[406] Ardibehest (see pp. [61.] [62.]) presides over the second month of the year, and the 3d, 8th, 15th, and 23d day of the month; he is pure, beneficent, endowed by Ormuzd with great and holy eyes; he grants health, and eloquence to men, productions to the earth, and grandeur to the world; he drives away the Dívs and all evils (Zend-Av., II, pp. 69. 153. 154. 159. 316. and elsewhere).—A. T.
[407] Zoroaster, according to the concurring account of several authors, retired from the world and lived in a cavern of the mountain Alborz, or in the mountains of Balkhan. According to the Rauzat us Sufa (Shea’s transl., p. 286) it was in the mountains near Ardebil, a city of Azarbijan (the ancient Media). This cavern is said to have been consecrated by him to Mithra. Pliny states (H. N. l. xi. c. 42), the prophet lived 20 years in deserts, upon cheese so tempered that he should not feel the effects of age. This was probably before he appeared at the court of Gushtasp.—A. T.
[408] This miracle is not recorded in Anquetil’s life of Zoroaster.—A. T.
[409] Not receiving immediate access to the king, the prophet split the upper part of the apartment where Gushtasp was, and descended through the opening (Anquet., Vie de Zoroastre, p. 29). This was in the year 549 B. C. (ibidem), after the 30th year of Gushtasp’s reign (Hyde, p. 323).—A. T.
[410] To these miracles add that related in the Shah nameh naser, quoted by Hyde (p. 324): Zoroaster planted before the king’s palace a cypress-tree, which in a few days grew to the height and thickness of ten rasons (measure undetermined), and upon the top of it he built a summer-palace.—A. T.
[411] All those particulars about Zoroaster’s imprisonment, and about his release after the cure effected by him upon the king’s charger are, with little variation, related in the Shah-nameh naser (see Hyde, 325, 327), and in the Zerdusht nâmah (Anq. du Peron, t. I, 2. P. p. 325-327).—A. T.
[412] This cure of Lohrasp is touched upon by Anquetil in his life of Zoroaster (p. 53), but not that of Zerir; Hyde mentions neither; but the conversion of king Lohrasp and of his relations is generally admitted.—A. T.
[414] See pp. [61. 62.] 241. [note].
[415] See pp. [61. 62.] Khordad is the sixth Amscháspand; he presides over the third month of the year and the sixth day of the month; he is a chief of years, months, days, and of time in general; he grants and aids intelligence; he causes pure water to run through the world if man lives holily; he is taken for water itself; he gives what is sweet to eat (Zand-Avesta, I. 2. P. pp. 81. 103. II. pp. 69. 97. 153. 157. and elsewhere).—A. T.