[416] See pp. [61. 62.] The name of the angel is simply Azar.
[417] Yasht, a Zand word, may be referred to the Sanskrit इष्त्व ishtva, the participle of यज् yaj, “to venerate.”
The Darun is an office celebrated particularly for the sake of a king, or of the Dostur of Dosturs, in honor of celestial beings of different names and classes (Zend-Av., t. II. p. 73). Darun is also a little cake in the shape of a crown piece, which the priest offers to the Ized-Dahman, who blesses the creatures, the just man, and having received from the hands of the Serosh the souls of the just, conducts them to heaven (ibid., t. I. 2. pp. 86. 172).—A. T.
[418] Bishutan, according to some authors was the brother, according to the Shah-nameh, a confidential friend, of Isfendiar.—A. T.
[419] Jamasp, the brother and minister of Gushtasp.—A. T.
[420] Chapt. LXXVIII. v. 38.
[421] Chapt. XXVIII. v. 56.
[422] According to Abulfeda, quoted by Hyde (p. 315), Zoroaster was born in ارمی or ارميه, in Armi or Armia, the most western town of Azarbijan (the Media of the Greeks), in the Gordian mountains, which accounts for the surname of Median, or Persian, or Perso-Median, which different authors have given to him. Other historians affirm that he came from Palestina.—A. T.
[423] Raí is the most northern town of the province Jebal, or Irak Ajem, the country of the ancient Parthians.—A. T.
[424] Anquetil says (Zend-Av., 2 P. p. xviii.): “The Bahman Yesht Pehlvi, rather the epitome than the translation of the true Báhmán Zand, may be called the Apocalypse of the Parsees. It presents, in the form of a prophecy, an abridged history of the empire and of the religion of the Persians, from Gushtasp to the end of the world.” That part of the Dabistán which follows, said to be transcribed from the Zand Avesta by a Mobed, may be presumed to be taken from the true Báhmán Yesht Zand; still these prophecies are undoubtedly compositions of later times interpolated in the original works.—A. T.