar-titanic powers of light and darkness. ... a death at the hands of God is also a felicity and consummation most to be desired. If the Eagle … really “devours” the Nāgī, this is not merely a consumption, but also an assimilation and incorporation; if the act of solar violence is a rape, it is also a “rapture” and a “transport” in both possible senses of both words.

This vividly recalls the symbolism of the vision as light, the magical flight and the bird that was celebrated in the Vedas. The garuḍa-nāgiṇī heavenly-elevation-representations were sometimes elaborated through the introduction of specific narrative details that occur in more complex versions. As M. Stoye has shown, these are much indebted to western iconographic types of Graeco-Roman art portraying Ganymede and the eagle. In its reincarnation in a Buddhist context, individual elements were necessarily informed by Indian iconographic frameworks.45 Based on these compositions, G. Azarpay identifies our ascension theme — both in its Gandhāran and Sasanian manifestations — with a jātaka tale, the Sussondī-jātaka, in which a young garuḍa, a former incarnation of Śākyamuni Buddha, abducts the beautiful queen of Benares, Sussondī, and takes her to his abode on the nāga island.46 Thematically there is, of course, a remarkable similarity between this jātaka and the story of Zeus abducting Ganymede or the nymph Aegina. It also has to be remembered that in typical Buddhist fashion the jātaka writer used the belief in the mythical enmity of these two classes of beings to demonstrate the efficacy of the Buddha’s teaching in bringing sworn foes together in perfect harmony. The transmission of the motif from the Hellenised region of Gandhāra to Buddhist sites in the Eastern Iranian world is evidenced by its presence in a Bactrian wall painting from Zar Tepe, near Termez in present-day Uzbekistan, dated to the late fourth or early fifth century ce. Here only the lower part of the painting is preserved, featuring small fish and what appear to be blossoms to either side of the bird’s tail and wings.47 The same subject is intaglio engraved on a garnet of circular form mounted in a contemporary gold ring discovered in northern Afghanistan in which a nude female is swept up diagonally by an eagle-like bird with outspread wings, a feature which perhaps indicates its indebtedness to Hellenistic models (Fig. 4).48 The raptor’s upright ears associate it with the iconography of the theriomorphic garuḍa whose regal attribute, the turban, is here substituted by a royal diadem with floating ribbons wound around the bird’s neck. The bejewelled female reaches one arm upwards to offer something to the bird. Her curvaceous body 45 46 47 48

Stoye 2008, pp. 268–269. Azarpay 1995, p. 112, figs. 19–20; von Drachenfels/Luczanits 2008, p. 279, cat. 209. Compareti 2010, p. 100, fig. 7. Carter/Freeman 2013, no. 94, pp. 167–168, 175; Harper in Carter 2015, pp. 326–329, cat. 91.

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and the twisted rope-border on the raptor’s wings associate the intaglio with Indian examples, such as the Gupta-period clay sealing discussed above.

© The al-Sabah Collection, Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah, Kuwait

Fig. 4. Gold finger ring, with garnet. Afghanistan (possibly Taliqan). Late 4th or 5th century ce. Kuwait, al-Sabāh Collection, Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah, LNS 3136 J. The bird is flanked on one side by what appears to be a fish next to two overlapping circles and on the other side by a long string of beads surmounting a serpent-like creature that seems to be emerging from an egg.49 Beneath the bird are hillocks and flowers. While the egg motif seems to be typically Indian,50 it also occurs in a Zoroastrian context. In a simile in the Pahlavī Rivāyat narration accompanying the Dātastan-i dīnīk, the protective nature of the wise lord Ahura Mazdā/Ōhrmazd’s material creations is alluded to. The verses state that the sphere of the sky encloses the earth like an egg,51 a conceptualisation also mirrored in 49 Harper interprets the iconography as “a serpent that has swallowed a globe” in Carter 2015, p. 326, cat. 91. 50 Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa 11.1.6. 51 Zaehner 1955, p. 365.

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the thirty-fourth chapter of Vizīdagīhā ī Zādspram.52 Both the serpent and the serpent-like dotted line may be astrological references to the Persian gōchihr, the circumpolar constellation Draco, which is sometimes metaphorically identified with the Milky Way,53 whereas the fish — a motif which also appears on the Zar Tepe wall paintings — may allude to other constellations. The fish taken together with the overlapping circles are, perhaps, a representation of the Pythagorean calculation, vesica pisces (bladder of a fish), as P. O. Harper has suggested.54 The cosmic overtones of the iconography is underlined by the mystical and astrological symbols, egg motif, plant forms and mountains. The subject of the transport from mortal to celestial realms is also found further east in the Buddhist cave paintings from Kizil at Kucha in the Tarim Basin, in Cave 118 which is dated to the sixth or seventh century ce,55 portraying a nude male figure borne skywards by a giant bird.56 Another painting in Cave 165, dated to the early seventh century, shows a double-headed raptor carrying aloft a halo-crowned nude male. To these we may add the depiction of the subject on a fragmentary silk samite excavated at Reshui-Xuewei in Dulan county, Qinghai province in western China, which presumably owes its existence to the cultural interchange of the trade routes. It shows an eight-petalled roundel enclosing a frontally rendered giant bird with wings outstretched and head turned to the left. Set against its breast is a stylised human figure.57 It is noteworthy that the weaving technique of this samite is different from the Sogdian group of Central Asia but may be associated with that of textiles from Byzantine regions.58 Mention must also be made of celebrated ‘post-Sasanian’ examples of the iconic airborne theme which appeared thousands of kilometres to the west. It is displayed three times on two important objects of the mysterious gold hoard found in 1799 near the town of Nagyszentmiklós/Sânnicolau Mare in northern Banat. The provenance of the find remains enigmatic, yet thematic analogies have been drawn to the Sasanian silver-gilt plate in the State Hermitage (Fig. 1).59 Mirror-image depictions of an airborne male figure, nude except for a loin cloth, raising a bowl and a vegetal stalk as an offering to the great bird are shown on two sides of a jug (Figs. 5 a and b). A parallel scene with a nude female figure is 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59

Zaehner 1955, p. 349. MacKenzie 1964, pp. 521–522, n. 53, 525; cf. Azarpay 1978; Duchesne-Guillemin 1990. Harper 2013, p. 168. Radiocarbon dating of the wall painting was carried out both by The Institute of Social Sciences of China (582 to 670 ce) and by the Museum für Asiatische Kunst der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin (432 to 538 ce). Howard 2009, fig. 14.18. Xining, Qinghai Cultural Relics and Archaeological Institute, QK 001857. Zhao 1999, fig. 03.00f, and; Zhao 2005, p. 347, cat. 246; Xinguo 2006, p. 286, fig. 231. Zhao 2005, p. 347, cat. 246. Grabar 1979, pp. 259–261; Bálint 2010, pp. 347–356, 399–406, figs. 127 (1 and 2), 155– 160; Zhivkov 2015, pp. 115–116.

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© Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Figs. 5 a and b. Gold jug. 8th century?. Treasure of Nagyszentmiklós (present-day Sânnicolau Mare, Romania), found in 1799. Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, VIIb 40.

© Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Fig. 6. Gold flask. 8th century?. Treasure of Nagyszentmiklós (present-day Sânnicolau Mare, Romania), found in 1799. Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, VIIb 33.

shown on a flask (Fig. 6). She feeds the bird with floriated stalks. Both the male and the female figures wear torques and armlets. The scene seems to illustrate a myth. There are three further medallions on the flask depicting the airborne female figure. They are linked by an interlaced band and show scenes of war and the hunt: an armoured rider with a prisoner, an animal combat scene, and

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an archer mounted on a human-headed composite quadruped taking aim at a feline.60 It is worth to recall that Iranian epic activities associated with razm (and bazm) were not merely the locus of the ‘transcendental glory,’61 they were simultaneously the setting for the heroic apotheosis, a ‘one-way’ ascent,62 regaining immortal heavenly existence.63 The implied allegorical theme may be read as visual metaphor alluding to ancient Iranian socio-religious ideas attesting to the spread of Sasanian-style art far beyond the greater Iranian world.

Spiritual Flight in the Early Islamic Period In the originally Sasanian city of Nishapur, late ninth- or early tenth-century escutcheon-shaped mould fragments made of red earthenware were discovered at Tepe Madrasa, a site which, according to the excavators, might not have been a madrasa but was partly used for religious purposes. It shows a bird with outspread wings in a heraldic pose and with a round head and anthropomorphised features flanked on either side by bird heads. Set against the raptor’s breast is a stylised human with uplifted arms who is portrayed fully clothed, reflecting an Islamisation of the earlier iconography (Fig. 7).64 The anthropomorphised aspect of the bird — associating the imagery with a garuḍa-nāgiṇī conceptualisation — allows us to discern what appears to be a vestige of ancient Gandhāra surviving in the visual repertoire current in the first centuries of Islam. The ‘birds and spiritual flight’ trope was powerfully evoked by early Islamic mystics, philosophers and poets under the inspiration of the traditional Neo60 Sasanian kings are commonly depicted on horseback in hunting scenes on bowls (see Harper 1978, nos. 3–4, 6–7, 12, 17). 61 In the Iranian world a bird of prey (Av. vārəγna), an eagle or falcon, represents the incorporation of the khᵛarnah– (Mid. Pers. khwarrah “glory, God-given fortune, splendour”) bestowed, according to the Avesta, upon a sovereign or a hero by a god (Yašt 19.34–36). Yašt 29.28–29 relates that the divine kingly glory thrice departed from Yama/Yima, the first king, in the form of a bird (Barnett 1928, p. 712; cf. Boyce 1975, pp. 67–68). In the absence of rightful Iranian rule the khᵛarnah escapes to the depth of mythical Lake Vārukasha. Schlerath 1982 a, p. 369, and Schlerath 1982 b, p. 463. Mokri 1967, p. 23. Cf. Gnoli 1999. 62 Cf. Tabor’s examination of ‘The Heavenly Journey’ (1986, ch. 3, especially p. 77). 63 Feasting and fighting constitute a major theme associated with heroic figures in the Shāhnāme (Book of Kings), who are conventionally described as warriors particularly given to two activities, razm ‘fighting’ and bazm ‘feasting.’ The activity of feasting, with its full panoply of ceremonial rituals, is also the context for the telling of stories about the exploits of warriors, their activity of fighting. And this context is the ultimate occasion for the expression of regal authority on the two levels of performance: that of heroic prowess and of poetic skillfulness. 64 The original fragments are in the Muzé Iran Bastan, Tehran; The Metropolitan Museum, New York preserves a plaster mould of the original. Hauser/Wilkinson 1942, pp. 101– 105, 108, fig. 32. Cf. Wilkinson 1973, p. xxix; 1987, pp. 82–85, fig. 1.52.

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Platonic philosophical model of knowledge, in which ontology is not disassociated from epistemology. This theory has its origins in Greek philosophical sources, especially in Plato’s Phaedrus65 which establishes a relationship between the soul, described as a winged chariot, and the flight of birds: …now when it is perfect and fully winged, it mounts upward and governs the whole world.

Immediately before incarnation, the soul “loses wings and falls into the fetters of the body,” writes the Platonist Plotinus (204/5–270 ce) in his collection of writings, the Enneads,66 edited and compiled by his student Porphyry (ca. 270 ce),67 thereby paraphrasing the words of his master.68 Plotinus, generally considered to be the father of Neo-Platonism, recounts the ascent of the questing soul as it seeks to be united with the One. The soul is analogous to a daughter who, recognizing her true love for the father, seeks “no otherness” from the One.69 This return of the soul to the celestial spheres was a deep preoccupation that Neo-Platonist philosophy inherited from antiquity.70 65 66 67 68 69 70

© The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Fig. 7. Stucco mould fragment. Iran, Nishapur, Tepe Madrasa. Late 9th or early 10th century ce. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1940, 40.170.283.

Phaedrus 246b–c. Enneads 4.8.4. On the wings of the soul, see Enneads 2.9.3; 18.4.12. Phaedrus 248c. Enneads 6.9.9. In Plato’s works, and especially in the Phaedrus with its myth of the soul that contemplates the heavenly ideas before its embodiment, intuition grasps the inner essence of a thing, a being, a cause, or a situation visible only to the intellect. The Neo-Platonic idea of intuition as a form of knowledge merged with the doctrine of revelation through visual symbols, a process which pre-figures and mirrors the process of intellectual intuition

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The multivalent idea of the soul bird’s celestial journey was used by some of the most significant Muslim thinkers, such as Ibn Sīnā (d. 428/1037), alGhazzālī (d. 504/1111), Khāqānī (d. ca. 595/1199), and Rūzbihān Baqlī (d. 606/1209). The symbolism is celebrated in the allegorical narrative called Manṭiq al-ṭayr or The Language of the Birds by Farīd al-Dīn ʿAṭṭār (d. ca. 617/1220) who lived in Nīshāpūr in the twelfth century. In the Qurʾān, it is the prophet-king Sulaymān (Solomon), who has been taught the Manṭiq alṭayr,71 the language spoken by the birds of the spirit. He receives this gift of language so that he can converse with them in a secret tongue and thereby learns about the existence of Balqīs, queen of Sabāʾ (Sheba), from the hudhud (Ar.; hoopoe).72 Known as the King of the Universe in the ancient Iranian tradition as well as in the Qurʾān, Sulaymān is thus initiated into esoteric knowledge which could easily be interpreted as the language of the soul that only the true master understands. In ʿAṭṭār’s mythical epic, the hudhud, once the messenger between Sulaymān and Balqīs, acts as the birds’ guide through the seven valleys in their quest for the sīmorġ, the king of birds and most famous representative of the avian ascent in the Islamic world.73 While the mystery of its name often led to speculation, its typological affinity to eagles or falcons74 is suggested by the name of the sōma-stealing Sanskrit śyēná(“eagle, falcon.” Av. saēna), which is etymologically identical.75 Likewise it is interpreted as xᵛarənah-, the good fortune of the Keyanids, the mythical ancestors of the Sasanian dynasty,76 which explains the functional approach of the bird sīmorġ (Av. mərəγō saēnō-, New Pers. sīmorġ, Old Syriac sīmur(gh), Ar. ʿanqaʾ).77 The poet’s questing birds number thirty, and, as the words for thirty birds in Persian are sī-morġ (sī, “thirty,” and morġ, “bird”), the mystic concludes his opus with a typically Sufi play on words:78

71

72 73 74 75 76 77 78

(Gombrich 1948, p. 171). Images serve only as vehicles that help the soul to approach the divine prototype hidden from humans due to the limitations of their corporeality. “To the profane these enigmatic images conceal the arcanum of the holy supernatural, to the initiate, however,” as E. Gombrich (1948, p. 167) succinctly puts it, “they serve as the first rung of the ladder by which we ascend to the Divine.” He goes on to explain that “We can only hope to achieve this true knowledge in the rare moments when the soul leaves the body in a state of ek-stasis, such as may be granted to us through divine frenzy” (Gombrich 1948, p. 171). Against this background, it is interesting to recall that, according to Zoroastrian cosmogonic and cosmological ideas drawing on the Avesta, some birds were thought to be able to utter the most ancient scriptures of Zoroastrianism in the language of birds. Bundahišn 19.16. Qurʾān 27:16, 22–23. See Melikian-Chirvani 1971, p. 30. On the iconography of the sīmorġ, Cf. Cristoforetti/Scarcia 2011. Binder 1964, p. 285. Schmidt 1980, p. 16. On the association with garuḍa, see Schneider 1971, pp. 31–33, 36. See n. 61 supra. Schmidt 1980, p. 2. Browne 1908, vol. 2, pp. 513–515.

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They perceived themselves to be naught else but the Sīmurgh while the Sīmurgh was naught else than the thirty birds (sī murgh). ... They besought the disclosure of this deep mystery, and demanded the solution of “we-ness” and “thou-ness.” Without speech came the answer from that Presence, saying: “This Sun-like Presence is a Mirror.”

At the end the thirty birds or sī morġ realise that the goal of their quest, the divine sīmorġ, is nothing but themselves expressing one of the principal gnostic tenants — that divinity dwells in the inner self. The soul’s redemption from its corporeal bonds and its ascension like a heavenly bird to find its identity is a topic returned to a number of times by the mystic Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī (d. 672/1273), who had left Balkh in present-day Afghanistan to live in the Saljuq capital Konya in central Anatolia. In his work he evokes the “sīmorġ of the spirit” who “before this (material life), has flown and experienced (the bounty of Divine) grace,”79 also leading his reader to see that:80 Within the egg of the body you are a Marvellous bird — since you are inside the egg; you cannot fly. If the body’s shell should break, you will flap Your wings and win the spirit.

It was, however, Shihāb al-Dīn Suhrawardī (549/1153–587/1191), the šaykh of the Philosophy of Illumination (ešrāq), who transformed the sīmorġ into the mediating figure, or the spiritual guide, connecting man and the divine.81 In his ʿAql-e sorkh (The Red Intellect), the divine bird is a mediator for man’s soul, showing the way by which it should ascend.82 The sīmorġ is believed to have its nest on top of a great Ṭūbā tree, located on the summit of the cosmic Mount Qāf,83 which is thought to encircle the whole world and constitutes the dividing line between two worlds, the one visible and the other invisible to the ordinary 79 Mathnavī I 1140, transl. Nicholson 1925. 80 Dīvān 33567–33568, transl. Chittick 1983, p. 29. 81 Even though the miʿrāj, the ascension of the Prophet Muḥammad, is not specifically alluded to by the šaykh al-ešrāq in this context, Muslim visionary ascent is necessarily modelled on the celestial elevation of the Prophet, which provides, in the words of M. Sells (1996, p. 47), “a continual subtext, evoked by subtle allusions to inspiration, vision of the divine, and the gaze of the contemplator.” 82 The costume of birds’ feathers is also attested in the account of Zoroaster’s voyage to the beyond. According to the Bahman Yašt (14.34–36), Zoroaster asked Ahura Mazdā how to rid himself of a curse. The great god told him to take a feather of the vulture and rub his body with it, for “the man who carries bones of the powerful bird or feathers of the powerful bird, nobody can kill or hunt such a lucky mortal” (Gignoux 2001, p. 75). 83 The Philosophical Allegories, transl. and ed. Thackston 1999, III (ʿAql-e sorkh), §8, and VIII (Ṣafir-e sīmorġ), §2. A prototype of this iconography may plausibly be seen to lie in the Zoroastrian cosmological motif of the Saēna Tree, the perch of the great mythical Saēna bird. See Boyce 1975, pp. 88–91, 137–138 and 143.

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senses.84 It is a dual symbol of the flight of the soul that, in the form of a bird, descends from, and also returns to, its point of origin, Mount Qāf.85 In his tales, the mystic philosopher alludes to the Iranian epic tradition, best recorded in Ferdaosī’s Šāhnāme (Book of Kings), in which the sīmorġ is a giant creature, the special protector of the Iranian prince Zāl, father of the hero Rustam. Zāl was born with what was considered inauspiciously white hair (at the same time white is, of course, the colour of light, purity and wisdom),86 which so chagrined his father, Sām, that he took the child out to the mountains and abandoned him. The sīmorġ appeared, carried the child away and reared him with her own young in her nest in the Alborz Mountains. It is interesting to note the striking analogy between a legendary Achaemenid-period founding myth recorded by Greek historians and this episode in the Šāhnāme — for the child Achaemenes was said to have been raised by an eagle,87 just as Zāl was brought up by the guardian genius sīmorġ.88 Approximating to the phoenix, the ʿanqāʾ — which was assimilated with the sīmorġ in the Islamic period — is part of this mythic and symbolic geography. In a twelfth-century copy of Qazvīnī’s ʿAjaʾ ib al-makhluqāt, the fabulous hybrid bird is depicted elevating a woman (Fig. 8). The painting might have served as an illustration of the Arabic romance Kitāb al-ʿAnqāʾ, which narrates the adventures of a young, betrothed couple. Shortly before the marriage, the girl, named al-ʿAnqāʾ, is kidnapped by the eponymous giant bird, described as a jinnīyya, a female genie. The fact that both bearer and borne carry the same name indicates more ancient layers of the narrative that were likely transmitted largely in an oral form before finding crystallisation in the literary world, carriers that transmitted and thereby preserved remnants of age-old concepts pointing to a complete assimilation of the two participants in the magic flight. The story goes on to describe the quest of the prospective bridegroom who eventually finds and rescues his bride84 The Philosophical Allegories, transl. and ed. Thackston 1999, III, §5. Ḥadīths (traditions attributed to the Prophet Muḥammad and his followers) speak of green birds whose breasts offer shelter to the spirits (Ar. arwāh) of the martyrs (Ar. šuhadāʾ or “the witnesses of truth”) who will fly to Paradise, outside of their resurrected bodies. Goldziher 1903, pp. 301–304; Corbin 1977, p. xxxii. Another ḥadīth states that “the life-breath of the person of faith will be a bird perching on the trees of the Garden until it returns to his body on the Day of Resurrection,” cited after Chittick 1993, p. 98 and n. 20. 85 Corbin 1971, pp. 236, 272. As Plotinus says in the Enneads 4.8.8, “…something of [our human soul] is continuously in the Intellectual Realm.” 86 On the theme of white hair, see Caquot 1974, pp. 161–172. Of note is the occurrence of the same theme in Heliodor’s Aithiopika. In the third- or fourth-century novel, Chariklea, the daughter of the king of Ethiopia, is born with white hair and, just like Zāl, is abandoned in the desert by her parents. After an initiation process she remembers her land of origin, the East, which she makes every effort to reach. 87 Aelian, De Natura Animalium 12. 21. 88 For a discussion of the motif of rescued children who were exposed at birth, see Huys 1995, especially pp. 299–308. On the iconography of the genius of the “psychopomp angelwind,” see Scarcia 1983, pp. 85–109.

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to-be. In the introduction to the Kitāb Ḥikmat al-išrāq, Suhrawardī reminds us of the link to the broad cultural past:89 The words of the Ancients are symbolic and not open to refutation. The criticisms made of the literal sense of their words fail to address their real intentions, for a symbol cannot be refuted. … The ancient and the modern philosophers differ only in their use of language and their divergent habits of openness and allusiveness.

© The Royal Asiatic Society, London

Fig. 8. A Giant Bird Bearing a Female Figure, page from al-Qazwīnī’s ʿAjāʾib al-Makhlūqāt. 12th century ce. London, The Royal Asiatic Society, MS 178, f. 408a (detail). 89 Kitāb Ḥikmat al-išrāq, transl. and ed. Walbridge/Ziai 2004, p. 2.

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It is against this background of perceived continuity with the pre-Islamic tradition that an image on a twelfth-century Iranian silk textile must be seen. It features the visual symbol of the celestial ascent represented in the form of a large double-headed bird of prey, wings outstretched, carrying close to its breast a crowned figure (Fig. 9).90 With both hands the figure clutches two cords

© Musée national du Moyen Age, Paris

Fig. 9. Silk textile fragment. Iran. 12th century ce. Paris, Musée national du Moyen Age, Thermes et Hôtel de Cluny; dépôt du Musée du Louvre, CL 218-72. 90 Another fragment of the same silk textile is preserved in Washington, DC, Dumbarton Oaks Collection, acc. no. 30.1.

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slung around the raptor’s neck. The scene is framed by two confronted pairs of mythical quadrupeds. The raptor’s two heads are flanked by an inscription in mirror-image which reads: “Glory to God.” The motif must have intimated a mystic dimension when emblazoned on material objects. It appears on a circular copper alloy mirror with added handle from Kerman in Persia, dated to the tenth- or eleventh-century. The cast roundel features a large bird with head turned to the left and wings outstretched, which carries a human figure clad in a long dress with outstretched arms grasping a cord which encircles the head of the bird like a halo. The scene is enclosed by a Kufic frieze bearing the formulaic statement: “Might, auspicious fate, good fortune, domination, elevation, triumph, alacrity to its owner.”91 The worn surface of this mirror indicates the frequency with which it must have been polished. In mystical language this process is often associated with the blurring of the differentiation between subject and object, self and other. Another example is found on an eleventhor twelfth-century Iranian earthenware bowl, on which the elevated female figure, clothed in what appears to be a diaphanous garment, is secured by twisted ropes to the bird’s body and wings (Fig. 10), a feature associating it with both Sasanian (Fig. 4) and Indian examples (see the above-discussed Gupta-period clay sealing). It also appears on a twelfth-century Khurāsānian oil lamp with three frontal spouts.92 Here, the reflector is crowned by a great raptorial bird carrying into space a human figure which, again, is held by cords to the bird’s breast. The interpretation of the scene is aided by the fact © The al-Sabah Collection, Dar al-Athar al-Islamiyyah, Kuwait that the function of the object, a lamp, is to provide illumination Fig. 10. Earthenware bowl. Iran. for the inner vision as it does 11th or 12th century ce. Formerly for the outer.93 Yet another D. K. Kelekian collection, Paris. variation of this theme in veiled Kuwait, al-Sabāh Collection, Dar visual language is preserved on al-Athar al-Islamiyyah, LNS 311 C. 91 London, Victoria and Albert Museum, 1536–1903. Melikian-Chivrani 1982, p. 48, no. 9. 92 Paris, Musée du Louvre, OA 7958 bis. Bernus-Taylor 2001, p. 203, cat. 140. 93 Cf. the lamp symbolism employed in Qurʾān 24:35.

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a small thirteenth-century plaque from the Jazira in Upper Mesopotamia.94 This shows a giant double-headed bird about to fly towards the heaven; set against its breast is a human seated cross-legged and holding up a crescent in both hands.95 In the words of S. H. Nasr, “the symbol is the revelation of a higher order of reality in a lower order through which man can be led back to the higher realm.”96 A certain phase of spiritual life is revealed and a particular set of mythical symbols and images is unveiled that are dependent on the power of imagination. The unseen can be apprehended through the seen, either through the eye or through the imaginative gaze.97 It is the faculty of the imagination that allows us to bridge this gap between the phenomenal and the transcendental.

By Way of a Conclusion As the preceding examples have shown, Hellenistic and Roman embodiments of the rape of Ganymede by the theriomorphic epiphany of Zeus served as models for the variations of the Indian and Gandhāran visual conceptualisations of spiritual ascent. In these depictions, garuḍa, a former incarnation of Śākyamuni Buddha, supplants Zeus in eagle form and a nāgiṇī, a creature of the earth and the terrestrial waters, takes the place of the mortal cupbearer of the gods. Once taken into the Indian and Gandhāran repertoire, Hellenistic and Roman forms rapidly became charged with associations and meaning drawn from the host countries. The ongoing pivotal importance of the airborne theme is underscored by the fact that it is featured on the turban emblems of some Bodhisattvas (Fig. 3). Here, it replaced and provides an equivalent to the Buddha image which appears on other turban emblems symbolising the aspiration to Buddhahood. The parallel imagery reminds us of the blurring of the proper demarcation between the human and the divine realms, for just as Bodhisattvas in some sense attained Buddhahood, so Ganymede was believed to have been raised to the status of a god. Informed by these models, the Sasanian reincarnation of the airborne theme was adapted and assimilated to a Zoroastrian context, acting as a major point of influx for both Indian/Gandhāran and Hellenistic/Roman embodiments into 94 Paris, Musée du Louvre, OA 5016. Bernus-Taylor 2001, p. 204, cat. 141. 95 The wide distribution of the subject is underlined by the fact that it appears twice in the Fatimid-period pictorial cycle on the painted ceiling-panels of the Capella Palatina in Palermo, commissioned by Roger II of Sicily (d. 1154) in 1132. For colour images of the Capella Palatina paintings, see Grube 2005, p. 75, fig. B20.4 and 77, fig. B21.4, also, pp. 244–245. 96 Nasr 1977, p. 88. 97 In a key section at the end of the Kitāb Ḥikmat al-ishrāq Suhrawardī elaborates on this very moment in great detail; Kitāb Ḥikmat al-ishrāq, part II.5.8–9, §271–7. Cf. Hughes 2005, p. 171.

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Sasanian iconography. At the same time, one can also speculate that Sasanian works drew upon common background stores of mythical material. A raptor with garuḍa-like upright ears, possibly associated with sōma/haoma, carries a beautiful maiden skywards. In turn the fabulous bird may be linked with Thraētaona, son of Athbiia, known as the second mortal to extract the intoxicating liquid haoma. Interestingly, an important symbolic visual theme of airborne figures offering something to the bird is repeated on several Sasanian and post-Sasanian works. The widespread yet enigmatic motif of the ornithic bearer soaring heavenwards with its human passenger, that could be either male or female, embodies crosscultural currents moving between the late antique Mediterranean world, India, Central Asia, and Iran. Just like their prototypes, the later examples of the motif accentuate the close physical contact between the bearer and the borne, exuding a relationship so intimate that it can take the form of an assimilation and incorporation. The significance of this ‘unification’ is often underscored by cosmological allusions. Die Himmelsreise der Seele and its rendition as both a physical and spiritual journey was, as M. Sells points out, “one of the meeting points — and arenas for interreligious and intrareligious contention — in the late antique and medieval Near East [and beyond].”98 In this context it is worth turning again to the work of Suhrawardī, who considered himself to be a reviver of the ancient tradition of using symbols to condense and concentrate concepts that contained ‘wisdom.’99 His discussion of the multivalent theme of spiritual ascent is of particular interest due to its preservation of traces of Zoroastrian and Manichean thought along with the Neo-Platonism that provided the original conceptual framework on which the later traditions drew. He interpretes the upward orientation primarily as the movement of the soul towards the universe of beauty and light and the unifying, intuitive “knowledge by presence” (Ar. ʿ ilm ḥuḍūrī) being essentially one with the Self (Ar. anāʾīyat).100 This fundamental act of the gnosis of the Self is seen as an awakening which induces a recollection of its origin before coming into this world. When all veils are lifted and removed, the illumination of the soul reflects onto the object of its vision (Ar. išrāq ḥuḍūrī). This necessarily entails a certain reciprocity for the vision of the essence is at the same time the essence of the vision.101

98 Sells 1986, p. 242. 99 Gombrich 1948, pp. 171–172. 100 In the Kitāb al-Talwīḥāt Suhrawardī shows how the perception of the self is direct and non-mediated, concluding with the statement, “Know you are the perceiver of yourself and that is all, not by corresponding impression and not by a non-corresponding impression. Yourself is the intellect, intellector and the intellected.” Transl. Bylebyl 1976, p. 31. 101 Corbin 1971, vol. 2, p. 63, p. 66.

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Beyond the Gate: Alans, Sasanians and the Caucasus Paolo Ognibene The nomads and the rulers of the Iranian empires never had good relations. This enmity existed long before the Iran-Turan opposition crystallized between Iranian and Turkic peoples, as the first nomads with whom the Achaemenid kings fought were for the most part as Iranian as them.1 Cyrus was the first to experience how dangerous the peoples inhabiting the regions north of the Persian empire were: the conquest of Media, Lydia and Babylon did not save him from the wrath of queen Tomyris who, after defeating him, let his head fall down into a skin full of human blood, according to Herodotus’ Histories.2 Everything lying north of the Perisan borders was known in ancient times under the name of “Saka,” a generic term referring to the European Scythians on one side, and the Asian Scythians on the other.3 After Cyrus, it was Darius the Great who experienced how difficult it was to confront nomadic peoples, and his escape from Scythia together with the most powerful army of the world at that time is a clear example of how mutual incomprehension can compromise a campaign won from the start.4 1 2

3

4

About the so-called “Scythian question” (= language and ethnicity of the Scythians), see Müllenhoff 1866, pp. 549–576; Miščenko 1884, pp. 55–76; Miller 1886, pp. 232–283; Marr 1922, pp. 67–132; Ognibene 2019. Hdt. I, 214: “ἀσκὸν δὲ πλήσασα αἵματος ἀνϑρωπηίου Τόμυρις ἐδίζητο ἐν τοῖσι τεϑνεῶσι τῶν Περσέων τὸν Κύρου νέκυν, ὡς δὲ εὗρε, ἐναπῆκε αὐτοῦ τὴν κεφαλὴν ἐς τὸν ἀσκόν, λυμαινομένη δὲ τῷ νεκρῷ ἐπέλεγε τάδε· “σὺ μὲν ἐμὲ ζῶσάν τε καὶ νικῶσάν σε μάχῃ ἀπώλεσας, παῖδα τὸν ἐμὸν ἑλὼν δόλῳ· σὲ δ᾽ ἐγώ, κατά περ ἠπείλησα, αἵματος κορέσω”. τὰ μὲν δὴ κατὰ τὴν Κύρου τελευτὴν τοῦ βίου, πολλῶν λόγων λεγομένων, ὅδε μοι ὁ πιϑανώτατος εἴρηται». The classical sources do not agree about the death of Cyrus, cf. X. Cyr. VII, 1: “οὕτω δὲ τοῦ αἰῶνος προκεχωρηκότος, μάλα δὴ πρεσβύτης ὢν ὁ Κῦρος ἀφικνεῖται εἰς Πέρσας τὸ ἕβδομον ἐπὶ τῆς αὑτοῦ ἀρχῆς” and Ctes. F (9) 7: “Κῦρος δὲ στρατεύει ἐπὶ Δέρβικας, Ἀμοραίου βασιλεύοντος αὐτῶν. Καὶ ἐξ ἐνέδρας οἱ Δέρβικες ἱστῶσιν ἐλέφαντας, καὶ τοὺς ἱππεῖς Κύρου τρέπουσι, καὶ πίπτει καὶ αὐτὸς Κῦρος ἐκ τοῦ ἵππου, καὶ Ἰνδὸς ἀνὴρ (συνεμάχουν γὰρ καὶ Ἰνδοὶ τοῖς Δερβίκεσιν, ἐξ ὧν καὶ τοὺς ἐλέφαντας ἔφερον) οὗτος οὖν ὁ Ἰνδὸς πεπτωκότα Κῦρον βάλλει ἀκοντίῳ ὑπὸ τὸ ἰσχίον εἰς τὸν μηρόν, ἐξ οὗ καὶ τελευτᾷ”. Szemerényi 1980: 46: Saka, used by the Achaemenids as a generic term for all Northern nomads (in lieu of earlier Skuda), cannot have meant “dog” or “stag”, or “powerful.” In agreement with the general characterization of these peoples as nomads, their name can only be traced to the now well-established root sak- “go, roam,” so that Saka meant the wanderer, vagrant nomad.” See also for other interpretations of this name. Abaev 1979, pp. 11–16. Hdt. IV, 134: “Πέρσῃσι δὲ μετὰ τὰ δῶρα τὰ ἐλϑόντα Δαρείῳ ἀντετάχϑησαν οἱ ὑπολειφϑέντες Σκύϑαι πεζῷ καὶ ἵπποισι ὡς συμβαλέοντες. τεταγμένοισι δὲ τοῖσι Σκύϑῃσι λαγὸς ἐς τὸ μέσον

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Paolo Ognibene

What was lying in the north was shrouded in the deepest fog, and it is difficult to understand if people of Inner Iran knew about the populations and military elites who dominated these geographically and culturally distant territories. In fact, apart from sharing the Iranian language , Inner and Outer Iran shared very little in common: one was sedentary, the other nomadic; one used writing, the other did not; one was Zoroastrian, the other was almost untouched by the reform of this prophet.5 Even the encounter with the Greek world had completely different consequences in Inner and Outer Iran. In Outer Iran, Greek traditions were considered by the Scythians corrupt and unsuitable and it is well known that this is reported by a Greek.6 In Inner Iran, on the other hand, Greeks and Iranians had always been in contact, and the Macedonian conquest favoured a cultural interaction that reached all corners of the Persian Empire, including the most remote ones.7 Centuries later, Parthians and Sasanians made new enemies on their northern borders. But it remained that the populations living in the north were the enemy. In the first century ad, however, a change took place in the region north of the Caucasian ridge, which had a deep impact on the life of the Parthians and the Sasanians. A new people came from the East and settled on the lands that used to belong to the Cimmerians, then to the Scythians and the Sarmatians. This event was not as traumatic as the passage of the Huns in the fourth century through those lands. The newcomers were also nomads, their language was Iranian, and their way of life was so similar that by comparing the description of the Scythians in Herodotus with that of the Alans in Ammianus one would think that the second text was “copied” from the first.8 There was no concept of ethnic cleansing among nomadic peoples . The conquered peoples were not exterminated but subdued and became part of the new “state” formation, where the power remained, nonetheless, in the hands of the dominant political-military elite. The arrival of the Alans was not perceived in Parthian Iran as a worrying event. Certainly, the Alans reached the region north of the Caucasus coming Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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διήιξε. τῶν δὲ ὡς ἕκαστοι ὥρων τὸν λαγὸν ἐδίωκον. ταραχϑέντων δὲ τῶν Σκυϑέων καὶ βοῇ χρεωμένων, εἴρετο ὁ Δαρεῖος τῶν ἀντιπολέμων τὸν ϑόρυβον· πυϑόμενος δὲ σφέας τὸν λαγὸν διώκοντας, εἶπε ἄρα πρὸς τούς περ ἐώϑεε καὶ τὰ ἄλλα λέγειν “οὗτοι οἱ ἄνδρες ἡμέων πολλὸν καταφρονέουσι, καί μοι νῦν φαίνεται Γοβρύης εἶπεῖν περὶ τῶν Σκυϑικῶν δώρων ὀρϑῶς. ὡς ὦν οὕτως ἤδη δοκεόντων καὶ αὐτῷ μοι ἔχειν, βουλῆς ἀγαϑῆς δεῖ, ὅκως ἀσφαλέως ἡ κομιδὴ ἡμῖν ἔσται τὸ ὀπίσω.” See also Ognibene 2018, pp. 11–19; Ognibene 2017, pp. 119–128. But consider in any case also Abaev 1975, pp. 1–12; Abaev 1956, pp. 23–56. Hdt. IV, 76: “ξεινικοῖσι δὲ νομαίοισι καὶ οὗτοι φεύγουσι αἰνῶς χρᾶσϑαι, μήτι γε ὧν ἄλλων ληῶν, Ἑλληνικοῖσι δὲ καὶ ἥκιστα.” See also Ognibene 2018, pp. 18–19; but consider also Miščenko 1884, p. 63: “исходным пунктом в определении взаимных этнических отношений между скифскими племенами, которые неясно различаются у Геродота, должно служить то положение, что в описании скифских нравов, образa жизни, религиозных представлений греческий историк имеет в виду прежде всего царских скифов.” Consider, for example, that in Bactria Greek alphabet was used to write Bactrian in Hellenistic period. See Sims-Williams 1989, pp. 230–235; Oranskij 1973, pp. 98–102. Amm. Marc. XXXI, 2; Hdt. IV, 62ss.

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from NE.9 Their passage from the south would have been undoubtedly witnessed by the Armenians, the Georgians and the Parthians, but the sources say nothing about it. However, changes to the north of the Caucasus became evident. The Alans were a restless people and, although seemingly a natural ally, the Caucasus was a real barrier for them.10 They soon discovered the existence of passages connecting north and south Caucasus, as well as the power that came with their control. The Alans had learned from experience that when it came to war between the Romans and the Parthians and the Byzantines and the Sasanians, the so-called “third wheel” had everything to gain and so they were able to exploit this situation to their advantage by forming changing alliances with one or the other. Misunderstandings between sedentaries and nomads were the same as in the days of Cyrus and Darius. The Alans were still far from having undergone the Georgian/Byzantine influence that had led them to convert to Christianity in the 10th century.11 Looking west and south, they saw the possibility of looting those expeditions, a practice we find in a different form also in the Narts epos under the name of balc, “real raids” that could last very long and provide goods and glory.12 In the fourth century, the Hun transit shuffled the cards: some Alans were incorporated into the army of the Huns,13 (according to the model that Genghis Khan will adopt in the thirteenth century, after the defeat of the Tartars)14 and 9

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Miller 1887, p. 12: “Если выше приведенныя аналогiи для осетинскихъ названий серебра, мѣди и свинца убѣдительны, если дѣйствительно названiя этихъ металловъ урало-алтайскaго происхожденiя, то для определѣнiя пути, по которому пришли предки осетинъ на сѣверный Кавказъ, получается довольно вѣское указанiе. Они должны были двигаться не съ юга, откуда не могли бы принести съ собою уралоалтайскихъ названiй для трехъ металловъ, а съ сѣвера, близъ обильныхъ металлами отроговъ Урала, т.е. пройти въ Европу тѣмъ путемъ, между Уральскимъ хребтомъ и Каспiемъ, по которому шли угро-финскiя и урало-алтайскiя племена, частью даже въ историческiя времена.” See also Ognibene 2020, pp. 196–215. In Europe, you can find something similar only when you approach the High Tatras (Slovak: Vysoké Tatry; Polish: Tatry Wysokie) from the Slovak side, but the Tatras are not as high as the Caucasus. Ognibene 2012, pp. 65–92. балц | балци: “в нартовском эпосе военная экспедиция,” Abaev 1958, pp. 233–234; балц: “путешествие, поездка, поход,” IUDz 1962, p. 145; балци: “путешествие, поход,” DUDz 2003, p. 168. Amm. Marc. XXXI, 3: “Igitur Huni pervasis Halanorum regionibus, quos Greuthungis confines Tanaïtas consuetudo cognominavit, interfectisque multis et spoliatis, reliquos sibi concordandi fide pacta iunxerunt, eisque adhibitis confidentius Ermenrichi late patentes et uberes pagos repentino impetus perruperunt, bellicosissimi regis, et per multa variaque fortiter facta, vicinis nationibus formidati.” Tartars was not only the name of a people, but also a general name used to designate different ethnic groups. As for the Tatar people, many were killed by the Mongols after the Tartar campaign. See Pelliot 1949 [= HS, §154], p. 47: “tan-ï bügüdä-yi či’ün-tür üliǰü kïduya kä’äldüba kä’äǰü’ü.” See also: SSM, §154; SHM §154. In Western Europe, their name was associated with the idea of the tartarus described by the Classical

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moved westward penetrating inside the Roman Empire. At the dissolution of the Hun empire, some Alans continued to move west and caused many problems in the Roman Empire, which was unable to predict their movements.15 Others, however, showed a strong willingness to assimilate16 and Alanic loanwords are very rare in European languages.17 The Alan influence on the Arthurian cycle is in any case undeniable.18 In the Caucasus, their strength remained substantial, although partially reduced. From the Georgian and Armenian chronicles, we know of their repeated incursions south of the Caucasus ridge, which created problems for the whole Transcaucasia and generated friction with Sasanian Iran.19 The clearest evidence of Sasanian attention towards the Alans is preserved in the treaty between the Byzantines and the Sasanians following the war in Lazica. The Sasanians obtained a commitment from the Byzantines that the populations of the northern Caucasus would stop trespassing south of the ridge. In these populations we must basically see the Alans.20 Although weakened by the Hun passage, the Alans had not yet fallen under the control of the Khazars and represented a serious danger.21 They had not yet stationed in the territories that are now referred to as North Ossetia.22 At that time, they were further downstream and further north, partly in the territory that today constitutes the Republic of Kabardino-Balkaria23 and partly in the plains that extend north of the ridge towards the Black Sea. Undoubtedly, they controlled one of the

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authors: MGH 1884, p. 548: “videte ergo si tartarorum nome convenerit hiis, qui abunt, vel quia ad tartara pertrahunt, vel quia tartareis satellitibus in omnibus concordant, vel a tatarsin, quod in greco sonat tremere vel horrere.” Bachrach 1973; Thordarson 1998, pp. 483–498; Ognibene 2015b, pp. 51–58. Claud. Carm. 8, 484–487 (MGH 1892, p. 168): “Obvia quid mirum vinci, cum batbarus ultro || iam cupiat servire tibi? Tua Sarmata discors || sacramenta petit, proiecta pelle Gelonus || militat, in Latios ritus transistis Alani.” See also Alemany 2000, p. 46. The name of the bridge in Hungarian híd comes from Alanic: Abaev 1989, p. 199: хид | хед: “мост” in Ossetic; IUDz 1962, p. 435; DUDz 2003, p. 584; MOSz 1987, p. 303. Littleton/Thomas 1978, pp. 512–527; Littleton 1979, pp. 326–333; Littleton/ Malcor 2000; Ognibene 2015a, pp. 9–19. ქართლის ცხოვრება = KC 1955; Պատմություն Հայոց = Khorenats’i, PH. About the treaty and its meaning, see Panaino 2009, pp. 273–299; about the Alans in this context, see Ognibene 2009, pp. 261–272. For a certain period of time, the Alans seem to have been under Khazar control. After the Arab-Khazar war, the Khazars were seriously weakened and Prince Svjatoslav destroyed their capital Běla Vežja. On his way back, Svjatoslav was killed by the Pechenegs of Kurja. Lavrent’evskaja, 6480 [= PSRL I, p. 31]: “В лѣто 6480. Всяша главу его и во лбѣ его съдѣлаша чашю, oкoвaвшe лoбъ eгo и пьяху пo нeмъ” About the Khazars, see Dunlop 1954. The Ossetians now live in the territory of the Republic of Northern Ossetia – Alania (Oss.: Республикæ Цæгат Ирыстон Алани; Russ.: Республика Северная ОсетияАлания), parts of the Russian Federation and in South Ossetia part of the Republic of Georgia, but reached de facto independence in 2008 (Oss.: Республикæ Хуссар Ирыстон; Georg. სამხრეთ ოსეთის რესპუბლიკა). Kabardino-Balkaria is still called today by the Ossetians Asy | Asi, Assi: Abaev 1958, pp. 79–80.

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main access routes to Transcaucasia, at least from the northern side. This pass (the Darial pass) still preserves their name in various languages, including in Persian.24 The study of the linguistic situation in the Caucasian region allows us to understand quite well the role played by the Caucasus in the whole area between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. Although there are Caucasian languages both south and north of the ridge, the Northern Caucasian (in the Western and Eastern varieties) is profoundly different from the Southern one: the mountain ridge seems to have played the role of barrier between the peoples of the north and south.25 I do not want to overestimate the role of the Caucasus as an extremely conservative area from a linguistic point of view (all mountain areas are), nor as a refuge for peoples,26 which led the Arabs to name the main mount of the Caucasus (mount Elbrus, but it extended to all Caucasus) “the mountain of the languages,” but I would like to highlight how these mountains were in all respects a barrier that only allowed the strongest to pass in one direction or another (very often from north to south). Still today, no railway crosses the ridge and the routes connecting one side to the other are mainly along the coasts of the Black Sea or the Caspian Sea. According to Herodotus the first one was followed by the Cimmerians to leave their lands upon the arrival of the Scythians, the other is the one followed by the Scythians in pursuit of the Cimmerians.27 The Eastern route, the one that follows the coast of the Caspian Sea and descends from Maxachkala towards Baku,28 has only one real difficult point: Derbent. There the mountains extend all the way to the sea, making it quite difficult for anyone to cross from one side to the other. Derbent, also known as the “Iron gates,” stopped the Mongolian army of Jebe and Subedei in 1221.29 But at the centre of the ridge the Darial gorge, crossed by the Terek river, allows the passage from one side to the other. It begins from the north just south of Vladikavkaz. The valley narrows quickly and soon one enters a gorge with rocky walls almost a thousand meters high. It is the famous Alan gate: the control of this gorge made it possible to prevent the passage of a large 24 Georg. დირიალის ხეობა; Arm. դրումք Ալամաց; Pers.: ‫ ;در االن‬Arab: ‫ ;ﺑﺎﺐ اﺎﻟن‬Oss. Дайраны ком; Russ. Дарьяльское ущелье. 25 About Caucasian languages see: Tomelleri 2008, pp. 143–172; van Ginneken 1938; Bouda 1960; Dirr 1928; Geiger et al. 1959. 26 But consider Miller 1887, p. 1: “Кавказскiй перешеекъ является ключомъ для разрѣшенiя этнографическихъ вопросовъ: достаточно бросить взглядъ на географическую карту, чтобы понять значенiе Кавказа какъ азiатско-европейскаго asylum’a.” 27 Hdt. IV, 12: “φαίνονται δὲ οἱ Κιμμέριοι φεύγοντες ἐς τὴν Ἀσίην τοὺς Σκύϑας καὶ τὴν χερσόνησον κτίσαντες, ἐν τῇ νῦν Σινώπη πόλις Ἑλλὰς οἴκισται. φανεροὶ δέ εἰσὶ καὶ οἱ Σκύϑαι διώξαντες αὐτοὺς καὶ ἐσβαλόντες ἐς γῆν τὴν Μηδικὴν, ἁμαρτόντες τῆς ὁδοῦ· οἱ μὲν γὰρ Κιμμέριοι αἰεὶ τὴν παρὰ ϑάλασσαν ἔφευγον, οἱ δὲ Σκύϑαι ἐν δεξιῇ τὸν Καύκασον ἔχοντες ἐδίωκον ἐς οὗ ἐσέβαλον ἐς γῆν τὴν Μηδικήν, ἐς μεσόγαιαν τῆς ὁδοῦ τραφϑέντες.” 28 The old M29: Rostov na Donu – Baku. 29 Ognibene/Sayaf 2011, pp. 77–89; Ognibene 2017, pp. 30–38; Ognibene 2003, pp. 163–186; Mong. ǰäbä, sübä’ätäi.

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army.30 The Alans controlled this “gate” from the north for centuries (at least until the 13th century) and the Sasanians knew it precisely because of its name, The Gate of the Alans. It has long been debated whether the name that appears in the Šābuhr inscription is that of the Alan gate (Darial) or that of the Alban gate (Iron gates).31 This question is complicated by the spelling of the two names — Alans, Albans — which often leads to confusion in Middle Persian and in Armenian.32 This is complicated by the definition of the borders of Inner Iran. Gh. Gnoli offers a clear and convincing argument in his work, but we should keep in mind that the Alans — present or not in the Sasanian inscriptions — were never part of the Sasanian empire and the Caucasus represented the northern border for them, as it did for the Iranian empires preceding them.33 In general, Alan history is very long. It ran in parallel with Sasanian history for some centuries, a time during which the Alans were an insidious and dangerous enemy for them, more than any other nomadic tribes preceding them.

Bibliography Abaev, V. I. 1956: “Скифский быт и реформа Зороастра.” In: ArOr 24/1, pp. 23–56. — 1958: Историко-этимологический словарь осетинского языка, т. 1. Москва/Ленинград. — 1975: “Зороастр и Скифы.” In: Monumentum H.S. Nyberg 3 (AcIr 6). Téhéran/ Liège, pp. 1–12. — 1979: Историко-этимологический словарь осетинского языка, т. 3. Ленинград. Alemany, A. 2000: Sources on the Alans. A Critical Compilation (HdO 8. Central Asia 5). Leiden. Amm. Marc. 1939: Ammianus Marcellinus with an English Translation by J.C. Rolfe. 3 (Loeb Classical Library 339). Cambridge. Bachrach, B. S 1973: A History of the Alans in the West. From Their First Appearance in the Sources of Classical Antiquity through the Early Middle Ages. Minneapolis. Bouda, K. 1960: Introducción a la lingüística caucásica (Filosofia y Letras, XIV 1). Salamanca. 30 According to the Arab chronicles (Ibn al-Athīr and others), the Mongols crossed the Caucasus near Derbent, but there is also evidence that they were not able to cross the ridge and were helped by the guides of Shirvan who showed them another place to cross. If we have in mind that the Mongols fought in the Caucasus with the Alan-LezginKipchak coalition and that they stopped the Mongol army before the defection of the Kipchak, it is possible that this coalition tried to stop the Mongols at the Darial pass. See Karamzin 1988, p. 142: “Моголы хотѣли итти самымъ кратчайшимъ путемъ къ Дербенту … но обманутые путеводителями Моголы зашли въ тѣсныя ущелiя, и были со всѣхъ сторонъ окружены Аланами-Ясами, жителями Дагестана.” 31 Gnoli 1996, pp. 831–861 (with extensive bibliography). 32 Gnoli 1996, pp. 832–836. In Armenian we have Ալամք (Alans) and Ալուամք (Albanians). 33 Gnoli 1996, p. 837: “Le iscrizioni sassanidi, quindi, definiscono “Porta degli Alani” non la gola di Derbend o le Porte dell’Albania, ma il limite settentrionale fino a cui si estendeva il controllo persiano nella regione caucasica: il passo di Darial, appunto, o del Terek.”

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Dirr, A. 1928: Einführung in das Studium der kaukasischen Sprachen. Leipzig. DUDZ 2003: Дигорон-уруссаг дзурдуат / Дигорско-русский словарь. Дзæуæгигъæу. Dunlop, D. M. 1954: A History of the Jewish Khazars. Princeton. Geiger, B. et al. 1959: Peoples and Languages of the Caucasus. A Synopsis (Janua Linguarumi 6). Den Haag. van Ginneken, J. 1938: Contribution à la grammaire comparée des langues du Caucase. Amsterdam. Gnoli, Gh. 1996: “Il nome degli Alani nelle iscrizioni sassanidi: considerazioni linguistiche e storiche sul tema dell’opposizione tra Iran Esterno e Iran Interno.” In: Il Caucaso: Cerniera fra culture dal Mediterraneo alla Persia. Spoleto (Settimane di studio, 43/2), pp. 831–861. Hdt. 1921: Herodotus with an English Translation by A.D. Godley (Loeb Classical Library 118). Cambridge. Ibn al-Athīir 1967: Al-Kāmil fī al-tārīkh. Vol. 12. Beirut. IUDz 1962: Ирон-уырыссаг дзырдуат / Осетинско-русский словарь. Орджоникидзе. Karamzin, N. M. 1988: Исторiя государства россiйскаго. 3. Москва. KC 1955: Картлис цховреба. I: грузинский текст. Подготовил к изданию по всем основным рукописям С.Г. К аухчишвили. Тбилиси. Khorenats’i, Ph = [Movsēs Xorenac‘i] 1978: History of Armenia, translated by R. Thompson. Cambridge. Littleton, C. S. 1979: “The Holy Grail, the Cauldron of Annwn, and the Nartyamonga.” In: JAF 92, pp. 326–333. Littleton, C. S./ L. A. Malcor 2000: From Scythia to Camelot. A Radical Reassessment of the Legends of King Arthur, the Knights of the Round Table and the Holy Grail. New York. Littleton, C. S./A. C. Thomas 1978: “The Sarmatian Connection: New Light on the Origin of the Arthurian and Holy Grail Legends.” In: JAF 91, pp. 512–527. Marr, N. J. 1922: “Термин скиф.” In: Яфетический сборник 1. Петроград, pp. 67–132. MGH 1884: Monumenta Germaniae Historica. Autores antiquissimi, t. 23: Emoni et Menchonis Werumensum chronica. Hannover, pp. 454–561. MGH 1898: Monumenta Germaniae Historica. Autores antiquissimi, t. 10: Claudi Claudiani carmina recensuit T. Birt. Berolini. Miller, Vs. F. 1886: “Эпиграфические следы иранства на юге России.” In: ZNMP 240, pp. 232–283. — 1887: Осетинские этюды. 3 (Ученыя записки Императорскaго московскaго университета, отдѣлъ историко-филологическiй 8). Москва. Miščenko, F. G. 1884: “Къ вопросу о царскихъ скифахъ.” In: KS, pp. 55–76. MOSz 1987: Magyar-orosz szótar / Венгерско-русский словарь. Budapest/Moszkva. Müllenhoff, K. V. 1866: “Über die Herkunft und Sprache der pontischen Scythen und Sarmaten.” In: MKPAWB. Berlin, pp. 549–576. Ognibene, P. 2003: “Jäbä and Sübä’ätäi’s Military Expedition to the West.” In: Nartamongæ 2, pp. 163–186. — 2009: “Gli Alani tra la Persia e Bisanzio.” In: Bizantinistica XI, pp. 261–272. — 2012: Alani I: la “riscoperta”, il nome, l’Alania medievale (Indo-Iranica et Orientalia. Series Lazur 5). Milano.

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— 2015a: “Re Artù e i Narti.” In: Slavia 1, pp. 9–19. — 2015b: “Alan Place-Names in Western Europe.” In: A. Krasnowolska/R. RusekKowalska (eds): Studies on the Iranian World I: Before Islam. Kraków, pp. 51–58. — 2017a: “Scythian, Persian and Greek Misunderstandings.” In: EIT 3, pp. 119–128. — 2017b: “Кипчаки в сражениях против татар.” In: Avrasya uluslararası araştırmalar 5, pp. 30–38. — 2018: “Sguardi incrociati Greco-scitici.” In: Electrum 24, pp. 11–19. — 2019: Scythica. Gli studi sugli Sciti in Russia fra Ottocento e Novecento (IndoIranica et Orientalia. Series Lazur 16). Milano. — 2020: “A Matter of Metals: Finno-Ugric and Northern Iranian.” In: Iran and the Caucasus 24, pp. 196–215. Ognibene, P./Gh. Sayaf 2011: “Поход Джэбэ и Субэдэя на Кавказ: арабские источники.” In: V. Tomelleri/M. Topadze/A. Lukianowicz/O. Rumjancev (eds.): Languages and Cultures in the Caucasus (Studies in Language and Culture in Central and Eastern Europe 16). München, pp. 77–89. Oranskij, I. M. 1973: Le lingue iraniche. Traduzione di A. V. Rossi. Napoli [Russian: Иранские языки, Москва, 1963]. Panaino, A. 2009: “Il duplice volto del protocollo aggiuntivo sulle minoranze religiose nella Pace dei 50 anni.” In: Bizantinistica XI, pp. 273–299. Pelliot, P. 1949: Histoire Secrète des Mongols. Restitution du texte mongol et traduction française des chapitres I a VI. Paris. PSRL 1846: Полное собрание русскихъ лѣтописей. I: Лаврентьевская и Троицкая лѣтописи. Санктпетербургъ. SHM 1982: The Secret History of the Mongols. Translated by F. W. Cleaves. Cambridge. Sims-Williams, N. 1989: “Bactrian.” In: Rüdiger Schmitt (Hrsg.): Compendium linguarum iranicarum. Wiesbaden, pp. 230–235. SSM 2009: Storia segreta dei Mongoli. A cura di S. Kozin. Parma. Szemerényi, O. 1980: Four Old Iranian Ethnic Names: Scythian – Skudra – Sogdian – Saka (ÖAW, Phil.-hist. Kl., Sitzungsberichte 371). Wien. Thordarson, F. 1998: “Gallia alanica”. In: Studia iranica et alanica. Festschrift for Professor Vasilij Ivanovič Abaev on the Occasion of His 95th Birthday (Serie Orientale Roma 82). Rome, pp. 483–498. Tomelleri, V. 2008: “La famiglia delle lingue caucasiche.” In: E. Banfi/N. Grandi (eds.): Le lingue extraeuropee: Asia e Africa. Roma, pp. 143–172.

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Between Semantics and Pragmatics: Origins and Developments in the Meaning of dastgerd A New Approach to the Problem Antonio Panaino In1 his edition of the Res Gestae Divi Saporis, Philip Huyse2 clearly resumes the state of the debate concerning the much intriguing Middle Persian word dastgerd (cf. also Parthian dastakirt [dstkrty], dastegird [dstygyrt];3 MP dastgerd [dstkrt], etc.;4 Gr. δαστικιρτ, δαστκίρτης, δαστικέρτης,5 or κτίσμα, pl. κτίσματα,6 “possession,” “creation, creature”). Philippe Gignoux7 offers another overview concerning this important term. Both contributions cover the literature and the history of the academic discussion on this subject. Following Prods O. Skjærvø,8 Huyse9 observes that the supposed three different meanings of this technical word, as previously classified by Back10 and earlier by Maricq,11 can be reduced to two basic values, whose distinction is in some cases still obscure or uncertain.12 The semantic extension of these two 1

I must thank for their kind suggestions my colleagues and friends Amir Ahmadi (Monash University), Salman Aliyari Babolghani (Università degli Studi della Tuscia, Viterbo), Samra Azarnouche (EPHE, Paris), Gian Pietro Basello (Università di Napoli, l’Orientale), Ela Filippone (Università degli Studi della Tuscia, Viterbo), Paolo Ognibene (Università di Bologna, Campus di Ravenna), Andrea Piras (Università di Bologna, Campus di Ravenna), Hrach Martirosyan (Leiden University), Velizar Sadovski (Institut für Iranistik, AÖW, Wien), Gianfilippo Terribili (Università di Roma, la Sapienza). 2 Huyse 1999, II, pp. 98–100. 3 Gignoux 1972, p. 50. See also Durkin-Meisterernst 2004, p. 142. 4 Gignoux 1972, p. 22. Cf. CPD, p. 25: sub dast(a)gird [YDE-, dst-krtˈ, M. dstygyrd, N. dastgird] “estate;” Nyberg 1974, p. 59. 5 Huyse 1999, I, pp. 72, 12. 6 Huyse 1999, I, pp. 72, 144. Against the reading κτήματα, “land, farmland,” suggested by Rostovtzeff 1943, pp. 30, 37, see Ensslin 1949, p. 115, n. 1. 7 Gignoux 1996, pp. 105–106. 8 Skjærvø in Humbach/Skjærvø 1983, pp. 31–32. 9 Huyse 1999, II, pp. 8. 10 Back 1978, p. 210 (n° 119), p. 504, n. 199. 11 Maricq 1958, pp. 314–315, n. 3 (= 1965, pp. 56–57, n. 3), who distinguishes the following meanings: “domaine.” “créature” and “la créature par excellence.” 12 As shown again by Skjærvø in Humbach/Skjærvø 1983, p. 32. Sasanian Studies | Sasanidische Studien. Vol. I (2022). Ed. by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee doi: 10.13173/SSt.1.215

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meanings ranges from “material possession” (and thus “landed, royal property”)13 to “spiritual possession” (i.e. vassal, subject etc.). We know that MP dastgerd was originally used (according to the tradition recorded within the Sasanian inscriptions) with reference either to a (royal) landed property lato sensu (and in these occurrences it was fittingly translated in Greek as κτίσμα, pl. κτίσματα),14 or to a human “vassal,” appointed by the king or even by the gods. In particular, the king himself can be a dastgerd of the gods.15 The stem was actually attested also in the Pahlavi books (see, e.g., the Dādestān i ̄ Dēni ̄g 90, par. 5;16 the Pahlavi Riwāyat to the DD, 49,3;17 or the Kārnāmag i ̄ Ardaxšēr i ̄ Pābagān 5,13 and 7,1)18 and in the later Sasanian legal tradition,19 where its basic meaning was that of “property.” 13 On this subject, see Klíma 1957, pp. 65–69; Idem 1962, p. 52, n. 23. 14 See again the detailed discussion offered by Huyse 1999, II, pp. 99–100 (cf. Janda 2006, p. 77). Actually, the term can correspond to Lat. fundus, latifundus, but also to “Krongut” (i.e. “Crown estate”), as noted by Huyse, but this meaning covers also the buildings, productions, and servants (in particular the slaves) depending by these properties, as already noted by Geiger 1935, p. 123; cf. also Nöldeke 1878, p. 48; Müller 1897 12; Goetze 1925, p. 252. Huyse, very fittingly remarked that Dhabhar (1930 = 1955) collected all the pertinent attestations within Pahlavi literature with the exception of the legal sources, as in particular the Mādiyān ī hazār Dādestān, for which he referred to Bartholomae 1920, pp. 26–49 For this legal text, see not only Macuch 1993, pp. 164–166, 292, 700 (Index), but also Perikhanian 1997, pp. 349–351, with all the pertinent references to the textual occurrences. de Menasce (1966, pp. 171–172 = 1985, p. 151–52) for his part underlined the legal value of dastgerd in the framework of donations, implying also everything contained in such a kind of property. About the attestation of the term dastgerd as a gloss of Av. vīs-, “village” in the Pahlavi translation of the Avestan sources such as Y. 10,7 [where ahe vīse uta maēϑanǝm is probably an interpolation] and Vd. 5,10 [vīsi vīsi], see again Dhabhar (1930, pp. 37–42 = 1955, pp. 37–38, 63–69); a long discussion in Klíma (1957, pp. 66–68). About the gloss dastgerd in the Pahlavi version of Y. 10.7, see also Unvala 1924, p. 59, n. 1. More precisely, in the Widēwdād, the sequence vīsi vīsi is translated wis wis, “in every village,” and then glossed dastgerd dastgerd (twice!), “in every estate.” See Moazami 2014, pp. 132–133. 15 As well underlined by Sprengling 1940, p. 378. On the importance of gods’ hand, see already the remarkable study by Weinreich 1909. 16 But here it was written with the heterogram in the first compositional element: YDEkrtˈ. See Huyse 1999, II, p. 98; cf. again Dhabhar (1930, pp. 42–43 = 1955, p. 70–71). 17 See Williams 1990, I, pp. 190–191 (pad dastgird kard); II, p. 88 (“into an estate”). It is useful to mention the fact that Weber (2008, pp. 216, 220, n. 24) has found in a Pahlavi papyrus of Berkeley a fitting reference to a kadagdastbed “‘Master of the household service” in connection with a dastgerd. 18 See Grenet 2003, pp. 76–77 (was deh [ud] dastgird “beaucoup de villages et de domaines”); pp. 80–81 (dastgird-ē Gulār “au domaine de Gulâr”). As Samra Azarnouche notes (personal communication): “Le passage de Šahrestānīhā ī Ērānšahr 20 est particulièrement intéressant car il fait le lien entre la construction d’une fortification défensive importante et les dastgerd. Dans un article sur Khosrow Ier (2015, p. 237) j’avais fait l’hypothèse que les larges domaines fortifiés qu’on a découverts le long du Mur de Gorgân correspondaient à ces dastgird mentionnés par ce texte, puisque Khosrow a voulu se présenter comme le bâtisseur de ce mur.” 19 See again Macuch 1993, pp. 164–166, 292, 700; Perikhanian 1993, pp. 349–351, with all the references to the pertinent passages. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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The etymology of dastgerd is clear (< *dasta-kr̥ta “made by hand, handiwork”), and its formal antecedent is probably attested in Old Persian in DSe, ll. 42–43,20 although it occurs only in a partly damaged passage, where we find ⌈dasta⌉kr̥tam,21 whose reading has been restored after the Elamite version: ŠU.ma.hu-ut-tuk-qa.22 This kind of compound is paralleled by other formations such as Vedic and Sanskrit hástakr̥ta-, “handwork, handmade, handiwork,”23 as Gr. χειροποίητον “hand-made,”24 and from the semantic point of view we may also mention Lat. manufactus (with univerbation from the usual manu factus).25 Whether Darius’s claim in DSe 42–43 is properly referred to as something “previously done” by somebody and that was not in order, so that Darius put it again in the right place, or not, is a matter of discussion. For instance, Janda presumes that in this occurrence already ⌈dasta⌉kr̥tam would be better interpreted as “Geltung, Besitz.” The Elamite version does not underpin this sharp conclusion. Actually, we simply find the juxtaposition of the logogram for “hand” ŠU (largely used in Akkadian, instead of a phonemic spelling rendering the corresponding Elamite 20 Kent 1953, p. 142; Schmitt 2009, p. 125. On this passage, see Klíma (1957, pp. 66–68), whose attempts to connect this occurrence with the later meaning assumed by dastgerd are too speculative. Cf. also Schweiger, 1998, I, pp. 98–99, and n. 21; II, p. 333; Janda, 2006, p. 76. 21 Skalmowski 1993, pp. 159–161, has tried to derive the first compositional element dastafrom *daδ-ta- + kr̥t- (with reference also to Skt. hita-kr̥t-), plus the root noun kr̥t-, as second element, later thematized, so that the compound would have been re-shaped as dasta-kr̥ta- (with an additional change in the first compositional element due to popular etymology). Skalmowski assumed that the meaning of *daδ-ta- > dasta- was “settled, fixed”, then “secure” > “strong”, while that of kr̥t- was “maker of …” The whole compound, thus, would mean something like “defence (arrangement)”, “stronghold”, from “maker of security.” But against this interpretation, see Schmitt 1994, p. 291, who objected that root names such as kr̥t- as second element of composition work as nomina agentis and not as nomina actionis, so that dastgert should mean “Beschützer,” not “Schützling,” (as Skalmowski would like to demonstrate). Other fitting objections have been advanced by Janda (2006, pp. 81–82). Cf. also Durkin-Meisterernst 2014, p. 195. About the Elamite occurrence, see Vallat 1977, p. 164, line 35, and in the related dictionary at p. 98, s.v. ŠU.MEŠ “entreprise;” Basello 2011, p. 69, n. 41. For the Babylonian text, see Steve 1987, pp. 61–63 and line 31 of the fragment (but cf. the following note); for a comparative analysis of the three versions of this passage, see also Filippone 2020, p. 131. 22 See Schmitt 2014, p. 166; Janda 2006, pp. 75–76. Cf. already Weisbach 1937, pp. 82, 85; Herzfeld 1938, p. 136. Very kindly Dr. Aliyari Babolghani informs me that: “The AB equivalent of the OP dastakr̥ t am and AE kur-ma.utu-k(a) is what Steve (1987, p. 61), apparently following Weissbach, reads as dul-lu(!)-um. “ouvrages.” In case we trust our current restoration and meaning of the OP dastakr̥ t am ‘von Hand geschaffen’ (see Schmitt, 2014, p. 166), this reading (i.e. dul-lu(!)-um) could match the other two equivalents (cf. dullum “work” [...]). Nevertheless, I have doubt if this reading is correct; the yet legible traces of the second and the third signs do not show lu-um (Gian Pietro Basello has confirmed my doubt).” About OP dastakr̥ta-, see now Filippone 2020. 23 See Janda 2006, pp. 75, passim; Schutzeichel 2014, p. 214. 24 Rightly mentioned by Huyse 1999, II, p. 98, n. 160. However, as Sprengling (1953, p. 103) noted, this Greek compound “in its use does not correspond to the Persian term.” 25 Lewis 1879, p. 1111.

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word, which is rarely attested as ki-ir and kur-pi, the latter being a plural form) with the verb “to do” hut. We may speculate that “to do with hands” had a specialized (administrative) meaning in the technical language of the Persepolis administration,26 but it is very risky to establish a more clear value for this earlier stage.27 For instance, Lecoq has preferred to frame the semantic field of ⌈ dasta⌉kr̥tam within the limits of the lexicon concerning building constructions (“il y avait beaucoup de constructions qui, auparavant, n’étaient pas en bon état”),28 which, albeit not certain, seems to be supported by the proximate occurrence of duškr̥ta- clearly referring to didā- “wall (of a fortress” [DSe: didā duškr̥t ā āha]).29 For these reasons, it is arguable that various contemporary meanings of dastgerd in Late-Antiquity assumed technical connotations, which are reflected in a number of loanwords in contemporary foreign traditions, such as Arm. dastakert;30 Syr. dstgrd (?),31 and dsqrtʾ.32 Maricq33 has discussed some of the Armenian occurrences, maintaining that dastakert had in Eƚiše also the technical 26 See Basello 2011, pp. 69–72, passim. 27 This observation does not mean that ⌈dasta⌉kr̥ t am was not involved by a phraseological value, as rightly Janda (2006, p. 76) states, but that its technical meaning is too unclear in this context, and that even a phraseological pattern can assume semantic varieties we are unable to discriminate in the attested Achaemenian framework. 28 See Lecoq 1997, p. 233. 29 See again Schmitt 2009, p. 126: “die Burgmauer was schlecht gemacht”. 30 Garsoïan 1989, p. 520; cf. Hübschmann 1897, p. 135, nr. 169; Herzfeld 1924, p. 164, who noted that “in the Armenian political system dastakert occupies the lowest rank: city, market-town, village and dastakert;” Eilers 1982, p. 26; Schmitt 1983, pp. 81, 101, 89. We must also remark that in Armenian the new formation jer̄akert was built on the model of its Arm. synonym dastakert; cf. Huyse 1999, II, p. 99. Very important has been the investigation developed by Sarkissian 1967 and 1968. Cf. also Gignoux 1996, p. 106. In her monographic research, Olsen (1999, pp. 263–265) has shown that the form jer̄akert is a calque on the loanword dastakert, with the substitution of the word for “hand” with a genuine Armenian stem. She also tried to refuse the basic meaning of “hand-made” for the word dastakert, suggesting the possible coalescence of two different older compounds, one meaning “hand-made,” the latter “ploughed land” (with reference to dašt “field” and the verbal root karš- “to plough”). But the consistent presence of dast is against this solution. See also the objections by Janda 2006, p. 83. 31 Payne Smith 1879, col. 930. 32 Bedjan 1895, pp. 438–439. Cf. Geiger 1935, pp. 124, 128, who also made references to pertinent occurrences in the Talmud (at p. 126); the same statement was already given by Nöldeke 1878, p. 48, n. 4; Nöldeke 1879, pp. 143–144. On the phonetics of Talmudic dsqrt’ “village, estate,” re-analysed as a feminine stem, see Telegdi 1935, pp. 216, and 239–240, with the regular loss of internal -t- (see Ciancaglini 2008, pp. 153–154). Pigulevskaja (1963, p. 151) outlined various kinds of property, which corresponded to a dastkart in the Syriac tradition. She also discusses the description of the dastkart in the Syriac Martyrologia as the one of Mihrāngušnasp. We must observe that Ciancaglin 2008, pp. 153–154, fittingly observed that the Syriac spellings such as dsqrt’ and dstqrt’ “seem to have been borrowed earlier than dstgrd, because the presence of q and t points to an older MP model, preceding the sonorization of the plosives /k/ and /t/ and realized as *dastkart.” 33 Maricq 1958, pp. 314–315, n. 3 (= 1965, pp. 56–57, n. 3).

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meaning of “(special) creature of god.” But we could translate it as “divine ἔργον/ ὄργανον,” both words being connected to ἐργάζομαι “to do, to make,” and meaning “creature” (as a nomen rei actae) or “instrument” (as a nomen instrumenti). In this case, we can mention the definition of the “slave” given by Aristoteles (Ethica Nicomachea 134, 1161b) as an ὄργανον ἔμψυχον (opposed to the ὄργανον ἄψυχον).34 Its usage in the Christian framework assumed a different value (see Eusebius, Demonstrationes IV, 4). But, as Perikhanian35 remarked, MP dastgerd possesses a more variegated semantic range, which a simple translation such as “creature” does not capture. Furthermore, we cannot forget that in Biblical Armenian dastakert translated Gr. ἀγρός, “field, land,” γεώργιον, “(cultivated) field” or κτήσεις, “possessions,” which Janda36 suggests to subsume under the Oberbegriff of “Besitz” or “possession.” The investigation undertaken by Sarkissian37 has the merit of bringing out the evolution of dastakert in Armenian within the local political jargon. There, it can have the same meaning as agarak, “property, domain,”38 or as dzer̥akert, i.e. “created thing,” “something founded by someone,” “made by human hands,” a term which perfectly corresponded to Arm. jer̄akert (with jer̄ meaning “hand”), another literal translation of dastgerd. While the second meaning confirms the long persistence of the etymological background of dastgerd, the first one assumed an additional political hue, as emphasized by Hewsen,39 so corresponding, for instance, in Agathangelos,40 to a denomination of a large district transferred to the Roman Empire as a “province” or as a “vassal state.” It was in this sense of the term that Trdat III (298 – ca 330) referred to “the dastakert of the Caesars”41 in a passage still

34 I must thank V. Sadovski for this attractive comparison. 35 Perikhanian, 1997, pp. 350–351. We must carefully note that the Armenian scholar considered the traditional etymology of dastgerd and dastwar as wrong (see again Perikhanian, 1997, pp. 348–349), and the connection between the first element dast° and the meaning of “hand” as simply due to popular etymology. On the contrary, she preferred to connect dast° with the verbal root *danh- “to be able/capable, entitled, gifted, competent,” so that the compound *dasta-kr̥ ta- would designate “(a person) made competent,” although the semantic evolution has been unclearly explained, as Janda (2006, pp. 82–83) has remarked. 36 See Janda 2006, p. 80. 37 Sarkissian 1968; 1969; cf. Hewsen 1985–86, pp. 17–18. Garsoïan (1989, p. 520) remarks that the meaning of “royal estate” is rarely attested, although it generally means “estate”, and that dastakert can be also used of naxarar “holdings.” See also Canepa 2018, pp. 356–358. Dr. Terribili (in a private communication) called my attention to the fact that in ŠKZ § 30 dastgerd is used with reference to ancestral possessions, and it would be possible to infer that Šābuhr included also special estates belonging to earlier dynasties under this designation. 38 See Martirosyan 2010, pp. 4–5. 39 Hewsen 1985–86, pp. 17–18, passim. 40 See, again, the historical discussion by Hewsen 1985–86, pp. 17–18. 41 See Sarkissian 1969, p. 47.

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replete with Iranian and Mazdean concepts.42 This evolution shows the juridical flexibility of the word and its richness. Gignoux has rightly pointed out that the Christian translator of the Pahlavi Psalter (cf. Psalm 134: 15)43 must have known the basic etymological meaning of dastgerd since he renders Syr. ʿbd ʾydʾ “the work of the hands” (Septuaginta, Gr. τὰ ἔργα χειρῶν) with dstklty.44 This was a translation ad litteram, which did not (necessarily) incorporate more specialized meanings of the term in legal or official Parthian, Middle Persian or even Armenian contexts. On the other hand, the persistence of the basic meaning seems to be supported by another evidence, which comes from the Armenian lexicography. In the case of the translation of the same passage quoted above from the Septuaginta, exactly jer̄akert was used. If this word is a calque of dastakert, there is no reason to doubt that in Armenian, too, the basic meaning of the Persian compound was known.45 Thus, we can see a subtler meaning behind another example quoted by Sarkissian:46 Eƚiše (8,65) relates that a Persian priest (referred to as the magupat of Aparšahr), deeply traumatized by the carnage of Avarayr battle of (451 ce) converted to Christianity.47 Armenians dubbed him “the dastkert newly created by god,” and Sarkissian asserts that this meaning is just a continuation of the earlier literal sense of the compound, which is true enough, but it seems that it has also assumed a further and higher spiritual connotation. In this context, the title of dastakert implies that the newly converted priest was “received” or “made new by the hands” of god. In this case, the meaning of “property, creature of god” registers the putative spiritual transformation, so that the “divine property” was realized thanks to the conversion and the duly performed baptism. The earlier exclusive association of dastgerd with the “royal domain,” or better the “superior” investiture (so including also the divine power), which marked out the semantic field assumed by this term in early Sasanian times, at least in the official language of the court, was gradually lost. The semantic range 42 See Agathangelos, History of the Armenians, ch. 127: “May there be greeting and prosperity by the help of the gods [cf. III Macc. 3.9], abundant fertility from noble Aramazd, protection from Lady Anahit, valor from valiant Vahagn to you and all our land of Armenia; may there be the wisdom of the Greeks to the province (dastakert) of the Caesars, protection (to us) from our heroic Parthians, from the glory (p‘ar̄k‘) of our kings and brave ancestors;” edition and translation by Thompson 1976, pp. 138–139. Cf. again the pertinent notes by Thompson 1976, pp. 467–468. 43 Andreas/Barr 1933, pp. 25, 38; cf. Huyse 1999, II, p. 99. 44 Gignoux 1969, pp. 241–42 and n. 22. See Ciancaglini 2008, p. 154 on this expression well attested in the New Testament also with reference to similar patterns in Akkadian, in the form šipir idī (šipir qātē). We may also recall the existence of Arabic names such as Abd-ullah “slave/servant of god.” 45 See again Janda 2006, pp. 83–84, 86. 46 Sarkissian 1968; 1969, pp. 47–48. 47 See Perikhanian 1997, p. 350–351.

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of the term extended to include other kinds of aristocratic properties, and later it became current also in the denomination of normal villages48 as in modern times. A striking example comes from the Arabic loanword daskara, meaning “village,” which is used for at least four different places in ʿIrāḳ,49 while this kind of toponym is attested practically everywhere in present day Iran.50 This evolution seems to follow a circular course: to the basic simpler meaning is added a more technical value, the evidence of which progressively seems to have gone lost despite its importance. But the emergence of the complex semantics of this juridical51 term and title has presented a number of problems, which I would like to re-examine in the present study. With regard to the value of “vassal” as a person in the hands of the king52 or of the gods (i.e., with a special relation with a superior authority), the term dastgerd is of enormous interest.53 Actually it shows that the king can be understood to be bound to the gods, as other nobles are bound to him. This simple consideration demonstrates that the Sasanian šāhān šāh was not envisaged as a god but only as “sacred,” whose prerogatives gave him a superior status.54 We may recall that the meaning of “vassal of God” was preserved also in Armenian Christian sources.55 But despite the fact that the etymology is clear beyond any doubt and that other suggestions for the first element of the compound56 must be considered far-fetched,57 48 Pigulevskaja (1963, p. 152) fittingly noted that in the administrative divisions, the dastgerd took the last place in the lists of the localities. See also de Menasce 1956, p. 426; Gignoux, 1996, p. 105. 49 See Geiger 1935, pp. 123–125, passim; Herzfeld 1924, p. 164; Skalmowski 1993, p. 157; cf. also Eilers 1982, p. 26. See also the entry “Daskara” by Duri, 1965. Many similar toponyms can be found at the address https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dastgird. For pertinent historical comments about the Arabic sources concerning the Sasanian town of al-Daskara, see Pigulevskaja 1963, pp. 151–152. On toponyms, see also the informative note offered by Klíma 1957, pp. 85–86, n. 44, with a number of references to the Byzantine sources concerning a palace, property of Xusraw II, named Δασταγέρδ. See also Frye 1984, p. 337; Morony 1982, pp. 19–20. 50 As very kindly Samra Azarnouche wrote me, with reference also to https://www.parsi. wiki/fa/wiki/248604/%d8%af%d8%b3%d8%aa%da%af%d8%b1%d8%af. 51 Already Maricq (1958, p. 315, n. 3 = 1965, p. 57, n. 3) assumed that dastgerd had a precise juridical implication. 52 This, for instance, was the case of the king of Georgia, Hamāzāsp, dastgerd Šābuhr, mentioned in ŠKZ § 44; see Henning 1961, p. 355; Huyse 1999, I, p. 57. 53 The close link of the word dast with the ideological self-representation of king Šābuhr I as dast-nēw in the inscription of Ḥājiābād is a subject of pertinent interest; on this matter, see now Terribili, 2019, pp. 281–292; cf. also Piras, 2018, pp. 231–239. 54 See Panaino 2009, passim. 55 Maricq 1958, p. 314, n. 3 = 1965, p. 56, n. 3; Perikhanian 1973, p. 460: Eadem 1997, pp. 250–351. 56 Skalmowski 1993. For a historical overview of older hypotheses, see also the article by Geiger 1935, passim, who discussed and criticised earlier interpretations. See also here the note 35, about the solution advanced by Perikhanian 1997, pp. 350–351. 57 Schmitt 1994, p. 291; cf. Huyse 1999, II, p. 99.

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a literal meaning such a “the one who is made by hands” still presents us with some problems, which cannot be overcome without a number of prudent considerations. Why was a “property” or a “vassal” something like “handmade”? Why should a vassal of the king or of the gods be designated with such a peculiar title? Within the earlier Iranian framework, we can exclude the idea that the compound could refer to god’s formation of the human body by hand, say, on the model of a potter making clay figurines (as in the Genesis) through a manual act in which he made human beings with his own hands. This possibility seems to be excluded by the description of the world creation as presented in the first chapters of the Bundahišn, although we must admit that nothing excludes the conclusion that human beings were considered “creatures” of god, made by him (but there is no evidence to a creative role played by His hands).58 It was again Maricq59 who connects the semantic development of MP dastgerd with the idea of a personal relation between the king and Ahuramazdā, as attested in the introductory text of a number of inscriptions of Darius (DNa/DSe/DSf). The king declares that the god has made him king, etc. (haya dārayavaum xšāyaϑiyam akunauš […]), being understood that he plays the role of the god’s steward on earth.60 Furthermore, we may observe that in Zoroastrian lore Mazdā’s arrangement of the universe is considered to be a constructed masterpiece; according to the Dādestān ī Mēnōg ī xrad 47,7,61 for instance, “the sky has been established above the earth like an egg by the manufacturing skill (dastkārīh) of the creator Ohrmazd” (asmān azabar zamīg xāyag homānāg pad dastkārīh ī dādār Ohrmazd winard estēd). I would not describe this creation as a handicraft stricto sensu, because the term dastkārīh seems to be used in the general sense of “construction,” and we cannot find other evidence supporting the idea of a specific handmade of the cosmos. Sims-Williams has suggested to Huyse62 the possibility that the real meaning is “held in someone’s hands” (“was in jemandes Hand (Lok.) gelegt wurde”), and a similar idea has been developed by Janda,63 followed by Schmitt.64 In reality, Huyse shortly referred to an interpretation of the linguistic data that SimsWilliams inferred from Bactrian documents, which he published only the year after.65 Thus, these Bactrian evidences remained partly unnoticed. Sims-Williams, thanks to the discovery of Bactrian words such as λιστηγιρδο, λιστιγιρδο, meaning 58 Perikhanian 1997, pp. 350–351, rightly notes that despite theological differences Christians and Mazdeans agreed on the fact that humanity was a creation of god, but there was no reason for Šābuhr to proclaim that he and other nobles had been literally created (i.e. made) by the hands of the gods. 59 Maricq 1958, p. 315, n. 3 = 1965, p. 57, n. 3. 60 See Lincoln 2012, pp. 10–11, passim. 61 Anklesaria 1913, pp. 126–127; Bausani 1963, p. 150. 62 Huyse 1999, II, p. 100. 63 See Janda 2006, pp. 83–90. 64 Schmitt 2014, p. 166. 65 See, in fact, Sims-Williams 2000, pp. 201–202.

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“estate,” directly comparable with Parthian dstygyrd “mansion,” Inscriptional Parthian dstkrt “(royal) estate,” also “ward, adopted child,” immediately deduced their derivation from λιστο + κιρδο and assumed what follows: The compound-vowel -η-, Pth. -y- is probably a locative ending, the etymological meaning of *dastay(ā)-kr̥ta- being “(person or thing) put into (someone’s) hands,” hence both “property administered by an agent on behalf of the owner” and “person looked after by another on behalf of his or her own family.”

This solution has been critically discussed only by Ciancaglini,66 who casts doubts on the fact that we may easily distinguish later words coming from a simple *dasta-kr̥ta- or from a “syntactic compound” such as *dastay(ā)-kr̥ta-. She objects that the compound-vowel appearing in Bactrian as -η-, in Parthian as -y- seems, “a too weak evidence to reconstruct a locative ending in the first member of the compound, and the two meanings “estate, possession” and “handiwork” are not so irrelated to imply the reconstruction of two different compounds: so the translator of the Pahlavi Psalter easy translated Syr. ʿbd ʾydʾ“handiwork” with MP dstklty.” We will discuss this matter later again, but at the moment it is necessary to observe that the study of the phraseological relevance of the sequence *dastay(ā)-kr̥- was in the meantime developed by Janda and Schmitt, although without special references to the above quoted reconstruction as advanced by Sims-Williams. Actually, Schmitt shows caution regarding to OP dastakr̥ta-, translated “von Hand geschaffen,” just underlying the fact that the Middle Iranian forms are mostly “formal identisch” with the OP earlier (unique) attestation, but he endorses Janda analysis67 of the phraseological framework from which dastgerd, etc., stems. In this connection, we note that the OP syntagmatic sequence dastay-ā kar- + dative. i.e. “given/delivered in the hand(s) [locative] (to/of somebody)” can be illuminating. The presence of this phraseological structure is very important, and Janda has the merit to have identified a wide-ranging conspectus of parallel patterns in other IndoEuropean languages. Although dastay-ā kar- is attested only once, in DB IV § 54, 35–36,68 it occurs in a very significant framework:

66 Ciancaglini 2008, p. 154. 67 Very fittingly Janda (2006, p. 84) noted that Herzfeld (1938, p. 137) had already mentioned the Greek usage of πρὸ χειρὸς “ready” and ὑπὸ χεῖρα “in promptu,” although Herzfeld himself did not develop this intuition. 68 Weisbach 1911, pp. 60–61; Kent 1953, pp. 129, 131; Schmitt 1999, p. 69; Schmitt 2009, p. 79. For the Elamite text, see Vallat 1977, pp. 129, 130; see now also Aliyari Babolghani 1394 [2015], p. 136; for the Babylonian text, see von Voigtlander 1978, pp. 41, 60, and Malbran-Labat 1994, pp. 103, 119. See now the discussion by Filippone 2020.

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pasāvadiš auramazadā manā dastayā akunau̯ š; yaϑā mām kāma avaϑādiš akunavam. Afterwards A huramazdā made (i.e. put) them within my hand; as was my desire, so I did unto them.69

Janda, who has discussed in detail this occurrence, concludes that dastakr̥tawas a substantivization of a concept such as “das in die Hand, Verfügungsgewalt Gegebene” and that the meaning of “Besitz” was a direct derivation of it, although he rightly maintains that the earlier basic sense of “handiwork” was never erased.70 Furthermore, Schmitt pointed out the existence of a very similar structure such as dīśta yan (< *dastai ā̯ kar-) in Khotanese (where dīśta is the regular locative of dasta-,71 and yan-,72 the regular derivative of Old Iranian *kar-), and also insisted (as Janda; see below) on comparing the Iranian phrase with hástayoḥ dhāin Vedic. Furthermore, Janda73 and Schmitt74 have called attention to the two attested Old Avestan occurrences of zastaiiō (locative dual) dā-, which I translate in the most literal way in order to preserve the original syntactical structure: Y. 30,8:75 […] yōi aṣ̌āi dadən zastaiiō drujəm […] (those) who gave wrongness/ deceit to Aṣ̌a into (his two) hands. Y. 44,14:76 kaϑā aṣ̌āi drujəm diiąm zastaiiō “How could I give wrongness/deceit to Aṣ̌a into (his two) hands.”

The Old Persian attestation, although isolated, demonstrates that the act of putting/giving77 something/someone in the hands (loc.) of somebody (OP manā is gen.) meant that the thing/person was placed under the latter’s full jurisdiction, i.e. under a sort of ius utendi abutendique. It is thanks to this authority that Darius might claim to have done with the rebels as he pleased. Thus, they become dastakr̥ta- (i.e. “[beings] assigned [to him] in his hands”) and the (royal) person is legitimized to assume their total custodia, including the right over their life. Thanks to this formula, we find an act of public legitimization for death sentences, including all the consequences inflicted on the subjects submitted to 69 For a synoptic comparison of the three different versions (Old Persian, Elamite and Akkadian) of this text, cf. now Filippone 2020, p. 131. 70 Janda 2006, pp. 85–86. 71 Bailey 1979, pp. 154; 160. 72 Bailey 1979, p. 342. 73 Janda 2006, p. 87. 74 Schmitt 2014, p. 166. 75 Kellens/Pirart 1988, p. 112; Humbach/Faiss 2010, pp. 82–83. 76 Kellens/Pirart 1988, p. 152; Humbach/Faiss 2010, pp. 125. 77 In these two Old Avestan examples, the use of the verb dā- is very interesting, because here we find a Kreuzung between the phraseology of the Indo-Iranian dhā- and that of *dā-. The passage actually states that one wants to give to Aṣ̌a (dative) the druj- setting the demon in its hands, but at the same time the actor is putting into the hands (of Aṣ̌a) the druj- in order to deliver it to the Aməṣ̌a Spəṇta.

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this procedure. The Avestan examples, in their turn, confirm the importance of the symbolic role attributed to the hands, in which Aṣ̌a takes “wrongness/ deceit” (druj-) with the right of destroying it. Thus, the use of dā- (in Avestan),78 but even more that of kar- in Old Persiaṇ, with the locative of dasta-/zasta-, generated a Hypostasierung, as defined by Schmitt,79 which, in Old Persian, was assumed by the already existing compound dastakr̥ta-, for which I would like to postulate two different meanings: one literal and simpler as “hand-made,” a common and probably earlier meaning; and a second one, derived from a “complex” juridical institution, which presumably also had a ritual function, symbolically attributed to the use of the hands.80 Then, “to be put in the hands of the king” meant an act of complete submission, as a complete transfer of property and domain, whose only witness in the Old Persian corpus is punitive. This evolution must be envisaged within a cultural context in which god had the power to make (kar-) — in the sense of appointing, promoting — somebody the custodian of something special, as, for instance, to make/appoint a man king. Then, the semantic evolution of dastgerd (et similia) shows that other, less acute juridical meanings were possible. The person subjected to this action practically became sacer as well as a res involved in this ceremony was sacrum, a very complex juridical and religious term, which shows two opposite meanings: one, more common, was “sacred, holy,” even “divine, celestial,” but another one, was “accursed, detestable, abominable, criminal, etc.” We mention in passing the ancient religious formula of malediction:81 sacer esto! One of the best treatment of this vox media is given by Benveniste,82 who shows the ritual implication of the act by which a person, an animal, or something is committed to the divine transcendent sphere, and thus beyond 78 The Pahlavi translation of Y. 30,8 (ka ō ōy kē ahlāyīh [kū pad tis ī frārōn hammōxt estēd] ā-š ō dast dahīhēd druz [druz ī ahlmōγīh] “since [when] to one to whom righteousness (belongs) [i.e. in a righteous thing he has learnt], then to his hands the druz is delivered [the druz of the heretic])” and 44,14 (kay [ka] ōy kē ahlāyīh kard estēd ā–š ō dast dahīhēd druz [druz ī ahlmōγīh] “when to the one who has performed righteousness, then to his hand the druz is delivered [the druz of the heretic]?),” do not show a direct continuity of the Avestan construction in any special compositional form or in any striking syntactical construction, which can remind the use of dastgerd; cf. Malandra/Ichaporia 2013, pp. 33, 65, 210, 235. 79 Schmitt 2014, p. 166. Very kindly Ela Filippone (personal communication) called my attention to the extraordinary importance assumed within the Mesopotamian framework of royal expression such as “to set / put something in the hands of somebody,” where usually the agentive is a god and the beneficiary is the king; she also remarked the pertinence for the present discussion of the entry qātu “hand” in CAD, vol. 13 (1982, pp. 183–200), where a great number of metaphoric uses can be found, such as “power of gods,” “authority, possessions, custody, charge, care, control, jurisdiction.” 80 Gonda 1980, pp. 82–87, insists on the role of hands in the rituals concerning the transmission of power. 81 See already Bennet 1930. Cf. now Schiemann 2001. 82 Benveniste 1969, II, pp. 192, passim.

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the profane sphere, so that sacer can mean also “untouchable,” “cursed” and “execrable,” and “liable to be killed”. Before continuing with the ritual and pragmatic evaluation of the development of the term dastgerd in Middle Persian, I would like to resume the interesting comparative conspectus proposed by Janda,83 who notes that in the R̥ gveda from 49 attestations of hásta- at least 17 are with dhā- in the locative singular (háste), dual (hástayoḥ) or plural (hásteṣu). But this is to be expected. What is very noteworthy is that the phrase “in die Hand genommen” (i.e. “taken in hand) is used of objects that cannot be literally taken in hands, thus making plain the metaphoric usage of the phrase. Janda84 quotes three passages (R̥ V 9,18,4a [ā ́ yó vi ś́ vāni vāŕ yā vásūni hástayor dadhé “he who holds all desirable things in his two hands”];85 6,31,1a [hástayor adhithā indra kr̥ṣ ṭī ḥ́ “you have taken all the communities in your hands, O Indra”];86 1,38,1ab [pitá putrá ná hástayoh dadhidhvé “What have you taken in your hands, as a father does his son”]).87 Apart from the first, the last two sentences in particular have a rhetoric force, in which the phrase is used of persons who are in Indra’s hands or the barhis in the Maruts’ hands on the model of a son in his father’s hands. A similar phraseological structure can also be found in Homeric Greek, where Janda88 identified a sequence such as ἐν χερὶ ϑήσειν “to place [something] in the hand” (in Ilias, 8,289 [ἐν χερὶ ϑήσω] and 20,182 [ἐν χερὶ ϑήσει]),89 and in Hittite, where keššar “hand” frequently occurs with the verb dai- “to set, put.”90 For the present investigation it is less relevant whether the word for “hand” was feminine91 (*ghésōr) or masculine (as ĝhésto-), but we can certainly agree with Janda92 on the fact that a phraseological pattern with dheH1- + the locative of the word for “hand” produced certain ideological implications and some pragmatic and ritual realia. The ramifications of these evolutions underpinning the individual traditions cannot be easily inferred,93 because different trends 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93

Janda 2006, pp. 87–88. Janda 2006, p. 88. See Jamison/Brereton 2014, III, p. 1252. See Jamison/Brereton 2014, II, p. 815. For this passage, see Jamison/Brereton 2014, I, p. 146. But other examples, such as R̥ V 1,72,1b; 3,39,6cd; 6,31,1ab, have been collected by Schutzeichel 2013, p. 213. Janda 2006, pp. 88–89. Schutzeichel 2013, p. 212, has discussed other pertinent examples with the verb τίϑειν occurring in Od. 13,57 (ἐν χερσὶ τίϑει); Ilias 1,441 (ἐν χερσὶ τίϑει); 1,585 (ἐν χειρὶ τίϑει); 6,482 (ἐν χερσὶν ἔϑηκε). Janda 2006, pp. 89–90. Cf. again Schutzeichel 2013, p. 213. But we must observe that the masculine in hásta- seems to be secondary, as suggested by Ernout/Meillet 2001, p. 386. For further detail, see Janda 2006, p. 90. We must also observe that the verb kar- had a number of different phraseological implications, studied for instance by Schindler (1980) in the so-called “cvi-Bildungen,” or more recently by Sadovski (2018, p. 171, 176). Cf. also the wide-ranging study offered by Schutzeichel 2013.

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and local variations inevitably occurred in the course of the linguistic history of the single languages. It is for this reason that the polysemic connotations assumed by the term dastgerd show a very wide range, which cannot be reduced to a single frame, and we observe that its semantics covered a whole range of actions in Old Persian from punitive measures (as in DSe) to divine appointment of the king, which was that presumably developed and that later assumed the meaning of “(special) ὄργανον in the hands of the gods,” as a title adoptable also by the king himself. This kind of amphibolic evolution warrants a broader reflection on the importance attributed in Antiquity to the symbolic function of the hands. This brief overview, which does not pretend to offer any complete conspectus of the subject (for which we should imagine a huge book) could be at least preparatory for further investigations. We know the antiquity of the ancient Roman matrimonial ceremony of the marriage in manum or cum manu mariti,94 in which the father transferred his patria potestas to his son-in-law in the presence of high priests such as the Pontifex Maximus and Flamen Dialis. The expression “to ask for the hand” of a bride sounds certainly old-fashioned in present-day English (and in all the languages where a similar expression is used), but its long survival is bound to be impressive, although we can doubt that all the non-Latin-speaking persons who have used it, understood its original meaning. Incidentally, note that a Latin participial compound such as mănūmissus, derived from mănūmitto (or manu emitto),95 “to make free a slave,”96 etc., implies a legal enactment or ceremony, while the cognate Italian past participle manomesso (or even the substantive manomissione < mănūmissĭō,̄ “freeing of a slave”) has lost its capacity to evoke such a ritual liberation and is simply understood as referring to something “manipulated (and damaged) by hand.”97 The use and significance of hands are therefore foundational and essential in many ceremonies. We know that to be uttānáhasta- or ustānazasta- “with upraised hands”98 was necessary in certain occasions – and not just in ritual –, but 94 See Dumézil 1979; Hersch 2010. The important symbolic role of hands is visible also in the ancient Indian ritual of marriage; see Gonda 1980, p. 60, passim. 95 For the whole family of these words, see Lewis 1991, p. 1111. 96 It is interesting to note, although this remark does not change our framework, that also dastgerd could be used for slaves. See Bartholomae 1920, pp. 123–125; Geiger 1935, p. 123; Klíma 1957, pp. 66–69, 86–87, n. 46, Frye 1984, p. 221. 97 From the phraseological point of view, we must also consider the relevant examples coming from Latin manus tactus, “hand’s touch,” manuum tactus, “hands’ touch,” and manū-tactus, “touched by hand” (as in the expression Dei manū tactus). In particular manus / manuum tactus is connected with the ritual gesture for weddings; cf. Colish 1990, p. 393; Treggiari 1993, pp. 11, 23, 28. For the curative act referred to in the expression manū tactus, see Kortekaas 2007, p. 387. Cf. also de Vaan 2009, pp. 364– 365, for some other phraseological expressions. 98 See Kellens/Pirart 1990, p. 226; for Ved. ud-hasta-, see Sadovski 2001.

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the use of the verb kar-/kr̥- had special ritual implications, as for instance, in the famous term samskr̥ta-, which confers the status of “confectus-/-m,” “completely performed,” or in Young Avestan in the performative verb haṇkāraiia-, which technically means “to perform something in a complete and perfect way,” or in the term haṇkǝrǝϑa-, adj. “pronounced in a complete way.99 We might also mention the act of the δεξίωσις,100 “giving (someone) the right (hand)” in the Mediterranean area and in Iran, and in particular its role in Commagene and in the Mithraic Mysteria. Without any emphasis for this visual physical and spiritual manifestation of alliance and friendship (also between humans and gods), we have another opportunity to consider the strong implication of the “hands” in ceremonies in which the performative dimension of “making things with the words,”101 was certainly accompanied by gestures and acts, where the role of one or both hands was prominent.102 The ritual dimension is well attested behind the meaning of the Greek verb χειροτονέω “to stretch out the hand,” or in that of the compound χειροτονία, f., “stretching of the hand,”103 whose semantic field covers an area including politics (e.g., the vote in an assembly or the act of an election) and religion (as in some Jewish and Christian rituals, as that of the confirmation).104 The χειροτονία and the χειροϑεσία were well known also in the Manichaean ritual traditions, as confirmed by many sources.105 I underline the significance of the performative dimension and in the event of the hands in this context, even in the Manichaean ritual lore, despite its deprecating view of the body. Actually, notwithstanding the signaculum manuum, which was one of the three seals of this Gnostic tradition insisting on the abstention from impure acts, the Manichaean religion knew the “laying of the hands” and other manual gestures,106 which were current in Sasanian Iran. One fitting example is mentioned in the Turfan Parthian fragment M47.107 According to this source, Mani heals the brother of king Šābuhr, laying his hand on the head of the sick man, who was asleep (aδiyān frēštag dast pad sar awistād “Thus, the Apostle placed the hand on (his) head”). When he recovered, the king’s brother grasped Mani’s right hand, presumably the one that cured 99 See Panaino 2004, pp. 53–54. 100 Reekmans 1958; Ricks 2006. 101 See Austin 1972; Tambiah 1968; 1985; 1990. 102 In particular, about the role of the right hand in Vedic ceremonies, see Gonda 1972; this subject has been enormously expanded by Gonda 1980 with a high number of very pertinent examples regarding the present discussion. 103 Liddell/Scott 1968, p. 1986. 104 As kindly remarked by V. Sadosvki (oral communication), “In (Old) Church Slavonic, the act of roͅko-polaganьje ‘χειροτονία of a priest’ is a calque of (Byz.) Gr. χειροϑεσία, f.; roͅko-polagati is = χειρο-τίϑημι.” 105 See Coyle 2009, pp. 94–99. 106 On this subject, see the detailed chapter by Coyle 2009, pp. 89–91. 107 Boyce 1975, pp. 37–38; Sundermann 1981, p. 103: “Da legte der Apostel die Hand auf (seinen) Kopf;” Müller 1904, pp. 82–84; Coyle 2009, pp. 94–95.

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him.108 In the framework of the Persian world, a ritual like this would have been probably associated with, or interpreted as, a religious ceremony transforming a person into a sort of dastgerd of the God of Light. As stated in the Kölner ManiCodex,109 Mani’s healing power was received by the hands of the most saint angels (CMC 12.1–15), an example simply showing the persistence of this performative motif in a culture framework so important also for the Iranian world.110 For all these reasons I suggest that in the Middle Persian usage of dastgerd we can identify different semantic levels. The most basic refers to something handmade. But this elementary meaning seems to have been inflected somewhat in the context of Achaemenid tradition, in which “to put (literally “make”) one in the (king’s) hands” meant to deliver him to his own destiny. But the semantics of this condition seems to be too specifically negative, and I suggest that a different, positive or neutral, use of this phraseology, as shown by the Indo-Iranian (and Indo-European) examples, was equally possible. Thus, the existence of a vox media, starting from the basic meaning of “made/delivered in king’s/gods’ hands” (in a good or a bad sense) is actually a very plausible solution. This neutral meaning could easily evolve also in the direction of “consecrated to the power of the king or of the divinities,” so that it meant also “to be a royal (or divine, in the case of a temple) property/estate.” In Late-Antiquity Iran we actually find lexicographical data confirming the survival of the original etymological sense, but also the one of royal landed property, “made/placed in royal hands” or that of “royal (or divine) vassal.” The attestation in Parthian of a South-Western Iranian form with dast° (not zast°)111 would confirm the Persian derivation of this “institution”, although its presence in Northern Iran can also have other explanations.112 In this perspective, there is no need to wonder with Skalmowski113 “why would MIr. terms such as bandag or paristag have not been used instead of the ambiguous dast(a/i)kirt?” The answer is very simple. Dastgerd did not just mean a “servant,” but a more complex institution, whose translation made trouble for the translator of the Greek version, when 108 On the “healing hand” in Indo-Iranian, see Sadovski 2005, pp. 531–534; Sadovski 2009, pp. 159–161; Delaini 2017, pp. 133–134, 140, 185–186; Gonda 1980, pp. 68–71, 82–85, passim. The healing power attributed to the royal touch in Mediaeval France and England is the central matter of an epoch-making book by Bloch (1924). 109 See Coyle 2009, p. 93; Koenen/Römer 1988, p. 8; Cirillo 2003, pp. 44–45. 110 According to the Bundahišn I,41, at the end of the fight against Ohrmazd, Ahreman will become “powerless,” a concept expressed by a-kār. The semantic implication of this term underlines the force of the verb kardan, and the idea of impotence emerging from the term a-kār. 111 It is interesting to recall that in Avestan zasta- is the so-called Ahuric term for “hand,” opposed to the demonic one gauua-; this opposition persisted in Pahlavi, where we find dast and gaw; CPD, pp. 25, 35. N.B. In Avestan there is no 4gav- “daēvic hand,” but, as shown by Kellens 1974, pp. 331–332, there is only a thematic stem gauua-. 112 See the discussion by Janda 2006, pp. 81–82. 113 Skalmowski 1993, p. 158.

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he was required to convey not only the sense of physical possession (κτίσμα, pl. κτίσματα), but also the special liaison between the king and his vassals or — even a more difficult situation — as the relation between the gods and the king.114 Thus, it was possible for a man or a woman to be “in king’s hands” as proven by the case of Dēnāg, the queen of Mēšān [ŠKZ § 44 (31/25/60)]. She is presented as dastgerd Šābuhr (δαστικιρτ Σαπορ),115 a title that implies the existence of a special relation between her and the king. But even the king, who was properly crowned and initiated into the royal mysteria, was designated as “a creature in the hands of the gods”, i.e. “a sort of divine possession” (exactly as a vassal was a satellite of the royal power). The king as a dastgerd of the divinities is clearly presented in ŠKZ §32 (22/17/36); here δαστικερτας, at the accusative plural in agreement with ἡμᾶς (pluralis maiestatis referring to Šābuhr) is governed by the verb ἔκτισαν (Parthian OBDW-nt [karēnd]),116 whose subject was ϑεοί! This and other occurrences show that there was no shame or humiliation in accepting or attributing this title, and that it was considered, when used by a person, as a sort of privilege, probably as a mark of distinction. In the present case, the Greek syntax in my opinion seems to evoke a ceremonial statement, a sort of investiture. This suggestion is confirmed by the fact that in the closing section of Šābuhr’s inscription [ŠKZ § 51 (35/30/70)],117 the Greek version states that, as the present king has been a κτίσμα of the gods and has enjoyed their support, the gods will be equally supportive friends and helpers (βοηζοὶ) of the right descendants of the legitimate successors of the Sasanian king, so that they will make (ποιήσωνται) his legitimate followers as their own dastgerd (δαστικιρτην). Although only the Parthian text preserves this sentence (the MP text is shorter and partly different),118 it confirms that divine help is strictly connected with the possibility to obtain the status of dastgerd (δαστικιρτην), which is granted (lit. “made”) by the gods (Parth. karānd), and it is connected with the execution 114 The Armenian Canons of the Covenant of Aƚuēn (488 ce) show, as well noted by Perikhanian (1997, p. 351), that the institution of a dastakert was considered strictly related to the Mazdean period, particularly connected with the pad ruwān foundations, present in the Albania Caucasica during the pre-Christian phase. 115 See Huyse 1999, I, pp. 56–57. Cf. also Perikhanian 1997, p. 350. See also the important remarks made by Janda 2006, pp. 77–81. 116 See Huyse 1999, I, p. 45. It is remarkable that Parthian, again, uses the verb kardan in the phraseology of dastgerd karēnd. The use in the Parthian version of the expression až ēd gōnag “auf diese Art,” strictly referred to dastgerd, seems to concern something not explicitly stated, but connected with the quality of the royal person. 117 See Huyse 1999, I, pp. 63–64. As Terribili notes (personal communication), in ŠKZ §§ 31–32 as well as in § 51 (Parthian text), the “achievements” obtained by Šābuhr I correspond to a sort of premise and, at the same time, of consequence (even of evidence) of his status as “dastgerd of the gods.” This condition, however, implied a patent subordination of the king to divine will, so that his human action should be imagined as in full harmony with God’s desires. 118 See already the discussion by Henning 1958, p. 96; cf. also Huyse 1999, I, pp. 63–64; II, pp. 180–181, and now Janda 2006, pp. 78–80, with a number of very pertinent comments.

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of the religious duties. The adoption of κτίσμα in this context, before the final use of δαστικιρτην, could raise some doubts, but we must keep in mind that κτίσμα, apart from the sense of “foundation, property, etc.,” and of “creature” in general, had a more elevated meaning in the contemporary Greek language. Origenes,119 for instance, used κτίσμα specifically for “the divine Son”! It is quite possible that the later meaning of dastgerd, whose origins were in any case already rooted in the Achaemenid royal jargon, was more or less directly determined by the existence of special symbolic rituals, in which the king might stretch his own hands over a land or a town, thus affirming or vindicating his right to it; or in the course of ceremonies of investiture of royal entourage, ritual gestures of the hands such as laying them on the candidate could have been performed by the king.120 We have good reasons to assume, with due caution, the existence of something similar in the case of the ceremonies of royal coronation, when the king became kē čihr az yazdān, but also a dastgerd of the gods.121 From what we know of the archaic royal rituals of the Vedic period,122 stretching the hands on the new king was equally attested. In the framework of the present semantic and pragmatic field is it possible to postulate a radical distinction between two originally different compounds such as *dasta-kr̥ta- and dastay(ā)-kr̫ta-? Theoretically, this distinction would be possible, but the Bactrian and Parthian data, if really their spellings derive from an earlier (Proto-Iranian?) compound with a locative in the first term (an unclear matter),123 do not allow to assess a sharp semantic distinction in the further attestations. On the contrary, apart from the isolated presence in Old Persian of ⌈dasta⌉kr̥ta- and the clear witness of the phraseological use of dastay(ā) kar-, we can wonder if this theoretical distinction was really relevant. The simper form would have probably assumed (and assumed indeed!) the same 119 See Ashwin-Siejkowski 2010, p. 81. 120 We should keep in mind the complexity of the ceremonial apparatus, which was enacted during the submission or the rendition of a town or a fortress in the hands of the Sasanian kings. Unfortunately, we do not know these rituals in detail, but certainly there was a codified language, in which formal sentences and coded gests had to follow strict rules and patterns, mutually accepted even by antagonist peoples. 121 Terribili (2019, pp. 284–286) has emphasized the importance of the epithet attributed to Artaxerxes I, said “Longimanus” (or Μακρόχειρ), i.e. “long-hand,” in Classical sources, connecting this qualification with the one occurring in Yašt 17, 22.2–3, where the goddess Aṣ̌i praises Zoroaster for his being dərəγō.bāzāuš “the one possessing long arms”, a very fitting quality for the image of a ritual officiant. Very pertinent is also chapter 3,4–7 of the seventh book of the Dēnkard (Molé 1967, pp. 28–29); there, a wizard would have tried to beat Zoroaster’s head with his hand in order to kill him, but his hands were made dry and paralyzed. Rightly, Terribili suspects that this event is based on a sort of narrative inversion of an earlier ritual, aiming at obtaining a sort of prognosis, but here transformed into a dangerous event. 122 Heesterman 1957. 123 On Avestan compounds with a possible locative as first term of composition, see Duchesne-Guillemin 1936, pp. 6 § 10, 22 § 32, 60, § 86, 126 § 149, 154 § 194.

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meaning.124 In any case, if this coexistence was living, it was soon levelled, or at least this is what we can infer from the extant attestations, even despite the possible strong semantic differences. The possible discrimination between different uses of the verb kar-/kr̥- must take into consideration a new challenging problem, emerging from the keen observation advanced by Filippone125 that in some constructions this verb presents a “light” construction, and one case should be exactly that of the most pertinent locution dastayā kar- “to consign, to hand over.”126 Thus, if kar- in OP dasta-kr̥ta- “hand-made” was “heavy,” while in *dastayā-kr̥ta- it was “light,” their respective origins should be semantically considered different, despite the formal similarity of the “significant.”127 This is at least a sharp deduction we could infer from the status of the data, but I would like to observe that in the case of the construction taken by dastayā kar- the weight of an earlier phraseology and probably the impending heritage of a ritual, pragmatic framework, created an inevitable contiguity, if a not a certain overlapping with the “heavy” verbal semantics. In this respect I am hesitant on the definitive assessment of the impact we can attribute to this morphosyntactic distinction, although the new methodology proposed by Filippone opens new perspectives of investigation. In particular, I must remark that the Elamite version of DB § 54 (= 62 El.)128 ak meni duramašda kurpi uninama appin huttaš translates OP manā dastayā as kurpi uninama “in my hands”, while hutta, the frequent Elamite verb used to translate kar- can occur (under special phraseological conditions) in its “heavy” sense,129 evidence showing that the symbolic reference to the manual possess of the prisoner was well maintained. The preservation of the Iranian phraseology with an explicit reference to the “hands” occurs also in the Babylonian version:130 duramazda ana ŠU-ia indanaššunūtu (§ 43) “Then Ahuramazdā gave them in my hands,” so that the “mental image” of an act of manipulation should have been maintained in a way or the other. This suggestion increases in probability, when we keep in mind that with respect to DB § 66–67 (OP) the Babylonian version insists on the double role (i.e. positive and negative) of the “hands”. In § 66, the Babylonian text (according to the translation by von Voigtlander)131 runs as follows: “and whatever you do may Ahura Mazda 124 Actually, a compound such as *j́hasta-kr̥ta- could mean “made by hands,” “with hands,” “in hands.” 125 See again Filippone 2020. 126 Filippone 2020, p. 130. On this subject, see also Ittzés 2007; 2013 with further bibliographical details. 127 Malbran-Labat 1994, pp. 103, 159. 128 Vallat 1977, pp. 129, 130 “Ahuramazda les a alors remis entre mes mains”; Aliyari Babolghani 1394 [2015], p. 136. 129 See again Filippone 2020, p. 125. 130 von Voigtlander 1978, pp. 34, 60; Malbran-Labat 1994, pp. 103, 119. 131 von Voigtlander 1978, pp. 34, 60.

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cause to prosper in your hands” (according to Malbran-Labat:132 “Et que tout ce que tu accompliras Ahuramazda le fasse prospérer dans te mains”): mimma ⌈ mala⌉ teppušu duramaazda ⌈ina ŠU-ka⌉ luštēšer). In § 67, the Babylonian version repeats the concept, but in an inverted perspective:133 “and whatever you do may Ahura Mazda snatch from your hands”134 (in the translation by MalbranLabat:135 “[…] et tout ce que tu accomplis, puisse Ahuramazda l’arracher de tes mains”): mimma mala teppu⌈šu⌉ duramaazda ultu ŠU-ka lissuh. The Elamite version, as the Old Persian one, omits any reference to the “hands”! Therefore, a doubt remains open: the Babylonian phrase is an independent outcome, which followed an earlier stylistic pattern, or it derives from another, slightly different, OP Vorlage?136 I leave this question open to further investigation. Before concluding this essay, I would like to recall the importance of the hands in the iconography of the Sasanian seals, where it is frequently represented.137 The visual “quotation” of the hand is remarkable also on Sasanian reliefs, and we should not forget the famous portrait of Šābuhr grasping the hand138 of a Roman emperor, probably Valerianus.139 In relation to our theme I would like to draw attention to the interesting fact that while the Great Priest Kerdir did not apparently use the term dastgerd (an absence perhaps due to chance of transmission or to the fact that this was a word proper of kingship, and not of the Church jargon?), but the section concerning the so-called “vision” in his inscriptions [KSM § 36,140 § 44141] preserves a patent ceremonial usage of dast griftan [YDE OHDWH dast *gīrēd].142 In section 26,143 the woman and the man (i.e. the double of Kerdir), representing the dēn 132 Malban-Labat 1994, pp. 105, 121, 159. 133 von Voigtlander 1978, pp. 45, 61. 134 von Voigtlander 1978, pp. 46, 62. 135 Malban-Labat 1994, pp. 105, 121, 159. 136 The parallel text in the Old Persian version DB § 66–67, IV 76–80 (see Schmitt 1991, p. 72; 2009, p. 85, does not exactly correspond, and we can wonder whether a variety of the “Aryan” Vorlage transmitted in the attested version eventually had something like: **taya kunavāhi, avatai ̯ ahuramazdā ucāram kunau̯tu tavā dastayā and […] uta taya kunavāhi, avatai ̯ ahuramazdā hacā tavā dastaib̯ iyā kunau̯tu/nikantu/paribaratu. 137 See very many examples in the catalogues published by Gignoux/Gyselen 1982, pp. 44–45; Gignoux/ Gyselen 1987. 138 In this respect (although it is difficult to state with security), it is not farfetched to wonder whether a certain word-play between dastgerd and dastgrift “prisoner” (< “taken by hands”, “grasped”) was current. Benveniste (1969, I, p. 357) explicitly assumed a sort of proximity between expressions such as dasta-yā kar- and dasta- grab-, closely associated with military activity and the capture of prisoners. I would like to underline the phraseology adopted in the pertinent sentence of the Parthian text in ŠKZ § 22: pad xwēbēh dast dastgraβ kerd (Huyse 1999, I, pp. 37). 139 See already Babelon 1894. 140 Gignoux 1991, p. 82. 141 Gignoux 1991, p. 86. 142 MacKenzie 1989, pp. 48, 56, 60; Gignoux 1972, p. 36. 143 Gignoux 1991, pp. 42, 91, 96.

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and the ruwān, hold each other’s hands. In section 31, a brilliant prince probably crossing the Činwat bridge holds the hand (YDE OHDWN dast *gīrēd)144 of the woman and of Kerdir’s double.145 The verbal construction is different, of course, but the act of holding souls’ hands seems to convey a remarkable eschatological meaning, and if the “vision” of Kerdir corresponded to a ritual ceremony,146 the salvation performed by the prince (probably playing a role similar to that of the sraōšāuuarəza- priest), holding the hand of the spiritual couple and escorting both of them across the bridge of Činwat, is certainly significant. “To stay in the hands of the gods” (who are acting as princes and priests) meant as much as to be accompanied to salvation.147 In conclusion, I argue that dastgerd, on the basis of its Old Persian usage and syntax, i.e., dastay-ā (loc.) kar- (or eventually, but less probably, under the influence of a compound such as dastay(ā)-kr̥ta-, if actually it existed) developed a more complex juridical sense. According to that usage the act of putting somebody/something in the hands of a superior authority (the king, but presumably also a god) signified a relation of submission and dependence. The term could refer to a punitive situation or to a ceremonial gesture of fidelity and protection between a noble and his king or between the king and the gods. The reference to the landed property, as a terra regia, enters inevitably in the category of the material obligations, which were in the hands (i.e. property) of the king, in the same way as later they were in those of noble owners. But the personal relation underpinned by the use of dastgerd inevitably implies a juridical act in which gestures and rites involving the symbolic value of the hands were involved. Last but not least, the archaic, simpler meaning based on the manual construction was never abandoned,148 as confirmed by various occurrences, which curiously 144 145 146 147

MacKenzie 1989, pp. 50, 56, § 31. Gignoux 1991, pp. 42, 92, 97–98; MacKenzie, 1989, p. 60, sub § 31. Panaino 2011; 2010. It can be useful to recall that in the same inscriptions, dastan [written YDEn] “capable” (see Gignoux 1972, p. 37; 1991, pp. 80, 81, 90–91, 94 “s’il vous est possible;” MacKenzie 1989, pp. 46, 55, 59 [§§ 21, 22; “if you gods are able”]), was re-interpreted by the scribe as connected with “hand” by popular etymology, although its etymology is different; according to Back (1978, p. 210, n° 120) it derives from *das-tana- with *das- as a derivation from *daϑ-; cf. also Perikanian 1997, p. 348; Bailey 1943, p. 160, n. 6, with reference to the root danh-. 148 I must insist on the importance of the surrounding semantical framework, where the same term can radically change its meaning; I would like to quote the Italian word “unto,” which is a past passive participle of ungere, and which is usually referred to Jesus Christ, exactly as English “anointed.” On the other hand, we can use it just to say that a kind of food is “troppo unto,” which means that it was “too fat” (because of an excess of oil), or even that a person was “unta,” in the sense that he/she was “dirty.” The etymology, the derivation, etc, are the same, but the range of semantic implications goes from the heaven deep down into the rubbish. No etymology could a priori resolve the conundrum, discriminating the different meanings without a careful analysis of the context.

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enough are attested in the Christian and Manichaean framework: so in the case of the famous passage from the Gospel (John 2.19), preserved in a Parthian Manichaean source, in which the temple, made by hands, would be destroyed and built up again in three days without the work of any hand:149 […] kū […] ādag hēm kū im *apaδan I am able to destroy this temple, wigānān, *kē pad dast kird, which is made with hands, ud pad hrē rōž an karān, and in three days to build up another one, kē nē dast kird. […]. which could not be made by hand. […]

One may wonder whether the use of a phraseology such as pad dast kird was due to conservatism in diction, or rather the translator openly played with a sentence whose target was also that of criticizing a political and religious institution of the Sasanians, which influenced even the foreign Christian lore, as we have seen in Armenia. Certainly, the word-play (and the word-game) between pad dast kird, nē dast kird, and dastgird/dastgerd was patent. But this is another story.

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Grenet, Fr. 1972: Le Geste d’Ardashir fils de Pâbag. Kārnāmag i ̄ Ardaxšēr i ̄ Pābagān traduit du pehlevi. Paris. Heesterman, J. C. 1957: The ancient Indian royal consecration: the rājasūya described according to the Yajus texts and annotated. Mouton. Henning, W. B. 1961: “A Sassanian Silver Bowl from Georgia.” In: BSOAS 24/2, pp. 353–356. — 1958: “Mitteliranisch.” In: Iranistik. Erster Abschnitt. Linguistik (HdO 1.4.1.). Leiden, pp. 20–130. Hersch, K. 2010: The Roman Wedding: Ritual and Meaning in Antiquity. Cambridge. Herzfeld, E. 1924: Paikuli. Monument and inscription of the early history of the Sassanian Empire. 2 Vols. Berlin. — 1938: Altpersischen Inschriften. Berlin. Hewsen, R. H. 1985–86: “In Search of Tiridates the Great.” In: JSAS 2, pp. 11–49. Hübschmann, H. 1897: Armenische Grammatik. Erste Theil: Armenische Etymologie. Leipzig. Humbach, H./P. O. Skjærvø 1983: The Sasanian Inscription of Paikuli, 3 pts., Wiesbaden. Huyse, Ph. 1999: Die dreisprachige Inschrift Šābuhrs I. an der Kaʽba-i Zardušt (ŠKZ). 2 Bände. London. Ittzés, M. 2007: “Remarks on the periphrastic constructions with the verb ‘to make, to do’ in Sanskrit, Greek and Latin.” In: D. Csaba (ed.): Indian Languages and Texts Through the Ages. Essays of Hungarian Indologists in Honour of Professor Csaba Töttössy. New Delhi, pp. 1–40. — 2013: “Light Verb Constructions vs. Simple Verbs in Vedic: vimócanam kr̥ṇute (RV 3,30,12d).” In: D. Stasik/A. Trynkowska (eds.): CEENIS Current Research Series. Vol. 1, Warsaw, pp. 107–123. Jamison, St. W./J. P. Brereton 2014: The Rigveda. The Earliest Religious Poetry of India. 3 Vols. Oxford. Janda, M. 2006: “Šābuhr I. in der schützenden Hand Gottes: Mittelpersisch dastgerd als iranischer und indogermanischer Phraseologismus.” In: IJDL 31, pp. 73–90. Kellens, J. 1974: Les noms racines de l’Avesta. Wiesbaden. Klíma, O. 1957: Mazdak. Geschichte einer sozialen Bewegung im sassanidischen Persien. Praha. — 1962: Manis Zeit und Leben. Prag. Koenen, L./C. Römer 1988: Der Kölner Mani-Kodex. Über das Werden seines Leibes. Kritische Edition. Opladen. Kortekaas, G. 2007: Commentary on the Historia Apollonii Regis Tyri. Leiden. Lecoq, P. 1997: Les inscriptions de la Perse achéménide. Traduit du vieux perse, de l’élamite, du babylonien et de l’araméen présenté et annoté. Paris. Lewis, Ch. T. 1879: A Latin Dictionary founded on Andrews’ Edition of Freund’s Latin Dictionary. Revised, enlarged, and in great Part rewritten by Ch. T. Lewis. Oxford. Liddell, R./R. Scott (1968) A Greek-English Lexicon. Revised and augmented throughout by H. S. Jones with the assistance of R. McKenzie. With a Supplement. Oxford.

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Lincoln, B. 2012: “Happiness for mankind”: Achaemenian Religion and the Imperial Project. Leuven. MacKenzie, D. N. 1989: “Kerdir’s Inscription (synoptic text in transliteration, transcription translation and commentary).” In: G. Hermann/D. N. MacKenzie (eds): The Sasanian Rock Reliefs at Naqsh-i Rustam. Naqsh-i Rustam 6, The Triumph of Shapur I (together with an account of the representations of Kerdir). Berlin, pp. 1–71. Macuch, M. 1981: Das sasanidische Rechtsbuch “Mātakdān i hazār dātistān”, Teil II. Wiesbaden. — 1994: Rechtskasuistik und Gerichtspraxis zu Beginn des siebenten Jahrhunderts in Iran. Die Rechtssammlung des Farroḫmard i Wahrāmān (Iranica 1). Wiesbaden. Malandra, W. W./P. Ichaporia 2013: The Pahlavi Yasna of the Gāthās and Yasna Haptaŋhāiti. Wiesbaden. Malbran-Labat, F. 1994. La version akkadienne de l’inscription trilingue de Darius à Behistun. Roma. Maricq, A. 1958: “Res Gestae Divi Saporis.” In: Syria 35, pp. 295–360 [reprinted in Maricq, 1965]. — 1965: Classica et Orientalia. Extrait de Syria 1955–1962 revu et corrigé, augmenté d’un article et d’un index (Institut français d’archéologie de Beyrouth, Publications hors série n° 11). Paris. Martirosyan, H. K. 2010: Etymological Dictionary of the Armenian Inherited Lexicon. Leiden/Boston. de Menasce, J. 1956: “Inscriptions pehlevies en écriture cursive.” In: JA, pp. 423–31. — 1966: “Textes pehlevis sur les qanats.” In: AO 30, pp. 167–175. — 1985: Études iraniennes. Paris. Moazami, M. 2014: Wrestling with the Demons of the Pahlavi Widēwdād. Transcription, Translation, and Commentary. Leiden. Molé, M. 1967. La légende de Zoroastre selon les textes pehlevis. Paris. Moroni, M. G. 1982: “Continuity and Change in the Administrative Geography of Late Sasanian and Early Islamic al-‘Irāg.” In: Iran 20, pp. 1–42. Müller, F. M. 1897: “Beiträge zur Textkritik und Erklärung des Kārnāmak i Artašir i Pāpakan. Wien. Müller, F. W. K. 1904: “Handschriften-Reste in Estrangelo Schrift aus Turfan, Chinesisch-Turkestan. II. Theil”. In: AKAWB (Philosophisch-Historische Classe. 1904, Abhandlung 2), pp. 1–117. Nöldeke, Th. 1878: “Geschichte des Artachsîr i Pâpakân aus dem Pehlevi übersetzt mit Erläuterung und einer Einleitung versehen”. In: BB 4, pp. 22–88. — 1879: “Ueber îrânische Ortsnamen auf kert und andre Endungen”. In: ZDMG 33/1, pp. 143–156. Nyberg, H. S. 1974: A Manual of Pahlavi. II: Ideograms, Glossary, Abbreviations, Index, Grammatical Survey, Corrigenda to Part I. Wiesbaden. Olsen, B. A. 1999: The Noun in Biblical Armenian. Origin And Word Formation: With Special Emphasis on the Indo-European Heritage. Berlin/New York. Panaino, A. 2009: “The King and the Gods in the Sasanian Royal Ideology”. In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Sources pour l’histoire et la géographie du monde iranien. Leuven, pp. 209–256.

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— 2011: “Apocalittica, escatologia e sciamanismo nell’opera iranologica di Ph. Gignoux. Con una nota sulla visione del mago Kirder”. In: R. Gyselen/Ch. Jullien (eds.): Maître pour l’éternité. Florilège offert à Philippe Gignoux pour son 80e anniversaire. Paris, pp. 205–243. — 2020: “The Ritual Drama of the High Priest Kirdēr”. In: E. Moradi (ed.): AfarinNameh. Essays on the Archaeology of Iran in Honour of Mehdi Rahbar. Tehran, pp. 179–188. Payne Smith, R. 1879: Thesaurus Syriacus. 2 vols. Oxford. Perikhanian, 1973: Sasanidskij sudebnik: “Kniga tysjači sudebnyx rešenij” (Mātakdān ī hazār dātastān). Erevan. — 1997: Farraxmart ī Vahrāmān. The Book of a Thousand Judgements (A Sasanian Law-Book). Introduction, Transcription and Translation of the Pahlavi Text, Notes, Glossary and Indexes. Translated from Russian By N. Garsoïan. Costa Mesa/New York. Pigulevskaja, N. 1963: Les villes de l’état iranien aux époques parthe et sassanide. Contribution à l’histoire sociale de la Basse antiquité. Paris/Mouton/La Hague. Piras, A. 201: “Spandyād’s lance and message. Some Remarks about the Imagery of Shooting Weapons”: In: A. Panaino/A. Piras/P. Ognibene (eds): Studi Iranici Ravennati II. Milano/Udine, pp. 231–242. Reekmans, L. 1958: “La ‘Dextrarum Iunctio’ dans l’Iconographie Romaine et Paléochrétienne.” In: BIBR 31, pp. 23–95. Ricks, S. D. 2006: “Dexiosis and Dextrarum Iunctio: The Sacred Handsclap in the Classical and Early Christian World”. In: FARMS 18, pp. 431–436. Rostovtzeff, M. I. 1943: “Res Gestae Divi Saporis.” In: Berytus 8, pp. 17–60. Sadovski, V. 2001: “Bahuvrīhis und Rektionskomposita im R̥ gveda und Avesta: Reinterpretationen ursprünglicher Entheos-Komposita als Ausgangspunkt für die Herausbildung neuer präpositionaler Rektionskomposita.” In: St. Wild/H. Schild (eds): Norm und Abweichung. Akten des 27. Deutschen Orientalistentags, Bonn, 28.09.–02.10.1998. Würzburg, pp. 101–120 — 2005: “Dichtersprachliche Stilmittel im Altiranischen und Altindischen.” In: G. Schweiger (ed.): Indogermanica. Festschrift Gert Klingenschmitt. Indische, iranische und indogermanische Studien dem verehrten Jubilar dargebracht zu seinem fünfundsechzigsten Geburtstag. Taimering, pp. 521–540. — 2009: “Ritual Formulae and Ritual Pragmatics in Veda and Avesta.” In: R. Nedoma, D. Stifter (eds.): SZS 48 (Festschrift für Heiner Eichner), pp. 156–166. — 2018: “Nominalkomposita, Neowurzelbildungen und zugrundeliegende syntaktische Konstruktionen im Veda und dem Avesta.” In: Dabir 6 (Hanns-Peter Schmidt Gedenkschrift [1930–2017]), pp. 156–187. Sarkisjan, G. Ch. [= Sarkissian, G. H.] 1967: “O dvuch značenijach termina dastakert v rannich armjanskich istočnikach.” In: Sbornik Ėllinističeskij Bližnij Vostok, Vizantija i Iran: istorija i filologija. Moskva, pp. 97–101. — 1968: “Les deux significations du terme dastakert dans les anciennes sources arméniennes.” In: REA 5, pp. 43–50. Schiemann, G. 2001 “Tabulae duodecim.” In: H. Cancik/H. Schneider (eds): English Edition by Ch. F. Salazar: Brill’s New Pauly, Antiquity volumes.

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Classical Tradition volumes edited by M. Landfester, English Edition by Francis G. Gentry. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/1574-9347_bnp_e1128170. Schindler, J. 1980: “Zur Herkunft der altindischer cvi-Bildungen”. In: M. Mayrhofer/M. Peters/O. E. Pfeiffer (eds.): Lautgeschichte und Etymologie. Akten der VI. Fachtagung der Indogermanischen Gesellschaft. Wien, 24.–29. September 1978. Wiesbaden, pp. 386–393. Schmitt, R. 1983: “Iranisches Lehngut im Armenischen.” In: REA 17, pp. 73–112. — 1994: “Rezension von Medioiranica. OLA 48, Leuven, 1993.” In: WZKM 84, pp. 287–293. — 1999: The Bisitun Inscriptions of Darius the Great. Old Persian Text (Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum. Vol. I. The Old Persian Inscriptions. Texts I). London. — 2009: Die altpersischen Inschriften der Achaimeniden. Editio minor mit deutscher Übersetzung. Wiesbaden. — 2014: Wörterbuch der altpersischen Königsinschriften. Wiesbaden. Schutzeichel, M. 2014: Indogermanische Funktionsverbgefüge. Münster. Schweiger, G. 1998: Kritische Neuedition der achaemenidischen Keilinschriften. Band 1: Textband. Transkribierter Text und Übersetzung. Band 2: Transliteration. Taimering. Sims-Williams, N. 2000: Bactrian Documents from Northern Afghanistan I: Legal and Economic Documents (Studies in the Khalili Collection Vol. 3; Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum; Part II: Inscriptions of the Seleucid and Parthian Periods and of eastern Iran and Central Asia. Vol. VI: Bactrian). Oxford. Skalmowski, W. 1993: “On Middle Iranian dstkrt(y).” In: Medioiranica 48, pp. 157–62. Sprengling, M. 1940: “Shahpuhr I, the Great on the Kaabah of Zoroaster.” In: AJSLL 57, pp. 341–429. — 1953: Third century Iran: Sapor and Kartir. Chicago. Steve, M.-J. 1987: Nouveaux mélanges épigraphiques. Inscriptions royales de Suse et de la Susiane. Avec une contribution de J. A. Brinkman (Mémoires de la Délégation Archéologique en Iran. Tome LIII. Mission en Susiane sous la direction de P. Amiet. Ville Royale de Suse 7). Nice. Sundermann, W. 1981: Mitteliranische manichäische Texte Kirchengeschichtlichen Inhalts, mit einem Appendix von N. Sims-Williams. Berlin. Tambiah, S. J. 1968: The Magical Power of Words. In: Man, N.S. 3/2, pp. 175–208. — 1985: Culture, Thought, and Social Action. An Anthropological Perspective. Cambridge. — 1990: Magic, Science, Religion, and the Scope of Rationality (Lewis Henry Morgan Lectures). London/New York. Telegdi, S. 1935: “Essai sur la phonétique des emprunts iraniens en araméen talmudique.” In: JA 226, pp. 177–256. Terribili, G. 2019: “Sasanian Royal Ceremonies and Heroic Qualities. The Case of Sabuhr I’s Inscription at Ḥājiābād.” In: A. Panaino/A. Piras/P. Ognibene (eds): Studi Iranici Ravennati III. Milano/Udine, pp. 269–301. Thompson, R. W. (transl. & comment.) 1976: Agathangelos: History of the Armenians. Albany. Treggiari, S. 1993: Roman Marriage: iusti coniuges. Oxford.

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Unvala, J. M. 1924: Neryosangh’s Sanskrit Version of the Hōm Yašt (Yasn IX–XI) with the original Avesta and the Pahlavi Version, translated with copious notes and a glossary. Vienna. de Vaan, M. 2009: Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages. Leiden. Vallat, F. 1977: Corpus des Inscriptions Royales en Elamite Achéménide. Thèse présentée pour l’obtention du Doctorat de IIIe cycle (Inédite). Paris. von Voigtlander, E. 1978: The Bisitun inscription of Darius the Great, Babylonian Version (Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum. Part I, Inscriptions of ancient Iran. Vol. II. The Babylonian versions of the Achaemenian inscriptions. Texts, I). London. Weber, D. 2008: “New Arguments for Dating the Documents from the ‘Pahlavi Archive’.” In: BAI, N.S. 22: Zoroastrianism and Mary Boyce with Other Studies, pp. 215–222. Weinreich, O. 1909: ΘΕΟΥ ΧΕΙΡ. Antike Heilungswunder. Untersuchungen zum Wunderglauben der Griechen und Römer. Gießen. Weisbach, F. H. 1911: Die Keilinschriften der Achämeniden. Leipzig. — 1937: “Achämenidisches.” In: ZDMG 91 (N.F. 16), pp. 80–87. Williams, A. V. 1990: The Pahlavi Rivāyat Accompanying the Dādestān ī Dēnīg. Part I: Transliteration, Transcription and Glossary. Part II: Translation, Commentary and Pahlavi Text. Copenhagen.

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Antoine-Isaac Silvestre de Sacy and the Study of Tāq-e Bostān Daniel T. Potts

Introduction While the intrinsic importance of the Sasanian reliefs for our understanding of Sasanian art, history and ideology is obvious, there are other domains in which these extraordinary monuments loom large, namely, the interaction between European Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment scholars and the archaeological and epigraphic remains of pre-Islamic Iranian empires; and the Classical and mediaeval transmission of oral traditions surrounding both historical and mythical figures in late Antique Iran. Early Modern European philologists and historians struggled to make sense of pre-Islamic Iran. Progress depended in large measure on the episodic flow of new data from visitors to key sites. Varying levels of detail and descriptive accuracy; varying degrees of proficiency in the crafting of hand copies of inscriptions; and varying interpretations of trustworthiness and the meaning of eyewitness observation all impacted the utility of this data. In an earlier study some of these issues were examined in the context of French Enlightenment observations made at Bīsotūn.1 The purpose of the present note is to draw attention to the work of the French Orientalist Antoine-Isaac Silvestre de Sacy (1758–1838)2 and the sources used in his groundbreaking work on Tāq-e Bostān (Fig. 1). As H. Humbach noted, “Today little attention is paid to Silvestre de Sacy’s fundamental epigraphic studies, including work on the Middle Persian inscriptions at Tāq-e Bostān.”3 It is hoped that this modest offering goes some way towards rectifying this situation.

1 2 3

Potts 2018. For his life see Daunou 1842; Salmon 1905, pp. vii–lix. Humbach 2011.

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(© The Nelson Collection of Qajar Photography).

Fig. 1. Antoine Sevruguin’s photograph of “Tagh-Bustam” Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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Fig. 2. Antoine-Isaac Silvestre de Sacy. Lithograph by François-Séraphin Delpech (1778-1825) after a portrait by Antoine Maurin (1793-1860) (Yale University Art Gallery).

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Silvestre de Sacy’s First Study of 1793 In his résumé of early research on Tāq-e Bostān, A. Gabriel,4 clearly basing himself on Silvestre de Sacy (1758–1838), referred briefly to the notices of J.-B. Tavernier (1605–1689), J.-C. Ballyet (1702–1773), Pro-Vicar and later Bishop of Babylon often referred to by his nom de religion, E. de st. Albert, J. Otter (1707– 1748), E. Ives (1719–1786) and J. de Beauchamp (1752–1801), Vicar-General of Babylon and astronomer. These early writers, he noted, provided the evidence on which Silvestre de Sacy (Fig. 2) based his groundbreaking studies of the site and its two inscriptions.5 Indeed H. S. Nyberg considered Silvestre de Sacy, along with C. Niebuhr, one of the “fathers of this branch of Oriental research.”6 Reading Silvestre de Sacy’s studies of 1793 (originally read in 1790) and 1815 (originally read in 1809) today, one cannot but admire his detailed exposition of the data on Tāq-e Bostān as it accrued incrementally from the late 17th to the late 18th century. Skipping over the descriptions of J.-B. Tavernier,7 J. Chardin8 and J. Thévenot,9 which were “très-superficielle,” Silvestre de Sacy initially credited the Swedish diplomat J. Otter, who was sent by the Ottoman sultan to Nader Shah in 1737, as the first writer to offer a detailed description of Tāq-e Bostān.10 When the diary of A. Bembo was published in 1803, as he recognized in his second study, this turned out to be incorrect (see below). 4 5 6 7

Gabriel 1952, p. 134, n. 4. Silvestre de Sacy 1793, 1815. Nyberg 1960, p. 40. Tavernier 1678, p. 109, “Between Sahana and Polisha you leave the only high Mountain in all the Road to the North. It is as steep and as straight as a Wall, and as high as you can see; you may observe the Figures of men clad like Priests, with Surplices and Censors in their hands, and yet neither can the Natives tell you, nor any person imagine the meaning of those Sculptures. At the foot of the Rock runs a River, over which there is a Bridge of Stone.” 8 Chardin 1711, p. 164, discussing sculptural representations of the female form, wrote, “il n’y en a pas une seule de Femme; & que cependant, dans de semblables antiquitez qui se trouvent dans le Païs des Parthes, comme à Kirmoncha, Ville située entre Suse, & Babylone, où les Figures sont Gigantesques, comme celles de ce Temple de Persepolis.” 9 Thévenot 1727, p. 238, where the description is very vague, “Cette montagne jette en dehors des pieces de rocher separées les unes des autres par des veines; & ces pieces de rocher sont un peu rondes, & prennent depuis le haut de la montagne jusqu’en bas, elles paroissent comme des figures de relief. Les gens de nôtre caravane me dirent que ce sont autant de figures, que Ferhad a taillées pour l’amour de sa chere Schirin, qui avoit son château sur cette montagne. Ce Ferhad étoit un excellent Sculpteur de ce païs, qui étoit si amoureux de Schirin qu’il en mourut. Ses amours sont décrits dans le Poëme intitulé Cosrouve Schirin, dont il y a un manuscrit dans la Bibliotheque du Roi à Paris.” Although this work was originally published in 1689, Silvestre de Sacy used the third, 1727 edition. 10 Otter 1748, pp. 184–186, “Je m’écartai de la compagnie pendant la route, pour aller voir à Taki-Bostan un ancien monument dont les Persans m’ayoient beaucoup parlé; je croyois sur leur rapport, qu’il méritoit la curiosité d’un Voyageur, & je trouvai au bas d’une haute montagne, qui est à l’extrémité occidentale de Bi-sutoun, deux niches l’une à côté de l’autre, taillées dans le roc assez profondément, l’une de 20 pieds, l’autre d’environ 10 pieds de haut.

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On 4 March 1755, seven years after Otter’s publication appeared, the French cartographer J.-B. Bourgignon d’Anville read an account provided to him in 1743 by the duc d’Orléans, for whose son Louis Philippe I he acted as tutor, that had been written by the Pro-Vicar of Babylon, E. de st. Albert.11 As discussed Il y a sur le ceintre de la plus grande, deux anges qui ont chacun un cercle à la main, & au milieu d’eux un croissant. On voit trois grandes figures debout, & taillées en relief dans le fond de la niche. Celle du milieu paroît être un Roi, celle de la droite une femme, & celle de la gauche porte une grande barbe. L’on me dit qu’elles représentoient Khosrew, Chirin & Chapour, que nous appellons Sapor. Au-dessus de ces figures est un Géant à Cheval; il a un bouclier passé dans le bras, & porte sur son épaule une lance monstrueuse. Les Persans disent que c’est Rustem, un des hommes forts de l’antiquité. Cette figure est entre deux colonnes cannelées d’ordre corinthien; un des pieds du cheval est cassé. Sur les deux retours sont représentées plusieurs petites figures d’hommes, entremêlées de différentes bêtes sauvages, comme cerfs, sangliers, éléphans & autres. Les uns sont assis dans des barques, d’autres jouent de divers instruments, quelques-un chassent. Il n’y a dans la petite niche que deux figures aussi en bas-relief, & de grandeur naturelle, avec une inscription au-dessus, en charactères que l’on dit être ceux des anciens Persans ou Guebres. Il sort du pied du rocher un ruisseau d’une eau claire & fraîche, mais crue & pesante. Il me fut impossible de prendre copie de l’inscription, parce que les gardes qu’on m’avoit donnés pour m’y accompagner, me pressèrent à l’approche de la nuit de me rendre au camp, disant que nous courions risque d’être assasinés dans l’obscurité par les Kiurds.” 11 d’Anville 1761, pp. 159–160, “A deux heurs de marche au-delà de Kirman-shah, ville où réside un Khan ou gouverneur Persan, en quittant la route au passage d’une rivière, pour se rendre sur la gauche à la source de cette rivière, qui sort d’un rocher extrêmement escarpé; après une heur & demie de chemin entrecoupé de ruisseaux, on recontre des ruines, & à quelques cent pas de-là on arrive à une place plantée agréablement de peupliers fort élevés. Ce terrein n’est séparé du pied de la montagne que par un canal de douze à quinze pas de large, creusé dans le rocher, & dans lequel les eaux qui sortent du rocher avec abondance, se rassemblent, & paroissent comme arrêtées dans l’espace d’environ cent pas, quoiqu’elles se répandent insensiblement dans la plaine, & forment la rivière à quelques milles de-là. Quand on a traversé le canal sur un petit pont de planches, on trouve avec surprise une voûte pratiquée dans le rocher, d’environ trent pieds de profondeur, sur autant de hauteur, & à peu près la moitié en largeur. Le parement en paroît très-poli. Dans le fond, une large corniche porte trois figures en bas-relief très-saillant. La figure du milieu paroît celle d’un Roi, sa coëffure étant semblable à une couronne fermée, ou à la tiare Médique ou Persane. On prendroit la figure qui occupe la gauche pour une Reine dans sa parure, & la troisième figure pour un Officier de considération. Ces trois personnages sont debout, & de hauteur qui passe un peu le naturel. Au dessous de la corniche on a représenté un cavalier de taille gigantesque, armé de toutes pièces, & portant sur l’épaule une espèce de massue: deux jambes du cheval sont détachées du rocher, les deux autres & une partie de la masse y sont adhérantes. Le reste de ce qui est renfermé dans cette voûte est travaillé en bas-relief, représentant des éléphans, des chameaux & d’autres animaux, des captifs, des bergers avec leurs troupeaux, & plusieurs espèces de trophées. Le travail en a paru au P. Emmanuel aussi fini que s’il étoit en marbre; ce qui dénote, dans le rocher, une qualité très-dure & très-compacte. Au dehors de la voûte, le rocher est taillé en escarpement, & poli jusqu’à la hauteur de plus de trente pieds: on y voit deux Renommées en bas-relief, & une espèce de couronne sur l’entrée. En s’avançant dix ou douze pas plus loin, par un sentier très-étroit entre le canal & le rocher, on trouve une seconde cavité, à peu près de même hauteur & largeur, mais moins profonde. Sur une corniche semblable à la première, sont trois figurse dans une attitude & un habillement trèsmodestes; & que pour cette raison les Persans appellent les trois Calenders ou Dervis. Le

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several years ago, the transmission of this testimony followed a circuitous route.12 The Pro-Vicar of Babylon had travelled to Hamadan in November, 1729, and remained there until May 1730, principally to study Turkish outside of the Ottoman capital, where his Catholic “confrères” feared he would be apprehended and severely punished by the authorities if he were found conducting religious services. He was in Hamadan again for about a month between early August and early September 1736. It is not known whether he went to Tāq-e Bostān on his first visit of 1729–30, his second visit of 1736, or on both occasions. In any case, his report was transmitted to Paris via the physician I. Bellet (1683– 1780) who, in the late 1730s and early 1740s, was in Constantinople conducting secret negotiations with the Porte on behalf of Louis XV. A letter from Bellet to the duc d’Orléans, dated 26 January 1742, reports that de st. Albert had transmitted to him an account of a journey from Aleppo to Baghdad, Isfahan and Basra, along with a report on the ruins of Babylon. It is unclear whether this, or another dispatch from the Pro-Vicar, contained his observations on Tāq-e Bostān. A fragmentary letter signed by Bellet refers to “les instructions qui m’ont été données par Mr Danville par ordre de Monseigneur,” and to having found an interpreter who had been to Georgia and to whom Bellet had shown a map given by d’Anville to Bellet. This would suggest that, with the approbation of the duc d’Orléans, Bellet was charged, during his stay in Constantinople, with fulfilling requests for geographical information made by d’Anville. It is not entirely clear what Bellet’s mission was, but in a letter of 10 February 1746 from Bellet to the marquis d’Argenson, the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, reference is made to the French desire to see the Ottomans launch an attack on the Russians. Bellet also referred to a memoir he himself was forwarding on the treaty made by Nader Shah with the Porte. It comes as no surprise that the duc d’Orléans, a pious scholar who famously retreated from the world late in life, should have played a pivotal role in transmitting de st. Albert’s account of Tāq-e Bostān to d’Anville. He is known to have studied Greek, Latin, Arabic, Aramaic, Hebrew and Syriac, and to have worked on the historical geography of the Bible, especially the location of the Garden of Eden and the topography of Jerusalem. He translated and wrote commentaries on Genesis, Isaiah, Deuteronomy, the Book of Psalms, the letters of Paul and the works of several early church fathers. He also amassed an important collection of engraved gems that was eventually purchased by Catherine the Great and is today part of the Hermitage Museum’s collection. Perhaps his most lasting contribution, however, was his establishment of the chair of Hebrew at the Sorbonne in 1751.13 dessous de la corniche est rempli d’une longue inscription, dont le caractère tient un peu du grec, mais en une langue que l’on juge être différente de celles qui sont actuellement d’usage en Asie.” Cf. Potts 2018, pp. 4–7 (English translation). 12 See Potts 2018 for the details of the transaction. 13 In Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s estimation, “Il possédait la sainte écriture mieux que personne au monde; il en savait toutes les langues, et en connaissait tous les textes. Les

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In addition to de st. Albert’s account, Silvestre de Sacy noted three other brief accounts of Tāq-e Bostān, the first by the Kashmiri historian of Nader Shah, ‘Abd al-Karīm Kashmīrī,14 the second by E. Ives15 and a third, which he scarcely credited as an eyewitness account, by L.-F. comte de Faerrièrres de Sauveboeuf.16

commentaires qu’il a faits sur saint Paul et sur la Genèse ne sont pas un témoignage moins certain de la justesse de sa critique et de la profondeur de son érudition, que de son zèle pour la gloire de l’Esprit saint qui a dicté ces livres: et la chaire de professeur en langue hébraïque qu’il a fondée en Sorbonne n’y sera pas moins un monument des lumières qui lui en ont fait apercevoir le besoin, que de la munificence chrétienne qui l’a porté à y pourvoir.” See Rousseau 1817, p. 551. 14 Gladwin 1788, pp. 97–98, “The 25th we arrived at Kermanshahan, the inhabitants of which are chiefly of the Goordzengteh. At the distance of half a farsang from the city, is the famous mountain of Tâk Bustân. Out of the mountain is cut an arch large enough to admit two elephants abreast, in the middle of which is the statue of Khusro on horseback larger than life; and on the roof of the arch, as well as on other parts of the mountain, are carved in relievo, the figures of birds and beasts.” 15 Ives did not visit Tāq-e Bostān himself but related a description given to him by de st. Albert in 1758 when the two met in Baghdad: “We were politely entertained to-day by the bishop; two courses of eight dishes at dinner, a dessert, punch, claret, French, and Turkish white wines. His lordship entertained us also with an account of an antique pile of buildings called Kurman Shah, still to be seen at about twelve days journey between this place and Ispahan; wherein is a great deal of sculpture in marble, with Basso and Alto Relieves, representing battles, trophies, arms, men, and camels; and one most remarkable horse whose body seems quite detached from the wall, being joined only by the pedestal on which it stands. In the roof is a window represented, and a head crowned, with great earnestness looking through it, but at what object, the observer is for a time at a loss to guess, till casting his eye in a particular direction, which he is led to do by the extatic gaze of the figure above, he discovers a bath, and in it a naked Venus. In another part of the building, there is a long inscription in characters unknown to the bishop, or any other of the French antiquarians. The letters are neither Persian, Parthian, Chaldean, Hebrew, Arabic, Greek, Coptic, or any other type now known in this part of the world.” See Ives 1773, p. 292. 16 “Je sus voir, près de Kermancha, une grande arcade taillée dans une montagne qui n’est qu’un immense rocher. Il y a une statue équestre dont la hauteur depuis la tête du cavalier jusques au pied du cheval qui a trois pieds de diamètre est au moins de soixante pieds. Les Persans me dirent que c’étoit un nommé Ferrer renommé, long-tems avant Alexandre, par sa bravoure & sa taille extraordinaire; elle ne pouvoit cependant pas approcher de celle qui le représente, ainsi que sa femme qui est encore à cheval à côté de lui, mais de moindre grandeur: je ne pus pas en tirer d’autres éclaircissemens, sinon qu’il a laissé dans plusieurs autres montagnes des marques de sa valeur, en gravant sur des rochers des bas-reliefs pour immortaliser ses victoires; en effet, je vis en différens endroits sur la route d’Hispahan différens ouvrages de ce genre qu’on m’assura être du même Ferrer. Cette grande arcade a trente pieds de profondeur sur environ soixante-dix de hauteur, taillée en voûte; de chaque côté on voit des bas-reliefs qui représentent des chasses & des pêches, le tout est assez bien conservé. A côté de l’arcade & au pied du rocher, il en sort une grande source d’eau glacée en été & très-chaude en hiver; elle forme, dès son principe, une belle rivière, & je n’ai jamais bu d’eau plus fraiche ni meilleure.” See Ferrières de Sauvebœuf 1790, pp. 48–50.

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None of these compared, however, to that of J. de Beauchamp,17 whose visit to the site in April–May, 1787, resulted in a description praised by Silvestre de Sacy, who drew on Beauchamp’s own journal as well as an informative letter sent to Auguste de Choiseul-Gouffier (1752–1817), French ambassador in Constantinople. Silvestre de Sacy stressed the fact that Beauchamp’s observations were particularly precious because, he had not read any of the earlier descriptions of Tāq-e Bostān before visiting the site. Thus, he had observed the monuments there without prejudice and, most importantly, copied two inscriptions, of Shapur II and III (Fig. 3), which he sent to Silvestre de Sacy. These allowed the French scholar to determine, for the first time, the date and attribution of the monuments and correct the overly early date proposed by d’Anville.18 In his masterful study, Silvestre de Sacy drew on data 17 Beauchamp 1791, pp. 266–267, “Nous sommes arrivés après treize jours de marche [from Baghdad], à Kermancha (on prononce Kermonncha), petite ville de Perse auprès de laquelle se trouve un monument antique dont il est fait mention dans plusieurs relations de voyages, & dont je n’ai vu la description nulle part. Chardin en parle dans son neuvieme volume, mais succinctement & sans l’avoir vu. Ce monument se trouve au pied d’une haute montagne, de laquelle jaillit au printems une source d’eau considérable & limpide, qui tombant par cascades, arrose une jolie plaine. Les Persans appellent cet endroit TakRustam. Ce nom est fameux en Perse, & Chardin prétend que c’est Hercule. Il y en a d’autres qui disent que c’est Ferabat, autre nom célebre d’un roi de Perse. On voit dans cet endroit deux salles taillées dans le roc vif, en forme de portiques, dont l’une est à-peu-près double de l’autre. La plus grande peut avoir, en carré, 25 à 30 pieds. Le fond de cette salle contient 4 figures. La plus considérable est au niveau du pavé. C’est une statue équestre & colossale, tenant d’une main une lance, & de l’autre un bouclier; le tout en relief de trois quarts; de maniere qu’il n’y a que l’épaule du cavalier & du cheval qui tiennent à la roche. Ce cavalier a une cotte de maille & la tête couverte comme nos anciens chevaliers. Plus haut regne une espece de corniche au-dessus de laquelle sont trois autres figures de bas relief & moins colossales. Celle qui est au milieu représente probablement un souverain; cette figure présente une coupe à celle qui est à gauche, & qui, par sa posture modeste, a l’air dêtre le ministre. Il paroît sortir de l’eau de cette coupe. La figure qui est à droite représente une femme qui verse de l’eau. C’est à mon avis une allusion aux sources voisines qui sortent de ce charmant endroit. Ces figures peuvent avoir huit pieds de hauteur, & sont mal sculptées. Les deux côtés de la salle représentent sans ordre, d’un côté une grande quantité de sangliers, poursuivis par des chasseurs montés sur des éléphans. Ces petites figures en bas-relief sont assez bien faites. Ces sangliers semblent se précipiter d’une roche au milieu des mers. L’on voit quatre bateaux dans deux desquels sont des chasseurs tirans de l’arc. Dans les deux autres, il y a six joueurs d’instrumens composés de dix cordes; de l’autre côté de la salle il y a aussi des chasses de cerfs ou de daims poursuivis par des cavaliers courans à toute bride. L’on y voit aussi des chameaux & des éléphans. Au milieu l’on voit un personnage sur la tête duquel des esclaves tiennent un parasol. A ses côtés sont des musiciennes. La seconde salle, qui est plus petite, ne contient que deux figures de grandeur naturelle qui occupent le fond du portique. On voit à leur côté deux inscriptions d’une écriture inconnue, que j’ai relevée pour la communiquer à M. l’abbé Barthelemy.” 18 Thus Silvestre de Sacy 1793, pp. 213–214, “Quoique l’objet de ses voyages dans le Curdistan & dans plusieurs provinces de la Perse, fût plutôt d’étudier le ciel que de chercher sur la terre les vestiges de l’antiquité, il n’a cependant négligé aucune occasion de se rendre utile à ceux qui s’occupent de l’étude des monumens. Ses observations sur

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contained in the accounts of Otter, de st. Albert (as related by d’Anville) and Beauchamp, comparing the three and making occasional reference to Edward Ives’ description, itself an oral communication from the Pro-Vicar of Babylon but differing from it in certain respects.

Fig. 3. Shapur II and Shapur III relief at Tāq-e Bostān (photo: Philippe Chavin, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license). In addition, Silvestre de Sacy called his readers’ attention to several references to Tāq-e Bostān in Ḥamd-Allāh Mostawfi’s (c. 1281–1344) Nozhat les ruines de Babylone, & sur l’édifice nommé par les Arabes Tak kesra, dont il a fait part à l’Académie, & qui ont été publiées dans le Journal des savans, en sont une preuve certaine, & les descriptions des monumens de Kirmanschah qu’il a eu la bonté de me communiquer, & dont M. de la Lande [Jérôme de Lalande (1732–1807), leading French astronomer of the day] a donné aussi un extrait dans le Journal des savans, lui assurent un nouveau droit à la reconnoissance des antiquaires. Ces descriptions que j’ai extraites tant de son journal manuscrit, que d’une lettre qu’il écrivit de Kirmanschah à M. de ChoiseulGouffier, ambassadeur de France à la Porte, & membre de l’Académie des belles-lettres, sont d’autant plus précieuses, qu’ignorant absolument à l’époque où il écrivoit, que ces monumens eussent attiré l’attention d’autres voyageurs avant lui, il les a vus sans préjugés, & les a décrits de même. Mais ce qu’il y a de plus important, ce sont deux inscriptions qui accompagnent un de ces monumens, & que M. l’abbé de Beauchamps a copiées & m’a pareillement communiquées. Ces inscriptions comparées avec l’histoire & avec les traditions des gens du pays, me paroissent propres à fixer l’âge de ces monumens, qui perdent par-là beaucoup de l’antiquité que M. d’Anville avoit cru pouvoir leur accorder.”

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al-qolūb (c. 1340) where a Sasanian date for the Large Grotto and its equestrian sculpture had already been noted. Discussing Kermanshah, Mostawfi wrote, “In the neighbourhood of the town is the Stall of Shabdīz (the famous horse) of king Khusraw Parvīz, which he caused to be built. In the plain nearby, also, he laid out a park two leagues square; and part thereof he planted with trees that bore all kinds of fruit, of both the hot lands and the cold country; and the remaining part he laid out in meadow-lands as a race-course, and there various kinds of animals were allowed to roam free, which same bred and brought forth their young.” The nearby village, “opposite the Stall of Shabdīz,” he wrote, was called Vasṭām.19 Elsewhere, describing the route from Soltaniyah to Najaf, Mostawfi wrote of “the terrace of the horse Shabdiz lying one league to the right of the road, with the portraits of King Khusraw and Queen Shīrīn carved on the rocks at a place where two springs gush out that turn two mills.”20 Finally, discussing the mountain of Bīsotūn, Mostawfi wrote, “at the other end of the mountain, some six leagues distant from the great spring with its gallery, there has been built a second but smaller gallery, round two springs which gush out over against the same, and each spring is abundant enough to turn a mill. This place is known as the Gallery of (the Horse) Shabdīz, and round it have been sculptured the likenesses of Khusraw and Shīrīn and Farhād, also of Rustam and Isfandīyār with others; and every bolt in the armour (of Rustam) and even the silken strings of the harp (of Farhād) are all most wonderfully represented herein, so as to be easily recognised.”21 Finally, to cement the association between Kermanshah and the Sasanians, Silvestre de Sacy pointed to the notice in Nikbī b. Mas’ud’s work, which explained that Bahrām IV was known as “Kermanshah” because the government of Kerman had been conferred upon him during the reign of his father and elder brother,22 and concluded that, along with references to the same effect by Bar Hebraeus and others, the Sasanian foundation of Kermanshah, combined with the testimony of Mostawfi, strongly suggested a Sasanian date and attribution for the monuments at Tāq-e Bostān.23 Beauchamp wrote to Choiseul-Gouffier of two attempts to copy the inscriptions at Tāq-e Bostān, sometime before 4 May and again on 13 May 1787.24 Describing the difficulties he had due to their height, relative inaccessibility and 19 20 21 22

Le Strange 1919, p 107. Le Strange 1919, p. 161. Le Strange 1919, pp. 183–184. Silvestre de Sacy 1789, p. 334, “Bahram, fils de Schabour, succéda à son frère. On le surnomme Kermanschah, parce que sous le règne de son père & de son frère, il avoit eu le gouvernement du Kerman.’ Cf. Tabari, ‘[He was] the son of Sābūr (II) Dhū al-Aktāf, and had the title of Kirmān-Shāh, since his father Sābūr had made him governor of Kirmān during his own lifetime.’”See Bosworth 1999, p. 69. 23 Silvestre de Sacy 1793, p. 239. 24 For the discrepancies in dates, and the probability that 13 May is correct, see Silvestre de Sacy 1815, p. 171, n. 1.

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blackened discoloration, he also revealed that he rigged up a primitive ladder using joists and leather straps from his horse tack, and had his servant scratch and scrape in the letters with a knife to make them more legible.25 Although some letters at the end of lines were partially effaced, and others omitted or transposed, Silvestre de Sacy was astonished that Beauchamp’s copy, for the most part, presented few difficulties.26 With the additional help of Bar Hebraeus, Agathias, Movsēs Xorenac‘i, Abu’l Faraj, Eutychius and others, Silvestre de Sacy easily identified the protagonists in the two inscriptions as Shapur II and III.

Silvestre de Sacy’s Second Study of 1815 In 1809 Silvestre de Sacy returned to the subject of Tāq-e Bostān, correcting his readings and interpretation of the inscriptions there in light of yet another precious piece of testimony, the diary of A. Bembo (1652–1705) and the drawings of the French artist who, for a while, accompanied him, G.-J. Grelot (c. 1630–1680). Bembo’s description of Tāq-e Bostān, which he saw in 1674, thus became the earliest Western treatment of the site, although it was only published in excerpted form in 1803.27 It took over 200 years 25 Silvestre de Sacy 1793, pp. 241–242, “Je n’ai pas pu, écrivoit-il à M. de Choiseul-Gouffier, le 4 Mai 1787, retirer l’inscription qui est à gauche, parce que le fond en est noir, & que les lettres ne ressortent pas bien, quoiqu’elles ayent un pouce de hauteur. Celles à droite sont plus visibles, & si j’avois pu m’élever, je les aurois relevées exactement, en grattant leur profondeur; les dernières lignes étant plus bas & plus visibles, je les ai mieux saisies…De ces lettres, ajoute-t-il, celles qui forment un trident, celle semblable à notre 5, & celle qui tire sur notre d, sont très-visibles, de même que celles qui sont parfaitement semblables à 2 & 3 de nos chiffres.” The journal entry for 18 May 1787 tells us, “Les lettres, dit-il, peuvent avoir un pouce de hauteur, mais elles sont difficiles à reconnoître, à cause du fond noirci par l’humidité. La première fois que je les copiai, je ne réussis pas trop bien. J’y retournai une autre fois, & ayant fait venir d’un village voisin deux solives, je fis avec les sangles de nos chevaux, une espèce d’échelle, sur laquelle grimpa mon domestique, à qui je commandai de gratter les lettres dans leur profondeur avec un couteau. Voici les inscriptions tells que j’ai pu les relever…Ces deux inscriptions, observe M. de Beauchamps, au bas de sa copie, sont assez exactes, à quelques lettres près: j’ai fait monter une personne pour faire racler le dedans des lettres qui ne paroissoient pas assez bien.’ In addition to this, see Beauchamp’s letter of 14 May 1787 to Choiseul-Gouffier, in which he said of the letters incised in the rock, that they were ‘écrites assez profondément, de manière qu’il m’a été plus facile d’en prendre la copie.” See Silvestre de Sacy 1815, p. 173. 26 Silvestre de Sacy 1793, p. 242, wrote, “Plusieurs lettres effacées à la fin des lignes, ne peuvent être rétablies que par conjecture; quelques autres, omises ou transposées, ce qui est presque inévitable dans une copie prise à la hâte, avec toutes sortes de difficultés, & par une personne qui n’entend point ce qu’elle copie, nécessitent encore des restitutions. Bien loin d’en être surpris, on doit plutôt s’étonner que la copie de M. l’abbé de Beauchamps ne présente pas un plus grand nombre de difficultés.” 27 Morelli 1803, pp. 66–72 for the description of the monuments at Tāq-e Bostān.

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for the diary to be published in full.28 Most importantly, J. Morelli, the librarian of St. Mark’s in Venice, sent Silvestre de Sacy copies of two of Grelot’s drawings, one of which contained the inscriptions of Shapur II and III in a clear, clean, professional draftsman’s hand (Fig. 4).29 Moreover, despite the fact that Beauchamp had sent Silvestre de Sacy the pages of his diary that contained his copies of the inscriptions, it was clear from Bembo’s description that Grelot had had much more time to make his copies — four days in fact — than Beauchamp had, and therefore merited full confidence, even if there were cases in which Beauchamp’s readings served to correct those of Bembo.30 Another account of Tāq-e Bostān that had appeared shortly before Silvestre de Sacy delivered his second address on the subject in 1809 was that of the French naturalist, entomologist and diplomat, G. A. Olivier (1756–1814). However, although reasonably detailed, this simply referred to the inscriptions as having been copied by Beauchamp and published by Silvestre de Sacy. Moreover, as Olivier admitted that he had been under pressure of time, and bothered by troublesome Kurds, Silvestre de Sacy did not feel his work deserved further comment.31 Instead, he made a detailed comparison of the transcriptions of Bembo and Beauchamp, correcting his former readings and presenting new translations to replace those of his 1793 study. With that his contribution to the early phase of Tāq-e Bostān studies was complete.

28 Invernizzi 2005; Welch 2007; Invernizzi 2008, p. 206. 29 Silvestre de Sacy 1815, Fig. 1. 30 Beauchamp wrote in his letter of 14 May 1787 to Choiseul-Gouffier that “j’ai été pressé en transcrivant, parce qu’il se formoit un orage et du tonnerre au-dessus de notre tête, et que les personnes qui m’y avoient conduit n’ont pas voulu attendre. J’ai été forcé de remonter à cheval et de regagner la ville à toute bride, après avoir traversé une rivière assez profonde.” On this Silvestre de Sacy remarked, “qu’outre les lacunes provenant des dommages occasionnés par le temps, il a dû rester quelques inexactitudes dans la copie de M. de Beauchamps, et que celle de, faite un siècle plutôt et à loisir, mérite une confiance plus entière; ce qui n’empêche pas que la copie de M. de Beauchamps ne puisse servir quelquefois à rectifier celle de Bembo.” See Silvestre de Sacy 1815, p. 173. 31 Silvestre de Sacy 1815, pp. 170–171, “quoique les témoignages contradictoires de Bembo et de M. Olivier semblent devoir être d’un poids égal, on n’hésitera pas à donner la préference au premier, si l’on compare sa description bien détaillée et le dessin qui l’accompagne, avec la description très-succincte de M. Olivier et le croquis qui y est joint; et si l’on fait réflexion que ce dernier voyageur a dû prendre ce croquis à la hâte, tandis que Bembo a employé quatre jours à considérer et à faire dessiner les seuls monumens de Kirmanschah; que les Curdes inquiétoient M. Olivier et troubloient son travail, au lieu que Bembo se loue de l’honnêté des Persans, qui ne lui laissoient voir qu’un sentiment d’admiration; enfin, que les inscriptions dont nous avons deux copies prises l’une par Bembo, l’autre par M. de Beauchamps, différentes, il est vrai, à quelques égards, mais parfaitement d’accord sur ce point, attestent que ces deux figures sont celles de deux rois.”

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Fig. 4. Grelot’s drawing of the relief and inscriptions of Shapur II and Shapur III (James Ford Bell Library, University of Minnesota).

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Conclusion Three years after Silvestre de Sacy’s second study appeared, K. Hoeck (1794–1877) referred to the fact that Bembo, Beauchamp and Sir J. Malcom had all published descriptions of Tāq-e Bostān and its inscriptions.32 In fact, Malcom, who was a soldier and diplomat, did little more than summarize what Silvestre de Sacy had written.33 But, whereas the French scholar sometimes doubted whether some of the authorities he cited had actually visited the site, in Malcom’s case, we know he did for he engraved his name to one side of the equestrian figure. H. Truilhier, a French military engineer who was a member of Napoleon’s embassy to the Court of Fath ‘Ali Shah in 1807–1808, led by Gen. Gardane, saw Malcom’s name, along with that of S. Manesty, the East India Company agent in Basra who undertook an unauthorized mission to the Qajar court in 1804,34 when he visited the site in 1807 or early 1808. As he wrote to his mother on 17 February 1808, when he saw the names of these two British visitors to the site he felt compelled to add, not his own, but to engrave “God save Napoleon.” Lacking space to fit this in, he settled for “Vive Napoléon.” This he incised with his own knife, breaking it in the process. Even if he was ignorant of Silvestre de Sacy’s fundamental contribution to scholarship on Tāq-e Bostān, Truilhier’s innocent pairing of Napoleon’s name with a site that owed its fame to this other countryman might seem fortuitous. After all, Napoleon had inducted Silvestre de Sacy into the Academy of Sciences three years earlier, in 1804.35 Elected a member of the Legislative Council in 1808, however, Silvestre de Sacy later wrote caustically that the Council was a mute body, condemned for playing no role beyond affirming Napoleon’s executive decrees.36 Truilhier wondered how long the names he saw at Tāq-e Bostān, to which he added Napoleon’s, or for that matter, the ancient inscriptions at the site would last, compared to the immortal name of the French emperor.37 To the best of my knowledge, those of Malcom, 32 Hoeck 1818, p. 114, “In superiori anaglyphi parte utrique figurae addita est inscriptio, satis bene conservata, cuius descriptionem debemus Bemboni, Beauchampio et Malcolmio.” 33 Malcolm 1829, pp. 544–545. 34 Wright 1986. 35 Goodrich 1880, p. 130. 36 Dehérain 1936, p. 279, “Dès 1808, il était entré au Corps législatif, comme représentant du département de la Seine. Sous l’Empire ‘c’était presque un jeu’ d’être membre du Corps législatif. Napoléon gouvernait au moyen de senatus consultes, ou de décrets rédigés par le Conseil d’État. ‘La tribune était muette et condamnée à n’être que l’écho d’une volonté absolue’, écrivait plus tard Silvestre de Sacy.” 37 Aubert 1959, p. 220, “Les ruines les plus anciennes sont effacées. Ce n’est guère qu’après avoir franchi les confins des deux Etats [Ottoman empire and Iran] que j’ai trouvé des monuments; le plus curieux est celui de Kermanschah que M. de Gardanne aura peut-être visité et qui consiste en une vaste chambre taillée dans le roc, et plusieurs statues colossales tenant au rocher. La principale de ces statues représente Roustam, ancien héros de la Perse. MM. le capitaine de vaisseau Malcolm et le consul de Bassora, Manesty, envoyés par les Anglais à la Cour de Téhéran, dans les dernières années, avec une mission politique, avaient

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Manesty and Napoleon are gone, no longer visible, and while Napoleon’s fame has certainly survived, its longevity hardly compares to that of the Sasanian dynasty.

Bibliography d’Anville, J. B. B. 1761: “Mémoire sur un monument très-ancien, sculpté dans une montagne de la Médie.” In: HARIBL 27, pp. 159–167. Aubert, P. 1959: “Un Marseillais de la Mission de Perse sous Napoléon Ier: Le Commandant Truilhier.” In: PrH 38 , pp. 213–225. de Beauchamp, J. 1791: “Relation d’un voyage en Perse, fait en 1787 par M. de Beauchamp, vicaire-général de Babylone, & correspondant de l’académie des sciences.” In: EJFF 6, pp. 263–297. Bosworth, C. E. 1999: The History of al-Tabarī (Ta’rīkh al-rusul wa’l-mulūk), Volume V: The Sāsānids, the Byzantines, the Lakmids, and Yemen. Albany. Chardin, J. 1711: Voyages de Mr. le chevalier Chardin, en Perse, et autres lieux de l’Orient, vol. 9. Amsterdam. Daunou, P. C. F. 1842: “Notice historique sur la vie et les ouvrages de M. le baron Silvestre de Sacy.” In: Bibliothèque de M. le baron Silvestre de Sacy, vol. 1, pp. i–xxviii. Dehérain, H. 1936: “Le rayonnement de Silvestre de Sacy.” In: JS, pp. 264–80. Ferrières-Sauvebœuf, L.-F. 1790: Mémoires historiques, politiques et géographiques des Voyages du comte de Ferrières-Sauvebœuf, Faits en Turquie, en Perse et en Arabie, depuis 1782, jusqu’en 1789; Avec ses Observations sur la Religion, les Mœurs, le Caractère & le Commerce de ces trois Nations…, vol. 2. Paris. Gabriel, A. 1952: Die Erforschung Persiens. Die Entwicklung der abenländischen Kenntnis der Geographie Persiens. Vienna. Gladwin, F. 1788: The Memoirs of Khojeh Abdulkurreem, a Cashmerian of Distinction, Who accompanied Nadir Shah, on his return from Hindostan to Persia… Calcutta. Goodrich, F. B. 1880: The Court of Napoleon; or, Society under the First Empire. Philadelphia. Hoeck, C. F. C. 1818: Veteris Mediae et Persiae monumenta. Göttingen. Humbach, H. 1998: “Epigraphy i. Old Persian and Middle Iranian epigraphy.” In: EIr Online 2011 [Last accessed 24.04.2021]. Invernizzi, A. 2005: Viaggio e giornale per parte dell’Asia di quattro anni incirca fatto da me Ambrosio Bembo nobile veneto. Turin. fait inscrire leurs noms et ceux des officiers de leur suite, l’un à droite, l’un à gauche du héros; le tout était enfermé dans un cadre. J’ai remarqué vers le haut un espace vide qui permettait d’y graver deux mots et il m’a paru plaisant de faire souscrire à ces messieurs la sentence finale de la domination anglaise. Elle est contenue dans ces deux mots anglais ‘God save Napoleon’ (Que Dieu conserve Napoléon), mais j’ai été obligé, faute d’espace, de réduire, et je n’ai pu inscrire que ‘Vive Napoléon’. J’y ai cassé mon couteau et, comme je n’avais pas de poinçon, les lettres sont faites d’une manière moins solide que celle des noms anglais. Cela même pourra peut-être un jour fournir un épigramme à quelque malin voyageur de cette nation, mais que sera la durée de ces caractères et celle du colosse à côté duquel ils sont gravés, et celle du rocher même, dont le colosse n’est qu’un faible parcelle, auprès de l’immortalité attachée au nom de l’Empereur?”

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— 2008: “El testimonio de Ambrogio Bembo y Joseph Guillaume Grelot sobre los restos arqueológicos iranios.” In: J. M a Córdoba/M. Molist/M a C. Pérez/I. Rubio/S. Martinez (eds.): Proceedings of the 5th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, Madrid, April 3–8 2006. Madrid, pp. 205–220. Ives, E. 1773: A voyage from England to India, in the year MDCCLIV…Also, a journey from Persia to England, by an unusual route… London. Le Strange, G. 1919: The Geographical Part of the Nuzhat-al-Qulūb composed by Ḥamd-Allāh Mustawfi of Qazwīn in 740 (1340). Leiden/London. Malcolm, J. 1829: The History of Persia, from the most early period to the present time…, vol. 1 [rev. ed. London]. Morelli, J. 1803: Dissertazione intorno ad alcuni viaggiatori eruditi Veneziani… Venice. Nyberg, H. S. 1960: “The new Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum.” In: BSOAS 23, pp. 40–46. Olivier, G. A. 1807: Voyage dans l’Empire othoman, l’Égypte et la Perse, Fait par ordre du Gouvernement, pendant les six premières années de la République, vol. 3. Paris. Otter, J. 1748: Voyage en Turque et en Perse. Avec une Relation des expéditions de Tahmas Kouli-Khan, vol. 1. Paris. Potts, D. T. 2018: “Bīsotūn and the French Enlightenment.” In: JRAS 3rd Ser. 28/4, pp. 1–32. Potts, D. T. 2020 [2018]: “‘Observatorium in Bagdad constructum:’ The observatory of ‘Babylon’ from Ctesias to Louis XVI.” In: The Canadian Society for Mesopotamian Studies/ La Société canadienne des études mésopotamiennes Journal 13, pp. 5–14. Rousseau, J.-J. 1817: Œuvres de J.J. Rousseau, citoyen de Genève, vol. 5/1. Paris. Salmon, G. 1905: Silvestre de Sacy (1758–1838), vol. 1. Cairo. Silvestre de Sacy, A. I. 1789: “Histoire des Rois de Perse, des Khalifes, de plusieurs Dynasties, et de Genghizkhan, par Nikbi ben Massoud. Manuscrit Persan, n.o 61, sans titre & sans date. Vol. in-folio de 640 feuillets.” In: NEMBR 2, pp. 315–385. — 1793: Mémoires sur diverse Antiquités de la Perse, et sur les Médailles des Rois de la Dynastie des Sassanides; suivis de l’Histoire de cette Dynastie, traduite du Persan de Mirkhond. Paris. — 1815: “Mémoire sur les monumens et les inscriptions de Kirmanschah et de Bi-sutoun, et sur divers autres Monumens Sassanides.” In: HMIRF 2, pp. 162–242. Tavernier, J.-B. 1678: The Six Voyages of Jean Baptista Tavernier, A Noble Man of France now living, through Turky into Persia, and the East-Indies, finished in the Year 1670… London. Thévenot, J. 1727: Suite du Voyage de Mr. de Thevenot au Levant, 3rd ed., vol. 3. Amsterdam. Welch, A. 2007: The Travels and Journal of Ambrosio Bembo. Berkeley/Los Angeles/ London. Wright, D. 1986: “Samuel Manesty and his unauthorized Embassy to the Court of Fatḥ ‘Alī Shāh.” In: Iran 24, pp. 153–160.

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The Justinianic Plague and Sasanian Iran: the Numismatic Evidence Nikolaus Schindel The plague that struck large parts of the ancient world, during the reign of Justinian I (527–565), from 541 ad onwards, has been widely discussed.1 Nowadays, it is commonly accepted that Yersinia pestis was involved in this outbreak,2 even if many open questions remain. For example, the overall impact of the so-called Justinianic Plague on the Byzantine Empire, and on the history of Late Antiquity, is disputed, and opinions vary.3 My intention here is not to discuss the pandemic in a general sense, but rather to look at one particular type of evidence — coins —, and to see what the numismatic material can tell us about the consequences of the Justinianic Plague. Despite the focus on Sasanian Iran in the title, let us start with Byzantium. If we consider Procopius’ report, in which he mentions the severe consequences of the pandemic in Constantinople,4 then it might be possible to observe the effects of the pandemic on coinage. Conveniently, since 538 ad,5 i.e. the regal year (henceforth: RY) 12 of Justinian, the largest units of Byzantine copper coinage, the folles of 40 nummi,6 as well as some of their fractions, bear dates in the form of regal years on their reverse. The gold

1 2 3

4

5 6

The ideas presented here originally date from late 2019, before the outbreak of the Corona pandemic, which then gave it a most unwanted actuality. At the same time, I hope that it underlines the relevance of studying the past for understanding the present. See e.g. Harbeck et al. 2013; Keller et al. 2019. For different opinions, see for example Sarris 2002; Meier 2016; Mordechai/ Eisenberg 2019 with further literature. A comprehensive overview of the existing literature on the topic or a discussion of the main problems at play are beyond the limited scope of this contribution. Proc. BP II, 23, 2 (Dewing 1914, p. 465), who says that during the worst time of the plague 5.000 or even 10.000 people died on a single day. Taking Procopius seriously does not necessarily mean that we have to take numbers literally, but that we accept that the plague had a devastating effect on the population of the imperial capital. Hahn/Metlich 2013, p. 57 (abbreviated here as “MIBE”). On the monetary reform of Anastasius I, see Metcalf 1969; Hahn/Metlich 2013, pp. 13–18; on the relationship between the nominal nummus and the pre-reform copper unit, the so-called minimus, see Schindel 2019.

Sasanian Studies | Sasanidische Studien. Vol. I (2022). Ed. by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee doi: 10.13173/SSt.1.259

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solidi are undated, and can only be attributed to larger chronological slots;7 but this does not devalue the data provided by the folles. Let us first have a look at the numbers of coins issued per year from RY 12 to RY 39, when Justinian died. The coins in Tab. 1 all originate from the card file (NZK) of the Institute for Numismatics and Monetary History at the University of Vienna. They mostly come from auction catalogues, but also from various public and private collections, as well as excavations. This compilation is certainly not complete, but represents the largest collection of data known to me. It has been continuously updated since the 1970ies. As with many imperial coin series, the data is insufficient for a full die analysis (which might seem, from a methodological point of view, preferable to this “trivial statistics”) This holds true also for the Sasanian drachm coinage discussed below. I still believe that the material collected in Tab. 1 allows at least some hypotheses. RY

Total

RY

Total

12 (538/9)

89

26 (552/3)

12

13 (539/40)

134

27 (553/4)

8

14 (540/1)

54

28 (554/5)

9

15 (541/2)

95

29 (555/6)

22

16 (542/3)

38

30 (556/7)

25

17 (543/4)

47

31 (557/8)

10

18 (544/5)

22

32 (558/9)

4

19 (545/6)

22

33 (559/60)

13

20 (546/7)

39

34 (560/1)

8

21 (547/8)

31

35 (561/2)

4

22 (548/9)

19

36 (562/3)

5

23 (549/50)

12

37 (563/4)

2

24 (550/1)

9

38 (564/5)

25 (551/2)

11

39 (565)

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Tab. 1. Folles of Justinian by regal year 7

Cp. Hahn/Metlich 2013, unnumbered folding charts. An important aspect for relative chronology is the system of lustral type change (the lustrum being a quinquennial cycle connected with the 15-year rhythm of the indictio, which primarily served taxation), Hahn 1971; Hahn/Metlich 2013, pp. 8–9.

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It appears useful to present the data from Tab. 1 also in graphic form (Tab. 2): 160 140 120 100 80 60 40 20

39 (565)

38 (564/5)

37 (563/4)

36 (562/3)

35 (561/2)

34 (560/1)

32 (558/9)

33 (559/60)

31 (557/8)

30 (556/7)

29 (555/6)

28 (554/5)

27 (553/4)

26 (552/3)

25 (551/2)

24 (550/1)

22 (548/9)

23 (549/50)

21 (547/8)

20 (546/7)

19 (545/6)

18 (544/5)

17 (543/4)

16 (542/3)

15 (541/2)

14 (540/1)

12 (538/9)

13 (539/40)

0

Tab. 2. Folles of Justinian by regal year in graphic form Tab. 1 contains altogether 744 folles. The average number of coins per year is ca. 27, a statistical value that rarely occurs — for most years more or fewer coins are attested. We can observe a particularly strong output in the first years of the issue of the new dated coins, peaking in RY 13 (134 examples, ca. 18 % of the total). Those post-reform folles not only showed a date on the reverse, but also a fronting, rather than a profile bust of the emperor on the obverse.8 They marked an important and lasting change in the overall appearance of large Byzantine copper coins. Therefore, it seems likely that a substantial number of earlier pre-538 folles was melted down and turned into new coins in the earliest years of this reform. Older coins cannot have been overstuck, since they were smaller, but at the same time thicker, than the new ones. One might think that the issue of the new folles did not start at the beginning of Justinian’s RY 12 because of the relatively modest output compared with the peak in the following year, RY 13.9 However that may be, we should bear in mind that the material basis can sometimes be misleading, as we are dealing with just a tiny fraction of the original coin population. Furthermore, not every single up and down in Tab. 2 can be linked to specific historical events 8 9

Hahn/Metlich 2013, p. 57. Admittedly, Novella 47 of Justinian, which ordered the inclusion of Justinian’s regal year on official documents, dates from 13 August 537, well before the beginning of RY 12. However, no dated folles were issued for the remainder of RY 11 (into which that date falls).

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in Justinian’s reign with full confidence. His 14th regal year lasted from April 4th, 540, to April 3rd, 541. While the plague made its first appearance in Egypt in spring 541, it apparently reached Constantinople in March 542.10 Tab. 3 below lists the various mints that issued the folles, whose totals are given in Tab. 1 and Tab. 2. I will discuss these results further at a later stage. For the time being, suffice to say that it is impossible that the plague was the cause of the low mintage in 540/1, because it arrived in Egypt (where no 40-nummi-coins were produced) only in the last weeks of RY 14. In RY 15, we can observe a steep increase in monetary production (95 coins, 13% of total); this is the second-strongest year attested in Tab. 1. The above-mentioned arrival of the plague in Constantinople in March 542 belongs to the last weeks of Justinian’s 15th regal year. According to Procopius, it remained in the capital for four months, three of them (presumably the later ones) being particularly bad.11 This would mean that the worst months of the plague in Constantinople corresponded by and large to the first quarter of RY 16. If we turn to Tab. 1 and Tab. 2, we observe a steep decline in coin production during that year. Admittedly, the total number of coins minted in RY 16 (Fig. 1) was not completely different from RY 14. But we observe no marked increase compared to that in RY 15 follows: in RY 17, the number of folles is only slightly larger than in RY 16. The weights of the folles were changed from 1/13½ of the Roman pound of ca. 325 g (ideal weight thus: ca. 24,1 g) to 1/15 (ca. 21,7 g) in RY 16, i.e. the plague year.12 It has been argued that this change can be read as evidence of the pandemic,13 but this is very unlikely because of two reasons. First, changes in the relationship between gold and copper were a frequent phenomenon in the Byzantine monetary system, regardless of a pandemic raging.14 Second, no heavier folles were issued in RY 16, meaning that the weight reduction should be dated to the beginning of the year, when the plague only had begun to strike Constantinople. Justinian and his financial advisers would have been exceedingly proactive in lowering the folles weights before the full disaster struck. In all probability, the weight reduction was planned well before the plague arrived, and certainly before its disastrous consequences could have been felt. Comparing the numbers of coins in RY 12 and RY 13 (i.e. after the introduction of the new follis type) with RY 16/17, one might claim that the same mechanism was at work: full production started in earnest only in the respective second year of the weight change. But compared to the first four, pre-plague years, when dated folles were struck (RY 12–15), the weight reduction of 542 had a lesser impact on the quantity of coins produced. For these 10 11 12 13

Proc. BP II, 22, 9 (Dewing 1914, p. 455); Sarris 2002, p. 170. Proc. BP II, 23, 1 (Dewing 1914, p. 465). Hahn/Metlich 2013, pp. 16, 57, 129. Sarris 2002, pp. 176–177; Sarris 2007, p. 129. His idea that the year 542 “witnessed a remarkable instability of in the weight of copper coinage” (Sarris 2002, p. 177) misses the fact that we are not dealing with an unplanned decline that could be used as an argument for a crisis, but with an intentional reduction of the ideal weight of the follis and its fractions. 14 Hahn/Metlich 2013, pp. 13–18; Hahn/Metlich 2009, pp. 9–10.

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first four years, no less than 372 folles are listed in Tab. 1 — half the total amount of all of the 28 regal years during which dated copper coins were produced. For RY 16–23 (542/3 to 549/50, before the next change in weight standards),15 only 218 folles can be found in the NZK (29% of the total), despite the fact that the time span is twice that of the earliest dated coins. Relatively speaking, from an average yearly coin production of ca. 93 folles for RY 12 and RY 15, the monetary output decreased to just ca. 27 coins per year,16 a decline by about 70%. It goes without saying that these numbers are estimates and should not be taken literally. Despite this cautioning, I am still convinced that this difference was not accidental, but rather suggests a reduction in mintage. For the last 16 regal years of Justinian, the average number of coins that we observe in Tab. 2 further declined to less than nine folles yearly (one third of the preceding period, or just 10 % of RY 12–15). Not even the change in weight standard in 550/1 makes itself felt in Tab. 2. The last two years (RY 38, 39) are not attested by any folles so far. We thus observe a continuing decline in the production of dated folles from RY 12 to 39, which I am confident did not happen by chance. It seems likely to me that the declining amount of folles produced in the course of Justinian’s reign was connected to the plague and its effects on the Byzantine Empire. Obviously, there are alternative explanations to this phenomenon. One could simply deny any value to Tab. 1 and Tab. 2 because the sample is too small; but I highly doubt that. With more than 700 coins, chance should not be so prevalent as to render the patterns of minting completely unclear. One might also claim that the decrease in RY 16 was due to the fact that a large enough number of old, pre-reform coins had been reminted by then, so that the mints no longer needed to produce such large numbers of new coins. While this is a sensible suggestion, it fails to explain the lasting decrease in follis production after RY 15, which is lower than in the pre-538 years. What is relevant here is that the patterns of minting of Justinian’s folles can also be considered as possible attestations of the effects of the plague: the markedly lowered mintage in 542/3 could have been caused by a reduction in mint personnel and administrative staff due to the plague, as well as a reduced need for coined money due to the loss of people who would have used coins. Another important, yet problematic, fact to consider is the low mint output for the rest of Justinian’s reign, especially when compared to the first four years when dated folles were struck. Was this due to the fact that enough post-reform coins has been produced, especially in RY 12–15, and that consequently the yearly production could be decreased? Even after 15 Hahn/Metlich 2013, pp. 16, 57, 129. 16 It goes without saying that with a survival rate of ancient coins of less than 1: 10.000 (itself just an educated guess), I am basing these conclusions on tiny evidence. It also should be stated that actual coin production under Justinian was different from the number of coins in the NZK. But as the latter provides insight into the former, I use the two terms without distinction.

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the introduction of new weight standards in 542 and 550, sealed bags full of older, heavier coins continued to be used as legal tender.17 So re-striking was probably not as necessary as it was in the case of the folles struck before 538. Or was (at least to some extent) the decrease in population due to the plague a reason for the lower yearly average from 542 onwards? It should be emphasized that this is a question of interpretation. The numismatic data (at least a preliminary, incomplete version of it) is presented in Tab. 1 and Tab. 2. I believe that the plague could be a factor to be reckoned with when discussing the apparent decline of the follis production from Justinian’s RY 16 to RY 39.

Fig. 1. Justinian I. AE. Follis. CON = Constantinople mint. RY 16 (542/3). MIBE 95a. Numismatik Naumann, Auction 82, 6. 10. 2019, no. 683. However, not all Justinianic folles were struck in Constantinople. Four different mints were issuing 40-nummi-pieces in the Eastern half of the Justinian empire:18 Constantinople, Nicomedia (for the dioecesis Pontica), Cyzicus (for the dioecesis Asiana), Antioch (for Oriens). As promised above, let us look at the distribution patterns of these four mints (Tab. 3). RY

CON (MIBE 95)

NIC (MIBE 114)

CYZ (MIBE 120)

ANT (MIBE 143,145)

12 (538/9)

64

19

6

 

13 (539/40)

53

25

21

35

14 (540/1)

36

11

7

 

15 (541/2)

64

20

11

 

17 Hahn/Metlich 2013, pp. 16–17. 18 The Italian and African mint are left aside here, as they cannot be compared with the Eastern mints. The same holds true for Alexandria, where only undated copper coins (mainly 12-nummi-pieces) were struck.

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The Justinianic Plague and Sasanian Iran: the Numismatic Evidence CON (MIBE 95)

RY

NIC (MIBE 114)

CYZ (MIBE 120)

265

ANT (MIBE 143,145)

16 (542/3)

13

10

15

 

17 (543/4)

18

11

8

10

18 (544/5)

16

3

3

 

19 (545/6)

6

4

12

 

20 (546/7)

5

7

5

22

21 (547/8)

3

5

8

15

22 (548/9)

8

2

5

4

23 (549/50)

4

6

1

1

24 (550/1)

4

 

1

4

25 (551/2)

1

 

4

6

26 (552/3)

7

2

1

2

27 (553/4)

19

6

 

2

28 (554/5)

4

1

 

4

29 (555/6)

7

2

6

7

30 (556/7)

11

2

7

5

31 (557/8)

1

4

2

3

32 (558/9)

2

2

 

 

33 (559/60)

1

 

 

12

34 (560/1)

6

 

2

 

35 (561/2)

4

 

 

 

36 (562/3)

5

 

 

 

37 (563/4)

2

 

 

 

38 (564/5)

 

 

 

 

39 (565)

 

 

 

 

total

345

142 

125

132

Tab. 3. Folles of Justinian by mint and regal year As one might expect, the capital19 Constantinople is the most productive follis mint: 345 coins (slightly less than 50 % of our total) were struck there. Let us 19 Hahn/Metlich 2013, p. 58 mention a “real gap” of folles in RY 27, which they connect to riots in the capital. Nevertheless, half folles were struck in this year in Constantinople, Hahn/Metlich 2013, p. 132.

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compare the last pre-plague year (RY 15) with the following year, when the pandemic struck: from the former year, 64 coins were attested for the capital in the NZK, from the later, only 13. This means a decline by about 80 %. In Nicomedia, the decline was 50 %, while in Cyzicus during the plague year the number of coins struck actually increased by 40 %. Despite all general and methodological caveats, I have the impression that something special was going on in the capital, and once again I feel inclined to assume a connection between the particularly drastic reduction of coinage in Constantinople and the effects of the plague, which Procopius describes in such a gruesome fashion. On the other hand, judging from the numismatic evidence it seems possible that some cities like Cyzicus were not badly affected by the plague. For Antioch, Bates has claimed that the combined effect of the city’s sack by the Sasanians in 540 and the plague in 542 led to a complete cessation of local minting in RY 17–19 (543/4–545/6).20 As can be observed in Tab. 3, the patterns of minting were different in Antioch from the other three Eastern mints in the period of the early dated folles — only three of the first nine years of their production are attested. Other than Bates believed, RY 17 is well documented today, so his claim regarding the inactivity of the Antioch mint in the first year after the plague can no longer be regarded as relevant. Since follis production had ended by RY 14 (540/1), well before the arrival of the plague, it is improbable that the inactivity in RY 16 was connected to the pandemic. Still, by and large, Bates’ observation that the combination of the Sasanian invasion and the plague might have had a negative impact on the activity of the mint of Antioch in the 540ies appears to be valid. So much for the evidence of Justinian’s copper coins that might — as a hypothesis — have relevance for the ongoing discussion of the pandemic in the 6th century ad and its effects. I have already stated above that a connection between the weight reduction of the folles in 542 and the plague is most unlikely. I also do not believe that there is a direct connection between the issue of light-weight solidi (Fig. 2) and the pandemic:21 these coins are too rare to have had any impact22 — a fact overlooked in the discussion by non-numismatists so far. At the same time, Hahn has convincingly explained how they were used: as a measure to make the exchange between bags with folles of different weight standards easier.23 20 Bates 1970, p. 75, note 13; cp. also Hahn 1973, p. 63. 21 As claimed by Sarris 2002, p. 176; Sarris 2007, pp. 128–129. While it is certainly positive that the author did not neglect the numismatic material, his ideas suffer from some weaknesses. One is that his re-dating of the introduction of the light-weight solidi is more the result of a circular conclusion than a sound scientific analysis. Another is the fact that while referring twice to the work of Wolfgang Hahn, he does not cite his study (Hahn, Metlich 2000, probably unavailable to Sarris 2002), but only an unpublished thesis by a certain J. Banaji. 22 While Hahn, Metlich 2013, p. 12, gives the portion of light weight solidi in Constantinople as below 10%, I wonder whether the numeric relation between regular solidi of 24 carat and the light-weight specimens of 20 and 22 carat might be more in the order of 1:100. 23 Hahn/Metlich 2013, p. 12; cp. also Hahn 2005, pp. 57–58.

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The lighter solidi bore marks that clearly distinguished them from the full solidi and stated their reduced weights.24 Therefore, they cannot have been intended to fool the population. The phenomenon of solidi of a lower weight than the otherwise canonical 24 carats survived into the 7th century,25 and it is impossible to connect all these issues with further outbreaks of the plague. Finally, because of typological reasons it is almost certain that the production of these light-weight solidi began in 537 and not in 542, as Sarris claims: they do not display the upper semicircle attached to the cross on the reverses of the solidi minted that year. While the reduced coins never took on this pictorial detail, it is most unlikely that upon their very introduction they should have employed an obsolete reverse type.26

Fig. 2. Justinian I. AV. Light weight Solidus of 20 carats. 537–542. Constantinople mint. MIBE 12. Numismatics Ars Classica, Auction 75, 18. 11. 2013, no. 493. To sum it up, while neither the weight change of the Justinianic folles in 542 nor the light-weight solidi can be connected with the pandemic, it seems possible that the decline in numbers of folles minted per year in the NZK in RY 16 (corresponding to the plague year 542 in Constantinople) was caused by the pandemic. It might, even more hypothetically, be possible that the continuing decline of the number of copper coins struck was connected to the population loss the Byzantine Empire had suffered. I am well aware of the fact that on the one hand, one might raise methodological objections against the ideas presented here. On the other hand, the interpretation of the numismatic data presented in Tab. 1, Tab. 2, and Tab. 3 will remain a subjective matter. At least, I hope that my study will encourage scholars to take a fresh look at Byzantine coinage in regards to the question of the Justinianic Plague and its effects. In any case, the 24 Hahn, Metlich 2013, p. 44, pl. 14, nos. 10a–16. 25 Hahn/Metlich 2009, pp. 22, 35, 37, 46–47, 61. 26 Hahn/Metlich 2013, pp. 44–45, unnumbered folding chart; Hahn 2005, p. 56.

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folles also attest to the resilience of the Byzantine Empire: the amount of coins produced annually might have been affected by the plague, but even in its worst year (542), the imperial mints continued to function, and there is no gap in the yearly sequence of Constantinople (except for RY 27 when it comes to the folles, which is unrelated to the epidemic of 542), Nicomedia, and Cyzicus. So much for a numismatic discussion on the possible effects of the plague on the Byzantine Empire. Let us now look at the coinage of Khusro I (531–578), a contemporary adversary of Justinian, into whose reign the first major eruption of the pandemic falls, as far as Sasanian history is concerned. I am currently finalizing the manuscript of SNS 4 (Khusro I), and therefore have substantial numismatic documentation at my disposal.27 Once again, I have to emphasize that the ca. 3770 drachms which are altogether listed in Tab. 4 represent but a very tiny fraction of the total number of coins produced during the 48-year-reign of Khusro I — they do not even add up to the yearly income of one single Sasanian knight.28 Still, this is the most comprehensive set of numismatic data available for study so far. At the same time, I can say with confidence that a die analysis makes little sense for Khusro’s drachms, because the material basis is too meagre. Once again, we have to limit our-selves to “trivial statistics”. Let us start with an overview of the distribution of drachms known to me by regal years. Since Khusro’s father, Kawad I (488–496, 499–531), had used regal years on all the coins of his second reign,29 we have dates for every single drachm struck by Khusro I (even if in some few cases, the date may be illegible; these have not been included in Tab. 4). RY

Total

RY

Total

1 (531/2)

29

11 (541/2)

27

2 (532/3)

86

12 (542/3)

51

3 (533/4)

70

13 (543/4)

42

4 (534/5)

67

14 (544/5)

48

5 (535/6)

69

15 (545/6)

41

6 (536/7)

54

16 (546/7)

39

7 (537/8)

39

17 (547/8)

55

8 (538/9)

34

18 (548/9)

58

9 (539/40)

21

19 (549/50)

58

10 (540/1)

27

20 (550/1)

64

27 A preliminary overview can be found in Schindel 2015. 28 Schindel 2004, vol. 1, pp. 125–126. 29 Schindel 2004, vol. 1, pp. 437–438, 452, 464; the introduction of dates was an innovation of Zamasp (496–499), Kawad’s brother and rival.

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The Justinianic Plague and Sasanian Iran: the Numismatic Evidence RY

Total

RY

269

Total

21 (551/2)

63

35 (565/6)

103

22 (552/3)

111

36 (566/7)

86

23 (553/4)

122

37 (567/8)

94

24 (554/5)

65

38 (568/9)

87

25 (555/6)

95

39 (559/560)

50

26 (556/7)

84

40 (560/1)

61

27 (557/8)

115

41 (561/2)

101

28 (558/9)

106

42 (562/3)

81

29 (559/60)

165

43 (563/4)

100

30 (560/1)

142

44 (564/5)

128

31 (561/2)

106

45 (565/6)

141

32 (562/3)

88

46 (566/7)

136

33 (563/4)

94

47 (567/8)

123

34 (564/5)

84

48 (568)

60

Tab. 4. Drachms of Khusro I by regal year. Here, too, it might be useful to present the data in graphic form (Tab. 5). 180 160 140 120 100 80 60 40 20 0

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48

Tab. 5. Drachms of Khusro I by regal year in graphic form Khusro became king around 13 September 531; the beginning of the reckoning of his first regal year is dated to 12 July of the same year.30 During his RY 10, the plague struck Egypt. Its worst effects on Constantinople (spring 542) chronologically belong to the end of his 11th regal year. Procopius states that in 30 Nöldeke 1879, pp. 428, 435.

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543 (probably in spring), Khusro had moved to Azerbaijan, planning to invade the Byzantine Empire through Persarmenia.31 However, these plans came to nothing because he and “the whole Persian army” contracted the plague.32 This episode might refer to the end of RY 12 or the beginning of RY 13. Also the Chronicle of Seert shortly refers to this outbreak.33 Apart from this, it seems that our primary sources do not contain much information on the pandemic in Sasanian Iran in the 540ies;34 it is absent from Tabari, and while I certainly cannot claim to command the oriental (Arabic/Persian) literature, one has to agree with Bonner that “the effect of the plague on Iran has not really been studied.”35 Once again, numismatics might offer insights that so far have not been possible because of a lack of a comprehensive set of data. I should begin with two important preliminary remarks. First, there appear to be some cyclical ups and downs in the numbers of Sasanian drachms attested per year, not only under Khusro I (Tab. 5), but also under Khusro II (590–628).36 So far, I have failed to find a comprehensive explanation for this. It seems that coin production in Sasanian Iran fluctuated without a reason as drastic as the Justinianic Plague. On the other hand, the majority of the 6th- and 7th-century Sasanian drachms known today seems to originate from coin hoards of the 7th century, sometimes buried even after the fall of the Sasanian Empire.37 The later, the more common: this is a basic rule for the distribution patterns of these hoards, and it follows that the coins of Khusro II normally are most common. Those of his father Ohrmazd IV (578–590), who ruled for only 13 years compared to Khusro I’s 48 years, are relatively more common than coins struck under Khusro I.38 During his reign, we can observe a preponderance of later issues, which are closer in chronological terms (at least relatively speaking) to the closing dates of the hoards.39 Tab. 5 therefore does not necessarily prove that coin production increased in the course of Khusro’s reign. 31 Proc. BP II, 24, 1 (Dewing 1914, p. 473). 32 Proc. BP II, 24, 8 (Dewing 1914, p. 475). 33 Chronicle of Seert (Scher 1950, p. 185): “A cette époque également Kosrau fut frappé de la maladie appelée Sar’outa, à savoir la peste; il perdait son sang.” (Available online: http://www.patristique.org/sites/patristique.org/IMG/pdf/po_32_vii_2.pdf, [Last accessed 13.02.2020]). The episode is firmly set within the detailed description of the Justinianic Plague and its effects on the Near East, pp. 182–186. 34 The plague of 627/8 which is named after the then reigning Sasanian King of Kings, Kawad II Shiroe (628), is left aside here. Cp. e.g. Little 2007, p. 8; Sarris 2002, p. 171. 35 Bonner 2011, p. 87. One exception is Morony 2007, p. 76, who discusses emergency burials at Siirt (Turkey), then within the borders of Sasanian Iran, as reported by the Chronicle of Seert. See now also Bonner 2020, pp. 191–195. 36 Akbarzadeh/Schindel 2017, p. 64, tab. 75–76. 37 Akbarzadeh/Schindel 2017, pp. 19–60. 38 Akbarzadeh/Schindel 2017, pp. 58–59, tab. 70–72. 39 In the Orumiye hoard, only 12 coins date from Khusro’s first 24 regal years, 83 from the second half of his reign; see Akbarzadeh/Schindel 2017, p. 11, tab. 3. While there

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The main question that shall be answered here is not to what extent coin production changed during the entire 48 years of Khusro I’s reign. We should rather enquire if the Justinianic plague had consequences on the patterns of minting in Sasanian Iran. Unlike in the case of Justinian’s folles, I am convinced that with Khusro’s drachms the answer is clearly negative. The nadir of coins per year falls into RY 9 (539/40), well before the arrival of the plague in Egypt. There is no indication in the sources that the plague might have arrived in Iran before Byzantium. The two following years witnessed a slight increase, but in RY 12 (542/3) the number of attested silver coins almost doubled. This regal year began after the plague reached its highest contamination peak in Constantinople. Khusro’s field army contracted the plague either at the end of RY 12 or at the beginning of RY 13 (Fig. 3) . Despite this, the number of drachms per year went up again in RY 14, and after two fairly meagre years (RY 15, 16) we observe a steady increase. Never again did the number of coins fall below 50 per year, not even in RY 48, when Khusro I died. As stated above, this has to do not only with an increase in drachm production, but also with the patterns of hoarding in the Late Sasanian period. In my opinion, the slight decrease of drachms during RY 13 compared with both RY 12 and RY 14 was too small to be attributed to the plague that struck the Sasanian army in 543.

Fig. 3. Khusro I. AR. Drachm. AS = Asuristan (Ctesiphon) mint. RY 13 (543/4). Göbl 1971, type I/1. Paris, Cabinet des medailles, 1980.162. As opposed to the Byzantine Empire, where a marked decrease of folles issues in the year 542, as well as a strong decline of yearly coin production thereafter can be observed, the production of drachm coinage under Khusro I showed no such was a typological change in Khusro’s RY 5 that might have led to the disappearance of pre-RY 5 drachms, there is no obvious typological reason that might have rendered post-RY 5 coins obsolete. Also in the case of Ohrmazd IV, an increase towards the end of his reign can be observed, see Akbarzadeh/Schindel 2017, p. 11, tab. 4.

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a dramatic fluctuation. This is not to say that the pandemic did not affect this region or caused large-scale human suffering. Still, one can at least hypothesize that the plague and its effects can be discovered in the patterns of minting of Justinian’s folles – if one specifically looks for them, that is. Admittedly, I doubt that anyone would make a connection between these changes and the pandemic without knowing from Procopius what happened in 542. I cannot detect similar patterns in the drachm coinage of Khusro I; whatever the effects of the pandemic on Sasanian Iran might have been, the numismatic sources do not reveal them — at least not to my eye. Two final remarks. So far, I have only spoken about silver coins; the drachm was the main denomination under Khusro I. Copper coins were struck too, but they are far too rare to learn anything from them regarding the topic discussed here; no serious distribution patterns can be reconstructed so far. Also, gold coins existed during the reign of Khusro I, but they are even rarer than copper coins. I know only five dinars that I consider both genuine as well as belonging to Khusro I. Two die-linked coins from RY 44 are of no interest here,40 and neither is a dinar from RY 21,41 since they all clearly post-date the pandemic of 542/3. Of relevance could be two gold coins dated from RY 13 (543/4) (Fig. 4), which have recently been discussed again by T. Daryaee.42 Theses dinars show the king fronting, holding a sword with both hands, in a gesture similar to that found on drachms from RY 5 onwards (cp. Fig. 3).43 Daryaee translates the reverse legend as “Khosrow, the maker of the world without fear”.44 He connects this with a passage in the Bundahishn, which has a similar wording (with Eranshahr instead of “the world”), and links it with the preceding phrase on Khusro’s successes against the (Iranian) Huns. I see two problems here. First, after the disastrous defeat of Peroz against the Hephthalites in 484, the losses of the Sasanian Empire in the East had already been largely repaired by Kawad I.45 Second, the really great and lasting victory of a Sasanian-Turkish alliance against the Hephthalites (the most dangerous Eastern enemies of Iran in the 5th /6th century ad) dates only to the 560ies, i.e. about 20 years after the dinar from RY 13 (543/4) was struck. Even if this is hypothetical and purely associative, I would at least like to suggest that maybe this gold coin was somehow connected to the plague. The year when it was struck was the second possible candidate for Khusro’s illness, when also the effect of the pandemic on the Iranian army is reported. Considering that in Constantinople the plague disappeared after four months, it seems possible that by the middle of RY 13 the pandemic was 40 Schindel 2006b, p. 29, no. 6. 41 Schindel 2006b, p. 29, no. 5. 42 Daryaee 2020; for a detailed discussion whether the coin belongs to Khusro I or II (with a clear preference for the former) Schindel 2006b, pp. 19–24. 43 Göbl 1971, reverse type 2. 44 Daryaee 2020, p. 194 45 Schindel 2004, vol. 1, pp. 489–490; Schindel 2006a, pp. 684–685.

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no longer considered a threat in Iran. The legend of “Khosrow, the maker of the world without fear” could be connected to this episode. That is not to say that I consider this likely. There was certainly nothing Khusro I could have done against the plague, so the word “maker”, if associated with the plague, would have to hold a very generic meaning here . At the same time, the meaning of the inscription could be general, and not necessarily refer to a specific historical event. Still, as long as no other dinars with the same typology and legend turn up that clearly pre-date the plague years, one might at least consider the possibility that the optimistic legend of Khusro’s dinar of RY 13 — at least to some extent — also was connected to frightening pandemic of the 540ies.

Fig. 4. Khusro I. AV. Dinar. No mint. RY 13 (543/4). After Daryaee 2020, p. 193, fig. 1; cp. also Schindel 2006b, p. 29, fig. 1 The impact of the Justinianic Plague on the Byzantine Empire and Sasanian Iran will certainly continue to be discussed. I hope to have shown that even if the material basis might not be as complete as one might wish, and even if much of what I said here remains speculative, coins produced by both the Byzantine and the Sasanian Empires are primary sources of utmost importance that might add to our understanding of the period. In the case of Emperor Justinian, they could bear witness to the severe effects of the plague; in that of Khusro I, they do not attest a decline in monetary production that could be linked to the pandemic of 541 ad.

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Bibliography Akbarzadeh, D./N. Schindel 2017: Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum Iran. A Late Sasanian Hoard from Orumiyeh. Vienna. Bates, G. E. 1970: “Five Byzantine Notes.” In: ANSMN 16, pp. 69–85. Bonner, M. J. 2011: Three Neglected Sources of Sasanian History in the Reign of Khusraw Anushirvan. Paris. — 2020: The Last Empire of Iran. New Jersey. Daryaee, T. 2020: “The Maker of the World Without Fear. Observations on the Gold Coin of Khosrow I.” In: M. Faghfoury (ed.): Ancient Iranian Numismatics in Memory of David Sellwood. Irvine , pp. 193–196. Dewing, B. (transl. & ed.) 1914: Procopius. History of the Wars: Vol. 1, Books 1-2: The Persian War (The Loeb Classical Library). Cambridge/London. Göbl, R. 1971: Sasanian Numismatics. Brunswick. Hahn, W. 1971: “Emission und Lustrum in der byzantinischen Münzprägung des 6. Jahrhunderts.” In: Anzeiger 108, pp. 215–221. — 1973: Moneta Imperii Byzantini 1. Von Anastasius I. bis Justinianus I. (491–565) einschließlich der ostgotischen und vandalischen Prägungen. Vienna. — 2005: Zur Münzprägung des frühbyzantinischen Reiches. Anastasius I. bis Phocas und Heraclius-Revolte, 491 – 610. Vienna. Hahn, W./M. Metlich 2000: Money of the Incipient Byzantine Empire, Anastasius I – Justinian I, 491–565. Vienna. — 20132: Money of the Incipient Byzantine Empire, Anastasius I – Justinian I, 491–565. Vienna. Harbeck, M. et al. 2013: “Yersinia pestis DNA from Skeletal Remains from the 6th Century ad Reveals Insights into Justinianic Plague.” In: PLOS Pathogens 9/5. Available online: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3642051/ [Last accessed 13.03.2020]. Keller, M. et al. 2019: “Ancient Yersinia pestis genomes from across Western Europe reveal early diversification during the First Pandemic (541–750).” In: PNAS 116/25, pp. 12363–12372. Little, L. K. 2007: Plague and the End of Antiquity. The Pandemic of 541–750. Cambridge. Meier, M. 2016: “The ‘Justinianic Plague’: The Economic Consequences of the Pandemic in the Eastern Roman Empire and its Cultural and Religious Effects.” In: Early Medieval Europe 24, pp. 267–292. Metcalf, D. M. 1969: The Origins of the Anastasian Currency Reform. Amsterdam. Mordechai, L./M. Eisenberg 2019: “Rejecting Catastrophe: The Case of the Justinianic Plague.” In: P&P 244/1, pp. 3–50. Morony, M. G. 2007: “‘For Whom Does the Writer Write?’: The First Bubonic Plague Pandemic According to Syriac Sources.” In: L. K. Little (ed.): Plague and the End of Antiquity. The Pandemic of 541–750. Cambridge, pp. 59–86. Nöldeke, T. 1879: Geschichte der Perser und Araber zur Zeit der Sasaniden aus der arabischen Chronik des Tabari: Übersetzt und mit ausführlichen Erläuterungen und Ergänzungen versehn. Leiden. Sarris, P. 2002: “The Justinianic Plague: Origins and Effects.” In: C&C 17/2, pp. 169–182.

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Scher, A. (ed.) 1950: Histoire nestorienne inédite (Chronique de Séert) [Patrologia Orientalis]. Paris. Schindel, N. 2006a: “The Sasanian Eastern Wars in the 5th Century: The Numismatic Evidence.” In: A. Panaino/A. Piras (eds.): Proceedings of the 5th Conference of the Societas Iranologica Europaea. Volume I. Ancient & Middle Iranian Studies. Milan, pp. 675–689. — 2006b: “Khusro I. oder Khusro II.?” In: MÖNG 46/1, pp. 16–29. — 2015: “The Mint System under Husraw I: Some Preliminary Remarks.” In: C. Jullien (ed.): Sources and Documents for the Reconstruction of the Reign of Husraw I. Paris, pp. 115–140. — 2019: “Ein frühbyzantinischer Münzfund nebst Bemerkungen zum Wert des Minimus im Verhältnis zum Nummus der anastasianischen Münzreform von 498.” In: NZ 124, pp. 79–115.

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Aramaic Legal Terminology in the Sasanian Law-Book Mādayān ī Hazār Dādestān: Some Remarks on Late Antique Legal termini technici Hossein Sheikh ْ ْ َ ‫َار ُم ْه ِدي َها‬ ِ ‫إِ َّن ال َهدَايَا عَ لى ِمقد‬ To my teacher Philip G. Kreyenbroek*

Introduction During the emergence of the Achaemenid Empire, in the sixth century bc, the Aramaic language became the lingua franca in all its territories.1 As the administrative language of the Empire, one of its functions was to record legal agreements for the archives. Therefore, a large portion of the Aramaic documents unearthed from this period are of legal nature,2 originating mainly from two satrapies, in Egypt and Palestine. The documents from Egypt are mostly from a military fortress, as well as a Jewish military colony,3 while the documents from Palestine come from Samira, Wadi al-Daliyah (a valley fourteen kilometers north of Jericho).4 Both documents are written on papyrus or ostracon. Certainly, the Aramaic scribes in the Achaemenid court stayed in constant contact with their Iranian fellows. This contact is evident in the many linguistic exchanges found between the two languages. The existence of Iranian loan words in Aramaic, as well as Aramaic loan words in Iranian were the result of such *

1 2 3 4

This is the first part of a study on legal terminology in Aramaic. The second part focuses on the Šalliṭ clause in late antiquity, and the third examines the origins of Aramaic legal terminology. All translations of the original sources are done by the present author. I would like to thank Shervin Farridnejad (Berlin) who read the text and shared with me his critical and helpful remarks. Of course, any errors that remain are my sole responsibility. For Aramaic as lingua franca see Follmer 2020, and Gzella 2015, chapter 4. Dušek 2013. Porten 1997; Porten/Yardeni 1989. Dušek 2020; Gropp 2001/Dušek 2007.

Sasanian Studies | Sasanidische Studien. Vol. I (2022). Ed. by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee doi: 10.13173/SSt.1.277

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interactions. Centuries later, most of the Middle Iranian languages, including Parthian, Pahlavi, Sogdian, and Khwarazmian, adopted Aramaic script (with modifications) as a writing system.5 Because of linguistic interactions and the adoption of Aramaic script, Aramaic legal terms entered the Iranian legal corpora. These inherited terms were of two kinds: arameograms or translations of Aramaic terms into Iranian languages. The former appeared as a linguistic phenome in middle Iranian languages (called huzwārišn in Pahlavi) in which an Aramaic word was written in their respective script, however was read in the target Iranian language.6 The latter were the Iranian “rendering” of the Aramaic legal terms and phrases. The focus of this paper lies on both categories of legal terminology, mainly preserved within Pahlavi legal sources. Such a study is not without its challenges. Because no pre-Islamic Pahlavi deeds of conveyance have been discovered yet,7 the primary source for the study of legal terminology in Pahlavi is Mādayān ī Hazār Dādestān (MHD), the late Sasanian Middle Persian law book composed most probably in the seventh century CE.8 This book contains a significant number of Aramaic legal terms, specifically terms regarding legal transactions, scattered throughout the text. This study, in particular, attempts a reconstruction of the investiture clause based on evidences rendered in the MHD.

GṬ (Pahl. GTk’= nāmag, gittig)

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278 Hossein Sheikh

Let us begin with the word G̣ T “document.”9 Different terms in Pahlavi are used to identify different types of documents.10 In this study, the arameogram GTk’ is important because it was used more frequently in the MHD than other terms for “document.”11 This Aramaic loan word from Akkadian12 is transcribed in

5 6 7

Skjærvø 1996. On Huzwāreš, see Durkin-Meisterernst 2004, pp. 585ff. A group of Pahlavi documents from Tabaristan, mostly court reports, with no transfer documents included, have recently been discovered. Thus, they are ineffective in our research. These documents have been edited and translated by Gignoux (2012, 2014, 2016) and reedited and translated by Weber (2016, 2017, 2019, 2020), with legal commentaries by Macuch (2016, 2017, 2019, 2020) and are published in the Res Orientales series. 8 Macuch 2005. 9 According to the common conventions for transcription of Middle Iranian languages, the arameograms are transcribed in capital letters. In order to demonstrate the similarities between the two traditions (Aramaic and Iranian), all the Aramaic terms and passages are rendered in capital letters as well. 10 Shaki 1996, p. 459. 11 Perikhanian 1997, p. 362. Macuch 1993, p. 721. 12 AHw I, p. 294 and CAD 5, pp. 112f.

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two ways in Pahlavi, namely to represent the Pahlavi word nāmag, as well as gittig,13 itself an Aramaic loan word.14 In Aramaic papyri from the Achaemenid period, the word GṬ15 appears twice in the WDSP, while the word ŠṬR16 is normally used for “document” in the whole corpus.17 The term used for “document” in the APE is ṢFR.18 Some centuries later, the term GṬ began to frequently appear in the Tannaic legal tradition, in particular divorce bills.19

ZBN W YHB (Pahl. MZBNWNtn W YHBWNtn = xrīdan ud frōxtan) This two-term transfer formula is found only in the Aramaic sale contracts from Elephantine. For example: ʾNH BGZŠT WʾWBL KL ʾNHN ZBN WYHBN LK [… BYTH]20 I, Bgzšt and ʾwbl we all sold and gave you (the house)

The same formula appears several times in the MHD in a very complicated passage.21 Nonetheless, it is clear that some sentences in the passage contain the Pahlavi version of the Aramaic two-term transfer formula. For example: ʾMT ḫwʾstk’ y nʾmcšt’ rʾy YML{LWNyt} ʾYK ʿD K ʿN ʿL L MZBNWNt W YHBWNt ʾywyn’ YHBWNt mrtyn’ rʾy Lʾ ptkʾrm22 If he declares concerning a certain thing (property) that “what (Mihren) sold and gave me was legal (lawful) until now (therefore) I will not sue Mihren.”

There are various theories regarding the origin and function of this two-term transfer formula.23 Botta has recently suggested that “[this two-term transfer formula] has the clear purpose of contextualizing the Aramaic legal formula in the Egyptian legal tradition.”24 Actually, it does not seems to be correct, 13 Schwartz 1970, p. 300; Perikhanian 1997, p. 362; Macuch 1993, p. 721. 14 This word is attested in Kardir’s inscriptions KNRb 25 & 26, Gignoux 1991, p. 36, and Jürgel 2010, pp. 73f. 15 Another cognate of this word is ʾGRT, which occurs in the Aramaic documents from Tall Šēḫ Ḥamad / Dūr-Katlimmu, see Schwiderski 2009, 11f.; for the texts, see Röllig 2014. 16 In the Neo-Babylonian dockets, the word ŠṬR is used for “document,” see Schwiderski 2009, pp. 778f. and Muffs 2003, p. 207. 17 Dušek 2007, pp. 170, 615. 18 Muffs 2003, p. 207. 19 Friedman 2006, p. 423, as well as Kaufman 1975, pp. 52f. 20 TAD B3.4 & B12. 21 MHDA 22.1–17. 22 MHDA 22.8–9. 23 For most of the opinions see Botta 2008a, 102ff, and also Yaron 1960, p. 382 and Muffs 2003, p. 34 note 1. 24 Botta 2008, p. 106.

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280 Hossein Sheikh because this formula has not been attested in conveyances from Ancient Egypt.25 Furthermore, evidence from the MHD suggests that this formula, at least, did not only occur in the APE.26 On the other hand, we see a similar phrase appear several times in Neo-Assyrian transactions as: Uppišma PN1… ana PN2 iddin or išīm27 PN1 contracted and gave or sold…to PN2

It is more likely that Aramaic scribes in the Achaemenid court used a formula similar to the Neo-Assyrian one rather than the Egyptian one. Regardless, maybe Botta be correct to assume that this formula was used “to assure the legal validity of the transaction.”28

Investiture Clause The “investiture clause” has been the most important and prominent feature of Aramaic legal tradition throughout its history.29 It confers full ownership rights of a property from one owner to a new one and his/her descendants for all time. The complete version of the investiture clause can be reconstructed as follows: From this day and forever, X is empowered to have the X property, as well as his children and descendants, and he can do with it whatever he wants.30

Accordingly, this clause consists of four parts: 1. The opening declaration; 2. The perpetuity phrase; 3. The heritability phrase; 4. The rights of alienation.31 The investiture clause is not preserved in its entirety in the MHD. However, all four elements can be found separately in the text.

Opening Declaration: the Phrase Šalliṭ (Pahl. ŠLYTʾ=pādixšāy) This part of the investiture confirms the authority of a legal participant over some objects involved in a legal transaction.32 The Aramaic word Šalliṭ is the main key 25 Yaron 1960, 381f. 26 See Sheikh 2017, Chapter 2. 27 Donbaz/Parpola 2001, Docs 234 & 258. See also Radner 1997, pp. 340ff; Sheikh 2017, Chapter 2. 28 Botta 2008a, p. 106. 29 Gross 2008, p. 92; For more details about the Šalliṭ clause, see Gropp 1993 and Botta 2006, 2009. Also for its historical evolution, see Ruddman 2001, pp. 144ff and the second part of the current study §The Šalliṭ clause in late antiquity. 30 Of course, it is a reconstruction. See also Porten 1996, p. 81. 31 Gross 2008, p. 93. 32 Gropp 1993, p. 31.

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word in this section,33 thus the investiture clause in Aramaic documents was sometimes referred to as the Šalliṭ clause.34 In the opening declaration of the investiture in Aramaic contracts, the word Šalliṭ is expressed either with the preposition B,35 for example: ʾNT ʿNNZH BR ʿZRZH ŠLYṬ BBYTʾ ZK 36 You Annzih son of Arzah are entitled to that house.

Or with the preposition L (entitled to, empowered in) (empowered to):37 ŠLYṬ YHWNWR LYHWḪNN ZK LʿLMʾ 38 Yhwnwr is entitled to so-called Yhwhnn forever.

Notably, the difference in the formulation of the phrase Šalliṭ in the two Aramaic traditions (APE & WDSP) is purely linguistic, and both have the same legal function. Similarly, the arameogram ŠLYTʾ in Pahlavi is a key legal term,39 which serves the same purpose as in Aramaic: Prznd pt ʾnštrykyh ʾywʾc ʾB’ ŠLYTʾ MZBNWt.40 Only the father is entitled to sell children into slavery.

Note: The phrase Šalliṭ in the investiture clause has a positive function in most cases. However, it is sometimes used in a negative context to deny or limit authority over property. This formulation appears in the APE as follows: LHN BYTʾ ZNK Lʾ ŠLYT ʾNT LZBNH WLMNTN RḪMT LʾḪRNW LHN BNYK MN MBṬḪYH BRTY HMW ŠLYṬN BH ʾḪRYKM.41 However, you are not empowered to sell and give it willingly others however your children from Mibtahiah, my daughter, have right to it after you.

The WDSP, on the other hand, place it after the penal provision, as renunciation of right of disposal: [Lʾ ŠL]YṬN ʾNḪWH LNḪMYH ZK We will [not have au]thority over the said Nehamiah.42 33 34 35 36 37 38 39

For the meanings of the word Šalliṭ, see Schwiderski 2009, pp. 787f. Gross 2008, p. 92, note 1. Just in the APE. TAD B3.4. In the APE and WDSP. WDSP 1. We are only considering the meaning and function of the term Šalliṭ (Pādixšāy) in transactions, here. For the function of the term Šalliṭ (Pādixšāy) in Zoroastrian family law, see Shaki 1999, 184f and Hjarrid 2003, pp. 11–77. 40 MHD 33. 13. MHD 22.6–8, 38.1–3, MHDA 17.13–16; for more examples, see Perikhanian 1997, p. 380. 41 TAD B2.4. See also TAD B3.5 & 6 and B6.3. 42 WDSP 4. And see also WDSP 6 & 7.

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282 Hossein Sheikh The MHD employs the negative formulation of the phrase Šalliṭ several times in the same context: ʾywk’ ZK hm-syyʾwḫš gwpt’ ʾYK ʾMT GBRʾ krt’ ʾYK przndʾn y L pt MZBWNt y ZNH ʾnštr[r]yk pʾtwhšʾyyh’ ʾL ʾy YHWWNyt ʿLH-šʾn prznd prznd W ʾwbʾtk’ y MN ʿLH-šʾn ʾnštr[r]yk ZK y NYŠH YLDWNyt MZBWNt Lʾ ŠLYTʾ HWHnd.43 It is so, the same Siyawaxsh said, that if a man has declared: May not my children are entitled to sell this salve (woman). (Thus) children of their children and their descendants are not entitle to sell the slave born from that woman.

ʿD ʿLM (Pahl. tā frašgird) The second element in the investiture clause is the perpetuity phrase. In this section, the former owner declares that the new owner has perpetual authority over the property.44 In Aramaic legal texts, the perpetuity phrase has two forms: the short version ʿD LʿLM (forever) and the long version MN YWMʾ ZNH W ʿD LʿLM (from this day and forever).45 In the APE, this element is mostly found in the long version: ZYLKY HW MN YWMʾ ZNH ʿD ʿLM WZY BNYKY YLDTY LY MN ʾḪRYKY46 It is yours from this day and forever and your children’s and whom you bore me, after you.

Whereas in the WDSP, as in all cuneiform documents, the short version is the only form attested in the texts:47 ʿBD YHWH LH WLBNWHY MN ʾḪRWHY LʿLMʾ48 He became his slave and his sons after him forever.

The MHD has three terms for the perpetuity phrase: Jāwēdānag,49 frašgirdīg50 and tā frašgird,51 the latter of which is an exact translation of the Aramaic term ʿD ʿLM:

43 MHD 96. 13–16 and MHDA16, 11–17, MHDA37, 1–17. 44 Gross 2008, pp. 112ff. As Yaron states: “(the) purpose (of the perpetuity phrase) is to denote that a certain legal relationship or position is not a priori limited in time”; cf. Yaron 1958, p. 31; see also Botta 2008b, pp. 161ff. 45 Gross, 2013, p. 144. This phrase occurred commonly in the investiture clause of conveyances and manumissions. Porten 1996, p. 166, note 31. About the evolution of this phrase, see Loewestamm 1980, pp. 166ff. 46 TAD B.3.5. 47 See Sheikh 2017, chapter 3. 48 WDSP 1, as well as Gropp, 2001, p. 39. 49 MHD 19, 2–3 28, 11–12. The word Jāwēdānag is also used in the perpetuity phrase of Bactrian documents. See Sims-Williams 2007, p. 216, s.v. ιαοηδανο. 50 MHD 62 4–6 A1, 1–2. 51 MHDA 2.14.

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ʾMT YMLLWNyt ʾYK-m wndšn’ y ZNH ʾnštryk ʿD 3 ŠNT ʿL LK YHBWNt ZK y BYN 3 ŠNT pt’ wndšn’ BYN YHBWNyt 3 ŠNT YHBWNt YHWWWNyt ʾMT YMLLWNyt ʾYK-m wndšnʾ y ZNH ʾnštryk[yh] y ʿD 3 ŠNT ʿL LK YHBWNt wndšnʾ y BYN 3 ŠNT ʿD prškrt’ YHBWNt YHWWNyt.52 If he declares: I gave you the earnings of this slave for three years, (it means) he will give in a time period of three years the earnings by (the slave) during three years. (But) If he declares: I give you the earnings of this slave in a three-year time period, (it means) the earnings by (the slave) has given forever.

The Preposition tā in the Pahlavi term tā frašgird was normally signed with the arameogram ʿD. and the Zoroastrian jurists translated the word ʿLM, with the Zoroastrian eschatological term frašgird (Av. frašō.kərəti-),53 which also refers to time.54 In addition, it seems that the Zoroastrian legal system preferred the short version of the perpetuity phrase over the long version.

WZY BNYK MN ʾḤRYK (Pahl. frazand ud āwādag) The heritability phrase appears in various forms in the Aramaic corpora, even though the goal is the same.55 According to Gross, this phrase confirms “the enduring nature of the new owner’s rights of ownership.”56 The APE contain the formula WZY BNYK MN ʾḤRYK “and your sons after you,”57 in the same way as the WDSP: ʿBD YHWH LH WLBNWHY MN ʾḪRWHY LʿLMʾ Forever he will be his slave and his sons after him58

In the MHD, the equivalent phrase is frazand ud āwādag “children and descendants”: LWTH ZK y gwpt’ ʾYK hwʾstk’ y prmʾn YHWWNt pt’ ʾcʾtyh W hwyšyh ʿL GBRʾYHBWNt’. ZK GBRʾ ʾP-šʾn przndʾn’ ʾwbʾtkʾn pt’ ʾcʾtyh W hwyšyhʾ dʾštn’ ‘W]’ NPŠH r’y wrc’ W ‘pʾtʾnyh MDM krtn.59 52 MHDA 2, 11–14. 53 For frašgird, see Hintze 2001, 190ff. 54 This is not an exact translation. However, they found that frašgird was an adequate solution for it. 55 Gross 2008, pp. 114ff. 56 Gross 2008, pp. 113f. 57 See above note 40, as well as Yaron 1960, p. 258. Noteworthy, the heritability phrase is normally found in the investiture clause, but it appears only once in the non-contest clause: Lʾ YKHL BR LY WBRH LY HNGYT ZYLY WHNBG ZYLY YRŠNKY DYN WDBB WYRŠH LBYKY ʾḪRYKY My son or daughter, partner in chattel or partner in land or guarantor does not have right to bring against you suit or process, or bring suit against your children after you… (TAD B3.10). 58 WDSP 1 and Gropp 2001, p. 38, note 27. 59 MHDA 37, 15– 38, 1. See Shaki 1983, pp. 191ff.

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284 Hossein Sheikh In conjunction with it, it is said: a property (land) concerning which a testamentary disposition was made has been transferred a man in fee simple and full ownership. (Thus) that man and his children and descendants can hold (the property) in fee simple and full ownership and can till and cultivate (it) for themselves.

WLMN ZY TṢBYN HBHY (Pahl. KLʾ MNW YSBHNyt = harw kas kāmist) The fourth and last element is the rights of alienation. In this part, the new owner receives ultimate power on his/her property. He/she can do whatever He/she wish with the property.60 Only in the APE is this phrase attested several times. It is available in two forms: with the verb RḤM and with the verb ṢBY.61 This last form reads as follows: WLMN ZY TṢBYN HBHY62 To whomever you desire you (can) give it.

In Pahlavi, the verb kāmistan is rendered with the arameogram YSBHN-63 and provides the same function in legal context. For example: ʾMT YMLLWNyt ʾYK GBRʾ 3 MN L ʾpʾm YNSBWNd ptmʾn krt’ ʾYK hmpʾyynʾnʾn HWHyym KLʾ MNW YSBHNyt ŠLYTʾ BʿYHWNst’.64 If he declares: three men borrowed money from me (and) they drafted contract: that we are co-warrantors “then he is empowered to claim (the money) from whichever (of them) he wishes.”

Interestingly, this function is also indicated in a passage from the MHD, where the phrase is discussed among similar examples: ʾMT YMLLWNyt ʾYK ZK y LK MDMHNyt ʾywp ZK y LK YSBHNyt ʾywp ZK y LK psndy ʾywp ZK y LK ʾpʾyt’ KLʾ 4 ʾyw’ ʾywynk’.65 Whether he declares that “whatever you choose,” or “whatever you desire,” or “whatever you like” or “whatever you need,” all these four formulae are equivalent.

60 About this element, see Hurwitz 1982, Holtz 2001 and Sheikh 2017, chapter 3. 61 Later, in the Aramaic documents from the Judaean Desert (the 2end century CE.), only the verb ṢBY appears in the rights of alienation. See Gross 2008, p. 130, note 99. 62 For example: DLYKY HW ʿD ʿLM WLMN ZYTṢBYN HBHY “It is yours forever and you can give it whomever you desire” (TAD B2.7). 63 See also Nyberg 1988, p. 88. 64 MHD 55.17–56.1. 65 MHD 66.3–5. See also Perikhanian 1997, p. 368, for other examples such as kāmistan, kām-.

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Final Clauses In the final clauses, the former owner guarantees rights of the new owner and their family in the future. In the APE, it is formulated as follows:66 ʾNḪN Lʾ NKL NGRNK DYN W DBB BŠM BYTʾ ZNH…WHN GBR ʾḪRN YGRNK WYGRH LBR WBRH LK ʾNḪN NQWM WNPṢL WNNTN LK BYN YWMN 30 YHN Lʾ PṢLN… NNTN LK KSPK KRŠ 1 ŠQLN 4.67 We shall not be able to bring suit against you or litigation on behalf of this house … and if another person sues you or your son or your daughter, we shall stand up and settle (the claim) and give (it) to you within 30 days. And if we do not settle (it)… (Then) we shall give you your silver, 1 Karsh, 4 shekels…

The formulation of the final clauses in the WDSP differs from the APE, despite the fact that their goal is the same. For example: HN G[BR] ʾḪRN DYNN YʿBD ʿM YHWPDYNY [WʿM BNWHY MN ʾḪRWHY] YQYM HW YMRQ YNTN LYHY [P]DYNY Lʾ [YMRQ] … WYʾMR KZʾ ʾN[H] YQYM LYHWʿNNY ZNH ʿBDʾ Lʾ ZBNT LK… ʾNTN L[Y]HWPDYNY [K]SP MNN 2 LQBL ʾSRʾ ZY HQYMW BYNYHM[…].68 If so[meone] else brings suit against Yehopadaini, [or against his sons after him] Yaqim, he will resolve (the dispute over the slave and) give (him back) to Yeho[pa] daini. If he does not [resolve (the dispute) … and says as follows: I, Yaqim, [did not sell] Yehoʿanani, [this slave, to you]… I (Yaqim) will pay Yelhopadaini 2 [si] lver minas as stipulated in the bond, which they made between themselves […].

One passage of the MHD features a discussion on defending the new owner from the former owner, which summarizes the content of all final clauses attested in Aramaic papyri: ʾMT YMLLWNyt ʾYK L Lʾ ptkʾrm ʾwgwn ʿBYDWNm ʾYK pt’-c dstwbryh y L ʾYŠ Lʾ ptkʾryt’ W HT ywdtr ʿBYDWNm tʾyywʾn YHBWNm.69 If he declares: I shall not bring suit and also I shall take care that nobody brings suit with my authorization either. If I do otherwise, I shall pay the fine.

Of course, the language used in the final clauses differs between these two traditions. The language in Aramaic is symbolic and metaphorical, whereas it is demetaphorized and literal in Pahlavi.70 Certainly, there are more evidence of Aramaic elements within the Pahlavi legal corpora, which deserve further complementary studies.

66 67 68 69 70

The main points of these clauses are extracted from these two Aramaic corpora. TAD B 3.4. WDSP 3. MHD A17.4–5. On the language of law in the Aramaic papyri, see Levine 2003, pp. XVIff.

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286 Hossein Sheikh

Appendices Appendix I Terms and phrases are not the only Aramaic elements in Pahlavi legal formulary and terminology. Other Aramaic elements in the MHD have their origins in the imperial regulations from the Achaemenid period. One of them is the place of the date formula in documents. In ancient Mesopotamian legal formularies, the date was usually placed at the end, before the names of the witnesses.71 However, most Aramaic legal papyri from the Achaemenid period begin with the date.72 This method of dating was used after the Achaemenid period and became the norm. Later, this norm found its way into the rabbinic texts and became part of the shared Aramaic scribal culture and tradition. For example, we read in Tosefta: GWPW ŠL ŠṬR BYWM PL BŠBT BḪWDŠ PL BŠNH PL WBMLKWT PL.73 The beginning74 of a document (is as follows): On day X, in week X, in month X, in year X, in the reign of X.

Remarkably, there is a recommendation in Mishna for dating divorce bills, which indicates that the Jews may have been aware of the origin of this rule, because the Median Empire (i.e actually the Achaemenid Empire) is the first mentioned era for bill dating in the text: KTB LŠWM MLKWT ʾḪRT LŠWM MLKWT MDY LŠWM MLKWT YWN LBNYN HBYT LḪRBN HBYT.75 If one wrote (a divorce bill) according to another era (Kingship), according to the empire of Mede, or the empire of Greek, according to the building of the Temple or to the distraction of the Temple…

Similarly, in Pahlavi documents, the date appears at the beginning of the text, as it is the case in the legal reports from Tabarestān (Northern Iran) dating from the eighth century CE.76 In this regard, the date on a legal report referred to in the MHD most probably was placed at the beginning of the original document: LWTH ZK y QDM pwrsšnʾ nʾmk’ -1 y ŠNT 26 y hwsrwy y ʾwhrmzdʾn rʾdynʾyt’ W BYN ʾrtxštr GDH … rʾd npšt’.77 71 72 73 74

Rabinowitz 1961, pp. 137ff. About the date in the Aramaic and Jewish tradition see Schiffman, 2005, pp. 188f. Tosefta Baba Baṯra 11.2.(Lieberman 5748 [1988]). The word GWPW, literally means “body, entrails, self,” however, I translated it here as “beginning” based on Sokoloff’s explanation: “in VR only, as a technical term following the introductory sermons indicating the beginning of the main body of the midrash to the periscope”; Sokoloff 2017, p. 112. 75 Mishna Gittin 8.5 (Blackman 1953, Vol. III. p. 434.). 76 Gignoux 2012, 66f. Doc. 12. See also Docs 14 and 26, as well as Gignoux 2014, Docs 13, 15–19. 77 MHD 100, 7–8, see also Perikhanian 1997, pp. 225f.

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In conjunction with it, it is written about a judicial inquiry report composed in Artaxsahr-Xvarreh in the twenty-sixth year of (the reign of) Xusrav son of Ohrmazd.

The formulation of the calendar is another point of similarity between these two traditions. The date in the Pahlavi passage, as in the Aramaic papyri, is based on the regnal calendar,78 which appears to be a Mesopotamian element.79

Appendix II Aramaic legal terms and their equivalents in Pahlavi Aramaic

Pahlavi

Translation

GṬ

GTk’ (gittig, nāmag)

“Document”

ZBN W YHB

MZBNWNt W YHBWNt “To buy and to give” (xrīdan ud frōxtan)

Šalliṭ

ŠLYTʾ (pādixšāy)

“Authority”

ʿD ʿLM

tā frašgird

“In perpetuity”

WZY BNYK MN ʾḤRYK frazand ud āwādag

“Children and descendants”

ṢBY

“To desire”

YSBHN (kāmistan)

Abbreviations AHw Akkadisches Handwörterbuch = Von Soden 1959–1981 APE Aramaic Papyri from Elephantine Av. Avestan CAD Gelb et al 1956–2010 EIr Encyclopaedia Iranica = Yarshater (Ed.) 1982– MHD Mādayān ī Hazār Dādestān = Macuch 1993 MHDA Mādayān ī Hazār Dādestān = Macuch 1981 Pahl. Pahlavi TAD Textbook of Aramaic documents from ancient Egypt = Porten/Yardeni 1989 WDSP Aramaic Papyri from Wadi al-Daliyah = Gropp 2001; Dušek 2007

78 For example: B 7 LʾLWL HW YWM 9 LYRH PʾWNY ŠNT 28 ʾRTḪŠSŠ MLKʾ “On 7th Elul (according to the Egyptian calendar), the 9th day of the month of Payni year 28 of Artaxerxes the king” (TAD 3.4). 79 Edzard 2004, p. 146.

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288 Hossein Sheikh

Bibliography Blackman, P. 1951–1955: Mishnayoth. 6 Vols. London. Botta, A. 2006: “The Legal Function and Egyptian Background of the ‫ תילש‬Clause: A Reevaluation.” In: Maarav 13, pp. 193–209. — 2008a: “A Reevaluation of the use of ‫ ןבז‬and ‫ בהי‬in Elephantine.” In: AntOr 6, pp. 99–108. — 2008b: “How long does an eternal covenant last? ‫ םלוע‬in the Light of AramaicEgyptian Legal Documents.” In: The Bible Translator 59, pp. 158–163. — 2009: The Aramaic and Egyptian legal traditions at Elephantine. London. Donbaz, V./S. Parpola 2001: Neo-Assyrian legal texts in Istanbul. Saarbrücken. Durkin-Meisterernst, D. 2004: “Huzwāreš.” In: EIr, Fasc. 6, pp. 585–588. Dušek, J. 2007: Les manuscrits araméens du Wadi Daliyeh et la Samarie vers 450 – 332 av. J.-C. Leiden. — 2013: “Aramaic in the Persian Period.” In: Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel 2, pp. 243–264. — 2020: “The Importance of the Wadi Daliyeh Manuscripts for the History of Samaria and the Samaritans.” In: Religions 11/2, 63. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/ rel11020063. Edzard, D. O. 2004: Geschichte Mesopotamiens. München. Follmer, M. 2020: “Aramaic as Lingua Franca.” In: R. Hasselbach‐Andee (ed.): A Companion to Ancient Near Eastern Languages. Hoboken, pp. 373–399. Friedman, M. 2006: “Contracts: Rabbinic Literature and Ancient Jewish Documents.” In: Sh. Safrai/Z. Safrai/J. J. Schwartz, P. Tomson (eds.): The Literature of the Jewish People in the Period of the Second Temple and the Talmud, Vol. 3: The Literature of the Sages. Leiden, pp. 421–458. Gelb, I. J. et al. 1956–2010: The Assyrian Dictionary of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. Chicago. Gignoux, Ph. 1991: Les quatre inscriptions du Mage Kirdīr : textes et concordances. Paris. — 2012: “Une archive post-sassanide du Tabaristān (I).” In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Objets et documents inscrits en pārsīg (Res Orientales XXI). Bures-sur-Yvette, pp. 29–96. — 2014: “Une archive post-sassanide du Tabaristān (II).” In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Res Orientales XXII. Bures-sur-Yvette, pp. 29–71. Gropp, D. M. 1993: “The Origin and Development of the Aramaic Šallīṭ Clause.” In: JNES 52, pp. 31–36. — 2001: Wadi Daliyeh II: The Samaria Papyri from Wadi Daliyeh. Oxford. Gross, A. D. 2008: Continuity and Innovation in the Aramaic Legal Tradition. Leiden. Gzella, H. 2015: A Cultural History of Aramaic: From the Beginnings to the Advent of Islam. Leiden. Hintze, A. 2001: “FRAŠŌ.KƎRƎTI.” In: EIr X, pp. 190–192. Hjerrild, B. 2003: Studies in Zoroastrian Family Law: A Comparative Analysis. Copenhagen. Holtz, S. E. 2001: “To Go and Marry Any Man That You Please: A Study of the Formulaic Antecedents of the Rabbinic Writ of Divorce.” In: JNES 60, pp. 241–258. Jügel, Th. 2010: Konkordanz der Kirdīr-Inschriften. Available online: https://titus. uni-frankfurt.de/personal/tjuegel/kirdir.pdf [Last accessed 27.08.2021].

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Kaufman, S. A. 1975: The Akkadian Influences on Aramaic. Chicago. Levine, B. 2003: “Prolegomenon.” In: Y. Muffs: Studies in the Aramaic legal papyri from Elephantine. Leiden, pp. XI–XLIV. Lieberman, S. 5748 [1988]: The Tosefta. New York. Loewenstamm, S. E. 1980: Comparative Studies in Biblical and Ancient Oriental Literatures. Kevelaer. Macuch, M. 1981: Das sasanidische Rechtsbuch Mātakdān i hazār dātistān : (Teil II). Wiesbaden. — 1993: Rechtskasuistik und Gerichtspraxis zu Beginn des siebenten Jahrhunderts in Iran: die Rechtssammlung des Farroḫmard i Wahrāmān. Wiesbadenz. — 2005: “Mādayān Ī Hazār Dādestān.” In: EIr Online. Available online: https:// iranicaonline.org/articles/madayan-i-hazar-dadestan [Last accessed 27.08.2021]. Muffs, Y. 2003: Studies in the Aramaic legal papyri from Elephantine. Leiden. Nyberg, S. 1988: Frahang-i Pahlavīk: from the posthumous papers of Henrik Samuel Nyberg by Bo Utas. Wiesbaden. Perikhanian, A. G. 1997: The book of a thousand judgements. Costa Mesa. Porten, B. 1996: The Elephantine Papyri in English: Three Millennia of Cross Cultural Continuity and Change. Leiden. — 1997: “Egyptian Aramaic Texts.” In: E. M. Meyers (ed.): The Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaeology in the Near East. Vol. II. Oxford, pp. 213–219, 393–410. Porten, B./A. Yardeni 1989: Textbook of Aramaic documents from ancient Egypt. Vol. 2: Contracts. Winona Lake. Radner, K. 1997: Die neuassyrischen Privatrechtsurkunden als Quelle für Mensch und Umwelt. Helsinki. Röllig, W. 2014: Die aramäischen Texte aus Tall Seh Hamad/Dur-Katlimmu/ Magdalu. Wiesbaden. Rudman, D. 2001: Determinism in the Book of Ecclesiastes. Sheffield. Schiffman, L. H. 2005: “Reflections on the Deeds of Sale from the Judaean Desert in Light of Rabbinic Literature.” In: R. Katzoff/D. Schaps (eds.): Law in the Documents of the Judaean Desert. Leiden, pp. 185–203. Schwartz, M. 1970: “On the Vocabulary of the Khwarezmian ‘Muqaddimatu l-Adab’, as Edited by J. Benzing.” In: ZDMG 120/2, pp. 288–304. Schwiderski, D. 2009: Die Alt-und reichsaramaischen inschriften/the old and imperial aramaic inscriptions. Band. 1: Konkordanz. Berlin/New York. Shaki, M. 1983: “Revertible and Irrevertible Grants in Sasanian Law.” In: StIr 12, pp. 183–194. — 1996: “Documents, production and registration of. In pre-Islamic periods.” In: EIr VII, pp. 457–460. — 1999: “Family Law: In Zoroastrianism.” In: EIr IX, pp. 184–189. Sheikh, H. 2017: Studies in the Bactrian legal documents. Georg-August Universität Göttingen (Unpublished PhD Thesis). Sims-Williams, N. 2007: Bactrian documents from Northern Afghanistan, Vol. 2: Letters and Buddhist texts. London. Skjærvø, P. O. 1996: “Aramaic Scripts for Iranian Languages.” In: P. T. Daniels/W. Bright (eds.): The World’s Writing Systems. New York, pp. 515–351.

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290 Hossein Sheikh Sokoloff, M. 2017: A dictionary of Jewish Palestinian Aramaic of the Byzantine period (Third revised and expanded edition). Ramat Gan. Von Soden, W. 1959–1981: Akkadisches Handwörterbuch. 3 Bände. Wiesbaden. Yaron, R. 1958: “Aramaic Marriage Contracts from Elephantine.” In: JSS 3/1, pp. 1–39. Yaron, R. 1960: “Aramaic Deeds of Conveyance.” In: Biblica 41, pp. 248–74, 379–94.

Online Sources Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon Project: http://cal.huc.edu/

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The Hermeneutics of Political Violence in Sasanian Iran: the Death of Mani and the Seizure of Manichaean Property Yuhan Sohrab-Dinshaw Vevaina In memory of Fergus Millar And if both are the same sect, why do the Magians (mogkʿ) abhor the Manichaeans (Zandikʿ), if they are not distinguished from each other by conduct? Perhaps it is by form, and not by truth. – Eznik of Kołb1 The killing of the prophet Mani, the eponymous founder of “Manichaeism,” in the 3rd century ce was one of the most discussed events of Late Antiquity and has remained so — at least in academic circles — till today. From being labeled a heretic, lunatic, seducer, maniac, and pseudo-prophet to Amin Maalouf’s sensitive treatment of Mani in his 1991 novel, Les jardins de lumière, his fascinating life, eclectic theology, and gruesome death have long captured imaginations. The circumstances of and motivations for his most violent end are described by a number of important authors and sources in a variety of languages and traditions, reflecting both the allure and challenge of studying Manichaeism.2 In this article, I will discuss a Zoroastrian account of this event, but one found in an unlikely place — the Warštmānsr Nask in Dēnkard Book 9 — a Pahlavi commentary on the five Gāϑās or “poems,” ascribed to the prophet 1

2

The present article is based on talks given at the University of Oxford, the Library of Congress, and Yale University. I would like to thank A. Amanat, K. van Bladel, T. Daryaee, H. Dinavari, and K. Rezakhani for their kind invitations. Here at Oxford, I must thank P. Booth and I. Toth for allowing me to present my work in the Late Antique and Byzantine Studies Seminar. I would also like to express my gratitude to J. BeDuhn, K. Dang, Ch. Häberl, P. O. Skjærvø, and M. Timuş for their critiques, suggestions and improvements. Transl. after Blanchard/Young 1998, p. 103, §148. For the most comprehensive synthetic works on the narrative sources about the Manichaeans, see Taqīzādeh/Šīrāzī 1335 [1956] and Reeves 2011. For the Manichaean sources, see Gardner/Lieu 2004. For recent methodological articles on the codevelopment and relationship between Manichaeism and Zoroastrianism, see BeDuhn 2020 and Rezania 2020.

Sasanian Studies | Sasanidische Studien. Vol. I (2022). Ed. by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee doi: 10.13173/SSt.1.291

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Zaraϑuštra, in which his archaic “poet’s complaint”3 reflects the lack of social and political acceptance of a new religious message and messenger. Just as Mani appears to have incorporated these tropes from Zaraϑuštra’s plaintive words in Yasna 46, the Kamnamaēzā Hāiti, for his own origin story as a tortured prophet in Sasanian Babylonia, as we see in the Cologne Mani Codex (CMC),4 the Zoroastrian hermeneuts in turn, read his death and the persecution of his followers right back into that very Avestan hāiti (Yasna 46.7–8) as a form of competitive and contested hermeneutics, with the Gāϑās serving as a scriptural battleground for establishing religious legitimacy and, ultimately, political primacy in one of the most dynamic moments in Iranian history. The most evocative passages describing Mani’s death provide us with a panoply of political and religious rationales for his gruesome execution. A selection, presented here in non-chronological order, will help to better contextualize the texts being discussed and the political and religious stakes in the late 3rd century ce in the Sasanian Empire (224–651 ce). Ibn al-Nadīm [ca. 932–990 ce], Kitāb al-Fihrist (“The Catalogue”): Mānī was put to death during the reign of Bahrām b. Sābūr [= Wahrām / Bahrām I, r. 271–274 ce]. After he executed him, he suspended him in two pieces, one half over a certain gate and the other half over a different gate of the city of Jundaysābūr [= Aram. Bēṯ Lapaṭ]. These two places received the designations ‘the upper part of the Lord’ and ‘the lower (part) of the Lord.’ It is said that he had been previously imprisoned by Sābūr, but after Sābūr died Bahrām freed him. It is also said that he died while in prison, but there is no uncertainty regarding his “crucifixion”. Some people relate that he had two misshapen feet whereas others said that it was his right foot (only).5 Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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al-Ṭabarī [839–923 ce], Taʾrīkh al-rusul wa-l-mulūk (“History of the Prophets and Kings”): According to what has been mentioned, Mānī the zindīq summoned him to his religion. So Bahrām enquired exhaustively into Mānī’s beliefs, and found that he was a propagandist for Satan. So, he ordered him to be executed and his body to be skinned and stuffed with straw, then for it to be hung from one of the city gates of Junday Sābūr, which is called Mānī’s Gate. He also killed his followers and those who had joined his faith.6

al-Bīrunī [973–1048 ce], Kitāb al-āthār al-bāqiya ʿaniʾ l-qurūn al-khāliya (“Chronicle of Ancient Nations”): 3 4 5 6

For the Zoroastrian term for ‘complaint’ (garz-) and a study of this genre in Old Avestan, see Skjærvø 2001, pp. 351–375. See de Jong 2014, pp. 129–147 and the discussion below. Tajaddud 1971, p. 398 (transl. Reeves 2011, p. 39), where he suggests (fn. 134) that Mani’s deformity might be inherited from Jewish polemical tropes connected with false prophets, but see also the Pahlavi sources below. de Goeje 1879–1901, vol. 1/2, pp. 830, 834 (transl. Bosworth 1999, p. 45).

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I heard the isbahbadh [= Pahl. spāhbed, “army chief” in the Sasanian period; used as “ruler” in later Islamic times] Marzubān b. Rustam says that Sābūr banished him from his kingdom, adhering to the way prescribed to them by Zarādusht; (namely, that) one should expel those posing as prophets from the land. He [= Sābūr] imposed upon him the condition that he was to never return. Hence, he [= Mani] journeyed to India, China, and Tibet, and announced his message there. Then he returned, and at that time Bahrām arrested him and put him to death for having violated the condition, for it was now permissible to take his life.7

Eznik of Kołb [5th century ce], Ełc ałandocʿ (“Contra the Heretics”) or De Deo (“Against the Sects”): But because Mani wished by a false form to demonstrate a way of life better than theirs [= Zoroastrians] — to make known that it indeed is entirely free from desire and not only more so than those, but than all sects — , whence, reprimanded for the fondling of young girls, he was deprived of his life through death by flaying.8

Michael Syrus ‘the Syrian’ [ca. 1126–1199 ce], Chronicon (“Chronicle”): Mānī, having promised the king of Persia that he would heal his son but then proving unable to do so, fled to Mesopotamia. However, the king of Persia found him, flayed him, stuffed his skin with straw, and hung it up upon a wall. This was the end of the impious Mānī.9

Coptic Bēma Psalms 225, 226: I have heard concerning you Magians, the priests of the fire, that you seized my god in your foul hands; impious men, mad and godless, the brothers of the Jews, the murderers of Christ. A fire took hold of your heart, until you had murdered the righteous ambassador… The lover of fighting [= the Sasanian monarch], the peaceless one, roared in flaming anger; he commanded them to fetter the righteous one, that he might please the Magians, the teachers of Persia, the servants of fire. In truth, this is the way that they gave judgement upon the victor, the angel, the Paraclete [= Mani]… (226) They were stirred, they trembled, even the powers of the evil one, they turned their sword against the humble man; they were not willing indeed to see me in the streets of their cities. Lo, the sky and the earth and the two luminaries bear witness of me in the heights; that I did good among them, but they in their cruelty crucified me... Lo, his body was brought forth in the city of these sinners, when they had cut off his head and hung it up amid the whole multitude.10 7

Sachau 1878, p. 109 (transl. Reeves 2011, p. 43). Marzubān appears to have been a prince of the Bāwand Dynasty in Ṭabarīstān in the late 10th century ce. 8 Transl. Blanchard/Young 1998, p. 104, §150. For a discussion of anti-Manichaean polemics regarding under-age sexuality, see Kiel 2019, pp. 112–136. 9 Chabot 1963, vol. iv, p. 119; transl. in Reeves 2011, p. 61. 10 Transl. Allberry in Gardner/Lieu 2004, pp. 97, 100–101. See also Polotsky 1934 for the last days of Mani. See now Gardner 2020, pp. 59–82, for a discussion of Mani’s death and the variegated reception histories of the event.

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Coptic Homilies 60, 1–17 (“The Section of the Narrative about the Crucifixion”): This is the memorial from [the day of] his crucifixion until the hour when he came forth: [On the] Lord’s Day he entered Bēlapat [= Copt. form of Bēṯ Lapaṭ]; on the second day (i.e. Monday) he [was] accused; on the third they ... he fortified his church [until the] Sabbath. They searched for him and bound him. [Afterwards ...] all his enemies. On the [Sabbath they] sealed his chains; they took [him in to the prison]. They bound him on the eighth day of [Meshir. Until] the day when he went to the heights shall make twenty-[six] days he was bound in chains of iron. At the eleventh [hour] of the day he rose from [the body] up to the dwellingplaces of his greatness [in] the heights. He met his Form ... of the lights. He came forth and leapt to the heights [with (?)] the power who had come for him.11

These vivid yet wildly contradictory narratives of the imperial motivations for and political symbolism of Mani’s ultimate demise capture the fundamental historiographical dilemmas we face while studying the Sasanian Empire.12 Our narrative sources for Iranian religious and political history connected with the Sasanian era were either chronicled by the much later Muslim scholars or were included in the histories written by their traditional enemies, the Romans and Byzantines, as well as often-hostile minority religious communities, such as the Jews, Christians, Mandaeans and Manichaeans, some of whom were disaffected former Zoroastrians. Additionally, we must take into account the underappreciated sources written by former vassals in Armenian and Georgian. What we do have in the way of securely datable sources from the Sasanians themselves are royal inscriptions and reliefs, coins, seals, bullae, and papyri13 — all of which bear witness to a rich political theology and a variegated material culture, but which typically do not explicate their own repertoire of political and theological symbolism in a self-reflective manner. For that, we must turn to the Zoroastrian literary sources in Pahlavi (Zoroastrian Middle Persian), though those texts were redacted in the early Islamic period, from the 9th century onwards. What I wish to demonstrate in this article is how the late antique-era hermeneutical tradition in Pahlavi literature can, nonetheless, meaningfully contribute to a richer understanding of Sasanian historiography, especially when historicized in concert with non-Zoroastrian and non-Iranian sources. No figure better embodied the religious cosmopolitanism of the Sasanian world than Mani, the founder of the world’s first universalizing “religion,”14 11 Transl. after Gardner 2015, pp. 203–204. 12 For more detailed discussions of this historiographical dilemma vis-à-vis Iranian religious history, see de Jong 2013, pp. 23–53; and from the perspective of general Iranian historiography, see Daryaee 2016, pp. 193–203. 13 For a discussion of the different types of “primary” sources and their historiographical value, see Gyselen 2009, pp. 163–190. 14 See BeDuhn 2015, pp. 247–275 and BeDuhn 2020 and Rezania 2020 for discussions of Mani’s use of what we might call “objectified religion” and the mutual development of the Middle Persian term dēn (< Av. daēnā- ‘vision soul’).

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who viewed himself as the inheritor of prophets like Jesus, the Buddha, and Zaraϑuštra, while drawing from traditions associated with Biblical patriarchs such as Adam, Seth, Enosh, Enoch, and Shem, and apostles like Paul upon whom he seems to have partially modeled his church.15 Mani’s execution is discussed most often in conjunction with the Zoroastrian imperial response to religious diversity succinctly captured in the contemporaneous 3rd-century ce inscriptions of the Zoroastrian priest Kerdīr (Kartīr16) in which he states that a number of repressive actions were taken against the non-Zoroastrian religious communities of the empire (§11; KKZ 9–10 = KNRm 29–30 = KSM 14): ... W yḥwdy W šmny W blmny W nʾclʾy W klstydʾn W mktky W zndyky BYN štly MḤYTN YḤWWNd W ʾwzdysy gwkʾnyḥy W glsty ZY ŠDYʾn wyšwpyḥy W yzdʾn gʾsy W nšdmy ʾkylydy... ud yahūd ud šaman ud braman ud nāzarā17 ud kristiyān ud magdag ud zandīg andar šahr zad bawēnd ud uzdēs gugānīh ud gilist ī dēwān wišōbīh ud yazdān gāh ud nišēm akirīy… … and Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, Nazoraeans, Christians, Baptists(?), and Manichaeans (zandīg) within the realm were struck down, idols were destroyed, and the dwellings of the demons were ruined and turned into thrones and seats for the gods…18

This passage has been discussed ad nauseam,19 especially since it is here that we have the first attestation of the term zandīg, often suggested to mean a producer of a heretical or non-normative interpretation (Pahl. zand) of the Avesta or Avestan corpus (Pahl. abestāg), and later used more expansively by Muslims for the Manichaeans, errant dualists, freethinkers, heretics, and those espousing dubious and problematic beliefs.20 What is less well known, however, 15 See Reeves 2011, pp. 11 and 39–41 and Reeves 1996, pp. 5–30. The Islamic heresiographer ʿAbd al-Jabbār [d. ca. ah 415 / 1024 ce] in his Tathbīt dalāʾ il al-nubuwwa (“The Confirmation of the Proofs of Prophethood”), written in ah 385 / 995 ce in the Būyid capital of Rayy, explicitly compares Mani to Paul and equates the former’s ignominious death with the latter’s martyrdom at the hands of the Romans. 16 For a survey of his name, titles, and inscriptions, see Skjærvø 2011a. 17 KKZ, KSM < nʾclʾy > || KNRm < [n]ʾs[lʾy] > 18 After MacKenzie 1989, pp. 42, 54, 58; cf. also Gignoux 1991, p. 46. Cf. also the text and transl. in MacKenzie 1989, pp. 42, 54, 58. For a detailed discussion of these names, see de Blois 2002, pp. 1–30, in particular pp. 5–8 and de Blois 2015, pp. 141–154. See also Jullien/Jullien 2002, pp. 282–335 for an analysis of the Christian names. 19 De Jong 2013, p. 40, makes the observation that Kerdīr’s hostile treatment of these minority religious communities living under the Sasanians finds scant evidence in their literature discussing that period. See also Russell 1990, pp. 180–193 and Skjærvø 1997, pp. 313–342 for the interactions between Mani and Kerdīr. See also Payne 2015. 20 But see de Blois 2012a for some deserved skepticism towards such a linear genealogy: “From the vantage point of modern linguistic knowledge it would seem more likely that Middle Persian zandīk was borrowed from Aramaic zaddīḳ ‘righteous’… It is naturally possible that already in Middle Persian the loan word zandīk was reinterpreted as

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is the explicitly eisegetical act of reading the death of Mani into the Zand of the Gāϑās, as found in the Pahlavi hermeneutical tradition in the ninth book of the Dēnkard (“Acts of the Tradition”21). Dēnkard Book 9 contains three Pahlavi versions of “lost” Avestan commentaries (Pahl. nask < Av. naska-22) on the five Gāϑās (Yasna 28–34, 43–51, 53), the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti (“The Sacrifice in 7 Sections,” Y. 35–41), and four shorter prayers (Y. 27.13–15 and 54.1) that frame them in the Yasna liturgy — the daily morning sacrifice. Essentially, we have these Old Avestan texts that we date back to the mid-2nd millennium bce on linguistic grounds embedded within the Yasna liturgy in Young Avestan and their Pahlavi versions or Zand that represent orally-transmitted commentarial traditions on these most sacred of ritual texts culminating some two and a half millennia later in Sasanian and early Islamic times.23 Alongside the Avestan originals and their Pahlavi Zand, we also find a meta-hermeneutical tradition in Dēnkard Book 9 with three radically different Gathic (Pahl. gāhānīg) nasks or commentaries. These Pahlavi summaries of putative Avestan nasks were, in turn, finally redacted in the 9th century ce and are attested in medieval manuscripts from the late 16th century onwards, one of which contains a copy of the earliest extant colophon in Pahlavi literature, copied in Baghdad in 1020 ce.24 While the myriad and vexing issues of the textual transmission and interpretive fidelity of Dēnkard Book 9 are beyond the scope of this article, what should interest us is the eisegetical technique of reading events in the Sasanian era into the Gāϑās, which I believe will prove rewarding for both historians and religionists alike. A passage in Dēnkard Book 9 (Dk. 9.39.13–1625) from the Warštmānsr Nask nominally interprets the Kamnamaēzā Hāiti (Y. 46.1–19), the final section (Av. hāiti-; Pahl. hād) of the second Gathic poem, the Uštauuaitī Gāϑā, as follows: (13) ud abar nišān ī druz-xastag mānīy ud druwandān26 ī-š niyōšāg zanišn ī-š az ōy ī dahībed mad. (14) ud ēn-iz kū druwand kē ān ī man gēhān dahēd ō ān ī kēnīg ahrimen ul-iš ēstēnīd bawēd ān ī xwad rēš dēw kū rawāg kard bawēd pad margīh ī ān ī ahlawīh gēhān. (15) kē stāyēd ān ī ahlāyīh yazišn nē ēdōn ān

21 22 23 24 25 26

*zandīg ‘follower of a zand’, but this is hardly the original meaning.” See also Skjærvø 2011a. For the zandīk in Islamic sources, see also Stroumsa/Stroumsa 1988, pp. 37– 58; Chokr 1993; and Kristó-Nagy 2016, pp. 56–81. For a discussion of an Avestan etymology of Zand, see Cantera 2004, pp. 1–15. The Pahl. term / dēn / from Av. daēnā- is translated here as “Tradition” following Skjærvø 2011. For a discussion of this term as “sacred corpus, tradition,” see Vevaina 2010a, pp. 111–143. Cf. Av. naskō.frasa- ‘asking (of) the nasks’ in Y. 9.22, which testifies to its antiquity if not to its precise meaning. For studies on the Zand, see Josephson 1997; Cantera 2004; and Zeini 2020. B 640, 17–644, 10 in Dresden 1966. B 662 || DH 296r. See Jackson 1930, pp. 34–36, evidently unknown to Taillieu 2004, p. 4, when he stated: “Stricto sensu, the anti-Manichaean polemic of (Western) Zoroastrianism is preserved only in the third book of the Dēnkard and the Škand-gumānīg wizār.” Blurry in DH.

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zardu(x)št stāyīd radīh27 ī gēhānān kū gōwēd kū pad radīh ud dastwarīh man weh28 +šāyam29 ud nē ēdōn ān zardu(x)št muhrišn bē ǰōyēnēd ō mardōmān ud ān ō awēšān gōwēd hamē- +zīyišnīh kū-š hamē- +zīyišnīh aziš bawēd awēšān kē bē ǰōyēnīd muhrišn ān awēšān pas menēnd ān ī dēwān yazišn pahlom. (16) ud rasēd pad padīrag-rasišnīh srōš-ahlīy 30{xwadāy ō ōy tan pad bēš ān} xwadāy kē ēn pad hu- +zīyišnīh pānagīh ud nē pad duš- +zīyišnīh ud pad kadār-iz-ēw zaman bēšīdār druwandān. (13) And about the sign of Mani “wounded by the Lie,” the wicked “Hearers” (niyōšāg) of his, and the violence which came upon him from the Lord of the Land [= the Sasanian monarch]. (14) And this, too, “He [= Mani] is wicked who gives my world [orig. “flocks”] to the vengeful one, Ahrimen, he will have impelled [lit. “raised up”] the Wound demon (rēš dēw) [< Av. raēša- “wound, sore”31] himself, i.e., he will have been set in motion for the death of the world of the Righteous. (15) The one who praises the sacrifice to Righteousness (but) does not do it the way Zardu(x)št praised the Office of the Rad [= the highest judicial authority] of those in the world of living beings, for he [= Mani] says: “I am better suited for the Office of the Rad and the Office of the Dastwar [= the priest].’ But that is not the way Zarduxšt (did it). He [= Mani] makes humans devour muhrišn [= Av. mūϑra- “urine,”32 cf. Skt. mūtra- “urine”], and he says to them: “Eternal life,”33 i.e., there is eternal life from it for those who were made 27 28 29 30 31

DH < lt’š > and below. B < ŠPYL ŠPYL > over two lines. B, DH < šʾyym > Sequence omitted in DH due to a jump omission to the following / xwadāy /. For a possible allusion to the Manichaean tradition, cf. Gardner 1995, pp. 242–245, on the chapter — “A Catechumen asked the Apostle: When I would give an Offering to the Saints, shall I inflict a Wound on the Alms?” — which addresses the Hearers’ fears of wounding and harming the foodstuffs that they would prepare for the Elect to consume. The chapter also discusses the nature of matter using a metaphor of a sore and a wound that is strikingly similar to the anti-Manichaean polemic in Dk. 9: “For this matter is like to two people, if a personal enemy and an opponent of their will hit one first and make a sore and a wound (on) his body. Afterwards he smi(tes him) again and […] and he hits over his blows and […] blows that have made sores on him and […] strikes him these two times […] accuses his [ene]my who has struck him. And this judge questions him to his face about the […] of the sores that he has left as marks on his body. And they […] on him as if he had split his head. And he is led to judgement and [sent]ence, and is punished before the judge of the worl[d…]” (p. 243). 32 Cf. AirWb, col. 1189, who has “Exkremente, faeces” instead. 33 While this precise allusion is somewhat opaque, cf. the Manichaean Parthian text of M 6020: < [recto, 1st col.] … (2) ʾwd hw mrdwhm ky pd (3) [dyn]ʾbryft ʿštyd +ʾwẖ (4) zʾnyndyẖ kw cwʾgwn (5) ʿstym pd rwʾn [.....] (6) hw ʾspʾs cy ʾw (7) dynʾbrʾn pwʾgʾn kryd (8) oo ʾwd zʾnyndyẖ hw bʾr (9) cy ʾc dʾhwʾn zʾyyd. (10) ʾbʾw kd hmg qdg (11) zrnyn ʾwd mwrgʾrydyyn (12) bwyndyẖ ʾwš rwʾn rʾd (13) dhyndyẖ ʾbʾwš ny (14) cʾr ʾbxšʾhʾd oo ʾ[wd +ʾg] (15) ʾwẖ kwš pyd cy [pd] (16) tnbʾr ʾst ngn p[wxt] (17) kyrd šhyndyẖ ʾw(š) [pd] (18) wxybyẖ dst fr[jnyndyẖ] (19) ʾwš ʾw dy[nʾbrʾʾn] (20) dhyndyẖ [(21) cʾr zʾnʾ[d (22) cy p[ (23) šh[… [recto, 2nd col.] (24) pwnwʾr ʿstʾnyndyẖ (25) cwʾgwn qwf ʿyw wzrg (26) ʾwš bwjʾd šhyndyẖ (27) ʾbʾwš wxrd cʾr oo hm (28) wxd bwxsyd ʾwd ʾw (29) hw[yc] (b)wjyd kyš pwnwʾr (30) dʾd oo ʾwd ʾby wzynd yʾdyd (31) ʾw (b)gʾn ʾrʾm oo > “… And

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to devour muhrišn. Then they think: “The sacrifice to the demons is the best.” (16) And in a counter-attack [lit. “counter-arrival”] Srōš-Ahlīy arrives, (thus) the ruler is in a state of hostility towards that person [lit. “body”34], that ruler is the one who is a (source of) protection for these ones through (their) good living — and not through evil living — and, in whichever epoch, he is (always) hostile to the wicked ones.35

Here, we can observe a number of historical allusions, including the euphemistic sobriquet “wounded by the Lie” (druz-xastag), perhaps alluding to a physical deformity or club foot, as we see in Ibn al-Nadīm’s testimony, but here being ascribed to the ultimate malevolent force in Zoroastrianism — “the Lie.” In addition, we find a reference to Mani being killed by the Sasanian sovereign, referred to as the “Lord of the Land” (dahībed), in this instance, perhaps as a way of reclaiming Mani’s use of the same term to refer to the “Keeper of Splendour/ Splenditenens” as < dhybyd > in his Šābuhragān.36 We also find it stated that Mani flaunted the power of the legal and ritual priestly offices by deviating from the established priestly norms laid down by Zaraϑuštra himself, further testifying to the closeness of the two dualist doctrines, as suggested by Eznik. We also find polemical denunciations of the Manichaeans misguidedly consuming “filth” (muhrišn) and believing that such a ritual act will provide them with ‘eternal life’ (hamē-zīyišnīh). This particular polemical trope of illicit consumption finds

the man [= Auditor] who is in the (Eastern) Manichaean Church should know how the service that he performs for the pure Elect (dēnāβars) ultimately [accrues?] to the Soul; and should understand the fruits that are born out of the gifts: then, even if his whole house were of gold and pearls and he gave it (to the Church) for the sake of the Soul, he would not necessarily receive forgiveness. And [if it were] so that he could [bake] the flesh that is on his body into bread and would [cut] it with his own hand and give it to the Elect, .… he should …. what …. [half a column missing] …. [he who] would take *alms-food (punwār) as (much as) a big mountain and could redeem it, should eat it: he himself will be saved, he will also save him who gave him the *alms-food, and it [the ‘Living Soul’ in the food according to Henning] will reach the home of the gods unharmed…” Text and transl. in Henning 1965, pp. 29–32. Cf. also the MPa. “Hymn of the Living Soul” in M 7, hymn 1a: < … pdwʾg kyrbg oo ʾw ʿšmʾh ky bʾšyd wjydgʾʾn yʾwydʾn jywhr wyndyd oo > “… (will give a?) virtuous response to you who sing, O Chosen Ones! You (pl.) will find eternal life.” Text and transl. Durkin-Meisterernst 2006, p. 23. 34 Conceivably referencing the symbolically-charged violence inflicted upon Mani’s corpse in the Dēnkard Book 9 reading of this passage. 35 Mss.: B 662 || DH 296r. 36 See Sundermann 1979, p. 101 and see also pp. 126–127, fn. 162–163 for further details and textual citations; see also Skjærvø 1995b, pp. 212–214 and Durkin-Meisterernst 2004, pp. 137–138.

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parallels in both Christian37 and Mandaean38 polemics against the Manichaeans. The arrival of the divine being Srōš-Ahlīy — once again a shared deity, in this case MMP < srwšhrʾy / srwšʾhrʾy > to refer to the “Column of Glory”39 — counteracts the sway of the Manichaeans. In the final portion of this historically inflected hermeneutical narrative explicating the Gathic base text, the ruler (or perhaps Srōš, a martial deity) is reaffirmed as a protector of those who live well — the Zoroastrians — and ever hostile to the wicked ones — the Manichaeans — ‘in whichever epoch’ (pad kadār-iz-ēw zamān). Besides the dense traditional intersignifications deployed by the Zoroastrian interpreters as both tools of hermeneutics and weapons of polemic, how and why is Mani found in a Gathic commentary in the first place? What word, formula, line, or concept in the Gāϑās motivates this eisegetically driven hermeneutical praxis? The 2nd millennium bce Avestan base text that triggers this radically anachronistic interpretation appears to be Yasna 46.7–8 of the Kamnamaēzā Hāiti, which is part of Zaraϑuštra’s “poet’s complaint”: kə̄mnā mazdā mauuaitē pāiiūm dadå hiiat̰ mā drəguuå dīdarəšatā aēnaŋ́hē aniiə̄m ϑβahmāt̰ āϑrascā manaŋhascā ́ yaiiå š iiaoϑanāiš aṣ̌ə m ϑraoštā ahurā tąm mōi dąstuuąm daēnaiiāi frāuuaocā (But) whom do You appoint (as) guardian for one such as me, O Mazdā, when the deceitful one tries to seize me in order to injure (me), 37 Cf. van Oort 2016a, pp. 1–24, who cites De Haeresibus (“On Heresies”) 46, 9–10 of Augustine of Hippo (ca. 354–430 ce): “For this reason [the Seduction of the Archons], or rather because of some demand of their sacrilegious superstition, their Elect are forced to consume a sort of eucharist sprinkled with human seed in order that the divine substance may be freed even from that, just as it is from other foods which they receive;” see also van Oort 2016b, pp. 430–440, where he cites the Catechesis (VI, 33) of Cyril of Jerusalem (313–386 ce), who served as the Bishop of Jerusalem: “I do not dare say in what they dip the fig they give to their wretched. I can indicate it only indirectly. Let men think of the delusive dreams of the night and women of the menses.” See also Pedersen 2017, pp. 1265–1295, in particular, see pp. 1278–1280 and pp. 1288–1291. For a comparative analysis of Manichaean food rituals as they overlapped with and were influenced by Zoroastrian parallels, see BeDuhn 2000b, pp. 14–36. For a general study of the Manichaean body, see BeDuhn 2000a. For a discussion of the myth of the Seduction of the Archons perhaps being referenced in Zoroastrian literature (viz. ŠGW. 16.28–37), see Timuş 2020, pp. 140–148 in particular. 38 For a Mandaean polemic (Ginza Rabbā IX) regarding the consumption of seed by the Manichaeans in a deviant sexual rite, see Shapira 2004, pp. 243–280, where we find: “Again I will teach you, my disciples, that there is another ‘gate’ [= ‘sect, denomination, dogma’], which emerges from Mšiha [= Jesus], who are called Zandiqs (zandiqia) and Manichaeans (+ marmania). They sow their seed secretly and allot a portion of it to the gloom, women and men sleep with one another, they take the seed and throw it into wine, and they offer it to the Souls (= Mandaeans) to drink, saying that it is pure.” 39 See Sundermann 1979, p. 101 and see also p. 128, fn. 182–183 for further details and textual citations; see also Durkin-Meisterernst 2004, p. 309.

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(whom do You appoint) other than your fire and thought, with whose actions one nourishes Truth/Order (aṣ̌a-), O Ahura? Proclaim a message about that to my vision soul (daēnā-). yə̄ vā mōi yå gaēϑå dazdē aēnaŋ́hē ́ nōit̰ ahiiā mā āϑriš š iiaoϑanāiš frōsiiāt̰ paitiiaogət̰ tā ahmāi jasōit̰ duuaēšaŋhā tanuuə̄m ā yā īm hujiiātōiš pāiiāt̰ nōit̰ dužjiiātōiš kācīt̰ mazdā duuaēšaŋhā Or if someone aims at my herds in order to injure (them), may destruction not reach me through his actions. May these, in response, come upon him for that hostility onto his body, so that they may prevent him from (living) a good life, by which one may keep him from a bad life, O Mazdā, by any hostility at all.40

The Gathic text, in line with its epideictic genre of “praise and blame” poetry41 — praise of Ahura Mazdā and scorn towards the forces of evil — suggests that the poet-priest, presumably Zaraϑuštra, and his priestly ritual successors in the generations to follow will not be held liable for the misdeeds of the wicked ones and that hostility will inevitably come upon the latter instead. The late antique Zand — the translation with glosses of these ancient Gathic poems — renders this as follows (PY. 46.7–842): (a) kē-t ō man ohrmazd ud manīgān [hāwištān ī man] pānag dād. (b) ka man ān druwand [ahrimen] pad dārišn dārēd43 kēn [kū-m kēn abāg dārēd ā-m pānagīh kē kunēd]. (c) anīy az tō ātaxš ud wahuman [čē ašmāh rāy dānam kū-m pānagīh kunēd]. (d) kē44 pad awēšān kunišn ahlāyīh parwaram ohrmazd [kū kār ud kirbag kunam ā-m pānagīh kē kunēd]. (e) ān45 ō man dastwar ī dēn frāz gōwē [ēn gōwē kū dēn pad dastwar dār]. 40 Text and transl. modified from Humbach et al. 1991, vol. I, pp. 169–170. 41 See Skjærvø 2002, pp. 29–67 for a discussion of this genre in the early Iranian world in comparison with related poetics found in Vedic and other Indo-European traditions. He compared the ‘singer of blame poetry’ (naēstar-) in Avestan with Gk. óneidos ‘blame poetry’ citing Nagy 1979, p. 223, but cautioned: “I have adopted the translation as ‘blame’ from Nagy’s work, but it may not be the one best suited to evoke to modern readers the actual semantic of the word. Translations such as ‘scorn, despise, put down, curse’ may be more appropriate” (p. 47). 42 J2 260v || K5 213r || Mf4 471 || Pt4 185v || [n.b. see https://cab.geschkult.fu-berlin.de for digital images of these four most important manuscripts of the Pahlavi version of the Yasna liturgy]. The square brackets [ ] are used to indicate the Pahl. glosses and brief comments on the Av. original, but it should be noted that we do not know their precise age or the hermeneutical processes by which they were gradually accreted into what has become the extant Zand and, as such, I do not mark them in the translation. 43 J2, K5 omit 44 J2, K5 < AMT > 45 J2 < OLE Y ZK L > || K5 < ZK Y ʾw’ L >

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(a) Whom have you given to me as a protector O Ohrmazd, and to mine — my disciples? (b) When that wicked one — Ahrimen — has me in his possession, (in) vengeance, i.e., when he has (an issue of) vengeance with me, then who will protect me? (c) Other than your fire and Good Thought, since I know that due to you, he affords me protection, (d) the ones by whose actions I nourish Righteousness, O Ohrmazd, i.e., I do work and (good) deeds, then who will protect me? (e) Proclaim that one to me as a priest/an authority of the Tradition (dēn), saying this: ‘Regard the Tradition as (your) authority!’

PY. 46.8: (a) kē ān ī man gēhān dahēd ō ōy ī kēnīg [kū xwāstag pad dastwar ī ahlomōγān dahēd46 ā-š pād(o)frāh kunēnd]. (b) nē pad ān ī ōy47 kunišn an ōy48 āhr rēš [kē pad tan ud49ruwān rēš kunēd] frāz rānēnīdār ham [kū- m50 pād(o)frāh bowandag bē kardan nē tuwān]. (c) pad padīrag-rasišnīh pad ān ī har dō [ka čiš ī mēnōy ud gētīy nē xūb kunēd] rasēd [ō ōy ī ahlomōγ] pad bēš51. (d) ō tanān [mard xwadāy] rasēd [kū- šān pād(o)frāh kunēd] kē ēn pad hu-zīšnīh pānagīh [kū- š ēn dādestān ēdōn kū pānagīh ī dāmān pad frārōnīh kunēd]. (e) nē pad duš-zīšnīh ud pad kadār-iz-ēw [zamān] ohrmazd bēšīdār [wattarān]. (a) The one who gives my herds to the vengeful one, i.e., the one who gives (away his) property by the authority of the heretics,52 they punish him. (b) Nor due to his actions, will I be someone who causes his āhr,53 (i.e.) wound, to grow forth — the one who inflicts wounds upon body and soul, i.e., I am unable to punish him completely (i.e. to kill him).

46 47 48 49 50 51 52

J2 < YHWWNyt’ > || K5 < dʾlšn’ > J2, K5 < ʾw’ > Pt4, Mf4 < Y > || K5 < ʾw’ > K5 < yʾn lwbʾn > K5 < AYK > Pt4 < krtn’ > superscripted Pahl. ahlomōγ “heretic” < Av. aṣ̌ə maoγa- perhaps means one ‘who obfuscates Truth/ Order [aṣ̌a -], shams/pretends Truthful/Orderly behavior’ in Avestan; cf. also Old Indic mugh-/muh-, mógha, which seems to mean “wrap in darkness, obfuscate” and is also used in the sense of “counterfeit, pretense,” for which, see Skjærvø 2003, pp. 401–402. For a study of the Pahlavi term, see Timuş 2019, pp. 271–294. It should be noted that this term here in PY. 46.8a is precisely what is being interpreted in Dk. 9 as encoding the anti-Manichaean interpretation of the Gāϑās. Timuş’s generally applicable claim that the Manichaeans “… are never qualified as ahlomōγ in the Zoroastrian sources” (p. 289) finds an exception here. 53 Av. āϑri- for which, cf. AirWb, col. 323, who has „Verderben, Unheil, Leid“ (from the context); Humbach et al. 1991, vol. II, p. 182, suggests that āϑri- ‘*destruction’ is derived from ātṛ- ‘fire,’ and so its primary semantics ought to be connected with ‘burning.’ This might explain the / rēš / ‘wound, sore’ in Dk. 9.39.14 as an injury that burns.

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(c) Through a counter-attack [lit. “counter-arrival”] in both, i.e., when one does nothing good in this world and in that world, it (punishment) comes to him — the heretic (ahlomōγ) — with harm. (d) To the bodies (of the heretics and) the man, the ruler comes, i.e., he takes retribution on them; the one who (provides) protection for these (ones) through good living, i.e., this law/judgement is thus: namely, the protection of the creatures of the world through the producing of virtue, (e) not through evil living — and, in whichever epoch, O Ohrmazd, he (is) hostile — (to) the evil ones.54

Here in the Zand, the “herds” (gēhān) are glossed by “property” (xwāstag), and it is given away to a priest/an authority (dastwar) of the heretics (ahlomōγān) and understood in the Warštmānsr Nask as being none other than Mani and the Manichaeans, who were notorious for their renunciationist philosophy.55 What we find in the Warštmānsr Nask are archaic references to movable property or herds and the lack of social acceptance of an archaic priestly poet-sacrificer being retasked through complex forms of allegoresis in Late Antiquity and subsequently understood as a proof text encoding political events in the early Sasanian era: (1) the tithing of property by the Manichaean followers to their Church; (2) the subsequent seizure of said property by the Sasanian authorities, just as we see with their imperial Roman counterparts; and (3) the killing of Mani by the Sasanian monarch in 274 or 277 ce.56 The theological importance and economic benefit of the Catechumens (Hearers) providing alms for the Manichaean “Holy Church”57 is stated quite eloquently in the Coptic Kephalaia of the Teacher 87 [216, 31–218, 32]: Now, the holy church / exists in two forms: in the brothers and / the sisters. Indeed, when these alms reach the holy / c[h]urch, they shall be [redee]med through it and purified and rest therein. They shall come from it and [go] to the / God of truth in whose name they were given. / Thus it is this holy church itself that is the place of re[st] / for all those alms that shall rest therein; / and it becomes a doorway for them and a conveyance to that land of rest. Also, the holy church / has no place of rest in this entire world exce/pt for through the catechumens who listen to it, as [...] / only with the catechumens who give it rest. For / [it]s honour is with the catechumens, through whom it shall be pass[ed on]… 54 Mss.: J2, K5, Mf4, and Pt4. Cf. Dhabhar 1949, pp. 201–202 and Malandra/Ichaporia 2013, pp. 71–72; cf. also the transl. in Mills 1894, pp. 252–255. 55 For Manichaean asceticism, see, BeDuhn 1995, pp. 513–519. 56 The reading of “problematic” historical figures into the Pahlavi versions of Avestan texts is not unprecedented as we find a reference to Mazdak, the son of Bāmdād in PV. 4.49; see Moazami 2014, pp. 116–119. It is possible that these passages referencing property and the killing of the ahlomōγ were interpreted by other strands of the Zoroastrian hermeneutical tradition as referring to Mazdak or even simply generic “heretics” (Mihaela Timuş p.c.). 57 For a useful diagram of the pyramidal hierarchies of the Manichaean Church, see Tardieu 2008, p. 59. See also Leurini 2013 for a study of the Church in the East.

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Again, this is how the [ho]ly church / shall become the place of rest for the alms of the cat[e]/chumens; and the catechumens themselves become the place of rest for the holy church. Nevertheless, both the former and the [latter], / the place of rest wherein they will be at peace [is the land] / of light.58

Across the various genres of the extant Manichaean texts — the homilies, parables, and hymns — we find didactic references and admonishments to the Hearers to keep the commandments; and, for our purposes, the specific requirement for the Hearers to provide alms for the Elect. For instance, we find in the Manichaean Middle Persian fragment M 101f: nywšʾg [ky] [rwʾn]gʾn dyyd oo cʾwn ʿš[kwh] myrd ky dwxt ʾw šʾh hn(d)[ymʾn] qwnyd oo ʾw wzrg pdyxšr r(s)[yd]. The Hearer who gives alms (to the Elect) is like a man of low birth, who presents (his) daughter to the king. He reaches (a position of) great honour.59

The twin expectations for Hearers to provide taxation to the Sasanian tax collectors as well as tithes to their Church leaders (MMP. niyōšāgbed; female leaders in the case of Sogd. niγōšāk-patānč60) would undoubtedly have led these two groups with inimical socio-religious and economic interests, to find themselves in conflict, leading ultimately to Manichaean property seizures by the Sasanian authorities. For the seizure of Manichaean property as a truly late antique phenomenon we may look beyond the Sasanian realm to legislation issued in 381 ce by the Roman Emperor Theodosius [r. 379–395 ce] in order to limit the philanthropy of Mani’s auditores for the benefit of the electi of his Church: The same Augusti [= emperors Gratian (r. 375–383 ce); Valentinian II (r. 375– 392 ce); and Theodosius I (r. 379–392 ce in the East, and then r. 392–395 ce in the whole empire)] to Eutropius, praetorian prefect. If any Manichaean — man or woman — from the day of the law enacted long ago and originally by our parents has transmitted his own property to any person whatsoever by having made a will or under title of any liberality whatsoever or by form of donation, or if anyone of these persons has been enriched by grant of an inheritance entered through any form whatsoever (since immediately from the said persons, under branded infamy’s perpetual stigma, we withdraw all capability of making a will and of living under Roman law, and since we do not permit them to have the power either of leaving or taking any inheritance), the whole by an immediate investigation on the part of our treasury (fiscus), should be joined to its resources.61 58 Transl. after Gardner 1995, pp. 225–226. 59 From a ms. containing the Book of Giants. Text and transl. in Henning 1943, pp. 59, 63– 64; cf. also M 221 for an “elaborated version of this parable” (Henning 1943, p. 64, fn. 1). See Sims-Williams 1985, pp. 573–582 for a survey of Mani’s commandments to the Elect and the Hearers across a number of languages; see also Colditz 2009, pp. 73–100, and, in particular, pp. 81–83. 60 See Colditz 2009, pp. 80–81 for further details. 61 Transl. in Gardner/Lieu 2004, pp. 145–146. The Roman emperor Diocletian had issued an edict against the Manichaeans earlier in 302 ce in which we explicitly find

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From a century and a half later, we also have a surviving Greek version based on an original Latin Mandate of Justinian I [r. 527–565 ce] regarding the wills and bequests of the Manichaean community: (First part lost) Since persons who have been unfortunate in respect to the Manichaeans’ impious error are worthy not only of punishment while they live, but also of the circumstance that after their death they may not give their property to whom they wish or to whom the laws give it by intestacy, we use the present divine pragmatic law to your magnificence, by which we command that the property of persons possessed by this disease should be examined; and that if their children or any of their descending relatives should be free of such sort of madness, these should be allowed to share the property given to them by law, but that if any other cognates of the deceased persons either are called to their inheritance according to those persons’ last will (which indeed has been forbidden) or have accepted a donation from such a person while living or even have been honoured with a legacy from, of course, the same person, their property or the things donated or bequeathed should be taken from them absolutely and should be attached to the public treasury.62

Just as we observe this anti-Manichaean rhetoric in the Roman West, we find confirmation of similar property seizures within the Sasanian Empire. Here we must look to the Pahlavi legal sources, namely, the Mādayān ī Hazār Dādestān (“Book of a Thousand Judgements”), likely a Sasanian-era work. It explicitly discusses the seizure of property due to “following the beliefs of the zandīg” (zandīg-wurrōyišnīh), with the term zandīg most often associated with the Manichaeans, as we saw earlier in Kerdīr’s inscriptions and in Eznik’s polemics, both of which are securely datable to the Sasanian period. We find it stated in MHDA. 8.76–77: (76) ān ī guft kū ōy ī ǰādūg xwāstag ī-š ast ka-šān ǰādūgīh ōst pad rad ēstēd. ud ka-šān marnǰēnišn kard ō ōy kē marnǰēnišn andar kard. ud ka-š gugāyīh abar dahēnd ud wināh andar kē kard pad nāmčišt nē paydāg ō gugāyān appār ud zandīgīh ǰādūgīh. anti-Persian rhetoric being employed: “… we have heard that they have but recently advanced or sprung forth, like strange and monstrous portents, from their native homes among the Persians – a nation hostile to us … they will endeavour, as is their usual practice, to infect the innocent, orderly and tranquil Roman people, as well as the whole of our empire, with the damnable customs and perverse laws of the Persians as with the poison of a malignant serpent.” Transl. in Gardner/Lieu 2004, pp. 116–118; see also Kaden 1953, pp. 55–68. For the spread of Manichaeism in the West, see the overview in Brown 1969, pp. 92–103; on imperial legislation against the Manichaeans (and other groups), see Beskow 1988, pp. 1–11 and Lim 2008, pp. 143–167. For various topoi found in anti-Manichaean polemics in the Roman context, see Lieu 1999, pp. 156–202; for Roman polemics specifically tied to Mani’s alterity and Persian origins, see Coyle 2004, pp. 217–234. 62 Transl. Gardner/Lieu 2004, p. 150.

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(77) abāg ān ī az dib ī pādixšāy-kard ud xwēškārīh-nāmag ī kār-framān ī šahrīhā paydāg kū zandīgīh ud zandīg-wurrōyišnīh rāy xwāstag [xwāstag]63 šāhīgān grift. (76) That which is said: ‘The property of a sorcerer (ǰādūg), which is his,’ when it is established that they are sorcerers, shall be held by the Rad. And when (the sorcerers) have caused them damage, (then his property goes) to him whom he caused the damage. And if they give testimony about him and it is not manifest exactly upon whom the crime was committed, (the property) is removed for the benefit of those who gave testimony. Manichaeism (zandīgīh) is sorcery (ǰādūgīh)! (77) Together with that which is manifest from the authoritative document and the Letter of (Proper) Duties of Officials of the Provinces: ‘Due to (practicing) Manichaeism (zandīgīh) and following the beliefs of the Manichaeans (zandīgwurrōyišnīh), property is seized for the palace.’64

Here, we can clearly see the Zoroastrian legal priests explicitly claiming Manichaeism as sorcery, thus justifying the seizure of the properties of Mani’s followers by the Sasanian state apparatus.65 It is worth noting that the Islamic 63 The / xwāstag / at the end of ms. p. 38 is repeated on p. 39. 64 Macuch 1981, p. 65; also Perikhanian 1997, pp. 316–319, for slightly different texts and translations. For a discussion of anti-Manichaean tracts circulating in the Sasanian Empire, see Skjærvø 1997, p. 341, where he cited Manichaean Homilies: “The Magians ... wrote their lying libels (bibliodon) [sic]… concerning you [= Mani]” = Polotsky 1934, p. 81, fn. 19; cf. also Skjærvø 2011a. Cf. also Dilley 2015, pp. 126–127, who notes: “The Graeco-Coptic term ⲃⲓⲃⲗⲓⲇⲓⲟⲛ suggests short texts on small-format writing materials that could be posted in public areas, much like the anti-Christian pamphlets that were distributed across the Roman empire at the beginning of the Diocletianic persecution.” Dilley views the multiple references in Kerdīr’s inscriptions to ‘documents’ (gitt), ‘charters’ (pādixšīr), and ‘records’ (mādayān) during his lengthy career spanning the reigns of four Sasanian monarchs as further proof of Skjærvø’s argument. Following Hutter 2015, p. 480, I would reiterate that this MHD. passage refers to one such tract and further confirms Skjærvø’s original argument. 65 It must be acknowledged that the confiscation of the property of the followers of ‘pseudoprophets’ in the Sasanian context is also said of the Mazdakites from the late 5th and early 6th centuries ce and discussed in the Arabic historical and heresiographical sources, thus muddying the waters. For example, see al-Ṭabarī, Taʾrīkh: “Then he [= Husraw I, r. 531–579 ce] commanded that the leaders of the Mazdakites were to be beheaded and that their property was to be divided among the poor. He executed a large group of those who had confiscated people’s possessions, and he restored these possessions to their original owners,” ed. de Goeje 1879–1901, 1/2, p. 897; transl. in Reeves 2011, p. 271. While this passage in al-Ṭabarī is similar to the MHD., the fact remains that the term used in the latter is / zandīg / and suggests the Manichaeans. Nonetheless, the later Mazdakites still remain a possibility, as al-Khwārazmī [ah 323–383 / 935–993 ce], Kitāb mafātīḥ al-‘ulūm (“Keys to the Sciences”) states: “The Manichaeans are ‘the Mānī-ones’ whose name can be traced to Mānī, and it is unknown whether they have created this designation as a name following the analogy of others… The zanādiqa are the Manichaeans, and the Mazdakites are (also) designated with this name. Mazdak was the one who appeared in the days of Qubādh. He was the chief mōbadh or chief magistrate (qāḍī) of the Zoroastrians, and he asserted that possessions and women should be shared. He produced a book which he called Zand and

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heresiographers, with all their attendant hostilities towards the Manichaeans, do provide us with further evidence for the socio-economic motivations behind the political decisions of the Sasanians to enforce the anti-Manichaean property seizures. The Islamic heresiographer al-Shahrastānī [ah 481–548 / 1086–1153 ce], in his Kitāb al-milal wa al-nihal (“Book of Religious and Philosophical Sects”) states quite unequivocally that Mani did, in fact, demand that his followers contribute to the Manichaean Church: Mānī imposed upon his followers a tithe upon all their property, four prayers (to be recited) daily and nightly, supplication(s) to God, abstention from deceit, killing, stealing, fornication, greed, sorcery, and worship of idols, and (to) not to do to a living being that which he would hate were it done to his own self.66

A similar claim can be found in a later heresiography by Ibn al-Mutaradā [d. ah 840 / 1436 ce] in his Kitāb al-munya wa-lamal fī sharḥ al-milal wa-l-niḥal (“Desire and Hope: A Commentary on Denominations and Creeds”): Mānī prescribed poverty for them. They should not accumulate things except dress for one year and food for each day. He imposed a tithe on their property and (commanded) it to be put at the disposition of its managers. He forbade them to enter idol-temples, and he prohibited fornication, theft, and causing pain to animals of any sort. He also prohibited marriage and agriculture.67

So, what do we have here in terms of the relationship between Sasanian jurisprudence administered largely by the Zoroastrian priesthood and the Zoroastrian hermeneutical tradition also produced by priests in a different sector of the sacral knowledge economy? From the perspectives of the “emic” or traditional interpreters of a religious tradition, in this case the dēn — the “Zoroastrian” one68 — their primary obligation was to make meaning — produce theology — by grappling with the profound hermeneutical challenge of constantly enlivening the meaning of their received past of archaic myth and ritual inherited from the Avestan world in the face of a rapidly evolving multi-religious landscape that maintained that it contained the (true) interpretation of the Avesta, which is the scripture of Zoroastrianism. It [= Avesta] is what Zarādusht brought, the one whom they allege is their prophet. The followers of Mazdak were named after (the) Zand and were called Zandī. Later the word was arabicized so that an individual came to be called a zindīq and a group zanādiqa.” Ed. Taqīzādeh-Šīrāzī 1956, p. 180, §28; transl. in Reeves 2011, p. 275, but cf. also the passage of al-Masʿūdī below. For these striking parallelisms as they contrast with Zoroastrian norms, see the valuable articles of de Blois 2012b, pp. 13–24 and 2015, pp. 141–154 on Mazdak and his place in Iranian historiography. 66 Transl. Reeves 2011, pp. 214–215. 67 Transl. Reeves 2011, p. 215. 68 Cf. the MMP text in M 68a, hymn 1: < nyw bʾd ʾwt pyrʾr pyrwz gr(dʾg)ʾn ʿyg dyn mʾzdys oo frzyndʾn ʿy wʾxš ywjdhr ʾwtʾn mʾd ʿy ʾbycg pdyš wfrʾyhʾd > “… may good … be and the omen of the victor to those returning (from?) the Mazdean dēn! Children of the holy Word (wāxš) and may your pure mother be helped through him/it!” After DurkinMeisterernst 2014, pp. 232–233 and discussed in Rezania 2020.

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threatened the very primacy of the Zoroastrian priesthood. This dangerous state of affairs would have been especially acute in moments where the Zoroastrian priesthood saw weakening or potentially weakening state support from Sasanian monarchs who were periodically enamored by “new prophets” or simply wished to blunt the power of the Zoroastrian priests by fostering religious competition. I would argue that the Zoroastrian hermeneuts took their sacral and scholastic responsibilities very seriously and did so assiduously using tradition-constituted forms of allegoresis to speak to their contemporary social realities by expanding — not delimiting — the spiritual and semantic range of scriptural understanding beyond merely the plain sense of the base text. For them, just as it was for the rabbis, scripture — in this case the Gāϑās — spoke for and already encoded all forms of lived human experience within the greater arc of human history and cosmic temporality, including all future religious and political events. The inter-confessional challenge of the Manichaeans was clearly threatening to the Zoroastrian priesthood for both economic and doctrinal reasons, the latter of which were due to Mani’s retasking of the theological terms, concepts, and deities that were inherited from the ancient Avestan tradition,69 as best encapsulated by Mani’s words found in a famous Manichaean Middle Persian text, M 5794, where he discusses the superior merits of his Church and prophetic message: tswm kw ʿyn ʾbhwmyšn ʿyg dw bwn ʾwd nbygʾn zyndgʾn whyh ʾwd dʾnyšn ʿy mn ʾc hʾn ʿy pyšyngʾn dyn frʾydr ʾwd why hynd. Fourth, this revelation of the two principles/origins (bun), and my living books (scriptures), wisdom, and knowledge are more and better than those of the religions (dēn) of the ancients [lit. “those who came before”].70

This interreligious competition between the Manichaeans and the Zoroastrians is nicely illustrated, from the latter’s perspective, in Dēnkard 3.200.1–12, an anti-Manichaean polemic with 10 propositions and refutations, the first one (1–2) being most relevant here: (1) 10 ī druz-xastag mānīy [ud] padīrag ān ī ahlāyīh ārāstār ādurbād ī mahrspandān andarz drāyīd. (2) ēk padīrag ān ī ahlāyīh ārāstār ādurbād ī pad menišn nē dāštan handarzēnīd. druz-xastag mānī kēn abārīg +druzān71 gilistag mardōm tan handarzēnīd. druz-xastag mānī pad [ud] a-warzišnīh čāštagīh ud +xān-hambār72 ī mardōm ī 69 See BeDuhn 2015, pp. 247–275; for the doctrinal overlaps, see Scott 1989, pp. 435–457; for the Manichaean retasking of Zoroastrian theological termini technici, see Colditz 2005, pp. 17–26 and 2006, pp. 359–364. 70 Text: Boyce 1975, pp. 29–30; cf. the Copt. version (Kephalaion no. 151: 370.29–375.15), transl. in Gardner/Lieu 2004, pp. 265–266. See also Lieu 2006, pp. 519–528 and BeDuhn 2015, pp. 247–275. 71 B < dlwc ʾnglystk > a mis-segmentation for < dlwcʾn glystk > 72 B < Whʾnhnbʾl > and alternatively read as < nhʾn hnbʾl > for / nihān-hambār / ‘hoard in secret’ which would also fit the polemical tone, but is less optimal syntactically. Cf. the Manichaean Middle Persian fragment, M 5265 which has references to ‘fleshly enemies’

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gēhān xwarišn ud dārišn abesīhēnīdan ī +gyān73 ī dēwān ī-š niyōšāgān nāmēnīd appurīhā hambārd + ǰōyīd74. (1) The 10 (propositions) of Mani, ‘wounded by the Lie’ (which he) chattered contrary to the precepts advised by the ‘Arranger of Righteousness’ Ādurbād son of Mahrspand75: (2) One (proposition), contrary to that which the ‘Arranger of Righteousness’ Ādurbād advised not to keep in one’s mind, Mani, ‘wounded by the Lie,’ advised that the lair (gilistag) of ‘Vengeance’ (kēn) and the other lie-demons (are) human’s < dwšmynwn [pd]yn > and ‘the storehouse of our souls’ < hmʾbyyd ʿy mʾn (gy)ʾnʾn > for which, see Durkin-Meisterernst 2014, p. 293. 73 B < wyʾn > 74 B < ŷwŷyt› > perhaps for < ywŷyt› >, though < ywt› > for / ǰūd / would be expected. 75 In earlier scholarship Ādurbād being found here was simply seen as an anachronism, as he is commonly understood to be a high priest of the 4th century ce under Shapur II [r. 309–379 ce] and one of the putative transmitters of the Zoroastrian sacred corpus (dēn) in Dēnkard Book 4; see the transl. in Skjærvø 2011b, p. 42. Rather than Kerdīr as Mani’s Zoroastrian priestly nemesis, as we find in the well-known Manichaean sources [called < Krydyr > in the Manichaean Middle Persian text M 3 and ⲕⲁⲣⲇⲉⲗ in the Coptic Homilies], Ibn Ḥazm of Cordoba [d. ah 456 / 1064 ce] in his Kitāb al-faṣl fī al-milal waʾ l-ahwāʾ waʾ l-niḥal (“Judgement regarding the Confessions, Inclinations and Sects”) also has Ādurbād son of Mahrspand as the Zoroastrian disputant: “Mānī was a monk in Ḥarrān and invented this religion. He was the one whom the king Bahrām b. Bahrām [= Wahrām II, r. 274–293 ce] put to death when he conducted in his presence his disputation with the chief mōbadh Ādhurbadh-Mahrspand(ān), undergoing interrogation about the prohibition of sexual relations and the rapidly approaching end of the world,” ed. Taqīzādeh/Šīrāzī 1956, p. 227, §41; transl. in Reeves 2011, pp. 43–44. In a related vein, al-Yaʿqūbī [d. ca. ah 295 / 908 ce] has a narrative of the mōbadh at court confronting Mani and challenging him to prove his worth by pouring molten lead on himself, for which, see Reeves 2011, p. 32, an ordeal associated with Ādurbād, son of Mahrspand in the Pahlavi texts. These seemingly anachronistic identifications in these later Islamic sources can now be read in concert with the recently published Copt. text entitled The Chapters of the Wisdom of My Lord Mani in the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin, where we find the reading: ⲁ̣ ⲇⲟⲩⲣⲃⲁⲧ ⲁⲣⲁϥ ⲡⲇⲓⲕⲁⲥⲧ̣ⲏⲥ “Adourbat the Judge (δικαστής)” in §359.3 [fragmentary in §359, 12] for which, see Gardner/BeDuhn/Dilley 2018, p. 39. As the editors note: “Reference is made here to several Mazdayasnian practices: a consecrated (yaštag, here rendered as ‘righteous’) fire, ‘gathered’ from various source fires (ātaš buzurg kardan; see Vendidad 8…); and the ritual nourishment of fire and water (ātaš-zōhr and āb-zōhr… ). The latter rituals are referenced by name in the Middle Iranian Manichaean text M 95… Reference is probably also made to a judicial ordeal or oath involving the fire” (p. 39, notes to lines 6–12). The text also appears to have a variant of his name as / Ardounabat / (ⲁⲣⲇⲟⲩⲛⲁⲃⲁⲧ) in §360.29; §361.7–8; and §364.3. I must thank Kayla Dang for suggesting this reference to me. Clearly the historical identification of the 3rd century ce ⲁ̣ ⲇⲟⲩⲣⲃⲁⲧ of the Kephalaia with the 4th century ce Ādurbād seems unlikely, all the more since in the Kephalaia he and Mani end on good terms (p.c. Jason BeDuhn). We might conjecture that the Pahlavi and Arabic sources have conflated two figures as part of later forms of polemical rhetoric that came to view the Zoroastrian priesthood as having always been inimical towards Mani and his Church. Such an example highlights the ever-present danger of using later polemical sources to historicize earlier events, as I am wont to do here.

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bodies (tan). Mani, ‘wounded by the Lie’ by (his) doctrine of non-cultivation and (thereby) causing the destruction of the *storehouse of the humans of the world — food and possessions (xwarišn ud dārišn) — which the souls of the demons whom he called his ‘Hearers’ had stored (and) devoured through (their) thieving.76

Here we find yet another intertextual reference to ‘vengeance’ (kēn) also seen earlier in PY. 46.7b: When that wicked one — Ahrimen — has me in his possession, (in) vengeance (kēn), i.e., when he has (an issue of) vengeance with me, then who will protect me?

In the Pahlavi Zand of the Gathic base text it is the fear of the vengeance of Ahrimen on the part of the Zoroastrian faithful, while in Dk. 3.200.2 we instead find the notion of ‘vengeance’ being attached to Mani and his commandments connected with the renunciation of food and worldly possessions that was so anathema to Zoroastrian religious and social norms that rejected sexual abstinence, fasting and all forms of asceticism. The Škand-gumānīg Wizār (“Doubt-Dispelling Disquisition”), a 9th- or 10th-century polemical text on the ‘sorcery’ (ǰādūgīh) of Manichaean doctrine composed by Mardānfarrox, son of Ohrmazddād and surviving in Pāzand, i.e., Middle Persian written in the Avestan alphabet,77 quotes liberally from the Dēnkard, and polemicizes against Mani in ŠGW. 10.60: kē-š kēš ǰādūgīh ud dēn frēftārīh ud hammōz dušīh ud brahm nihān-rawišnīh… “(whose) teaching [= Skt. śikṣa- ‘teaching’] is evil, and (whose) custom (brahm) [= Skt. veṣa- ‘dress’] moves in secret.”78 One person’s esotericism is another’s sorcery. In an oftencited passage, al-Masʿūdī [ah 282–385 / 896–956 ce] in his Murūdj al-dhahab wa maʿādin al-jawāhir (“Meadows of Gold and Mines of Gems”), living in 76 Text: B 169. Cf. the transl. in de Menasce 1973, p. 209; cf. also Taillieu 2004, pp. 266–267; see also Jackson 1924, pp. 213–227; and Olsson 1991, pp. 273–293, all with slightly different texts. For a general discussion, see also Hutter 2015, pp. 477–489, in particular pp. 485–488. 77 With glosses from its later medieval Sanskrit version added here from de Blois/SimsWilliams 2006. For more details, see Taillieu 2004. 78 Text after de Menasce 1945, pp. 116–117; cf. also Taillieu 2004, pp. 80, 194 and Timuş 2020, p. 128 for a partial translation and detailed analysis of the key terms of the broader text. The polemic against Manichaean secrecy finds a reference in L 68, a Manichaean Sogdian text now in Leningrad, where Mani tells a magus the parable of a deaf and dumb boy: “Then Lord Mar Mani said to the magus: ‘I together with (my) disciples (and) Electi, am like that boy who, by a cunning [all italics in original] stratagem, was silent, (who) did not speak and did not hear… So we too are silent, and we speak with no-one and perform good deeds and pious actions as a cunning stratagem. Moreover, that time will finally come when I shall speak before all, like that boy, and we shall demand justice for ourselves,’” transl. Sims-Williams 1990 [1992], p. 285. Cf., once again, M 7, hymn 1n: < nyxʾžyd gryw ʾw pwʾcyšn ʾwd ʿym rʾz rʾšt šwj dʾryd. nmwyyd ʾw hwyn ky bwxsynd ʾwd ʿym rʾz ʾw hwyn wchyd > “Prepare (pl.) the soul for purification! And keep this secret (rāz) truly holy! Honour those who are being saved! And teach them this secret!” Text and transl. Durkin-Meisterernst 2006, p. 27.

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10th-century Baghdad — the precise place where our earliest colophon of the Dēnkard was written some 60 years later — adds to the claims of Manichaean esotericism, but here in the context of scriptural hermeneutics: We report that Mānī, the son of Yazīd, disciple of Qārdūn [= Cerdo, a 2nd century ce gnostic79], came to Bahrām and presented to him the dualist doctrines (madhāhib al-thanawiyya). He [= Bahrām] cunningly accepted them, until he had gathered his missionaries, who were dispersed across the lands, those of his disciples who preached the dualist doctrines to the people. Then he killed him, and he killed the leaders of his disciples. The word zindiqa was created in the days of Mānī, with whom, the zanādiqa are associated. And regarding this, when Zarādusht the son of Asbimān [= Pahl. spitāmān] (whose genealogy we have already mentioned) brought to the Persians a book called the Bistā [= Pahl. abestāg, ‘Avesta’] in the first language (al-lughat al-ūlá) of the Persians, he gave it a commentary (tafsīr) called the Zand. And he gave this commentary a gloss (sharḥ) called Bāzand [= Pāzand], as we have said before. The Zand was an explanation (bayān) for the esoteric/ allegorical interpretation (taʾwīl) of the ancient revelation. Whoever there was in their religion (sharīʿat) who adduced anything in opposition to the revelation, i.e., the Bistā, and who turned toward the esoteric/allegorical interpretation (taʾwīl), i.e., the Zand, they would say, ‘He is a zandī,’ referring to (the name of) the interpretation, which shows that he had moved from the exoteric meanings (ẓawāhir) of the revelation to the esoteric/allegorical interpretation (taʾwīl), and this is in contradiction to the revelation. When the Arabs came, they took this term from the Persians, and they pronounced it zindīq and Arabized it.80

While many of us read this passage and others like it as part of the Manichaean – Zandīk question, I believe al-Masʿūdī is also providing us proof, through Islamic eyes no doubt, of the very contested process of allegoresis and competitive hermeneutics between the Zoroastrians and Manichaeans.81 I would contend that “normative” allegoresis as traditional intersignification — “knowledge from the Tradition” — was used by the Zoroastrian hermeneuts as a defense of the idealized view of the Sasanian political and religious status quo and can 79 See Reeves 2011, p. 34, fn. 97, where he notes that Irenaeus suggested that Cerdo was a follower of Simon Magus and an important intellectual influence upon Marcion. 80 de Meynard/de Courteille 1861–1877, vol. II, pp. 167–168; transl. after de Blois 2012a. For a discussion of the Pāzand, see Azarnouche 2014, pp. 81–99. See also van Bladel 2017, pp. 190–210 for a discussion of the Perso-Arabic historians’ views on Zoroastrian scripture, hermeneutics, and textuality. 81 Contra de Blois 2012a: “The zand, which the Persians believed to have been revealed by their prophet, is not an ‘allegorical interpretation’ of the Avesta, but a translation into Middle Persian (with commentary) of what the Zoroastrians of the Sāsānid period perceived to be the literal meaning of the scripture; there can consequently be no question of the Manichaeans having turned away from the Avesta to the (Zoroastrian) zand, as al-Masʿūdī implies... Nor is there any evidence that the Manichaeans produced a zand of their own … or that they considered their religion to be an allegorical interpretation of the Avesta. In fact, extant Manichaean writings make it quite clear that they did not accept the Avesta as a genuine prophetic revelation.”

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be seen most clearly in another Pahlavi passage on ‘heresy’ in Dk. 3.390.9 in a chapter entitled the “Protection of the knowledge of the Tradition (dēn) from the destruction of the heretics (ahlomōγān),” where it is stated: ud ēk wizīngarīh ī pad ōšmurdār ud čāšīdār ī dēnīg hammōg kē aziš bawēd pānagīh ī dēn-dānāgīh az ahlomōγān + wināhišn rāstīhā pad dastwar xūb raft ī dēn ud ārāyišn ī xwadāyīh wirāyišn ī gēhān. And one is the discernment by those who enumerate82 and teach the Tradition, from which the (proper) knowledge of the Tradition will be protected from corruption by the heretics (ahlomōγān); (also that) the Tradition, will go forth in a truthful manner by means of good authority; and (that) Rulership (xwadāyīh) will be adorned and the world will be (well) managed (or: restored).83

Here we see the deployment of a trope in Pahlavi much better known from its Nachleben in Islamic political theory from none other than al-Masʿūdi himself, as well as others, such as Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ [ca. ah 103–139 / 721–757 ce] before him — who commonly cite the founder of the Sasanians, Ardāšir I [r. 224–242 ce] as saying: Religion (dīn) and Kingship (mulk) are two brothers, and neither can dispense with the other. Religion is the foundation of Kingship and Kingship protects Religion. For whatever lacks a foundation must perish, and whatever lacks a protector disappears.84

Mani and his followers’ theological cosmopolitanism, aggressive trans-imperial proselytizing, and their non-sanctioned hermeneutics were precisely the first of many existential threats that laid bare the often-fractious social interactions between Zoroastrianism and the other faiths in the empire that patently belied this highly idealized discourse of the mutually supportive relationship between priestly and royal power in Sasanian Iran. This leaves us with one major hermeneutical question that still needs answering: Why is this anachronistic interpretation of the Warštmānsr Nask read into the Kamnamaēzā Hāiti and not some other section of the Gāϑās? In my experience, we are compelled to use a form of hermeneutical induction to try and motivate these radical forms of allegoreses by finding a word, phrase or strophe in the Old Avestan base text that likely served as the hermeneutical ‘trigger’ for the interpretive narrative to follow. In this case, I believe it is a topos and a well-known one at that. In a characteristically insightful article on the Cologne Mani Codex, Albert de Jong persuasively argues that the accounts of the lives and travels of the founders of Manichaeism and Zoroastrianism have a shared trope of prophetic despair in the face of scepticism and ostracism in the 82 See Vevaina 2010a, pp. 111–143. 83 Text: B 286; cf. the transl. in de Menasce 1973, p. 348. 84 de Meynard/de Courteille 1861–1877, vol. II, p. 162; cited in Zaehner 1955, p. 36; see also Hutter 1993, pp. 2–15, in particular, pp. 9–10. For this particular theme and its transmission histories, see Shaked 1984, pp. 31–67.

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early days of spreading their prophetic message.85 He cites CMC 102–104 where Mani is struggling against the Baptist community of his youth and bemoans his lack of social stature, reputation, and royal support to his divine “Twin” (Gk. σύζυγος): Where shall I go then? All religions and sects are adversaries of the good. I am a stranger and alone in the world... (103) How then, if these people (i.e. the Baptists) have given me no room to accept the truth, will the world, its princes or its teachings, receive me when it comes to hearing these secrets and to accepting (these) hard precepts? How shall I (speak) before the kings and... and (104) of the world, and the leaders of religions? For, see, they are mighty and exercise power with their wealth, their authority and their material means; but I am alone and poor in all these things.86

De Jong goes on to provide the Zoroastrian parallel — the opening two strophes of Yasna 46 of the Kamnamaēzā Hāiti87 — on which Mani had seemingly modelled his religious claims, and he unequivocally states: This passage is, almost up to its wording, reminiscent of the famous lines of Yasna 46, where Zarathushtra — according to the traditional explanation, which is the one that should guide us at the moment — utters words of despair for being cast out of his land and his family, the united opposition of the evil priests and rulers of the land and his despair of ever winning an audience with a mighty patron88: kąm nəmōi ząm kuϑrā nəmōi aiienī pairī xᵛaētə̄uš +airiiamanascā89 dadaitī nōit̰ mā xšnāuš yā vərəzə̄n ā hə̄c ā naēdā dax́iiə̄uš yōi sāstārō drəguuaṇtō kaϑā ϑβā mazdā xšnaošāi ahurā (To) which piece of land shall I (go to) graze (my cattle)? Where shall I go to graze (them)? They keep (me) away from (their) family and tribe. The community which I wish to join does not satisfy me Nor (do) the deceitful tyrants of the land. How shall I satisfy you, O Wise Ahura? +

vaēdā tat̰ yā ahmī mazdā anaēšō mā kamnafšuuā hiiat̰c ā kamnānā ahmī 85 See de Jong 2014, pp. 129–147, in particular, pp. 141–143. 86 De Jong cites the transl. in Gardner/Lieu 2004, pp. 65–66. 87 For another allegorical interpretation of the opening line of Y. 46.1 in the Sūdgar Nask of Dk. 9, see Vevaina 2010b, pp. 208–234. 88 De Jong 2014, p. 142. 89 Zand: / ērmānān / from Av. airiiamana- “tribe;” cf. also Y. 54.1 — Airiiaman Išiiō — which appears to have been borrowed by the Manichaeans as an epithet of Jesus in Manichaean Middle Persian: < yyšwʿ ʾryʾmʾn > “Jesus the Friend,” for which, see Durkin-Meisterernst 2004, p. 53; and see also Sundermann 1979, p. 103, fn. 246 with literature. For a list of Zoroastrian figures in Iranian Manichaean texts, see p. 101.

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gərəzōi tōi ā īt̰ [a]uuēnā ahurā rafəδrə̄m caguuå hiiat̰ friiō friiāi daidīt̰ āxsō vaŋhə̄uš aṣ̌ā īštīm manaŋhō I know wherefore I am lacking in vigour, O Mazdā. (It is) on account of the scantiness of my cattle stock, And because I am one of few men (only). I complain to You. Look hither, O Ahura, Extending (such) support as a friend would grant a friend. Look upon the vigour of Good Thought, (inspired) by Truth.90

De Jong then goes on to argue that the topos of a prophet going to the court of the ruling king of the land in question to preach his prophetic message is so familiar to us that scholars have not fully appreciated that it is not a component of the various Christian traditions from Palestine or the Graeco-Roman world,91 nor do we find in those polities the expectation that if said king converted, so would the denizens of the realm then follow suit. He then suggests that these particular religio-political ideas are, in fact, omnipresent in the Christian nations of what he refers to as the “Parthian commonwealth.”92 In my opinion, what de Jong has seen most accurately in the CMC is the imitatio zoroastris, as it were, of Mani’s claims to being a latter-day Zaraϑuštra in order to appeal to the pre-existing expectations of his Iranian and Iranianized followers in the Sasanian realm — the political successor to the Parthian commonwealth. As such, it fits perfectly with Mani’s brilliant re-tasking of the sacral symbolic systems of the “ancients” (pēšēnagān), an Interpretatio Manichaica, which the Manichaean scriptures state explicitly. De Jong’s claim is buttressed by the fact that we have incontrovertible evidence that the Manichaeans were well aware of both the Zoroastrian nasks and the five Gāϑās, as we find them enumerated in the Manichaean Parthian Gyān wifrās (“Sermon on the Soul”) [M 838 = M 419+M 3824], which BeDuhn suggests is likely a 3rd century ce text.93 The hymn states that in the (unnamed) nask < pd nsk > in question one finds the five Gāϑās, with each being homologized to one of the five “sons of Ohrmazd” < ʾw(hrm)yzd (bg)[zʾdgʾn] > (§21), who constituted the natural elements: the air < frwrdyn > is “called in the nask the Ahunauuaitī Gāϑā < ʾwhnwyt gʾẖ >” (§32); the wind < wʾd > is “called in the nask the +Uštauuaitī Gāϑā < ʾwyš(t)[wyt gʾẖ] >” (§46); the light < rwšn > is “called in the nask the 90 Text and transl. after Humbach et al. 1991, vol. i, pp. 167–168; de Jong 2014, pp. 141–142 [n.b. de Jong cites the Humbach et al. 1991 translation, but does not provide the Avestan text]. 91 The same point was argued more generally for the genre of the CMC in Henrichs 1986, p. 183. 92 De Jong 2014, p. 143, fn. 40, provides a definition: “On my understanding, the ‘Parthian commonwealth’ refers to those parts of the world that were within the cultural and political orbit of the Parthian Empire, but the majority of whose inhabitants did not speak Iranian languages: parts of Syria, Mesopotamia, Armenia, and Georgia to the West, and (for some subjects) the world of the Kushans to the East.” 93 BeDuhn 2020. Sundermann 1997, pp. 9 stated that the Parthian version is older than its Sogdian and Old Turkic versions, but he did not rule out a now-lost Aramaic original.

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[*Spǝṇtā.maniiu Gāϑā]”; the water < ʾb > is “called in the nask the +Vohuxšaϑrā Gāϑā < [whwxš](tr) gʾẖ >” (§65); and the fire < ʾdwr > is “called in the nask the [*Vahištoišti Gāϑā].”94 In Werner Sundermann’s view the references to the Gāϑās do not presuppose that Mani composed the work in an Iranian milieu, but he might well have known about the Zoroastrian sacred texts in his youth in Mesopotamia.95 We also have another Manichaean Parthian fragment [M 4525] that appears to contain a dialogue between Mani and a Sasanian monarch, whom Sundermann believed might refer to Wahrām I, and which appears to contain the word for / nask / as well: < ʿymy(c) šʾh ʾw (ʾ)m(ʾh) pydr wʾxt kw ʿym (n)sq … > “The king also said this to our father: ‘This nask …”96 We can now add significant intertextual evidence for de Jong’s argument and the Gathic allusions in the “Sermon on the Soul” by noting that the very Gathic section (hāiti) which serves as the base text for the eisegesis of Mani’s death and the condemnation of his followers in the Warštmānsr Nask — referred to as one of the seven Gathic (gāhānīg) nasks in Dēnkard Book 8 — is the very same Kamnamaēzā Hāiti, which de Jong argues was the Zoroastrian Vorlage of the trope of the ‘complaining’ prophet in the Cologne Mani Codex.97 I believe this non-trivial fact lends strong support to de Jong’s closing remarks on Mani as the son of the Parthian-Sasanian soil, as it were: “… that Manichaeism originated in Persia, and that this should mean something — they cannot be taken seriously enough: it could have come from nowhere else.”98 Mani and the Manichaeans’ referencing the nasks in the 3rd century ce finds a similar witness in the inscriptions of Kerdīr at Naqš-e Rostam and Sar Mašhad, where Prods Oktor Skjærvø restored the word / nask / in KNRm 53 || KSM 29: < W ZK [ʾw]gwn cygwn [PWN n]sky nmʾdty AYK A[N]ŠWT[A…] > for / ud ān ōn čiyōn ask nimāyēd kū mardōm / “And in the same way as he shows [in the n]ask that [when] people....”99 As Skjærvø points out, although there is no direct evidence that the Avestan texts were written down by this period, it is quite possible that the accompanying Pahlavi translations and their commentaries had conceivably been written down already in the 3rd century ce.100 While it would be pure speculation to argue that the Warštmānsr Nask passage and the Zand it was interpreting were definitively composed in the late 3rd century following Man’s execution, I would suggest that our understanding 94 95 96 97 98 99

See Sundermann 1997 pp. 58–65 and 76–79 and BeDuhn 2020. Sundermann 1997, p. 10. Sundermann 1981, p. 72 and see fn. 1; cf. also Skjærvø 2011a. Unfortunately, the extant CMC is not a witness to Mani’s death. De Jong 2008, p. 106. After Skjærvø 1983 [1985], p. 276. He suggested that the nask in question might be Videvdad 19.28–30 and justified the early date on orthographic grounds as well. Skjærvø’s reading has been largely accepted and note the further discussion in Cantera 2004, pp. 150–154. See also Skjærvø 2011a. 100 Skjærvø 1991, p. 107.

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of the Manichaean-Zoroastrian hermeneutic competition for the Avestan nasks qua “scriptural proof texts” was not limited to the well-known examples in Kerdīr’s inscriptions and the Manichaean Parthian texts. We may now add the CMC and its responsum in Dēnkard Book 9 to this pitched hermeneutic battle claiming the contested memory of the archaic Iranian past of myth, ritual, and epic.101 This scriptural rivalry animated the processes which ultimately resulted in both communities becoming “late antique religions,” and, hence, forever intertwined within the dynamic multi-cultural mosaic of the Sasanian period and surviving well into the early Islamic centuries. While the Sasanian monarch felt entitled to execute Mani when he fell out of favor, his Zoroastrian priestly counterparts felt equally justified on hermeneutical grounds to mock and reject Mani’s claims to being a Zoroaster revivus.102 From their perspective, Mani had gone so far as to craft his own illegitimate prophetic autobiography from the ipsissima verba of Zaraϑuštra in the sacred Gāϑās and, in doing so, had become the zandīg or deviant hermeneut, par excellence. The Zoroastrian priesthood evidently felt compelled to counteract Mani’s appropriation of Zaraϑuštra’s “poet’s complaint” in the Kamnamaēzā Hāiti by reading his death at the hands of the Sasanian monarch into that very hāiti in their hermeneutical tradition, thus implicitly praising Zaraϑuštra’s successful conversion of royal authority while explicitly scorning Mani’s failed attempt at achieving the same. “Praise and blame” in a late antique idiom. Put simply, competitive hermeneutics as interreligious polemics qua scriptural hermeneutics as political historiography.

Abbreviations Aram. Aramaic Av. Avestan B Dresden 1966 CMC Cologne Mani Codex Copt. Coptic DH Anklesaria 1971 Dk. Dēnkard (“Acts of the Tradition”) Gk. Greek KKZ Kerdīr’s inscription at Kaʿba-ye Zardošt at Naqš-e Rostam KNRm Kerdīr’s inscription to the right of Shapur I’s triumphal relief at Naqš-e Rostam KSM Kerdīr’s inscription above a relief near the road from Susa to Persepolis at Sar Mašhad MMP Manichaean Middle Persian MPa. Manichaean Parthian 101 See, e.g., Skjærvø 1995a, pp. 263–284 and 1995b, pp. 187–223 and Morano 2009, pp. 325–330. 102 For the figure of Zaraϑuštra found in Manichaean sources, see Sims-Williams 1976, pp. 43–82; Yoshida 1979, pp. 181–195; Sundermann 1986, pp. 461–482 and 2004, pp. 517–530; Skjærvø 1996, pp. 597–628; and Dilley 2015, pp. 101–135.

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316 MHDA. OAv. Pahl. Skt. Sogd. ŠGW. Y.

Yuhan Sohrab-Dinshaw Vevaina Mādayān ī Hazār Dādestān (“Book of a Thousand Judgements”), 2nd. part. Old Avestan ‘Book’ Pahlavi / Zoroastrian Middle Persian Sanskrit Sogdian Škand-gumānīg Wizār (“Doubt-Dispelling Disquisition”) Yasna

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Gardner, I. 1995: The Kephalaia of the Teacher. The Edited Coptic Manichaean Texts in Translation with Commentary (NHMS 37). Leiden. — 2015: “Mani’s Last Days.” In: I. Gardner/J. BeDuhn/P. Dilley (eds.): Mani at the Court of the Persian Kings. Studies on the Chester Beatty Kephalaia Codex. Leiden (NHMS 87), pp. 159–208. — 2020: The Founder of Manichaeism: Rethinking the Life of Mani. The Jordan Lectures in Comparative Religion School of Oriental & African Studies, University of London, 30 May–2 June, 2016. Cambridge. Gardner, I./S. M. C. Lieu 2004: Manichaean Texts from the Roman Empire. Cambridge. Gignoux, Ph. 1991: Les quatre inscriptions du mage Kirdīr. Textes et concordances (Cahier de StIr 9). Paris. de Goeje, M. (ed.) 1879–1901: al-Ṭabarī: Taʾrīkh ar-rusul wa-l-mulūk: Annales quos scripsit Abu Djafar Mohammed ibn Djarir at-Tabari. 15 vols. Leiden. Gyselen, R. 2009: “Primary Sources and Historiography of the Sasanian Empire.” In: StIr 38, pp. 163–190. Henning, W. B. 1943: “The Book of the Giants.” In: BSOAS 11/1, pp. 52–74. — 1965: “A Grain of Mustard.” In: AION 6, pp. 29–47. Henrichs, A. 1986: “The Timing of Supernatural Events in the Cologne Mani Codex.” In: L. Cirillo/A. Roselli (eds.): Codex Manichaicus Coloniensis. Atti del Simposio Internationale (rende-Amantea 3–7 settembre 1984). Cosenza, pp. 569–590. Hoffmann, K./J. Narten 1989: Der Sasanidische Archetypus. Untersuchungen zu Schreibung und Lautgestalt des Avestischen. Wiesbaden. Humbach, H./J. Elfenbein/P. O. Skjærvø 1991: The Gāthās of Zarathushtra and the Other Old Avestan Texts, 2 vols. Heidelberg. Hutter, M. 1993: “Manichaeism in the Early Sasanian Empire.” In: Numen 40/1, pp. 2–15. — 2015: “Manichaeism in Iran.” In: M. Stausberg/Y. S.-D. Vevaina with A. Tessmann (eds.): The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Zoroastrianism. Oxford, pp. 477–489. Jackson, A. V. W. 1924: “The So-Called Injunctions of Mani, Translated from the Pahlavi of Denkart 3, 200.” In: Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland 2, pp. 213–227. — 1930: “On an Allusion to Mānī in Dēnkart 9.39. 13–16.” In: The Dr. Modi Memorial Volume: Papers on Indo‐Iranian and Other Subjects Written by Several Scholars in Honour of Shams‐ul‐Ulama Dr. Jivanji Jamshedji Modi, B.A., Ph.D., C.I.E., J.P. Bombay, pp. 34–36. de Jong, A. 2008: “A quodam Persa exstiterunt: Re-Orienting Manichaean Origins.” In: A. Houtman/A. de Jong/M. Misset-van de Weg (eds.): Empsychoi Logoi — Religious Innovations in Antiquity. Studies in Honour of Pieter Willem van der Horst (Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity 73). Leiden, pp. 81–106. — 2013: “Religion in Iran: The Parthian and Sasanian Periods (247–654 CE).” In: M. Salzman/W. Adler (eds.): The Cambridge History of Religions in the Ancient World II: From the Hellenistic Age to Late Antiquity. Cambridge, pp. 23–53. — 2014: “The Cologne Mani Codex and the Life of Zarathushtra.” In: G. Herman (ed.): Jews, Christians and Zoroastrians: Religious Dynamics in a Sasanian Context. Piscataway, pp. 129–147.

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Josephson, J. 1997: The Pahlavi Translation Technique as Illustrated by Hōm Yašt (Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis. Studia Iranica Upsaliensia II), Doctoral Dissertation. Uppsala. Jullien, C./F. Jullien 2002: “Aux frontières de l’iranité: « nāṣrāyē » et « krīstyonē » des inscriptions du mobad Kirdīr: Enquête littéraire et historique.” In: Numen 49/3, pp. 282–335. Kaden, E.-H. 1953: “Die Edikte gegen die Manichaer von Diokletian bis Justininan.” In: Festschrift Hans Lewald bei Vollendung des vierzigstens Amtsjahres als ordentlicher Professor im Oktober 1953. Basel, pp. 55–68. Kiel, Y. 2019: “Playing with Children: A Talmudic Polemic against Manichaean Sexual Ethics.” In: JLAS 28: The Jewish Family, pp. 112–136. Kristó-Nagy, I. 2016: “Denouncing the Damned Zindīq! Struggle and Interaction between Monotheism and Dualism.” In: C. Adang/H. Ansari/M. Fierro/S. Schmidtke. (eds.): Accusations of Unbelief in Islam. A Diachronic Perspective on Takfīr. Leiden, pp. 56–81. Leurini, C. 2013: The Manichaean Church. An Essay Mainly Based on the Texts from Central Asia (Serie Orientale Roma, New Series 1). Rome. Lieu, S. N. C. 1999: Manichaeism in Mesopotamia and the Roman East (Religions in the Graeco-Roman World 118). Leiden/ Boston/Köln. — 2006: “‘My Church is Superior...’ Mani’s Missionary Statement in Coptic and Middle Persian.” In: L. Painchaud/P.-H. Poirier (eds.): Coptica, Gnostica, Manichaica: mélanges offerts à Wolf-Peter Funk. Leuven, pp. 519–528. MacKenzie, D. N. 1989: “Kerdir’s inscription.” In: The Sasanian Rock Reliefs at Naqsh-i Rustam. Naqsh-i Rustam 6 (Iranische Denkmäler. Lief. 13. Reihe II: Iranische Felsreliefs I). Berlin, pp. 35–72. Macuch, M. 1981: Das sasanidische Rechtsbuch Mātakdān i hazār Dātistān, (Teil II) (Abhandlungen für die Kunde des Morgenlandes, Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft). Wiesbaden. Malandra, W./Ichaporia, P. 2013: The Pahlavi Yasna of the Gāthās and Yasna Haptaŋhāiti. Wiesbaden. de Menasce, J. 1945: Škand-gumānīk Vičār. La solution décisive des doutes (Collectanea Friburgensia, Publications de l’Université de Fribourg en Suisse, Nouvelle série, fascicule 30). Fribourg. — 1973: Le troisième livre du Dēnkart (Travaux de l’institut d’études iraniennes de l’université de Paris 5. Bibliothèque des oeuvres classiques persanes 4). Paris. de Meynard B./P. de Courteille (transl.) 1861–1877: al-Masʿaūdī: Les Prairies d’or (Murūǧ al-d̲ahab wa-ma´ādin al-ǧawhar), 2 vols. Paris. Mills, L. H. 1894: A Study of the Five Zarathushtrian (Zoroastrian) Gâthâs, with Text, Translations. Erlangen. Morano, E. 2009: “‘If They Had Lived …’ A Sogdian-Parthian Fragment of Mani’s Book of Giants.” In: W. Sundermann/A. Hintze/F. de Blois (eds.): Exegisti Monumenta: Festschrift in Honour of Nicholas Sims-Williams (Iranica 17). Wiesbaden, pp. 325–330. Nagy, G. 1979: The Best of the Achaeans. Concepts of the Hero in Archaic Greek Poetry. Baltimore/London.

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Olsson, T. 1991: “The Refutation of Manichaean Doctrines in Dēnkard 3.200.” In: A. van Tongerloo/S. Geversen (eds.): Manichaica Selecta: Studies Presented to Professor Julien Ries on the Occasion of his Seventieth Birthday. Louvain, pp. 273–293. Payne, R. E. 2015: A State of Mixture: Christians, Zoroastrians, and Iranian Political Culture in Late Antiquity (Transformation of the Classical Heritage 56). Oakland. Pedersen, N. 2017: “Holy Meals and Eucharist in Manichaean Sources: Their Relation to Christian Traditions.” In: D. Hellholm/D. Sänger (eds.): The Eucharist – Its Origins and Contexts. Sacred Meal, Communal Meal, Table Fellowship in Late Antiquity, Early Judaism, and Early Christianity. Tübingen, pp. 1265–1295. Perikhanian, A. 1997: The Book of a Thousand Judgements (A Sasanian Law‐Book). Translated by N. Garsoïan. Costa Mesa/New York. Polotsky, H. J. 1934: Manichäische Homilien. Stuttgart. Reeves, J. C. 1996: Heralds of That Good Realm: Syro-Mesopotamian Gnosis and Jewish Traditions (NHMS 41). Leiden. — 2011: Prolegomena to a History of Islamicate Manichaeism. Sheffield/Oakville. Rezania, K. 2020: “‘Religion’ in Late Antique Zoroastrianism and Manichaeism: Developing a Term in Counterpoint.” In: Formative Exchanges between the Sasanid Empire and Late Antique Rome: Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism and Christianity in Contact (Entangled Religions 11/2). DOI: https://doi. org/10.13154/er.11.2020.8556. Russell, J. R. 1990: “Kartīr and Māni: A Shamanistic Model of Their Conflict.” In: D. Amin/M. Kasheff/Sh. Shahbazi (eds.): Papers in Honor of Professor Ehsan Yarshater. Liège/Leiden, pp. 180–193. Sachau, C. E. (ed.) 1878: al-Bīrūnī: Kitāb al-āthār al-bāqiya ʿaniʾ l-qurūn al-khāliya: Chronologie orientalischer Völker von Albêrûni.̂ Leipzig. Scott, D. A. 1989: “Manichaean Responses to Zoroastrianism (Politico-Religious Controversies in Iran, Past to Present 3).” In: RS 25/4, pp. 435–457. Shaked, Sh. 1984: “From Iran to Islam: Notes on Some Themes in Transmission.” In: Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 4, pp. 31–67. Shapira, D. 2004: “Manichaeans (Marmanaiia), Zoroastrians (Iazuqaiia), Jews, Christians and other Heretics: A Study of the Redaction of Mandaic Texts.” In: Muséon 117, pp. 243–280. Sims-Williams, N. 1976: “The Sogdian Fragments of the British Library.” In: IIJ 18/1–2, pp. 43–82. — 1985: “The Manichaean Commandments: A Survey of the Sources.” In: H. W. Bailey et al. (eds.): Papers in honour of Professor Mary Boyce, vol. II (AcIr 25). Leiden, pp. 573–582. — 1990 [1992]: “The Sogdian Fragments of Leningrad II: Mani at the Court of the Shahanshah.” In: BAI, New Series 4, pp. 281–288. Skjærvø, P.  O. 1983 [1985]: “‘Kirdir’s Vision’: Translation and Analysis.” In: Archaeologische Mitteilungen aus Iran 16, pp. 269–306. — 1991: Review of K. Hoffmann, J. Narten 1989. In: Kratylos 36, pp. 104–109. — 1995a. “Iranian Elements in Manicheism: A Comparative Contrastive Approach. Irano-Manichaica I.” In: R. Gyselen (ed.): Au carrefour des religions: Mélanges offerts à Philippe Gignoux. Bures-sur-Yvette (Res Orientales 7), pp. 263–284.

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— 1995b. “Iranian Epic and the Manichean Book of Giants. Irano-Manichaica III.” In: AO 48, pp. 187–223. — 1996: “Zarathustra in the Avesta and in Manicheism: Irano-Manichaica IV.” In: Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei (eds.): La Persia e l’Asia Centrale da Alessandro al X secolo. Atti del Convegno internazionale (Roma, 9–12 novembre 1994). Roma, pp. 597–628. — 1997: “Counter‐Manichaean Elements in Kerdīr’s Inscriptions: Irano‐Manichaica II.” In: L. Cirillo, A. van Tongerloo (eds.): Atti del terzo congresso internazionale di studi “Manicheismo e oriente cristiano antico”. Louvain, pp. 313–342. — 2001: “Rivals and Bad Poets: The Poet’s Complaint in the Old Avesta.” In: M. G. Schmidt/W. Bisang (eds.): Philologica et Linguistica. Historia, Pluralitas, Universitas. Festschrift für Helmut Humbach zum 80. Geburtstag am 4. Dezember 2001. Trier, pp. 351–376. — 2002: “Praise and Blame in the Avesta: The Poet‐Sacrificer and His Duties.” In: JSAI 26, pp. 29–67. — 2003: “Truth and Deception in Ancient Iran.” In: C. G. Cereti/F. Vajifdar (eds.): Ātaš-e Dorun. The Fire Within. Jamshid Soroush Soroushian Memorial Volume II. Assembled Papers on History and Culture of Ancient Iran in Commemoration of the Life of Jamshid Soroush Soroushian 1914–1999. Bloomington, pp. 383–434. — 2011a: “KARTIR.” In: E. Yarshater (ed.): EIr Vol. XV, Fasc. 6. Costa Mesa, pp. 608–628. — 2011b: The Spirit of Zoroastrianism. New Haven, CT (Sacred Literature Series). Stroumsa S./G. G. Stroumsa 1988: “Aspects of Anti-Manichaean Polemics in Late Antiquity and under Early Islam.” In: The Harvard Theological Review 81/1, pp. 37–58. Sundermann, W. 1979: “Namen von Göttern, Dämonen und Menschen in iranischen Versionen des manichäischen Mythos.” In: AoF 6, pp. 95–133. — 1981: Mitteliraniche manichäische Texte kirchengeschichtlichen Inhalts. Mit einem Appendix von Nicholas Sims-Williams. Berlin (Berliner Turfantexte XI). — 1986: “Bruchstücke einer manichäischen Zarathustralegende.” In: R. Schmitt/P. O. Skjærvø (eds.): Studia Grammatica Iranica. Festschrift für Helmut Humbach. München (MSS, Beiheft 13, Neue Folge), pp. 461–482. — 1997: Der Sermon von der Seele: Eine Lehrschrift des östlichen Manichäismus. Edition der parthischen und soghdischen Version mit einem Anhang von Peter Zieme. Die türkischen Fragmente des “Sermons von der Seele” (Berliner Turfantexte XIX). Turnhout. — 2004: Zarathustra der Priester und Prophet in der Lehre der Manichäer. In: M. Stausberg (ed.): Zoroastrian Rituals in Context (Numen 102). Leiden/Boston, pp. 517–530. Taillieu, D. 2004: The Zoroastrian Polemic against Manichaeism in Škand-gumānīg wizār and Dēnkard III. Doctoral Thesis. Katholike Universiteit Leuven. Tajaddud, R. (ed.) 1971: al-Nadīm: Kitāb al-fihrist li-ibn al-Nadīm. Tehran. Tardieu, M. 2008: Manichaeism. Translated by M. B. DeBevoise. Urbana. Taqīzādeh, S. H./A. A. Šīrāzī 1335 [1956]: Mānī va dīn-e-ū. Tehran. Timuş, M. 2019: “Breaking the Rules: Considerations on Zoroastrian Terminology Related to the Idea of Heresy.” In: Numen 66, pp. 271–294.

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— 2020: “Reléguer crânement l’adversaire aux enfers. Polémique anti-manichéenne en terre mazdéenne.” In: F. Ruani/M. Timuş (eds.): Quand les dualistes polémiquaient: Zoroastriens et Manichéens (Collection Orient et Méditerranée 34). Leuven, pp. 125–154 . van Bladel, K. T. 2017: “Zoroaster’s Many Languages.” In: J. E. Lowry/S. M. Toorawa (eds.): Arabic Humanities, Islamic Thought: Essays in Honor of Everett K. Rowson (Islamic History and Civilization 141). Leiden, pp. 190–210 . van Oort, J. 2016a: “‘Human Semen Eucharist’ Among the Manichaeans? The Testimony of Augustine Reconsidered in Context.” In: VChr 70, pp. 1–24. — 2016b: “Another Case of Human Semen Eucharist Among the Manichaeans? Notes on the ‘Ceremony of the Fig’ in Cyril of Jerusalem’s Catechesis VI.” In: VChr 70, pp. 430–440. Vevaina, Y. S.-D. 2010a: “‘Enumerating the Dēn’: Textual Taxonomies, Cosmological Deixis, and Numerological Speculations in Zoroastrianism.” In: HR 50/2, pp. 111–143. — 2010b: “Relentless Allusion: Intertextuality and the Reading of Zoroastrian Interpretive Literature.” In: C. Bakhos/M. R. Shayegan (eds.): The Talmud in Its Iranian Context (Text and Studies in Ancient Judaism 135). Tübingen, pp. 208–234. West, E. W. 1892 [1994]: Pahlavi Texts, Part IV: Contents of the Nasks (Sacred Books of the East 37). Oxford [Delhi]. Yoshida, Y. 1979: “On the Sogdian Infinitives.” In: JAAS 18, pp. 181–195. Zaehner, R. C. 1955 [1971]: Zurvan: A Zoroastrian Dilemma. Oxford. Zeini, A. 2020: Zoroastrian Scholasticism in Late Antiquity: The Pahlavi Version of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti. Edinburgh.

Online Sources Corpus Avesticum Berolinense: https://cab.geschkult.fu-berlin.de

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Sasanian Festivals in the Documents from the “Pahlavi Archive” Dieter Weber

Content In the following article documents from the so-called “Pahlavi Archive”1 with reference to festivals will be presented. In Zoroastrian theology there are three major festival days that are embedded in their corresponding months, thus Mihragān in the month of Mihr, Tīragān in Tīr and Nōg Rōz, the new year festival, in Frawardīn, the first month (cf. Bickerman 1967, p. 200; on the calendar in general Boyce 1970, 1983; Korn 2006, p. 160). Two of the mentioned festivals are documented in the “Pahlavi Archive”: I.

Celebrating Nōg-rōz Berk. 142 Berlin 5

II. Celebrating Mihragān Berlin 4 Berk. 24 Berk. 88

1

For the “Pahlavi Archive” in general see Weber 2012, p. 215. The following sigla will be used: Berk. Pahlavi documents, Berkeley. Berlin Pahlavi documents, Berlin, ed. Weber 2008. P. Pahlavi papyri and parchments, ed. Weber 2003 (pp. 125–343). P.Pehl. Pahlavi papyri and parchments of the Papyrussammlung der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek, Vienna (with original inventory number, mostly unpublished) Sasanian Studies | Sasanidische Studien. Vol. I (2022). Ed. by Shervin Farridnejad & Touraj Daryaee doi: 10.13173/SSt.1.323

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Harrassowitz Library for personal use only / no unauthorized distribution

I. Celebrating Nōg-rōz2

Fig. 1. Berk. 1422 Parchment, wedge, 18 × 6.5 cm bulla absent, bands a bottom Recto 14 lines, Verso blank 2

I owe the information on the measurements of the documents published here to David S. Flattery’s “Archive Database” established for The Bancroft Library, Berkeley, CA.

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Transliteration 1 ʾwhrmzdʾp̄zwṭ′ nwk-lwc′ 2 Y ŠNṬ X-III-II lʾd MN 3 kwṭkʾn KḤDH ywdṭ′ MN 4 ZK Y ʿL gʾlyk Y 5 PWN nmywl ṭk′ plmwṭ 6 krṭn′ GBʾ ṬWB 7 hwlṭk pnyl-II W PRG 8 mn′ gwc′ III-II-C ḤS-X 9 dwlk′ ʿL plsṭʾl Y 10 LʿYN′ ʾMYṭl Y 11 yzdʾnpnʾh 12 YḤBWNṭ′ ck′ 13 ʾwsṭʾndʾl 14 ḤṬYMWNṭ

Transcription 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Ōhrmazdabzūd nōg-rōz ī sāl 35 rāy az kōdagān h°mist ǰud az ān ī ō gālīg ī pad Namēwar tag framūd kardan paymānag did xʷurdag panīr 2 ud nēm man gōz 500 may 10 dōlag ō paristār ī pēš mādar ī Yazdānpanāh dād čak ōstāndār āwišt

Translation [1] Ōhrmazdabzūd ordered (framūd, line 5), on behalf of (rāy, line 2) New Year′s day of [3] the year 35, from [3] the young, all except [4] those who belong to the *household [5–9] of Namēwar, to organize a running, the quota (paymānag) again is 2 and a half man of *cottage cheese*, 500 nuts, 10 dōlag of wine to the maidservant [10] of the mother of [11] Yazdānpanāh [12–14] to be given personally. The Ōstāndār sealed the čak.

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Commentary

Berk. 142, 4

Berk. 87, 2

Berk. 89, 2

Berk. 91, 2

Berk. 91, 5

Berk. 258, 2

Fig. 2

Fig. 3

Fig. 4

Fig. 5

Fig. 6

Fig. 7

Line 4: This is the right place to acknowledge that gʾlyk gālīg must replace now former d ʾlyk 3 used in all other earlier publications! It is built by the common suffix -īg-4 on gāl ‘household, following’ (CPD) < Old Persian *garda-,5 Fig. 8 and for the writing of the initial characters see the example given alongside (i.e. gʾwls Berk. 23, 8). The examples clearly show that the older interpretation as ‘manager’ does not fit the context. Cf. Berk. 123, 10–12 ǰaw g(rīw) 6 ō Anōšān | ī pad Yazdānābestān gālīg | dād ‘6 grīw of barley to be given to Anōšān, a member of the household in Yazdānābestān’ (there is no Anōšān known as a “manager” or the like in any of the documents); Berk. 42, 10–12 čiyōn pad bun ī Māhfarrox ī pad | Namēwar gālīg nibištan ud āmār pad-iš | kardan abāyist ‘as it was necessary, for the bun of Māhfarrox, a member of the household on Namēwar, to write and to make a taxation for it’; also Berlin 10, 4 ō Dēnabzūd ī pad Namēwar gālīg ‘to Dēnabzūd, a member of the household in Namēwar’ and later again in Berlin 10, 7 ō Bāragān ī pad Namēwar gālīg ‘to Bāragān, a member of the household in Namēwar’.6 This relieves us of the assumption of two different †dārīgs in one and the same estate. Cf. also Berlin 26, 1 Zādōy ī pad xīr ī deh gālīg ‘Zādōy, member of the household responsable for the pecuniary affair of the community’.

Line 5: ṭk′ tag, lit. ‘running’, here possibly a ‘(horse) race’.



Line 6: The writing GBʾ also in Berk. 24, 5 and Berk. 165, 8. Though for GBʾ The Frahang i Pahlavīk gives the Pahlavi equivalent kabīz ‘measure, proportion’, however, it is, in one manuscript, also glossed ìäBáïI .7 As is known from the use of NKSYʾ vs. hwʾsṭk the former is used when denoting ‘money, cash’ the latter for ‘possessions, wealth’ in general. If we apply



3 Cf. Weber 2008, pp. xxff. 4 Weber 2007, p. 960 with fn. 45. 5 Cf. Colditz 2000, p. 108. 6 The document was completely misunderstood by me in Weber 2008, pp. 49–51 as well as by Gignoux 2010a, pp. 115–116. Most recent re-edition in Weber 2019b, pp. 85–87. 7 GBʾ kabīz ‘measure, proportion’, gl. ìäBáïI Junker 1912, p. 86.

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this idea on GBʾ vs. kabīz the second writing denotes the grain measure and only the heterographic writing is used in the sense of Pahl. paymānag ‘period, measure, proportion’, here rather in the sense of ‘quota’. 8

Berk. 24, 5

Berk. 142, 6

Berk. 165, 8

Berk. 33B, 68

Junker 1912, p. 86.

Fig. 9

Fig. 10

Fig. 11

Fig. 12

Fig. 13

There is another interesting incidence in Berk. 14, 2 Z NH GBʾ ‘this (is the) quota’, followed by “ration for Nāfōy the maiden servant for the months Frawardīn and Ardwahišt of the year 39, 3 grīw and 6 kabīz of wheat” but made unreadable by two circles.9 ‒ Ṭ WB = did ‘again, further’ very probably refers to the same quota of victuals to be issued on other occasions of festivals.

Lines 7: “cottage cheese” (also Berk. 24, 6) is obviously meant by the sequence xʷurdag panīr, lit. ‘cheese in particles’. It is noteworthy that this specific variant of ‘cream cheese’ is only known from these two documents. Lines 9–10: The phrase (‘to be given) personally’ is expressed by ō paristār ī pēš mādar, lit. ‘to the maidservant who (is) with the mother’.

8 Originally this example was misread as characters having been crossed out. The document was discussed in Gignoux 2010a, p. 30 and Weber 2014a. 9 First published by Gignoux 2009, p. 124.

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Fig. 14. Berlin 5 Description of the document in Weber 2008, p. 25

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Transliteration 1 MKBLWNty ʾMYṭl Y hwslwbʾn 2 yʾmk′ Y hwslwbʾn nwk-lwc′ Y 3 ŠNṬ X-IIII-III lʾd MN dynʾp̄zwṭ′ 4 ʾn pṭmwzn Y pyš MKBLWNty 5 W pṭglʾb pṭ-š ZK-m-c 6 nʾcwk pdy-II W šlwʾl-II W PWN 7 pylʾhn wndʾṭ′ I pnbk mn′ I ○ 8 W pṭglʾb ʾMYṭl Y hwslwbʾn 9 ḤṬYMWNṭ ○○ ○○

Transcription 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

padīrēd mādar ī Xusrōyān ǰāmag ī Xusrōyān nōg-rōz ī sāl 37 rāy az Dēnabzūd ān paymōzan ī pēš padīrēd ud padīrāy pad-iš ān-am-iz nāzuk pay-dō ud šalwār-dō ud pad pīrāhan windād ēw pambag man ēw ○ ud padīrāy mādar ī Xusrōyān āwišt ○○ ○○

Translation [1] The mother of Xusrōyān receives [2] for (rāy, line 3) the clothing of Xusrōyān on New Year′s day of [3] the year 37 (688/89 ce) from Dēnabzūd, [4] she receives the garment in advance, [5] and on presenting the acknowledgement also this for me, [6] viz. a pair of comfortable shoes and a pair of trousers and for [7] one shirt 1 man of cotton. [8–9] And the mother of Xusrōyān sealed the acknowledgement.

Commentary Ed. Weber 2008, pp. 24–27; cf. Gignoux 2010a, p. 115.

Lines 1 and 4: To be read MKBLWNty , see below Berk. 86, 1 (comm.). Line 3: The name Dēn-abzūd was not recognised yet in Weber 2008. Line 4: cf. paymōzan [ptmwcn′ | M pymwcn] ‘garment, dress’ (CPD)

Berlin 5, 4 pṭmwzn

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Line 6: The phrase nāzuk pay 2 seems to be the best interpretation now; neither pʾh (Weber 2008, pp. 25–26) nor  kpʾh (Gignoux 2010a, p. 115) are acceptable.10 The term pay, lit. ‘foot’, must be used here for the covering of the feet. For the form of the initial letter see the following examples:







Berlin 5, 6 pdy-II

Berlin 5, 5 pṭ-š

Berlin 5, 4 pyš

Fig. 16

Fig. 17

Fig. 18





10 The k in the alleged kpʾh necssarily belongs to nʾcwk , the first word of the line.

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II. Celebrating Mihragān

Fig. 19. Berlin 4 Description of the document in Weber 2008, p. 19

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Transliteration 1 MKBLWNty ʾškʾnyck′ Y dlcyk 2 hmwck′ Y mṭrykʾn Y ŠNṬ X-III-III-III 3 lʾd MN dynʾp̄zwṭ′ Y dpyr′ NKSYʾ 4 S-IIII ○ W pṭglʾb ʾškʾnyck′ 5 PWN gwkʾdy-mwdlyhʾ Y yšn-gwptʾl 6 Y wndʾtbwlcmṭr′ ḤTYMWNṭ ○○ ○○ [Bulla]

Transcription 1 2 3 4 5 6

padīrēd Aškānīzag ī darzīg hammōzag ī Mihrīgān ī sāl 39 rāy az Dēnabzūd ī dibīr xʷāstag satēr 4 ○ ud padīrāy Aškānīzag pad gugāy-muhrīhā ī ǰašn-guftār ī Windād-Burzmihr āwišt ○○ ○○ [Bulla]

Translation [1] Aškānīzag, the tailor, receives [2] (as) procurator of the Mihrīgān festival of the year 39, [3] from Dēnabzūd, the scribe, a sum [4–6] (of) 4 Satēr. And Aškānīzag sealed the acknowledgement by the witnesses’ seals of the the Speaker of the Festival of Windād-Burzmihr.

Commentary Ed. Weber 2008, pp. 18–23; cf. Gignoux 2010a, pp. 114f. Lines 1 and 4: Aškānīzag also in Teheran F, line 4, same person !

Line 2: The meaning of hmwck′ was given in Weber 2008 inaccurately as ‘Meister’ resp. ‘Lehrer’. The occurrence in Berk. 217A, 4–5 hammōzag ud aswārān ī hammōzag rāy is to be taken into account with a more specified meaning, perhaps ‘procurator’.11 In connection with the Mihragān-feast mentioned in this document and the donation of a certain amount of money it seems reasonable that hammōzag denotes the organizer or promotor of the festival; these considerations are reflected in our translation. The original reading of the word Mihragān, viz. mṭrpʾn , is outdated now; the term is to be read rather mṭrykʾn which occurs, as name of the Mihragānfestival, again in Berk. 24, 4 and Berk. 88, 4 (cf. the comm.):



11 See Weber forthcoming, p. 111.

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Berlin 4, 2

Berk. 24, 4

Berk. 88, 4

Fig. 20

Fig. 21

Fig. 22

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The formation in -īgān seems to be the original one, cf. Frawardīgān [plwltykʾn′ | N farwardagān] ‘festival of the frawards, the last five days of the twelfth month (Spandarmad) and the following five epacts’ (CPD); cf. Weber 2007, p. 962 (ch. 6.2.2.1.16.). As the modern Persian form shows that -īgān can result in -agān it is reasonable to assume the same development in the word Mihrīgān > Mihragān. Line 3: The person Dēnabzūd is called dibīr only here; we know from other documents that Dēnabzūd must have played a prominent role since he himself seals documents. Dēnabzūd is attested for the years 34 until 42. The interpretation of dibīr ‘scribe’ (CPD, also e.g. in Berk. 244, 5 and Tab. 10A, 2) is undoubted:12

Berlin 4, 3

Berk. 244, 5

Tab. 10A, 2

Fig. 23

Fig. 24

Fig. 25

Here follow the instancies with their contextual surroundings: Berlin 4, 3: az Dēnabzūd ī dibīr ‘from Dēnabzūd, the scribe’; Berk. 244, 5: ō Māhgušnasp ī dibīr ī Amīr Abdīn ‘to Māhgušnasp, the scribe of the Amīr Abdīn’;13 Tab. 10A, 2: Yazd ī dibīr ī tasūg ‘Yazd, the scribe of the (same) district’.14 Line 5: With regard to the festival mentioned in this document I now prefer the reading ǰašn-guftār ‘speaker of the festival’ instead of *yasn-guftār (thus Weber 2008, p. 19).15

12 13 14 15

See also the conspectus in Weber 2016a, p. 142. Weber forthcoming, p. 121. Weber 2016a, p. 141. Gignoux’ proposal to read this term *yazdān-guftār and to interpret it as the name of a son of Windād-Burzmihr is not very probable since in case of a filiation the patronymic form Windād-Burzmihrān would be expected; this patronymic is in fact attested in Berk. 172, 6, Berk. 227, 2 and Berk. 241, 10.

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Berlin 4, 5:

Berk. 102, 5: dšn-c

Fig. 26

Fig. 27



Line 6: Windād-Burzmihr is known from various documents, in some for the year 11 and 13 (e.g. Berk. 244), on the other hand for the years 39 until 48 (in the geographical name Windād-Burzmihr-Ābād).16 Very probably it is the same person who was busy in financial affairs.17

16 See Weber 2018. 17 See Weber 2019a.

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Fig. 28. Berk. 24 Textile, narrow wedge, 18 × 5 cm Bulla absent, bonds at bottom flanked by overlapping circles Recto 14 lines, Verso unmarked

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Transliteration 1 NYŠH Y hwlyn′ 2 ZNH BYRḤ mṭr′ Y 3 ŠNṬ -IIII-IIII 4 mṭrykʾn Y ʾMYṭl Y 5 hwslwdʾn lʾd GBʾ 6 ṬWB hwlṭk pnyl 7 II mn′ grmk′ 8 K-#III-II gwc′ 9 III-II-C ḤS 10 III-II dwlk′ 11 ʿL plsṭʾl 12 ZY-š LʿYN′ 13 YḤBWNṭ′ ck′ 14 plʾdy ḤṬYMWNṭ

Transcription 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

zan ī Xwarin ēn māh Mihr ī sāl 48 Mihrīgān ī mādar ī Xusrōyān rāy kabīz (paymānag) did xʷurdag panīr 2 man garmak k(abīz) 5 gōz 500 may 5 dōlag ō paristār ī-š pēš dād čak Frāy āwišt

Translation [1] The wife of Xwarin [2] this month Mihr (7th month) of the [3] year 48 (699/700 ce) [4] on behalf of (rāy, line 5) the Mihragān celebration by the mother of [5] Xusrōyān the quota [6–8] again is 2 man of *cottage cheese*, 5 kabīz of *beans, [9–10] 500 nuts, 5 dōlag (pails) of wine [11–12] to her maidservant [13–14] is to give personally. Frāy sealed the čak.

Commentary Ed. Gignoux 2001/2003 (No. 5). Issues of victuals for the organisation of the Mihragān-festival, comparable to Berk. 142 where such issues are mentioned for Nōgrōz.

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Line 1: Reading of the name after Berk. 12 and Berk. 33A.

Line 4: The reading mṭrykʾn is ascertained by Berk. 88, 4 and Berlin 4, 4, and particularly by the fact that the month (Mihr) is given but not the day. This is merely natural since the Mihragān-festival is celebrated on the 16th day (Mihr) of the 7th month (Mihr). ‒ The reading MN ʾwcynšn in Gignoux 2003, p. 81 is impossible.



Line 5: For the reading of GBʾ (instead of gʾh in Weber 2008, Index s.v.) see above Berk. 142 (comm.). Line 7: On garmak see Weber 2012, fn. 21, and 2014, fn. 57. Line 11: The pl. paristārān ‘maidservants’ is impossible.

Lines 12–13: ī-š pēš dād Z Y-š has been earlier misread in almost all instancies as ʾYŠ .

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Fig. 29. Berk. 88 Parchment, vertical rectangle, 9 × 8 cm, bulla is at lower right Recto 7 lines, verso blank

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Transliteration 1 MKBLWNty mlṭwy[ 2 symʾhk′ MN BYRḤ[ ṭyl 3 Y ŠNṬ -III-III-III ……[ 4 prʾc mṭrykʾn lʾd MN mʾhp̄ylwc′ 5 NKSYʾ -X ZWZN ○ W pṭglʾb 6 mlṭwy PWN gwkʾdymwdlyhʾ Y dʾṭplhw′ 7 Y dʾṭwdʾn ḤṬYMWNṭ ○○

Transcription 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

padīrēd Mardōy[ sÃmāhag az māh[ Tīr ī sāl 49 ……[ frāz Mihrīgān rāy az Māhpērōz xʷāstag 30 drahm ○ ud padīrāy Mardōy pad gugāy-muhrīhā ī Dādfarrox ī Dādōyān āwišt

Translation [1] Mardōy receives[ [2] for the period of three months from month [Tīr (4th month)] [3] of the year 49 (700/1 ce) …… [ [4] until Mihrīgān from Māhpērōz [5–7] money: 30 dirham. And Mardōy sealed the receipt with the witness’ seals of Dādfarrox, (son) of Dādōy.

Commentary Unpublished.

Line 1: For reading and interpretation of the complement -ty in MKBLWNty cf. the following conspectus of relevant examples which show that this abbreviation is arbitrarily used for the 1st sg. (‡) as well as for the 3rd sg. (‡‡) and pl. (‡‡‡) forms:

(‡) Berk. 20, 3–6: L ZNH BYRḤ | whwmn′ Y ŠNṬ W YWM lʾm | ḤG G○ ŠG G| ○ MN hwṭʾyk′ ʾp̄ʾm YNSBWNty man ēn māh | Wahman ī sāl 40 ud rōz Rām | gandum g(rīw) 40 ○ ǰaw g(rīw) 40 | ○ az xʷadāyīg abām stānēm ‘I will take out a loan (abām stānēm, line 6) this month [4] Wahman (11th month) of the year 40 and day Rām (21st day) [5] (on behalf of) 40 grīw of wheat (and) 40 grīw of barley [6] with You, Sir’;18 (‡) Berk. 68, 1–8: khlwd Y lsyk | gwpṭ′ ʾYK L nmk-swṭ′ | … | MN dʾṭynwndʾṭ′ Y PWN | yzdʾnʾp̄sṭʾn gʾlyk | MKBLWNty Kehrōy ī rahīg | guft kū man namak-sūd | ī abar čak kē ēn | ayādgār awi-š | wirāst ud nibišt ēstēd | az 18 Cf. Gignoux 2008, pp. 834–837, and Weber 2011, p. 291; finally Weber forthcoming, p. 5.

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Dādēnwindād ī pad | Yazdānābestān gālīg | padīrēm ‘Kehrōy, the page, said (that) I receive salted meat … from Dādēnwindād, member of the household19 in Yazdānābestān’;20 (‡) Berk. 244, 6: MN MRʿḤ MKBLWNty W ʿL mʾhgwšnsp̄′ YḤBWNm az xʷadāy padīrēm ud ō Māhgušnasp dahēm ‘I will receive (it) from You, Sir, and I shall give (it) to Māhgušnasp’;21 (‡‡) Berk. 78, 8–11: W ʾyw-lwck KḤDH ʿL yzdṭplhw′(?) lsyk Y yzdʾnpʾṭʾl ʾy YḤBWNyṭ | W pṭglʾb pṭ-š ḤG | YNSBWNty ud ēw-rōzag h°mist ō Yazdfarrox | rahīg ī Yazdānpādār ē dahēd | ud padīrāy pad-iš gandum | stānēd ‘And the total of one day ration to Yazdfarrox, [9] the boy of Yazdānpādār, You (“Sir”) should give, [10–11] and on presenting the receipt You will receive the wheat;’22 (‡‡) Berk. 86, 9–13: ŠG | G- ○ ʿL nmywl ʾy | ŠDRWNyṭ W ʿL dʾṭynwndʾṭ′ | ʾy ʾp̄sp̄ʾ lyṭ W pṭglʾb | (p)ṭ-š ʾy YNSBWNty ǰaw | grīw 20 ○ ō Namēwar ē | frēstēd ud ō Dādēnwindād | ē abespārēd ud padīrāy | (pa)d-iš ē stānēd ‘[9–10] 20 grīw of barley to Namēwar [11] You (“Sir”) should send and to Dādēnwindād [12] should entrust. And on presenting the receipt [13] You will get (it)’;23 (‡‡) Berlin 37, 1–7: ZNH BYRḤ mṭr′ Y ŠNṬ | X-IIII MKBLWNty mṭlwdy | Y dlcyk hmwck′ Y sʾmʾn′ | Y MN BYRḤ prwrṭyn′ Y | hm ŠNṬ X-IIII [prʾc]24 lʾd MN | dynʾp̄zʾnyt′ NKSYʾ | S-IIII ēn māh Mihr ī sāl | 34 padīrēd Mihrōy | ī darzīg hammōzag ī sāmān | ī az māh Frawardīn ī | ham sāl 34 [ frāz] rāy az | Dēnabzānīd xʷāstag | satēr 4 ‘[1] This month Mihr (7th month) of the year [2–3] 34 Mihrōy, the tailor, will receive in his function as (rāy, line 5) surveyor25 of the boundaries [4] starting with Frawardīn (1st month) [5] of the same year 34 from [6] Dēnabzānīd a payment [7] of 4 Staters’;26 (‡‡) Mazda 2, 9–10:27 W PWN gwkʾdymwdlyhʾ Y hm | [zʾṭʾnp]lhw′ pṭglʾb pṭ-š ḤG YNSBWNty ud pad gugāy-muhrīhā ī ham | [Zādānfa]rrox padīrāy pad-iš gandum stānēd ‘And on presenting the receipt with the witness’ seal(s) of the same [Zādānfa]rrox You will receive the wheat’; (‡‡‡) Berk. 189, 13–22: ḤG | G-III-III ʿL dʾṭynpnʾh | W yzdtwy YḤBWNṭ′ | W PWN gwkʾdymwdlyhʾ | Y pylwcʾmṭ′ Y | pṭwyšksṭʾn | pṭglʾb pṭ-š | YNSBWNty ck′ | ʾw(sṭʾn)dʾl | [ḤṬYMWNṭ] gandum | g(rīw) 6 ō Dādēnpanāh | ud Yazdōy dād | ud pad gugāy-muhrīhā | ī Pērōzāmad ī | Paywēšagestān | 19 See above sub Berk. 142, line 4, comm. 20 Gignoux 2010b, pp. 118–119; Gignoux 2019, p. 133 21 Weber forthcoming, p. 121. 22 Ibid., p. 44. 23 Ibid., p. 48. 24 Written above the line. 25 The various possibilities to render the term hammōzag will be discussed elsewhere, but cf. already above Berlin 4, 2 (comm.). 26 Ed. Weber 2008, pp. 155–156; corr. Gignoux 2010a, p. 119. 27 Weber forthcoming, p. 165.

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padīrāy pad-iš | stānēnd čak | ō(stān)dār | [āwišt] ‘[13–14] 6 grīw of wheat to Dādēnpanāh [15] and Yazdōy is to be given. [16] And with the witness’ seals [17] of Pērōzāmad from [18] Paywēšagestān [19] on presenting the receipt [20–22] they will receive (it). The Ō(stān)dār [sealed] the čak.’ Line 2: The restoration of the month name Tīr is due to the fact that the festival celebrated three months earlier than Mihrīgān is Tīragān in the month of Tīr.

Line 4: The reading of mṭrykʾn is undoubted. Mihrīgān denotes the Zoroastrian festivity to be celebrated on the 16th day (Mihr) of the 7th month (Mihr); see above comm. on Berk. 24, 4 and Berlin 4, 2. Line 6: Dādfarrox is also attested in Berk. 20, 15 (year 40), see Weber forthcoming, pp. 4–6.

Bibliography Bickerman, E. 1967: “The “Zoroastrian” Calendar.” In: ArOr 35, pp. 197–207. Boyce, M. 1970: “On the Calendar of the Zoroastrian Feasts.” In: BSOAS 33, 3, pp. 513–539. — 1983: “Iranian Festivals.” In: E. Yarshater (ed.): Cambridge History of Iran 3: The Seleucid, Arsacid and Sasanid Periods, Vol. II.. Cambridge, pp. 792–815. Colditz, I. 2000: Zur Sozialterminologie der iranischen Manichäer: eine semantische Analyse im Vergleich zu den nichtmanichäischen iranischen Quellen (Iranica 5). Wiesbaden. Gignoux, Ph. 1986: Noms propres sassanides en moyen-perse épigraphique. Wien. — 2001: “Nouveaux documents pehlevis sur soie.” In: Philologica et Linguistica (Historia, Pluralitas, Universitas) [Festschrift für Helmut Humbach zum 80. Geburtstag, hrsg. von Maria Gabriela Schmidt und Walter Bisang, Trier 2001, pp. 281–301. — 2003: “Sept documents économiques en pehlevi.” In: A. van Tongerloo (ed.): IRANICA SELECTA: Studies in honour of Professor Wojciech Skalmowski on the occasion of his seventieth birthday (Silk Road Studies VIII). Turnhout, pp. 79–89 (+ pl. I–VIII, pp. 273–280) [Re-edition of Gignoux 2001]. — 2008: “Lettres privées et lettres d’affaires dans l’Iran du 7ème siècle.” In: AS, LXII 3 (Documentary Letters from the Middle East: The Evidence in Greek, Coptic, South Arabian, Pehlevi, and Arabic (1st – 15th c ce), pp. 827–842. — 2009: “Les comptes de Monsieur Friyag : Quelques documents économiques en Pehlevi.” In: Sources pour l’histoire et la géographie du monde iranien (224–710) [Res Orientales XVIII], pp. 115–142. — 2010a: “Un nouvel ouvrage de référence de la papyrologie pehlevie : Note de lecture [Rev. of Weber 2008].” In: StIr 39, 1, pp. 111–120. — 2010b: “La collection de textes attribuables à Dādēn-vindād dans l’archive pehlevie de Berkeley.” In: Sources for the History of Sasanian and Post-Sasanian Iran (Res Orientales XIX), pp. 11–134.

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— 2019: “Les « Mémoires » dans l’archive pehlevie de Berkeley/Berlin.” In: A. Hintze/D. Durkin-Meisterernst/C. Naumann (eds.): A Thousand Judgements (Festschrift for Maria Macuch). Wiesbaden, pp. 127–140. Junker, H. F. J. 1912: The Frahang i Pahlavīk, edited by Heinrich F. J. Junker, and published with the assistance of the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences. Heidelberg. Korn, A. 2006: “Parthian Month Names and Calendars.” In: Parthica 8, pp. 153–167. Steingass, F. 1963: A Comprehensive Persian-English Dictionary. Fifth Impression. London. Weber, D. 1989: “Eine iranistische Kleinigkeit (zu lat. zanca ‘Schuh’).” In: HS 102, pp. 127–128. — 1992: Pahlavi Papyri, Pergamente und Ostraca (Textband) [Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum]. London. — 2003: Papyri, Pergamente und Leinenfragmente in mittelpersischer Sprache. Unter Mitarbeit von W. Brashear herausgegeben von Dieter Weber. Fotografien von Margarete Büsing und Eva Maria Borgwaldt (Textband) [Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum]. London. — 2007: “Pahlavi Morphology.” In: Alan S. Kaye (ed.): Morphologies of Asia and Africa. Winona Lake, pp. 941–973. — 2008: Berliner Pahlavi-Dokumente. Zeugnisse spätsassanidischer Brief- und Rechtskultur aus früh-islamischer Zeit. Mit Beiträgen von Myriam Krutzsch und Maria Macuch (IRANICA 15). Wiesbaden. — 2010: “The Pahlavi Script as a Medium of Iranian Identity. Some Palaeographical Notes.” In: Carlo G. Cereti (ed.): Iranian Identity in the Course of History. Proceedings of the Conference Held in Rome, 21–24 September 2005 (Serie Orientale Roma CV, Orientalia Romana 9). Roma, pp. 347–356. — 2011: “Philippe Gignoux’ Beitrag zur Interpretation der Dokumente des “Pahlavi Archive in Berkeley, Ca.” In: Florilège offert à Philippe Gignoux pour son 80e anniversaire (Textes réunis par Rika Gyselen et Christelle Jullien). Paris, pp. 283–303. — 2012 [2008]: “New Arguments for Dating the Documents from the ‘Pahlavi Archive’.” In: BAI 22, pp. 215–222. — 2013: “Taxation in Pahlavi Documents from Early Islamic Times (late 7th century ce).” In: S. Toxtas′ev/P. Lur′e (eds.): Commentationes Iranicae (Sbornik statej k 90-letiju V.A. Livšica). Sankt-Peterburg, pp. 171–181. — 2014 [2008]: “Villages and Estates in the Documents from the Pahlavi Archive: The Geographical Background.” In: BAI 24, pp. 39–67. — 2016a: “Court Records of Lawsuits in Tabarestān in the Year 86/7 PYE (737 ce): A Philological Examination.” In: Words and Symbols: Sasanian Objects and the Tabarestān Archive (Res Orientales XXIV), pp. 121–142. — 2016b [2012]: “Studies in Some Documents from the ‘Pahlavi Archive’.” In: BAI 26, pp. 61–95. — 2017 [2013]: “Accountancy of a Zoroastrian Craftsman in Early Islamic Times (662–664 ce).” In: BAI 27, pp. 129–141. — 2018 [2014]: “Pahlavi Documents of Windādburzmihrābād, the Estate of a Zoroastrian Entreprêneur in Early Islamic Times (With an Excursus on the Origin of the Fulanabad-Type of Village Names).” In: BAI 28, pp. 127–147.

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— 2019a: “The Story of Windād-Burzmihr. A Zoroastrian Entrepreneur in Early Islamic Times.” In: A. Hintze/D. Durkin-Meisterernst/C. Naumann (eds.): A Thousand Judgements (Festschrift for Maria Macuch). Wiesbaden, pp. 373–384. — 2019b [2015]: “Studies in Some Documents from the ‘Pahlavi Archive’ (2).” In: BAI 29, pp. 79–116. — forthcoming: Pahlavi Letters. A Survey of Documents from the “Pahlavi Archive” together with those from Egypt and Tabarestan. London.

Word Index abbr. cal. encl. geogr.n. inf. part. patr. pl. p.n. postpos. pron. prp. prt. sg. vb.

abbreviation calendar enclitic geographical name infinitive particle patronymic plural personal name postposition pronoun preposition preterite singular verb

ʾMYṭl mādar mother Berk. 24, 4. 142, 10. Berlin 5, 1. 8. ʾn ān that, he Berlin 5, 4. ʾškʾnyck′ Aškānīzag p.n. Berlin 4, 1. 4. ʾwhrmzdʾp̄zwṭ′ Ōhrmazdabzūd p.n. Berk. 142, 1. ʾwsṭʾndʾl ōstāndār title Berk. 142, 13. ʿL ō prp. to, at Berk. 24, 11. 142, 4. 9. BYRḤ māh month Berk. 24, 2. 88, 2. -c -iz encl. also, even: ZK-m-c ān-am-iz Berlin 5, 5. ck′ čak cheque, payment (order) Berk. 24, 13. 142, 12. dʾṭplhw′ Dādfarrox p.n. Berk. 88, 6. dʾṭwdʾn Dādōyān patr. Berk. 88, 7. dlcyk darzīg tailor Berlin 4, 1. dpyr′ dibīr scribe Berlin 4, 3. dwlk′ dōlag pail Berk. 24, 6. 10. 142, 7. 9. dynʾp̄zwṭ′ Dēnabzūd p.n. Berlin 4, 3. 5, 3. gʾlyk gālīg *household member Berk. 142, 4. GBʾ kabīz (paymānag) measure, proportion, quota, (gl.) ìäBáïI Berk. 24, 5. 142, 6. grmk′ garmak *beans Berk. 24, 7. gwc′ gōz nut Berk. 24, 8. 142, 8.

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gwkʾdy-mwdlyhʾ gugāy-muhrīhā Berk. 88, 6. Berlin 4, 5. hmwck′ hammōzag procurator Berlin 4, 2. ḤS may wine Berk. 24, 9. ḤS-X Berk. 142, 8. ḤṬYMWNṭ āwišt prt. seal Berk. 24, 14. 142, 7. 14. Berlin 4, 6. 5, 9. hwlṭk xʷurdag small particle(s) Berk. 24, 6. 142, 7. hwlyn′ Xwarin p.n. Berk. 24, 1. hwrdṭ Hordād cal. 3rd month Teheran F, 3. hwslwbʾn Xusrōyān p.n. Berk. 24, 5. Berlin 5, 1. 2. 8. K kabīz abbr. measurement for cereals etc., 1/10 grīw: K-#III-II Berk. 24, 8. KḤDH h°mist all Berk. 142, 3. krṭn′ kardan inf. make, do, organize Berk. 142, 6. kwṭk kōdag small, young pl. Berk. 142, 3. lʾd rāy postpos. for, for the sake of Berk. 24, 5. 88, 4. 142, 2. Berlin 4, 3. 5, 3. LʿYN′ pēš before, in front of Berk. 24, 12. 142, 10. -m -(a)m encl. pron. 1st sg. : ZK-m-c ān-am-iz Berlin 5, 5. mʾhp̄ylwc′ Māhpērōz p.n. Berk. 88, 4. MKBLWN- padīriftan, padīr- vb. receive, accept: MKBLWNty Berk. 88, 1. Berlin 4, 1. 5, 1. 4. mlṭwy Mardōy p.n. Berk. 88, 1. 6. MN az prp. from Berk. 88, 2. 4. 142, 2. 3. Berlin 4, 3. 5, 3. mn′ man a measure for wool etc. Berk. 24, 7. 142, 8. Berlin 5, 7. mṭr′ Mihr cal. 7th month Berk. 24, 2. mṭrykʾn Mihrīgān the Mihragān-festival Berk. 24, 4. 88, 4. Berlin 4, 2. nʾcwk nāzuk tender, gentle Berlin 5, 6. NKSYʾ xʷāstag money Berk. 88, 5. Berlin 4, 3. nmywl Namēwar geogr.n. Berk. 142, 5. nwk-lwc′ nōg-rōz New Year′s day Berk. 142, 1. Berlin 5, 2. NYŠH zan wife Berk. 24, 1. pdy pay foot, shoe: pdy-II Berlin 5, 6. plʾdy Frāy p.n. Berk. 24, 14. plmwṭ framūd prt. order Berk. 142, 5. plsṭʾl paristār maidservant Berk. 24, 11. 142, 9. pnbk pambag cotton Berlin 5, 7. pnyl panīr cheese Berk. 24, 6. pnyl-II 142, 7. prʾc frāz forth, forwards Berk. 88, 4. PRG nēm half Berk. 142, 7. pṭglʾb padīrāy receipt Berk. 88, 5. Berlin 4, 4. 5, 5. 8. pṭmwzn paymōzan garment Berlin 5, 4. pṭ-š pad-iš postpos. = PWN Berlin 5, 5. PWN pad prp. to, at, in, on Berk. 88, 6. 142, 5. Berlin 4, 5. 5, 6. pylʾhn pīrāhan shirt Berlin 5, 7. pyš pēš before Berlin 5, 4. S satēr abbr. stater: S-IIII Berlin 4, 4. symʾhk′ sÃmāhag a time space of three months Berk. 88, 2. -š: pṭ-š pad-iš Berlin 5, 5. ZY-š ī-š Berk. 24, 12. šlwʾl šalwār trousers: šlwʾl-II Berlin 5, 6.

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Sasanian Festivals in the Documents from the “Pahlavi Archive”

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ŠNṬ sāl year Berk. 24, 3. 88, 3. 142, 2. Berlin 4, 2. 5, 3. ṭk′ tag running; (horse) race Berk. 142, 5. ṬWB did again, then, further Berk. 24, 6. 142, 5. W ud and Berk. 88, 5. 142, 7. Berlin 4, 4. 5, 5. 6(2x). 8. wndʾṭ′ windād prt. find, acquire Berlin 5, 7. wndʾtbwlcmṭr′ Windād-Burzmihr p.n. Berlin 4, 6. Y ī Iẓāfe, relative part. Berk. 24, 1. 2. 4(2x). 88, 3. 6. 7. 142, 2. 4(2x). 9. 10. Berlin 4, 1. 2(2x). 3. 5. 6. 5, 1. 2(2x). 4. 8. Cf. ZY-š. yʾmk′ ǰāmag clothing Berlin 5, 2. YḤBWN- dādan, dah- vb. give: YḤBWNṭ′ prt. Berk. 24, 13. 142, 12. yšn-gwptʾl ǰašn-guftār the Speaker of the Festival Berlin 4, 5. ywdṭ′ ǰud separate, different: ǰud az except Berk. 142, 3. yzdʾnpnʾh Yazdānpanāh p.n. Berk. 142, 11. ZK ān that, he Berk. 142, 4. ZK-m-c ān-am-iz Berlin 5, 5. ZNH ēn this Berk. 24, 2. ZWZN drahm dirham Berk. 88, 5. ZY-š ī-š Iẓāfe + encl. pron. 3rd sg. Berk. 24, 12. I Berlin 5, 7(2x). II Berk. 24, 7. III-II Berk. 24, 10. X Berk. 88, 5. X-III-II Berk. 142, 2. X-IIII-III Berlin 5, 3. X-III-III-III Berlin 4, 2. -IIII-IIII Berk. 24, 3. -III-III-III Berk. 88, 3. III-II-C Berk. 24, 9. 142, 8.

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