"Baw is a pure Magian name and is a transcription of the Avesta Bangha (Yesht 13,124). Another transliteration of the same word is Bohak, a name borne by a hero of Ispahan who with his six sons and an army joined Ardeshir (Karnamak 4, 3, p. 22-19; Neoleke 46). It was also the name of a son of Hobakht, the chief Mobed under Shapur II. Bahak, son of Fredon, was the ancestor of Aturpat Mahraspand (Bundahesh 33; West Pahlavi Texts 1, 145). Another form of the same name is B[=a]we, who was the Astabed or magister officiorum of the Persians (Josua Stylite ed. Wright 59). The first ruler of the Bawend dynasty who enters history is Sharwin ibn Surkhab (Tabari 3, 519). By the Arabs he was at first made a vassal controlling the slopes of the Alburz (Ibn al Faqih 304; Yakut 3, 283), and probably assumed the title Padashkhwargar-shah which his descendants continued to hold in the time of al Beruni (Chronology, p. XL, No. 7). In Yakubi (vol. 2, 479) he even bears the title of King of Tokharistaxi. After him is named Mount Sherwin on the boundary of Komish (Tabari 3, 1275; Ibn al Fakih 305; Belazuri 339, 7). In the year 201, that is, A.D. 816-17, however, the governor of Tabaristan, Abdallah Ibn Khurdadbeh, the father of the historian and geographer, invaded Larijan and Sarijan and annexed them to the empire of Islam. He likewise conquered the mountain land of Tabaristan and compelled Shahryar, the son of Sherwin, to surrender (Tabari 3, 1014).
"But after the death of Shahryar, in 825-26, Maziyar Ibn Qaren contested the kingdom with his son Shapur and in alliance with the Moslems invaded Mount Sherwin, captured the sons of Shahryar and put them to death. (Tabari 3, 1093, Belazuri 339 and Ibn al Fakih 309.) However, a son of Shahryar named Qaren who had been detained at the court of Maziyar later on joined the Arabs and after the fall of Maziyar was restored to his paternal estate.
"As regards the Avesta expression Ragha Zarathushtrish in the Yasna 9, 18, it refers to political conditions of a much anterior age not yet reached by our historical investigations."
[Translated from Marquarts, Eranshahr, p. 127 seq-G.K.N.]
APPENDIX II
IRANIAN MATERIAL IN MAHASIN WAL MASAVI AND MAHASIN WAL AZDAD.
Professor Inostranzev gives a list of passages of Iranian interest which are to be found in the Mahasin-wal masawi and in the Mahasin wal azdad giving references to pages in the European editions. Unfortunately I have not been able to procure the latter and cannot verify the allusions. I, however, reproduce below the Iranian subjects touched upon in these two Arabic books on adab in the Cairo editions.
Iranian material from the Mahasin-wal masawi, Part I, p. 1. A dictum of
Buzarjmahir.
P. 82, A story of King Kobad.
P. 96, A story of Anushirwan, "the wisest of men of his time in Persia".