[16] See Rawlinson's Ancient Monarchies, where he identifies Zoroaster with the celebrated Median king Kudur-Nakhunta, and says: "A king of Elam, whose court was held at Susa, led in the year B. C. 2286 (or a little earlier) an expedition against the cities of Chaldæa, succeeded in carrying all before him, ravaged the country, took the towns, plundered the temples, and bore off the images of the deities which the Babylonians especially reverenced. This king's name, which was Kudur-Nakhunta, is thought to be the exact equivalent of one which has a worldwide celebrity—to wit, Zoroaster. Now, according to Polyhistor, who certainly repeats Berosus, Zoroaster was the first of those eight Median kings who composed the second dynasty in Chaldæa and occupied the throne from about B. C. 2286 to 2052. The Medes are represented by him as capturing Babylon at this time, and imposing themselves as rulers upon the country. Eight kings reign in the space of 234 or 224 years, after which we hear no more of Medes, the sovereignty being (as it would seem) recovered by the natives. The coincidences of the conquest, the date, the foreign sovereignty, and the name Zoroaster, tend to identify the Median dynasty of Berosus with a period of Susanian supremacy which the monuments show to have been established in Chaldæa at a date not long subsequent to the reigns of Urukh and Ilgi, and to have lasted for a considerable period."
[17] A collection of heroic poems on the ancient histories of Persia and her kings, by Firdoosi.
[18] See Martin Haug's Essays on the Sacred Language, Writings, and Religion of the Parsees.
[19] The Persian writers of the Middle Ages ascribed to Zoroaster a long series of prodigies and miracles without end; to which both Pliny and Eubulus, giving the last echoes of popular traditions, allude.
[20] The Uncreated, the Eternal. He has had no beginning, and will have no end.—The Yasnahs.
[21] To reconcile the existence of these two absolute Beings, coequal and coeternal, the doctrine of the Zarvanians was conceived in later times. This sect, which flourished about the time of Alexander the Great, supposed an unconditioned existence prior and Superior to Ahura-Mazda, Ormuzd, and Ahriman, called "time without limit," Zaravan-Akarana, from whom emanated the two spirits or principles of good and evil.
CHAPTER VI.
Domestic Life of the Fire-worshippers.—The Zend-Avesta.—Parsee Rites and Ceremonies at Birth, Marriage, Death, and Final Consignment to the Tower of Silence.