CHAPTER VIII.

In the form in which we have them the books of the Avesta are the work of the priests of Eastern Iran. According to the evidence repeatedly furnished by them, there were three orders in Sogdiana and Bactria: priests, warriors, and husbandmen. This sequence, which is uniformly preserved both in the invocations and in the book of the law, shows that the priests had risen above the warriors, and claimed to be the first of the three orders.[312]

In considering the civilisation of the Bactrian kingdom we found ourselves compelled by the proximity of the nations of the steppes to assume, that when the Arians had become established there, the tribes which had a capacity or love for battle, undertook the protection of the land, the flocks and fields, against the incursions of the nomads of the north, and made battle and strife their special vocation. Such attacks increased with the increasing culture of Bactria, and led to a consolidation of powers; these clans raised one of their number distinguished in battle to be theirleader, or followed him, and thus was laid the basis for the foundation of a great state. The importance ascribed in the Avesta to the splendour of majesty—we find the personification of good government in the Avesta among the Amesha Çpentas—in combination with the battles which, as we learn from the book, the princes of Bactria carried on against the Turanians, and with the statements in the West Iranian Epos about the kingdom of the Bactrians, together with the later condition of the country, allowed us to draw the conclusion that at one time the kings of Bactria were not without power and importance. They reigned, surrounded by the families of the warriors, who were enabled by their possessions in lands and flocks, to devote themselves to the practice of arms and to battle. The invocations to Mithra, Verethraghna, and Vayu, bear upon them very evident traces of a war-like spirit (p. 110, 114). That the spirits of the sky, which once fought with the cloud-dragons, have become mortal heroes in the Avesta, also proves—since even among other nations the Epic poetry which follows periods of warlike excitement transforms shapes of the sky into heroes of old time—that once on a time Bactria had experienced a period of warfare, when difficulties arose which it was mainly the business of the monarchy and the nobles to settle. The Avesta can tell us of arms and robes as well as of palaces with pillars and turrets; of earthen, iron, silver and golden vessels; of mats, carpets, and adornments of gold,[313]such as are found among noble families; and those hecatombs of horses, cattle, and sheep which the heroes in the Avesta sacrifice to Anahita and Drvaçpa, in order to obtain their favour by victory, are no doubt borrowed from the sacrificeswhich princes and nobles were wont to offer in cases where the numbers must be enlarged in honour of the heroes. Yet we see that Xerxes orders a thousand oxen to be sacrificed at one time. We have already shown (IV. 390), how important and pre-eminent was the position which the races of the warriors, "the princes," occupied on the Indus and the Ganges, and what respect they commanded among "the free Indians" in the Panjab, even in the fourth centuryB.C.That a warlike nobility of a similar character, attitude, and position, existed in Eastern Iran, is the less to be doubted, as the order of warriors in the Avesta is denoted by a name (rathaestar) which goes back to the chariots of war. The husbandmen, who were settled beside and among them, bear in the Avesta the name of Vaçtrya,[314]but the word Vaeçu is also used for them, which simply repeats the name of the Indian Vaiçyas.

Like the Arians of India, the Arians of Iran believed in the power of the correct invocations, prayers, and sacrifice; among them also the sacrifice strengthens the gods and increases their power. In India too, the priests, and minstrels, and sacrificers handed down in their families the knowledge of the effective invocations and ceremonies which exercised compulsion on the gods, and the same was the case in Eastern Iran; priestly families arose at a very early period. They did not here retain the name of supplicators, as in India; but are called Athravas in the Avesta. In the Veda Atharvan kindles the sacrificial fire, and among the Arians of India the incantations of the race of Atharvan passed from the most powerful. In a similar way powerful invocations and sentences were handed down in Iran from father to son in the race of theAthravas. These families preserved the ancient invocations to Mithra, Verethraghna, Anahita, Tistrya, which are preserved to us in the Avesta, though in a modified form. The god Haoma instructs Zarathrustra to praise him, as the other fire-priests had done (p. 124). The reform which bears the name of Zarathrustra cannot have left the condition of the priests unchanged. The doctrine may, as invocations in the Avesta would seem to show, have first found adherents in the race of Haechataçpa, to which Zarathrustra belonged, and to which he first proclaimed his law (131), and next in the race of Jamaçpa and Frashaostra, who are spoken of as Zarathrustra's most zealous followers. According to the creed of the Parsees the good law also came to Aderbat Mahresfant by family descent (p. 62). These new races of priests, who knew the sayings, invocations, and prayers of Zarathrustra, would then be joined by those among the races of the old fire-priests who approved of the reform, and the priesthood thus formed would be further strengthened by those who, deeply impressed by the new doctrine, sought and found reception as pupils into a family of the priests, thus entering into their circle, and becoming members of their families. United by a new doctrine and settled tenets, the priests who represented the reform would become united together more firmly than the priestly families of the old time.

The priesthood could very well claim precedence of the warriors; on their prayers and sayings, their knowledge of the custom of sacrifice, depended the favour of the gods, the power of averting evil spirits, the removal of pollution, salvation in this world and the next. Yet they could not obtain such a position as the Brahmans held on the Ganges after the reform ofthe ancient faith, and the victory of Brahman over Indra. For in Iran there was no order of Çudras, no vanquished remnant of an old population, which created a sharp line of division even among the orders of the Aryas; and moreover the Brahmans were the first-born of Brahman, a purer incarnation of the divine nature than any other order. The world had not emanated from Auramazda; there were in Iran no gradations of beings in which the divine essence existed in a more or less pure condition. All had to fight against evil deities and against evil; the priests were the leaders in this struggle—this leadership and nothing more could they claim. In their lives they studied especial purity of body and mind; and they were pre-eminently "the pure men." Only by their means, at any rate with their assistance, could sacrifice be offered; from their mouths alone could the correct invocations be uttered to the gods, and the evil ones be driven away. Men were compelled to submit to the rules of the life acceptable to the gods of light, of pure conversation, which were accurately known to the priests only; they had to take upon themselves the expiations which the priests prescribed, in order to wipe out offences and sins and their consequences—but they had not to reverence in them, as was the case beyond the Indus, a class of creatures raised by birth to a higher level. Hence the sharp separation of the priesthood from the rest of the orders, in the Brahmanic fashion, was at once placed out of the question. The priesthood of Iran perpetuated their knowledge and wisdom in their families; but they had not the right to bar all entrance into their families or their order on the score of higher birth, or to prohibit the marriage of priests with women of other orders, on the ground of their superior nature.

From our fragments of the Avesta we may assume that although, as is obvious, the precedence of the priests above the remaining orders was strongly marked, and they were especially denoted as "pure men," the limits of their political and social position were far more modest than those of the Brahmans. So far as we can see, the Avesta allots no special income to the priests beyond the camels, horses, or small cattle given to them by warriors and husbandmen in quittance for the purifications they have performed. The penalties also which have to be paid in expiation of certain offences are to be given to "the pure men," and the Avesta repeatedly recommends the presentation of gifts to them. On the other hand, the priests do not possess the exclusive right to perform purifications. The Vendidad merely says that any one who wishes to perform purifications must have learned the law from one of the purifiers,i. e.it is only the instruction of the priest which is indispensable in this matter. Any one who performs purification without such instruction (except in the case of necessary purifications, p. 230), will take away from the places where it is performed, "food and fatness, health and all remedies, prosperity, luxuriance and growth, and increase of corn and fodder; and corn and fodder will not return to such places until for three days and nights the holy Çraosha has been praised at the burning fire with bound withes and uplifted Haoma." The uncertified purifier is to be put in chains, his clothes taken from him, and his head cut off.[315]If it was permitted to learn the purifications, it follows that men not of priestly descent could enter the order of the Athravas, and the boundary line between this order and the rest was not impassable. Among the Parsees of India any one can become apriest. The duties of the priest, according to the book of the law, consist in watching and tending the sacred fire, in praising the good spirits, in offering sacrifice, and performing purifications, and in the ceaseless study of the holy scriptures. The priest is to be provided with a mortar made according to certain rules, a cup (for the Haoma sacrifice), the snake-switch (a stick for killing impure animals), and the Paitidana,i. e.a piece of cloth for veiling the mouth, in order that he may not approach the sacred fire with breath that is possibly impure. For the rest, the Vendidad lays down the rule that the priests are to be patient and content, and satisfied with a little bread, and they ought to eat what is offered to them.[316]Auramazda says; "Many men, O Zarathrustra, carry the Paitidana, the serpent-switch, the sacred bundle of twigs, without being guided according to the law. These are wrongly called priests; do not thou call them priests, O Zarathrustra. He who lies the whole night without praising or hearing, or reciting, or learning, or teaching—call not such an one a priest. Call him a priest, O pure Zarathrustra, who inquires of the pure intelligence the whole night, of the wisdom which purifies from sins and makes the heart wide, which has merits in store on the bridge of Chinvat, and causes us to attain the purity and bliss of Paradise."[317]The Avesta distinguishes different classes of priests, but the distinction only rests on the various acts which they perform in the sacred rites. The first rank is taken by the Zaotar, who utters the prayers and invocations (the Hotar,i. e.the Repeater of the Veda); next to him apparently is the Çraoshavareza, "who speaks very wise and truthful things;"[318]he bears the club of Çraosha,in order to keep the evil spirits at a distance from the sacred acts; then comes the Atarevaksha,i. e.the priest who causes the fire to increase, and attends to the worship of it; then the Açnatar (the Washer), who has to cleanse the instruments of sacrifice to keep them from pollution; the Frabaretar,i. e.the Carrier, etc. In the modern ritual of the Parsees all the duties of the sacred service have been transferred to the Zaotar and the Raçpi, which latter discharges the functions of ministering priest.

If we were only approximately correct in placing the date of Zarathrustra and the reform of the ancient faith at 1000B.C., the formation of this priestly order, which took place on the basis of the new doctrine, may have come to an end about the year 800B.C.We saw that from this date onwards the spread of the new doctrine must have begun in the west of Iran towards the Medes and Persians, since there existed among the Medes from 700B.C.an hereditary priesthood, charged with the worship of the gods according to the regulations of Zarathrustra, and in this century it was already sufficiently numerous to be placed as an equal division beside the tribes of the Medes.

We have no better information about the priests of the West than we have on the political and social position of the priests of Eastern Iran. They are not called Athravas but Magush. This name is first found in the inscription which Darius caused to be cut on the rock-wall of Behistun; afterwards it was consistently used by Western writers, from Herodotus to Agathias, for the priests of Iran. The Avesta has the wordsmaghaandmaghavan, i. e. the powerful, the great,[319]butdoes not use it of the priests, which are always called Athravas. If the last title is taken from the fire-worship, the first allows us to see the importance of the priests. He who can use incantations to the gods and spirits—can summon or remove them—is the mighty one, the powerful. If in this name we have evidence of the respect with which the laity of Western Iran looked up to the priests, the difference between the names in the East and West shows that there were priestly races among the Medes and Persians before the religion of Zarathrustra reached them. Had not such existed before the reform, and had they not possessed a definite name in the West—had priestly families become known there for the first time at the rise of the reform—they would never have had any other name than that of Athravas. Even without this positive proof we might assume that from all antiquity there had been priests among the Medes and Persians who understood how to invoke the gods of light in the old Arian faith—Mithra and Verethraghna, Vayu and Tistrya—and tend the fire which destroyed demons. When the new doctrine reached from the East to Ragha and then to Media (p. 96), the old races who passed over to the new faith united with the families the members of which were the prophets of the new doctrine. The teachers of the Medes in old times, which Pliny called successors of Zarathrustra, might have stood at the head of this transformation of theancient priestly families, of the creation of the Median priesthood on the basis of the new religion (p. 92). However this may have been, the priestly families among the Medes were so numerous, their connection and union so close and firmly fixed, that they could be counted as a sixth tribe beside the other five Median tribes.

Among the tribes of the Persians Herodotus mentions no tribe of Magi. It would be a mistake to conclude from this that there were originally no priests among the Persians, and to put faith in Xenophon's statement that Cyrus was the first to give the Magians the care of the sacred fire, "because he preferred to go on board with the pious rather than the impious."[320]No one will maintain that the Persians in ancient times were without worship and religious rites, or that when they accepted the doctrine of Zarathrustra, which did not permit sacrifice without Magians, they used the services of none but alien priests. Such a proceeding would be absurd. The proper conclusion from the fact that Herodotus does not mention a tribe of Magians among the Persians is that the priestly families there were less numerous; they had not broken away from the tribal connections to which they originally belonged, and formed themselves into a separate community. Further, from the fact that the priestly families of the Persians in old times had not formed themselves into a separate community, we may conclude—and indeed the conclusion follows from the position of Media and the notice in the Avesta about Ragha, and the observation about the ancient teachers of the Medes, who are said to have been followers of Zarathrustra—that the reform of the faith first came from Bactria to the Medes,that it was adopted and more strongly represented among them, and so passed on to the Persians. We cannot doubt that there were Persians belonging to the order of Magians. If Plato and his pupils call Zoroaster the "teacher of the Magians," and at the same time "a Persian," they must assume that there were Magians among the Persians; if, according to Plato's statement, the four teachers of the heirs to the Persian throne, of which one had to teach the Magism of Zoroaster, were selected out of "all the Persians;"—if at the time of Xerxes there were Persians who wrote on the doctrine of Zoroaster, they must have been initiated in the wisdom and knowledge of the Magians, and have known their invocations and customs; the contents of the holy scriptures and the scriptures themselves can hardly have been hidden from them. In order to prove that the Magians,i. e.the priests, belonged exclusively to the Medes, the fact has been brought forward that the Persians, after Darius had dethroned the Pseudo-Smerdis, celebrated each year the feast of the slaughter of the Magians, at which no Magian allowed himself to be seen, but all were obliged to remain at home.[321]The Magophonia was not the celebration of a victory over the Magi generally, but over the removal of a usurper, and the restoration of the dominion to the Achæmenids, which had been taken from them by one who happened to be a Magian. Herodotus at any rate calls this Magian a Mede.[322]Darius contents himself with calling him the "Magian." Hence there is no ground to doubt that both before and after the reform, families of the Persians were charged with the worship of the gods; the less so because Plato, as alreadyremarked, represents the heirs to the throne in Persia as being instructed in the doctrine of Zoroaster, while Strabo and Pausanias speak expressly of "Persian Magi," and the chief Magian is enumerated among the tribes "which dwell in the districts of Persis."[323]

When the dominion of the Achæmenids had been established over Iran, the priestly families of all the West must have been united into one community. There is no doubt that this remained an order in which the priestly wisdom and knowledge were traditional. Strabo, like Herodotus, calls the Magians a tribe; he adds that the members of it sought after a holy life. The tribe was large, he tells us in another place; Magians could be found even in Cappadocia. Ammianus also informs us that the Magians handed down their doctrines to later times, each by his descendants. Growing up through centuries from a small number, the Magians became a nation, and being regarded as dedicated to the service of the gods, they had acquired respect through their religion. They inhabited open villages, lived according to a law of their own, and possessed fruitful fields in the district called Nisæa. Agathias also calls the Magians a tribe.[324]But the separation of the priestly order in the West cannot have been more strict than that of the Athravas in the East. Marriage with the women of other orders was not forbidden, nor transition from other orders into that of the Medes. The Avesta speaks of the teacher and the pupil (p. 203); and it is expressly said—though the statement comes from the beginning of the third century of our era—that the Magians among the Persians,i. e.the Magiansunder the Arsacids, instructed even those who were not Persians in their doctrine, but only at the special command of the king.[325]

We find the Magians in close proximity to the rulers of the Medes and Persians; they were not without importance and influence. In Herodotus they tell Astyages that they had and would have great honours from him.[326]Xenophon speaks of them as determining, at the time of Cyrus, which god is to be honoured on each day.[327]Cambyses charges Magians with the duty of watching the grave of Cyrus, and this office became hereditary in their families;[328]he also entrusts a Magian with the care of the royal household, while he marches with the army into the remote parts of Egypt and Nubia. The inscriptions of Darius showed us how much in earnest he was with the doctrines and regulations of the religion—how lively was his faith. On his march to Hellas, Xerxes was accompanied by Osthanes, a man skilled in the priestly dogmas, and by Magians; they offer sacrifice, and charm the storms.[329]The sacred fire which was carried before the kings[330]was conducted by Magians, and so also were the sacred chariot, the sacred horses of Mithra and the sun-god, in the campaigns of the Achæmenids (p. 167). Of greater importance was it that the heirs to the throne in Persia were instructed, as Plato tells us, in the Magism of Zoroaster,[331]which could only be done by Magians. Nicolaus of Damascus relates that the Persian princes were instructed by the Magians in truthfulness, justice, and the laws of their country;[332]and, according to Plutarch, Magians were the educatorsof the Persian princes; Magians also under the Achæmenids performed the consecration at the accession of a new king.[333]We are also told that this king of the Medes and that of the Persians, took the advice of the Magians on important occasions. Under the Arsacids they formed, along with the members of the race of the kings, the supreme council of the kingdom; in the time when this dynasty was at its height they ruled, as Pliny told us, "over the king of kings;" and we have seen (p. 60) that their influence under the Sassanids, at court, in the administration of law, and in politics, was even more powerful.

Herodotus maintains that the Magians also occupied themselves with soothsaying and prophecy; like Ctesias, he ascribes to the Medes the interpretation of certain dreams and other miraculous acts. Of such interpretations and prophesying on the part of the priests the Avesta knows nothing, and those Greeks who were better informed, warmly contested the assertion that the Magians were occupied with such things. Plato tells us: "The Magism of Zoroaster is the worship of the gods;" and Aristotle assures us that the Magians knew nothing of soothsaying.[334]What Herodotus tells us, on the other side, he certainly did not invent, but repeats after his informants. The Medo-Persian Epos, which, though indirectly, forms the basis of Herodotus' account of the rise of Cyrus and the death of Cambyses, allowed a wide field, even in the account of the fall of the Assyrian empire (III. 264), to the astrological and prophetic wisdom of the Chaldæans. From this we may conclude that prophecies of the Chaldæans were not left out of sight at the overthrow of Astyages. In Nicolaus of Damascus it is a Chaldæan of Babylon who expoundsher dream to the mother of Cyrus,[335]and possibly the kings of the Medes followed the example of the Assyrian and Babylonian courts in having astrologers and interpreters of dreams from Babylon about them.

Whatever was the influence employed by the Magians at the court of the Achæmenids, the Arsacids and Sassanids, their influence was of a moral nature; it was only through the effect of religion on the heart and conscience of the king, that they could work; their position did not rest on any hierarchical institutions. In Iran the priesthood had no real means of power which permitted it to come forward in opposition to the power of the State. The priest was a subject of the king like any one else. It was within the king's power to proceed at his pleasure with the severest corporal punishment against the Magi, and it is abundantly clear that the kings did not shrink from inflicting such punishments, even if we do not regard as established facts the stories that Astyages impaled the Magians who had given him a false report, and that Darius caused forty Magians to be executed at once.[336]

Diogenes Laertius relates that the Magians lived on lentils, bread and cheese, which agrees with the Avesta to the extent that the priests are there commanded to be content with a little food.[337]What Herodotus tells us of the duties and occupation of the Magians agrees entirely with the rules given in the Avesta for theAthravas. No one could sacrifice without a Magian; the sacrifices were offered on high places (in this Xenophon agrees[338]) or in "pure places;" the most delicate grass was spread—we remember the importance of the Kuça-grass in the Veda and the Brahmanas—on this grass the flesh of the sacrifice was laid; the Magians sang the theogony,i. e.long sacrificial prayers, and the sacred rite is fulfilled. Herodotus also asserts that the Magians took great pride in killing serpents, ants, and other winged and creeping things with their own hands; that human life was greatly respected by them; that the dog was held in high honour (p. 86); and the corpses of the Magians were exposed to dogs or birds of prey. This he declares that he knows to be the truth; Xenophon represents the Magians as beginning their songs of praise with the break of day, and as offering their sacrifices at certain places, which were selected for the gods. Curtius relates that they sang native songs.[339]Strabo told us above that the Magians sought after a holy life; he observes also that whatever was the god to which they sacrificed they first prayed to fire. At every sacrifice the Magians conducted the sacred rite; the victims were not slain with the knife but struck down with a club. No part of the flesh of the victim was set apart for the deity, for they declared that the god required only the soul of the animal; yet according to some they placed a small portion of the fat in the fire. "In Cappadocia there were enclosed places," Strabo continues, "in the midst of which was an altar, heaped up with ashes. On this the Magians kept up the unquenchable fire. Each day they went and sang for an hour before the fire, holding in their hands a bundle of twigs. On theirheads they wore tiaras of felt, which fell down on both sides so far that the side-pieces covered the lips."[340]Pausanias, who observed the worship of the Magians in the cities of Lydia, says: "At both places there was a shrine with a cell, and in the cell is an altar; on this are ashes the colour of which is not the ordinary colour of ashes. When the Magian comes into the cell, he lays the dry wood on the altar, puts the tiara on his head, and sings the invocation to some god or another, in a barbarian manner, quite unintelligible to the Hellenes; but he sings from a book. Then the pieces of wood, without being kindled, ought to become lighted, and a flame from them should flash all round the cell."[341]

FOOTNOTES:[312]"Vend." 2, 87-89; "Yaçna," 14, 4-6. If in "Yaçna," 19, 46 four occupations are mentioned instead of the four orders, and artisans are added to the husbandmen, this is only another theory, which does not, however, alter the series and system; in India the order of Vaiçyas comprises husbandmen, merchants, and artisans.[313]"Vond." 8, 254.[314]Under the Sassanids we find a chief of the husbandmen (vaçtriosan), and a chief of the warriors (arthestaran); Nöldeke, "Tabari," s. 110.[315]"Vend." 9, 172-180, 187-196.[316]"Vend." 13, 126-129.[317]"Vend." 18, 1-17.[318]"Vispered," 3, 13, 14. Above, p. 165.[319]The Mobedh of Middle Persian ismagupat, i. e. lord of the Magians (p. 60). The derivation of the name Magus from the Turanianimga(apparently = honourable) can only be adopted by those who regard the Magians as descendants of the Turanians, or at any rate as containing a strong admixture of Turanians; a view which rests on the theory that the second series in the inscriptions of the Achæmenids is the Median translation of the Persian inscriptions. With this view I cannot agree; all that we learn from the Greeks of the customs, manners, and names of the Medes bears the mark of an Arian origin, and is in harmony with what is attributed to the Persians. In the inscription of the second class at Behistun, Gaumata is not calledimgabutmagush.[320]"Cyri instit." 8, 1, 23.[321]Herod. 3, 79.[322]Herod. 3, 73.[323]Strabo, p. 727; Pausanias, 5, 27, 3.[324]Ammian. 23, 6, 32-35; Agathias, 2, 26.[325]Philostratus in Rapp, "Z. D. M. G." 20, 71.[326]Herod. 1, 120.[327]"Cyri instit." 7, 5, 20; 8, 1, 8.[328]Arrian, "Anab." 6, 29.[329]Herod. 7, 191.[330]Curtius, 3, 7; Ammian. 23, 6, 34.[331]"Alcibiad. I." p. 122.[332]Nic. Dam. fragm. 67, ed. Müller.[333]Plut. "Artaxerxes," c. 3.[334]Diog. Laert. prooem. 6.[335]Fragm. 66, ed. Müller; cf. infra Bk. 8, c. 4.[336]Herod. 1, 128; Ctes. "Pers." 15. The excerpt says 40 Chaldæans, but obviously Magi are here meant.[337]Prooem. 7. Above, p. 190. The further statements of Diogenes about the white robes of the Magians, their avoidance of all ornament and gold, of their lying on the ground, and staff of reed, deserve little notice, inasmuch as the source whence they are derived is unknown.[338]"Cyri instit." 8, 7, 3.[339]"Cyri instit." 8, 7, 3; 7, 5, 20; 8, 1, 8; Curtius, 3, 3, 8.[340]Strabo, p. 733.[341]Pausan. 5, 27, 5, 6.

[312]"Vend." 2, 87-89; "Yaçna," 14, 4-6. If in "Yaçna," 19, 46 four occupations are mentioned instead of the four orders, and artisans are added to the husbandmen, this is only another theory, which does not, however, alter the series and system; in India the order of Vaiçyas comprises husbandmen, merchants, and artisans.

[313]"Vond." 8, 254.

[314]Under the Sassanids we find a chief of the husbandmen (vaçtriosan), and a chief of the warriors (arthestaran); Nöldeke, "Tabari," s. 110.

[315]"Vend." 9, 172-180, 187-196.

[316]"Vend." 13, 126-129.

[317]"Vend." 18, 1-17.

[318]"Vispered," 3, 13, 14. Above, p. 165.

[319]The Mobedh of Middle Persian ismagupat, i. e. lord of the Magians (p. 60). The derivation of the name Magus from the Turanianimga(apparently = honourable) can only be adopted by those who regard the Magians as descendants of the Turanians, or at any rate as containing a strong admixture of Turanians; a view which rests on the theory that the second series in the inscriptions of the Achæmenids is the Median translation of the Persian inscriptions. With this view I cannot agree; all that we learn from the Greeks of the customs, manners, and names of the Medes bears the mark of an Arian origin, and is in harmony with what is attributed to the Persians. In the inscription of the second class at Behistun, Gaumata is not calledimgabutmagush.

[320]"Cyri instit." 8, 1, 23.

[321]Herod. 3, 79.

[322]Herod. 3, 73.

[323]Strabo, p. 727; Pausanias, 5, 27, 3.

[324]Ammian. 23, 6, 32-35; Agathias, 2, 26.

[325]Philostratus in Rapp, "Z. D. M. G." 20, 71.

[326]Herod. 1, 120.

[327]"Cyri instit." 7, 5, 20; 8, 1, 8.

[328]Arrian, "Anab." 6, 29.

[329]Herod. 7, 191.

[330]Curtius, 3, 7; Ammian. 23, 6, 34.

[331]"Alcibiad. I." p. 122.

[332]Nic. Dam. fragm. 67, ed. Müller.

[333]Plut. "Artaxerxes," c. 3.

[334]Diog. Laert. prooem. 6.

[335]Fragm. 66, ed. Müller; cf. infra Bk. 8, c. 4.

[336]Herod. 1, 128; Ctes. "Pers." 15. The excerpt says 40 Chaldæans, but obviously Magi are here meant.

[337]Prooem. 7. Above, p. 190. The further statements of Diogenes about the white robes of the Magians, their avoidance of all ornament and gold, of their lying on the ground, and staff of reed, deserve little notice, inasmuch as the source whence they are derived is unknown.

[338]"Cyri instit." 8, 7, 3.

[339]"Cyri instit." 8, 7, 3; 7, 5, 20; 8, 1, 8; Curtius, 3, 3, 8.

[340]Strabo, p. 733.

[341]Pausan. 5, 27, 5, 6.

The rules concerning purity and purification, the expiations and penances necessary to avert the Daevas, which we possess in the Vendidad of the Avesta, are only the remnant of a far more comprehensive law. From the list of books and chapters traditional among the Parsees, we can see that it was intended to include not only all the invocations and prayers which the worship required, the rules of sacrifice, and the entire ritual, together with the Calendar of the year of the Church, but also the arrangement of the process of law, the civil and criminal code, and, moreover, rules for agriculture and medicine. If to this we add the statements and quotations of the Greeks (p. 53), we may assume that the scriptures of Eastern Iran comprised the whole sum of the knowledge of the priests. In the Avesta the Athravas had sketched the ideal picture of the correct conduct pleasing to Auramazda in every department of life. How far the princes of Bactria and the viceroys of Cyaxares and the Achæmenids, or even these princes themselves, and the judges, wished or allowed themselves to be bound in their decisions by these regulations of the priests, may be left out of the question. The priests here, like the Brahmans in India, could only influence the action ofthe State and those charged with it, so far as the reverence for the principles of religion and the force of their own authority extended.

The existing part of the law has obviously arisen out of the questions and considerations sketched above, which in consequence of the reform must have forced themselves into the circles of the priests. The reform also required above all things purity from men, but no supernatural purity, such as the Brahmans demanded. The body is not in the Avesta, as it was to the Brahmans and after them to the Buddhists, the impure prison of the soul which must be abandoned; on the contrary the Avesta rejoices in its health and vigour. It requires that the body should be kept pure from filth, from contamination by the impure, which gives the Daevas power over mankind,i. e.it demands the exclusion of the harmful side of nature; it desires that the soul should be pure from pollution, freed from untruthfulness, lying, and deceit, which are contradictory to the nature of the clear bright gods, and Auramazda, and make men companions of the Daevas, and sharers in their nature. In other words, it demands the invigoration of the light and wholesome side of man. The kingdom of the good spirits is truth, increase, and life; the kingdom of the evil is deception and falsehood, lying, destruction, and death. The Avesta praises Auramazda as purity itself; and next to him Asha vahista,i. e.the best purity; the gods are chiefly extolled as "the pure," and Zarathrustra as the master and teacher of purity. The Avesta repeatedly declares "that purity after birth is the best thing for men." Hence it is the foremost of all duties to keep the soul and body pure. The worshipper of Auramazda must preserve his purity by good thoughts, words, and works; truth is requiredin thinking, speaking, and acting; uprightness and honesty in all the relations of life; the sacredness of promises and pledges, and solemn assurances, at which Mithra is summoned to bear witness. It is an old function of the god which appears here. He is the guardian of the word, and the compact. "Mithra is twenty-fold between friends and kinsmen, thirty-fold between tradespeople, forty-fold between companions who live together, fifty-fold between man and wife, sixty-fold between associates in sacrifice, seventy-fold between scholar and teacher, eighty-fold between step-son and step-parents, ninety-fold between brothers, a hundred-fold between son and father." "Miserable are the houses, without descendants the dwellings, inhabited by those who deceive Mithra. Miserably does the cloven-footed cow go on the wrong path, which is oppressed by the burden of Mithra-deceiving men."[342]In accordance with this view deception is in the eyes of the law the worst offence; worse than robbery or theft. Evil-speaking and calumny also are, according to the Vendidad, "lies and sins" against Mithra. The gravest offence of this kind is the calumny by which "a pure man" is disparaged "with a man of another religion," for this sin is committed with full knowledge, and by a man's own intelligence; and the worst of all lies is teaching a false law. "One who teaches such a law," says the Vendidad, "does no better than if he killed a thousand horses, slew the men in a village inhabited by worshippers of Auramazda, or carried off the cows on the wrong way."[343]

It is not the least proof of the currency of the doctrines of the Avesta in the West of Iran that their ethical side, which gathers round the command of truthfulness, was there most distinctly recognised.King Darius has already told us that "the lie" had brought his kingdom into rebellion; the leaders of the rebellious lands, who gave themselves out to be descendants of the ancient royal families, he calls "liars against the kingdom." From their youth up, Herodotus tells us, the children of the Persians were instructed in truthfulness. He adds: Among the Persians it was forbidden to speak of that which it was forbidden to do; the Avesta requires truth "in thought, speech, and action." Lying and borrowing, Herodotus says, passed with the Persians for the most disgraceful acts, for they were of opinion that any one who contracted debts was generally compelled to tell lies. The Avesta says: "He who does not restore that which has been borrowed, seeks day and night to deceive the creditor." Plato states that the heirs to the Persian throne had, besides three others, a teacher whose special business it was to instruct them in truth. Xenophon assures us that pledges and oaths were religiously kept among the Persians; and Diodorus, that the pledge of hands was the strongest security among them.[344]Practice in Persia was, it is true, not equal to these injunctions, however sharply expressed; on the contrary, we often find the two in the most glaring contradiction.

Not falsehood and lies only, but also laziness and sloth pollute the soul of man. The pious man must rise early. Çraosha awakes the bird Parodarsh, we are told in the book of the law. At the return of the divine Ushahina,i. e.of the morning (p. 108), this bird speaks to those who are in their beds: "Friend, up, arise. Praise purity, and the Daevas will fly away. Long sleep, O man, is not good for thee. The Bushyançta runs up to thee, who lays again in sleep the whole corporeal world. Turn yourselves not away from the three best things: good thinking, speaking, and acting. He who rises first will come into Paradise; he who first brings pure, dry, old, well-hewn wood to the fire of Auramazda, him will the fire bless (p. 122)."[345]The pious man should be industrious and work; the best work is that which increases nourishment and fruit for men and animals, which furthers the increase and life of the world, and thus diminishes the kingdom of the evil, the power of the dark spirits. For this reason running water and growing fruits should be spread over the earth; "the field should be tilled, and trees planted which produce food." "When there are shoots," the law-book says, "the Daevas are in alarm; when there are stalks, the Daevas weep; when there are ears, the Daevas hiss; when there are grains, the Daevas fly."[346]"In the house where there are most ears, the Daevas are smitten most heavily." "The earth is not glad which lies untilled. The greatest pleasure is given to the earth where a pure man builds his house, provided with fire and cattle, and good flocks, with wife and child, where most corn, fodder, and grain is produced by husbandry, where the dry land is most watered, where fruit-bearing trees are planted, where cattle and beasts of draught leave the most urine."[347]"He who plants fruits and trees, who gives water to the earth where it is needed, and takes it away where too abundant, he worships the earth." When a man tills the earth she bestows life upon him; "as a friend to a beloved friend, she gives him descendants and wealth." To him who tills her, the earth says: "O man, whotillest me with the left arm and the right, with the right arm and the left, in love will I bear thee all kinds of fruit." But to him who tills her not the earth says: "Thou wilt go to the doors of others and there stand, in order to beg for food; in idleness thou wilt ask for it and get but little." He who sows corn, sows purity; the law of Auramazda increases with the fruits of the field; they extend the law of Auramazda by 100, 1000, and 10,000 meritorious works.

These regulations of the Avesta were fully accepted in the West. The great reverence paid to splendid trees by the Achæmenids is shown by Herodotus' story of Xerxes, that he furnished a beautiful plane tree, which he saw in Lydia, with golden ornaments, and appointed a perpetual guardian for it.[348]Ameretat, as already observed, was the special protecting spirit of trees (p. 164). Xenophon tells us that the Persian kings gave special attention to agriculture; on their journeys they inquired into the tillage of the land, and demanded similar attention from their satraps. Round their palaces and wherever they came they caused the most beautiful gardens to be laid out, planted with trees and all the most excellent shrubs in the world.[349]The satraps also had gardens of this kind (pairidaeza) round their residences, and the younger Cyrus assures Lysander, "in the name of Mithra," that he never took food before he had induced perspiration by work in the garden or exercise in arms.[350]The satraps, says Xenophon, whose provinces were found deficient in population and poorly cultivated, were punished and removed from their office, while those whose provinces were in good order, were rewarded by presents. When the king of the Persiansconferred distinctions, those were summoned first who had distinguished themselves in war, and next came those whose districts were best cultivated.[351]Respect and reverence for trees was so deeply rooted in Iran, that even Islam did not extirpate the feeling. To this day in Shiraz old trees are presented with dedicatory offerings, and hung with amulets; and the pious prefer to pray under tall trees rather than in the neighbouring mosques; while in the barren regions of Iran even groups of bushes receive offerings.[352]

Besides the care of trees, plants, and the soil, the labour of mankind must be directed to the care of the flocks, to the increase of the animals of the good god, and the destruction of the Khrafçtras, or animals belonging to the evil spirit (p. 171). Cows are not held in such veneration in Iran as beyond the Indus, yet even here the "cow is not to be driven on the wrong way," and gomez (the urine of oxen) is the most effectual means of purification; in the theory of the priests Auramazda began the creation of living things with the bull. We have already mentioned the rank taken among the animals of Auramazda by the cock and dog. In the Vendidad Auramazda says: "I have created the dog with clothes and shoes of his own, with keen scent and sharp teeth, attached to men, savage against the enemy, for the protection of the flocks. No thief or wolf comes to the village or the fold and carries away anything unobserved, if the dog is healthy, in good voice, and among the flocks. The houses would not stand firm upon the earth if there were not dogs in the villages and flocks. The dog is patient, contented, and satisfied with little food, like a priest; he goes forward, and is before andbehind the house, like a warrior; he sleeps less than the husbandmen, is talkative like a child, and friendly as a mistress."[353]The dogs are to receive good food, "for of all the creatures of Auramazda old age comes upon them the most quickly;" especially must the watch-dog be provided with milk, fat, and flesh, "the proper food" for a dog; and a dog must never be among those who are eating without receiving something to eat. Any one who gives unbroken bones or hot food to a sheep-dog or house-dog, and the bones injure him, and the hot food burns his mouth and tongue, so that he dies—is worthy of death.[354]Dogs with young are treated with the same care as pregnant women. It is a sin to chase or beat a dog which has brought forth; if she is injured or dies in running the sinner is worthy of death; and any one who beats a pregnant dog is to receive twice seven hundred stripes. It is the duty of every man to bring up for six months the dogs born on his ground, until they are able to run round in a circuit of twice seven houses.[355]Sick dogs are treated with the same remedies as rich men; and to the question of Zarathrustra—"If the dog will not take the remedies?" Auramazda answers that in this case "the dog can be tied, and its mouth opened with a flat piece of wood."[356]Wounds inflicted on dogs are to be punished with stripes to the number of twice eight hundred;[357]and besides this, compensation is to be given for the damage which thieves or wolves do to the village so long as the dog is prevented by his injuries from keeping watch. The book of the law everywhere threatens all those men who beat dogs thattheir souls will go from this world full of terror, and sick. To kill a water-dog is the greatest crime;[358]and is menaced with the worst penalties and expiations known to the Vendidad. As a general rule punishments do not go beyond 2000 stripes, or the necessity of killing 2000 noxious animals; but the slayer of the water-dog is to receive 10,000 stripes. Besides this, if he would save his soul, he must give 10,000 parcels of hard wood, well hewn and dried, for the fire of Auramazda, and also 10,000 parcels of soft, fragrant wood; he must kill 10,000 snakes, and an equal number of tortoises, lizards, and water-lizards, ants, flies, and rats. He must fill up 10,000 impure holes in the earth; give to the priests all the utensils required for the holy rites; to a warrior a complete set of armour; to a husbandman he must give all that is needed for agriculture: a house, provided with a beautiful mat, and arable land for tillage. In addition, he must give, as an expiation for his soul, fourteen head of small cattle to the "pure men," and bring up fourteen young dogs, and build fourteen bridges over running water. He must cleanse eighteen dogs from fleas, and make eighteen bones into edible food; and satisfy eighteen "pure men" with wine and flesh. If he does not perform these expiations he will go into the dwelling of the Druj, and "the heat which is injurious to the pasture will not depart from his dwelling until he has offered sacrifice for three days and nights for the pure soul of the water-dog, on the burning fire, with bound rods and uplifted Haoma."[359]

In order to extirpate the animals of Angromainyu,the priest is to be provided with a stick, the Khrafçtra-killer. Herodotus has already told us, that the Magians held it a duty to kill serpents, ants, and other creeping and winged insects. For the expiation of sins the Avesta universally requires the killing of serpents, lizards, and ants; rats and mice, which do harm to the crops; flies, midges, fleas, lice, and other vermin. Plutarch tells us that the Persians count him a happy man who slays most water-mice; Agathias observes that in honour of the chief festival in Persia every one killed as many snakes, and beasts of prey, and animals living in the desert, as possible, and then brought them to the Magians as a proof of his piety. In this way they believed that they did what was pleasing to the good god, while they injured and distressed Arimanes.[360]

According to the Avesta, the soul of man is kept pure by truthfulness, industry, and diligence, by good thoughts, good words and acts, which advance the kingdom of life; the body is to be kept free from dirt and the house from filth and dead creatures; from all that belongs to the evil spirits and is in their power. The soul of man is created pure; but from the first the body has certain impure parts, and the defilement which Angromainyu brought into the bodies of men. This defilement consists in the spittle, the excrements, dead skin, sores, etc; in everything that has an unpleasant smell, or is removed from the living body, like the hair and nails. These when cut are dead, and therefore belong to the kingdom of darkness; hence in Iran as in India they are impure things. "Wherever cut hair and nails lie," says the book of the law, "there the Daevas gather to these unholy places; there the impure animals come, which men calllice. Therefore carry away—so saith Auramazda—cut hair and nails, ten paces from the pure men, twenty from the fire, thirty from the water, fifty from the sacred bundle of rods. Dig a hole below the house in the earth, pronounce the prayer Ahunavairya thrice, six times, nine times, and then say: To thee, O bird, Asho-zusta, I show these nails. These nails I dedicate to thee; may they be thy lances, thy swords, thy bow, thy swift-flying arrows, thy sling-stones against the Mazanian Daevas. If these nails are not announced to the bird Asho-zusta, they are weapons for, not against, the Daevas."[361]Spittle is among the worst impurities. The priests could only approach the fire with veiled mouth, and even now the Parsees invariably cover the mouth in praying. They eat in silence, and two never use the same spoon, because the food would then be polluted by spittle. The removal of the excrements requires as much care in the Avesta as it did in the Brahmanic law, and the Vendidad gives minute regulations in regard to these matters.[362]A man is rendered impure by excess and debauchery; a woman by her courses, "by marks and blood," and by the birth of a child. She must be carried to an elevated place in the dwelling, which is strewn with dry sand, fifteen paces from the fire, from water, and the sacred bundle of rods, "at a distance also from the trees," and so placed that she cannot see the fire on the hearth. No one may touch her. Only a definite amount of certain kinds of food can be given to her, and that in metal jars, because these contract the least amount of impurity, and are most easily cleansed; the person who brings the food must remain three paces distantfrom her bed. After childbirth a woman is unclean for three days; then she must wash her body with water and gomez. If she has had a miscarriage her body is also polluted by the dead child: she must be placed thirty paces away from the fire and the sacred objects of the house, and must pass a longer period on her dust-bed—at the present time forty-one days are required. The first thing she is allowed to taste is ashes mixed with gomez—three, six, and then nine drops. The nine apertures of her body—that number is common to the Indians and Iranians—must be washed with ashes and gomez. She may not drink any water out of her impure hand; if she does so, she must receive two hundred blows with the rod, and two hundred with the whip.[363]Fire and water, springs, streams and rivers, the best gifts of the good gods, must, like the human body, be carefully preserved from all filth and defilement. The accounts of Western writers prove that the Persians and Medes observed the rules of purification given in the Book of the Law; it was not the custom among the Persians to spit in the presence of another, still less to sneeze, etc. They avoided the defilement of a river, or of the shadow of a man; and it was forbidden to uncover in the sight of the sun or moon.[364]

"The sun, the moon, the stars shine unwillingly," we are told in the Vendidad, "on the polluted man."[365]"The impure takes away prosperity and increase; he brings sickness and death; after death he will not go into heaven."[366]"But whatever pollution a man has contracted, and whatever sin he has committed, the good law quenches all impurity and sin, if the purifications, expiations, and penalties which it prescribes are performed and paid; for the good law of Auramazda surpasses all others in greatness, goodness, and salvation, as far as the heaven rises above the earth, and as the sea of Vourukasha includes all other waters."[367]"The good law of Auramazda takes from the man who praises it and commits no evil actions afterwards, his deception; it takes away the murder of the pure man, and the burial of the dead; it takes away inexpiable actions, and accumulated guilt; it takes away all evil words, thoughts, and actions, even as the strong swift wind purifies heaven from the right side."[368]

Slight pollution is removed by washing with pure water accompanied by certain prayers and imprecations on the Daevas, such as: "I contend with thee, O evil Angromainyu; away from this dwelling, away from the fire, the water, from this place, from all the blessings which Auramazda has created. I contend against pollution, direct and indirect; against the unclean spirits; I contend against the Daeva Andra, Çaurva, Zairicha (p. 169); against the Pairika, who goes to the water, the earth, cattle, and trees," etc.[369]More serious impurities require ablutions with gomez, which in certain cases have to be repeated thirty times, with various prayers.[370]The most efficacious purification, which removes even the worst taint, is that of the nine nights. This can only be performed by a priest, who knows the law accurately, can repeat the sacred word by heart, and speaks the truth. A special place must be constructed for it; thirty paces (which are equal to ninety times the length of the foot) from the fire, the water, and the sacred bundle of rods. In the middle of this space nine pits aredug in the earth, and round them twelve furrows are drawn with a metal instrument. The purifier sprinkles the person who requires cleansing (who is entirely naked) with gomez, from a leaden vessel, with many prayers. He is then rubbed fifteen times with earth; he must then wash himself at each of the nine pits once, twice, thrice with water, after which he is fumigated with fragrant wood. Then follow washings with water and gomez in the third, sixth, and ninth night. "After this," says the book, "the purified person shall bring water of purification to the fire, hard wood, and perfumes; he is to utter praises to Auramazda, to the Amesha Çpentas, and to the rest of the pure ones—so will the man be purified." The purifier must be rewarded for this purification; according to the measure of the man's property the payment rises from small cattle and cows to camels; "in order that the purifier may go away contented and without hatred." Instead of cattle, goods of another description can be given. "But if the purifier goes away discontented, the wicked spirit of impurity comes again into the purified persons, and they are impure for evermore."[371]

In the view of the Avesta impurity consists essentially in that which is opposed to life; hence there is no worse form of uncleanness than that caused by the corpse. The body, as soon as the soul has left it, belongs to Angromainyu. The fiend of death, the Druj Naçu, obtains possession of it, and from it she springs on all who touch it, or come near it. If a man dies, or a dog—and in this matter dogs are put quite on a level with men—and other men and women are in the same house—two, five, fifty, or a hundred—the Druj Naçu comes immediately from the north in the form of a fly, and settles on all the inhabitantsof the house and makes them impure with infection, pollution, and uncleanness.[372]In the first instance she is to be met by incantations—the Gathas, Bisamruta, Thrisamruta, Chathrasamruta, must be repeated; then the fiend falls to pieces like grass that has been dead a year.[373]After this the hearth-fire must be removed from the house of the dead, and the sacred utensils—the mortar, the cup, the sacred bundle of rods, and the Haoma. In winter the fire can be kindled again upon the hearth after nine nights; in summer, when the need for warmth and cooked food is less pressing, after a month; any one who does not observe these periods is to be punished with twice two hundred stripes.[374]After purification the kinsmen are to utter prayers for the departed, and the number of these is fixed, in the Vendidad, in the same fanciful manner which is so often met with in the book of Manu. The number decreases according to the degree of relationship; for the nearest kinsmen thirty prayers are spoken; for the most remote, five; if the dead man has led an impure life the number of prayers is doubled in order to give efficacy to the petition.[375]

The preservation and increase of life is the foundation of the teaching of the Avesta. The good life of nature is promoted by planting and agriculture, by tending the useful and destroying the pernicious animals; and by posterity provision is to be made for the life of men. From this point of view the Vendidad lays especial weight on marriage. "I declare," Auramazda says, "that the married is before the unmarried, and he that has a house before him that has none, and the father of children before the childless."[376]We can only ascertain very incompletely from the remaining fragments of the Avesta the rules which it prescribed for family life. We see that bringing about a marriage was regarded as a meritorious work, and marriage between close relations was considered happy. Yet maidens are not to be given in marriage before their fifteenth year.[377]To those who have long remained unmarried the god Haoma, the special protector of life, sends truthful, active husbands, gifted with good understanding (p. 125). We never hear of any difference of the orders in contracting marriage; nor is there the least hint that the priest can only marry a wife of priestly blood, or the husbandman a wife of his own class. On the other hand, the strictest directions are given that the worshippers of Auramazda are only to marry among themselves; marriage with those of an alien religion is severely reprobated. "A man who mingles the seed of the faithful and the unbelievers, the seed of the worshippers of the Daevas with the worshippers of Mazda, keeps back a third part of the flowing water, a third part of the increase of the blooming plants, and their golden fruits; he annihilates a third part of the clothing of Çpenta Armaiti (the Earth); he robs the just men of a third part of their power, their merits, their purity. They who do this are more destructive than forked serpents, than howling wolves, than the she-wolf which rushes on the flocks, than the thousand-fold brood of the lizard, which pollutes the water."[378]The Vendidad gives the house-father a similar power over his wife and children to that given in Manu's law—so far as we can conclude from certain indications. He is to be spoken of with thesame reverence as the house-father on the Ganges; the wife is to be honoured, but is to "be watched perpetually, like the fire of Auramazda."[379]With regard to the education of children, we can only gather from the Vendidad they were to be tended for seven years; "protect dogs for six months, children for seven years;"[380]and boys are to be invested in their fifteenth year with the sacred girdle.[381]We remember the sacred girdle which the three upper castes wore and still wear beyond the Ganges; the investiture with this, and adoption into the family and caste—"the second birth" takes place, according to Manu's law, among the Brahman boys in the eighth year, among the Kshatryas, in the eleventh, and the Vaiçyas in the twelfth. The habit of wearing the girdle, which prevails on both sides of the Indus, proves that this custom was in use before the two branches of the Arians separated. Originally the girdle was intended to be a protection or amulet against the evil spirits.[382]In the girdle which the priests prepare with traditional ceremonies, and put on boys in their seventh or tenth year, the modern Parsees see the bond which encloses and unites the worshippers of Auramazda.

If I attempt to supplement the scanty hints of the Avesta on family life from the accounts preserved to us on this subject by Western writers, it must be remembered that the more ancient of these statements hold good only of the West of Iran. But as we have hitherto found the worship and manners of the Persians and Medes, as described by the Greeks, agreeing with the rules of the Avesta, we may suppose that in this province also East and West were in agreement. Herodotus states that the Persians married manywives, and had concubines in addition. They considered it honourable and right to have as many children as possible; next to bravery in war it was the greatest merit to have many children, and the king sent presents every year to the man who had most.[383]Of all days the Persians celebrated most the day on which they were born. A more abundant meal was served on this day: among the wealthy an ox, a horse, or a camel was roasted whole; and smaller animals among those who were poorer. Plato adds: "When the first son, the heir of the kingdom, was born to the king of Persia, all the subjects of the king celebrated the day, and on the birthday of the king there were festivals and sacrifices throughout all Asia."[384]Herodotus observes, that the respect of children for their parents was great. The Persians regarded the murder of parents by a son as impossible; if such a thing happened they believed that the child was supposititious.[385]Aristotle tells us that the power of the father over the sons among the Persians was tyrannical,i. e.unlimited; he treated them as slaves.[386]That the mother was also treated with respect follows from the statement that the son might not remain seated when the mother entered, and could only resume his seat at her permission. At the court of the Achæmenids the mother of the king had the first place, the king the second.[387]That the queen-mother often exercised great influence is shown by the history of this ruling family. Of the careful education of the heir to the throne, the other princes, and the sons of the wealthy Persians, both in the exercise and strengthening of their bodies andin moral training, the Western writers had much to tell.

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