Author: Shervin Farridnejad

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A newly discovered Yasna manuscript

A newly discovered Yasna manuscript from Yazd, Iran

Yasna
© 2015 Saloumeh Gholami

The newly discovered Avestan manuscript contains an illuminated Yasna ceremony and belongs to the Dinyār family in Yazd, Iran. Prof. Alberto Cantera has already confirmed that the new manuscript is a Yasna manuscript. The only other known Yasna manuscript of a comparable age is kept at the British Library.

Even though the manuscript has no colophon, according to Alberto Cantera it is most probably by the hand of Mihrabān Anōšīrwān Wahromšāh and should be dated around 1630. The scribe’s hand as well as the illuminations also show a close relation to the Vīdēvdād Sāde of the same scribe, dated to 1647 CE / 1016 Y, kept today in the British Library.

This manuscript is discovered and purchased by Vahid Zolfaghari and is now kept in his private collection. Prof. Alberto Cantera and his team at the Avestan Digital Archive (ADA) project seek to publish and make the manuscript available publicly.

Yasna manuscripts contain the long liturgical text recited during the daily performance of the Yasna, the central ritual in Zoroastrianism. It was originally composed in the ancient Iranian language of Avestan between the 2nd and 1st millennia BCE. Different types of Yasna manuscripts are available, those transmitted with the Pahlavi translation (i.e. Pahlavi-Yasna), those without a translation (i.e. Yasna Sāde) and those with the Sankrit translation (i.e. Sanskrit Yasna). Among the manuscripts of the Pahlavi-Yasna one can distinguish two lines of transmission, namly the Indian Pahlavi-Yasna and the Iranian Pahlavi-Yasna.

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Books

Ancient Iran and Islamic Identity

Mozaffari, Ali. 2014. Forming national identity in Iran: The idea of homeland derived from ancient Persian and Islamic imaginations of place. London: I.B. Tauris.

Modern Iran is a country with two significant but competing discourses of national identity, one stemming from ancient pre-Islamic customs and mythology, the other from Islamic Shi’i practices and beliefs. At one time co-existing and often mutually reinforcing, in more modern times they have been appropriated by intellectuals and the state who have drawn upon their narratives and traditions to support and authenticate their ideologies. The result has been an often-confused notion of identity in Iran. In this essential work, Ali Mozaffari explores the complex processes involved in the formation of Iranian national identity. He lays particular stress upon the importance of place, for it is through the concept of place that collective national identity and ideas of homeland are expressed and disseminated. The author reveals the ways in which homeland is conceived both through designated permanent sites and ritual performance, illustrating his arguments through an analysis of the ancient Achaemenid capital of Persepolis and the Shi’i rituals of Moharram.

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Books

Ideological archaeology of Zoroastrianism

Ahmadi, Amir. 2015. The Daēva cult in the Gāthās: An ideological archaeology of Zoroastrianism (Iranian Studies 24). New York, NY: Routledge.

Addressing the question of the origins of the Zoroastrian religion, this book argues that the intransigent opposition to the cult of the daēvas, the ancient Indo-Iranian gods, is the root of the development of the two central doctrines of Zoroastrianism: cosmic dualism and eschatology (fate of the soul after death and its passage to the other world).

The daēva cult as it appears in the Gāthās, the oldest part of the Zoroastrian sacred text, the Avesta, had eschatological pretentions. The poet of the Gāthās condemns these as deception. The book critically examines various theories put forward since the 19th century to account for the condemnation of the daēvas. It then turns to the relevant Gāthic passages and analyzes them in detail in order to give a picture of the cult and the reasons for its repudiation. Finally, it examines materials from other sources, especially the Greek accounts of Iranian ritual lore (mainly) in the context of the mystery cults. Classical Greek writers consistently associate the nocturnal ceremony of the magi with the mysteries as belonging to the same religious-cultural category. This shows that Iranian religious lore included a nocturnal rite that aimed at ensuring the soul’s journey to the beyond and a desirable afterlife.

Challenging the prevalent scholarship of the Greek interpretation of Iranian religious lore and proposing a new analysis of the formation of the Hellenistic concept of ‘magic,’ this book is an important resource for students and scholars of History, Religion and Iranian Studies.

For ToC and haveing a look inside the book see here.

About the Author:

Amir Ahmadi is an Adjunct Researcher at the School of Languages, Literatures, Cultures and Linguistics, Monash University. He has published in Philosophy, History of Religions and Iranian Studies.

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Books

Admonitions of the wise Ōšnar

AODGoshtasb, Farzaneh & Nadia Hajipour (eds.). 2014. Admonitions of Ošnar-i Dānā. Tehran: Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies.

The (h)andarz ī ōšnar ī dānāg “The Counsels of the wise Aošnar” (AŌD) is the conventional name of a short didactic treatise in Middle Persian belonging to the so-called andarz “wisdom-literature”. AŌD is pseudo-epigraphically ascribed to Aošnara- pouru.jira “Aošnara, the very wise”, a sage mentioned in Yt.13.131. He is also mentioned in Dēnkard VII.1.36 (DkM 598) to be coeval with the primeval king Kay-Kāōs. The frame story of AŌD is a so-called “number-litany”, in which a disciple asks the sage to give an andarz “wise saying” for every number from one to thousand. However the extant manuscripts of AŌD contains the andarz only up to number six.

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Books

Perspectives on Pasargadae

Mozaffari, Ali (ed). 2014. World heritage in Iran: Perspectives on Pasargadae. Heritage, Culture and Identity. Farnham, Surrey, UK: Ashgate.

Pasargadae is the location of the tomb of Cyrus the Great, founder of the Achaemenid Empire. Through the ages it was Islamised and the tomb was ascribed to the Mother of Solomon. It was only at the beginning of the twentieth century that archaeological evidence demonstrated the relationship between the site and Cyrus and it was appropriated into conflicting political discourses on nationalism and Islamism while concurrently acknowledged as a national and then a World Heritages site. However, Pasargadae is neither an isolated World Heritage site, nor purely a symbol of abstract state politics. Pasargadae and its immediate vicinity constitute a living landscape occupied by villagers, nomads and tourists.This edited volume presents for the first time a broad, multi-disciplinary examination of Pasargadae by experts from both outside and within Iran. It specifically focuses on those disciplines that are absent from existing studies, such as ethnography, tourism and museum studies providing valuable insights into this fascinating place. In its totality, the book argues that to understand World Heritage sites and their problems fully, a holistic approach should be adopted, which considers the manifold of perspectives and issues. It also puts forward a novel approach to the question of heritage, representation and construction of collective identity from the framework of place.

 Table of Contents:
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Events

Zoroastrianism in Iran and India: Then and Now

Call for Applications

The Institute of Religious Studies at the University of Zurich (UZH) invites to the summer school:

Zoroastrianism in Iran and India: Then and Now
August 30th – September 2nd 2015

Zoroastrism is one of the oldest living religious traditions today. It shaped the Persian Empire and strongly influenced other religions, such as Judaism and Islam.
Zoroastrian communities today in Iran, India and in the diaspora are faced with typical challenges of modernity. They are confronted with the need to negotiate the preservation of tradition in the light of requirements of tolerance and the preservation of identity in an age of globalization.
Our Summer School appeals primarily to Master students and PHDs and will be conducted bilingually (English-German).
In lectures and workshops both historic and contemporary socio-scientific subject areas (rituals, beliefs, conflicts, etc.) are discussed with the contributors.
In the discussion with Zoroastrian guests the contemporary situation in India and Switzerland in particular will be analyzed.

Location
KAA E-11
Religionswissenschaftliches Seminar
Kantonsschulstrasse 1
8001 Zürich

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Online resources

History of Iran Podcast

History of Iran Podcast

The History of Iran Podcast project is an ongoing chronological attempt to trace the History of Iran in an innovative way of keeping the “dynastic framework as a useful way of organising the narrative”, but also “going to stop at certain points and explain and elaborate on certain points”. Starting with some general questions and topics on geography in the very first episodes, this series hosted by Khodadad Rezakhani is an ongoing account of the people, events, historic monents, political and cultural remarks that shaped the History of Iran. An invaluable resource for anyone that needs a ground level survey of the Iranian History.

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Books

Xerxes: A Persian life

Stoneman, Richard. 2015. Xerxes: A Persian life. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Xerxes, Great King of the Persian Empire from 486–465 B.C., has gone down in history as an angry tyrant full of insane ambition. The stand of Leonidas and the 300 against his army at Thermopylae is a byword for courage, while the failure of Xerxes’ expedition has overshadowed all the other achievements of his twenty-two-year reign.In this lively and comprehensive new biography, Richard Stoneman shows how Xerxes, despite sympathetic treatment by the contemporary Greek writers Aeschylus and Herodotus, had his reputation destroyed by later Greek writers and by the propaganda of Alexander the Great. Stoneman draws on the latest research in Achaemenid studies and archaeology to present the ruler from the Persian perspective. This illuminating volume does not whitewash Xerxes’ failings but sets against them such triumphs as the architectural splendor of Persepolis and a consideration of Xerxes’ religious commitments. What emerges is a nuanced portrait of a man who ruled a vast and multicultural empire which the Greek communities of the West saw as the antithesis of their own values.

About the author:
Richard Stoneman is Honorary Visiting Professor, University of Exeter, and the author of numerous books. He lives in Devon, UK.

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Books

Magic, Myth and Folklore in Iran

Donaldson, Bess. 2015. The wild rue of Persia: Magic, myth and folklore in Iran. London: I. B. Tauris.

The Wild Rue is a unique study of myth and magic in Iran. Bess Donaldson spent thirty years in Iran as both missionary and teacher and in this classic work she records the beliefs and superstitions of country at a time when they were increasingly under threat from the tremendous changes brought about by the Shah’s program of modernization. This earlier way of life, with its belief in angels and the evil eye, and with its age-old rituals surrounding childbirth and burial, is recounted in an informed yet highly readable text. A unique study of magic, myth and folklore with chapters on cosmology, names and numbers, snakes, dreams, talismans and signs, childbirth, angels, the evil eye, and the calendar. A classic work, long unavailable but now back in print.

A preview of the book is available here.

About the author:

Bess Allen Donaldson was an American Presbyterian missionary and teacher. She began teaching at the Iran Bethel Girl’s School in 1910,  eventually becoming its principal. Bess Donaldson spent thirty years in Iran, during which time she gathered the material for The Wild Rue.

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Books

A new etymological dictionary of Persian language

HassandoustHassandust, Mohammad. 2015. The etymological dictionary of Persian. 5 Vols. Tehran: Academy of Persian Language and Literature.

The Etymological Dictionary of Persian is the most comprehensive and up-to-date work in the field of Classical and Modern New Persian historical lexicology and etymology. Since the publication of P. Horn’s Grundriss der neupersischen Etymologie (1893) and H. Hübschman’s Persische Studien (1895), enormous progress has been made in the field, and many etymologies have been revised or proposed. This new etymological dictionary, with more than 5500 entries, covers the entire principal vocabulary of Persian lexicon of both Iranian and non-Iranian origin, as well as the inherited lexicon of Persian and synthesizes the achievements of Iranian, and Indo-European, comparative linguistics over the last century. It covers also the vocabularies from diffrent sources of the Persian language attested in Classical poetry, historical narratives, mediaeval Farhangs “dictionaries”, as well as the vocabularies from modern urban and daily vernaculars.

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