The Zend-Avesta assumes one Universal Being, clothed in an outward form, but this form is Light. Light is neither a serpent, nor a stone, nor a four-handed monster, nor a three-headed Brahmā, nor a bull, owl, or hawk; it is a simple manifestation, it has no particular existence, it perceptibly pervades universality. It admits of a highly symbolical interpretation; it is virtue, it is truth, proficiency, knowledge, and directing will. Light involves an opposite—darkness, just as virtue has an antithesis—evil. Both light and darkness took their origin in the unlimited All (Zeruane-Akerene). We have here clearly a purer Trinitarian conception. We have (1) the Infinite All, producing (2) light or good (Ormuzd), and (3) darkness or evil (Ahriman). With the Indians Brahmā is ether; Vishnu, water; and S’iva, fire; and in spite of all spiritualisation we have matter before us. The Persians, in becoming conscious of light and darkness, destroyed the innocence of mankind, but proclaimed to the world moral consciousness. Without a knowledge of evil there is no knowledge of good; to be virtuous is to know the evil and to do the good.
This led the Cis-Himâlâyans a step further. The two opposing phenomena, light and darkness, were placed, like good and evil, purity and impurity, right and wrong, truth and falsehood, knowledge and ignorance, in eternal conflict. Creation was thus considered as in everlasting strife. This strife was life-activity in honour of Ormuzd or Ahriman. This activity was carried beyond this world; for the followers of Ormuzd, there was a heaven, and for the followers of Ahriman, a hell in the future. Ormuzd had Fervers as attendants; Ahriman, Dews or Devas (in Keltic Dusii, devils). On the Persian and Assyrian slabs we see, floating over the heads of the kings, their winged portraits; these represent their protecting Fervers, one of whom continually watched over each good man, and protected him from the influences of Ahriman’s servants.
The worship of Ormuzd, in whose sight all creatures were equal, but equally dependent, was threefold:—
(a) Pure thoughts, through which alone we may approach the beginning of all things, wisdom and light—God.
(b) Pure words, the word of God (the Logos), which is no longer personified as some visible form, but is the mere vibration of the spirit of God, embodied in abstract signs in the Zend-Avesta.
(c) Pure deeds, accomplished by one’s own efforts, as we are endowed with perfect individual freedom.
This religion was the cause why the Persians had no special temples, but only small altars. The vaulted azure heavens were the glorious temple of Ormuzd, which he was compelled to share with Ahriman. Neither light nor darkness, however, could be carved or painted; the dynamic force of the artists was therefore directed to matter-of-fact scenes, to ornamentations, showing a better balance between forms and ideas. The rosette, the palmette, the sun with its disc, the moon, the pine-cone, the pomegranate, intermixed with clearly-defined, and not much entwined, geometrical patterns, were the principal means of ornamentation.
At a later period a tendency to allegorical and emblematic figures appeared. The artists composed cherubim, chimeras, basilisks, griphons, kentaurs, and sphinxes; undoubtedly influenced by Indian and Egyptian ideas, for Nineveh and Babylon were the ancient Venice and Genoa of the far East, situated as they were on the commercial high-roads, the twin-rivers, the Tigris and the Euphrates. The Babylonian textile fabrics were highly appreciated from time immemorial. Serpents and trees, winged witches and flying-fish, were first spell-bound in Babylonian tapestry, and then carved in stone on the walls of Nineveh. The immense riches which we possess in the British Museum, enable every student of art-history to see before him the active life of the Cis-Himâlâyans, whether as Assyrians, Persians, Medes, or Babylonians, in clear and distinct outlines. Their knowledge of embossing gold and silver was considerable. Their household furniture, drinking cups, tables, candelabra, bracelets, and rings are of strictly architectural construction. We miss that overburdening confusion in ornamentation which distinguishes the Indian products; and the more correct treatment of ornamental outlines, especially to be seen in their mosaics and tesselated pavements, approaches Greek forms.
The commercial spirit, which swayed this portion of the river-valley of the Tigris and Euphrates, engendered a powerful activity in a practical direction. Whilst we build railways—the Babylonians dug canals, connected the two rivers, and constructed aqueducts. They built palaces at Nineveh, castles (El Kassr) at Babylon, and an immense nekropolis at Vurka, about 180 English miles from Bagdad, and about 8 miles to the east of the Euphrates. At every step in the interior of these ruins we find clay-coffins piled up to a height of from 15–20 feet. All these ruins are now covered with saltpetre, small shells and broken pottery. The remains of the walls are from 12–22 feet thick, partly of unbaked and partly of baked bricks. The construction everywhere closely imitates wood-work, and the decoration reproduces textile fabrics such as carpets and striped tent covers. There are capitals in stucco of the Ionic and even of the Corinthian type; though the leaves are those of the palm-tree instead of the Acanthus. The volute of the Ionic capital is rather in the form of two serpents drinking from a cup, than in the form of rams’ horns. We might call this old Babylonian stucco capital, the proto-Ionic type.
On the two shores of the Euphrates, as far as Babylon, coffins of green glazed clay and small terra-cotta tablets with cuneiform inscriptions have been found by thousands. These coffins were imitations of dead bodies, swathed in cloths and tied with cords. In addition to this reproduction of textile fabrics in clay, we find with the Cis-Himâlâyans a tendency to overlay wood-carvings with metal coatings. When they advanced more in metallotechnic they still held to patterns which clearly had their origin in wood-carvings. The plant-like forms predominate; then we have the quilloche, palm-leaves, or feathers arranged in the form of palm-leaves, and the pine-cone, which is often used in eurythmical variation with the conventionally-treated open or closed tulips, and open or closed lotus flowers.