A Companion to Late Antique Literature

by Scott McGill

  7.7 Cultural Texts

  The texts that tell us much about the cultural life and social norms of the Sasanian period are mainly short works. They include a variety of subjects, such as food, games, ideas of beauty, giving speeches, dinner manners, and how to write properly. The most interesting is the text of Kusrō ud Rēdag (King Khusro and the Page), which lays out the courtly ideals of “good living.” The page recounts his training not only as a chef, but also as a calligrapher, his athletic prowess as a master polo player and horseman, his religious upbringing, and his morality. The suggestion is of an ideal Zoroastrian man in late antiquity (Azarnouche 2013). The text also mentions board games such as chess. This is the subject of another small work in Middle Persian known as Wizārišn cˇatrang ud Nēw‐ardaxšīr (Explanation of the Game of Chess and Backgammon). The treatise explains why the two games were invented and gives their rules, which are treated from a Zoroastrian perspective and placed in a Zoroastrian cosmological setting (Daryaee 2002b; Panaino 1999).

  Sūr ī Suxwan (Banquet Speech) is another text that sets out to describe the ancient Iranian banquet etiquette and the list of people who sit before the royal table, including the King of Kings (šāhān šāh) and the Grand Wazīr (wuzurg‐framadār), but also those of the lower ranks (Daryaee 2007). There is also a text on how to write properly for different matters, Abar Ēwēnag ī Nāmag Nibēsišnīh (On the Manner of Book/Letter Writing) (Zaehner 1939). The survival of these texts points to the sophistication of Persian culture and society, where varied aspects of life were discussed and standards were established.

  The nobility acquired some of its cultural knowledge and capital in the frahangestān, “House of Culture.” Activities included memorizing sacred utterances, scribal instruction and calligraphy, horsemanship, jousting, polo, playing musical instruments, singing, poetry, dancing, studying astrology, and mastering board games (Azarnouche 2013). Naturally, warriors were trained in the art of combat, and not only in shooting but also in horse racing and jousting. In fact, it is in Persia that we find some of the earliest reliefs on jousting scenes and the art of one to one combat. These are all familiar to the Medieval European world, where their Persian equivalent, i.e. the knights (Middle Persian āzādān), did the same, except much earlier.

  7.8 Dictionaries

  Two Middle Persian dictionaries (frahang) have survived. The first is the Frahang ī Pahlawīg, which is mainly concerned with difficult words that were written with the Aramaic ideograms. The authors took pains to show the Middle Persian word in question in its usual ideographic and its simple representation. For example, the word for “night” was written with the Aramaic ideogram LYLYA, which was read as Middle Persian šab. To demonstrate that this word stood for night, the author wrote the word without the ideogram as šb. The glossary also reflects ancient Near Eastern tradition in the way the subject headings are organized, based on cosmology, waters, fruits, metals, etc. A more recent recension of this glossary exists that approaches the words alphabetically (Nyberg and Utas 1988). The other major dictionary or glossary is the Frahang ī Ōīm‐ēwag, a dictionary of Avestan words. In the preface the author states that the work is intended to understand the zand (Middle Persian translation of the Avesta) (Reichelt 1900).

  7.9 Christian and Manichaean Literature in Middle Persian

  A relatively large number of Christians appear to have lived in the Iranian Plateau by the late Sasanian period. This was the result, first, of the influx of Christian captives and their settlement into the empire, and second, of later conversions to the Christian faith. In Mesopotamia the Persian (Syriac Persian) Christian community who received converts from the royal family became subjects of martyrologies and hagiographies of late antiquity (Brock and Harvey 1998). The Christians were also active in translating Christian texts, especially the New Testament, into Middle Persian. The Zabūr or Psalms are translations of these biblical texts into Middle Persian (Andreas and Barr 1933). These are the main non‐Zoroastrian Middle Persian texts that survive, along with a few Christian funerary monuments. They were probably done for and by the Nestorian community, using the Syriac versions of the Bible. There is also evidence of translation of the Book of Enoch and other Christian apocryphal works as well as of hymns; this suggests the importance and size of the Christian community in Iran.

  Another group of Middle Persian texts is the product of Manichaean religious life; Manichaeans were an important community in the Near East and the eastern Mediterranean region in the late antiquity. A large corpus survives, but most of the texts are fragmentary in nature, and are usually called Manichaean Middle Persian texts. They are quite varied in topic and parallel the Zoroastrian texts in subject matter (Klimkeit 1993). The most important Manichaean Middle Persian text is the Šāpūragān, which was written by Manī for his patron Šāpur I. This summarizes the teachings of Manī in the court language of the Sasanian Empire, although the text is difficult because of its esoteric and apocalyptic style (MacKenzie 1978). There are other fragments and texts in Middle Persian that may be called Manichaean hagiography and martyrology. Finally, there are sermons and addresses by Manichaean leaders (the Elect) after Manī’s death to the adherents.

  7.10 Pahlavi Literature in Contact with Greek and Sanskrit Literature and Islam

  In Pahlavi texts, we come across word compounds that appear to define technical religious and scientific terminology and that were foreign to Persian. These terms are further evidence for the translation of foreign works into Middle Persian. Some Syriac and Greek words that were translated in Middle Persian are as follows: dašnēzādagān for Syriac banyā yāminā “righteous ones;” gēhān ī kōdak for Greek mikros kosmos “microcosm;” xrad‐dōšagīh for Greek philosophia “philosophy;” and zamīg‐paymānīh for geōmetria “geometry” (Rezā’ī Bāgh‐Bīdī 2000, pp. 148–149) The evidence suggests a vibrant translation campaign by the Sasanian scholars to understand the world and their neighbors. This runs contrary to the common view of the Sasanian world as one that was static and hostile to non‐Zoroastrian ideas.

  In the fourth book of Dēnkard, we read that during the reign of Šāpūr I texts on medicine, astronomy, logic and other crafts and skill that existed in India and Rome and other lands were gathered and a copy of them were made (Choksy 2004; Shaki 1981). As to the nature of these texts, we do have some ideas. In another part of book four of Dēnkard the name of some of these texts are given: the Indian Kāla Koa, “Treasury of Astronomy,” and Pahlavi Magistīg (Almagest) of Ptolemy (Bailey 1971, p. 86; Shaki 1981, p. 123). In the Bundahišn we also find several pieces of evidence that the author(s) was familiar with Greek texts and sciences, namely the use of the Hippocratic treatise Peri hebdomádōn (MacKenzie 1989).

  A place for the dissemination of Greek knowledge among others in the Sasanian Empire was the city of Weh‐andīōg‐Šāpūr (Gundēšāpūr). This city, which was built during the reign of Šāpūr I, was comprised of Syriac‐speaking Christians of the city of Antioch, who established the famous medical center there. It was in this place that Greek medical books were translated into Syriac in the sixth century CE by Sargis, while Indian medical treatise also reached this location (MacKenzie 1989, p. 81). Thus, the Sasanians made possible the meeting of Greek and Indian sciences. Also, Aristotelian texts and other Greek texts dealing with bawišn ud vināhišn, “on coming to be and passing away,” Jatag‐wihīrīh, “change of form,” and nibēg ī zamīg paymānīh, “measurement of the earth,” i.e. geometry, were translated into Middle Persian (Bailey 1971, pp. 81–82; Shaki 1970). So, too, books on logic by Paul the Persian and a book on Aristotelian physics, theory of the soul, meteorology, and biology by Priscianus Lydus found their way to the Persian court (Gutas 1998, 26; Walker 2002).

  Persian knowledge of Indian learning is clear, mainly in the field of philosophy and astronomy. Books on logic called tark (Sanskrit tarka) were translated from Sanskrit into Middle Persian (Bailey 1971, p. 86). Indian influence on astronomy āwyākrn (Sanskrit vyākarana)
is well known. One can state that Persia was a conduit for the transmission of knowledge between the Hellenic and Indic world in late antiquity; consequently, it became a meeting ground of old and new ideas. All of this would be inherited by Muslim civilization, which transmitted these ideas to the West when it had forgotten its philosophical and scientific tradition.

  Astrology (MacKenzie 1964, p. 171) played a prominent part in Sasanian society which while the Avesta provided the initial inspiration, it was the Babylonian, Greek, and Indian tradition that impacted it; its importance can be seen from the number of terms used for those professions such as star‐gōwišnīh “star‐telling,” axtar‐āmar “zodiac‐teller,” stār‐hangār “star‐reckoner,” and hangām‐šnāsag “time‐knower.” The Sasanian king, we are told, consulted fortune‐tellers or astrologers to find out about the future and the courses of action that should be taken. The best example is found in the Ardaxšīr Romance, Kārnāmag ī Ardaxšīr ī Pābagān, where Pābag has a series of dreams about the progenitor of the house, i.e. Sāsān. One night Pābag dreams that the sun shines from the head of Sāsān; the second night he sees Sāsān sitting on a white elephant and everyone in the empire paying homage to him; and the third night he dreams that the three sacred Zoroastrian fires were shining on Sāsān’s house. Pābag has to ask the “dream interpreters” xwamn‐wizārān to tell him the meaning of his dreams.

  7.11 Conclusion

  What remains of Pahlavi texts is only a fraction of what existed. The reason for this loss is mainly that much of it was translated into Arabic, especially the wisdom literature, and above all to instruct the Caliph on how to rule and how to deal with his subjects. The survival of some of the Pahlavi texts was because of the diligence of a number of priests who wanted to keep the tradition alive and give answers to their Zoroastrian community in the face of conversion and loss of status and wealth in the new Islamic empire that stretched from China to Spain. Thus, what was important for religion was copied by the priests from generation to generation. Still, much was lost, and among the agents of destruction were bigoted emirs who had forgotten that the Zoroastrians were also a people of the book and their ancestors.

  What remains apparent, however, is that there was a vibrant literary tradition in the late the antique period. Nor did writing in Pahlavi stop with the coming of the Arabs (de Menasce 1975; Weber 2011): Rather, it continued for a group of scholars and priests who were devoted to the religion of Zoroastrianism and in daily economic (Gignoux 2010) and legal matters (Gignoux 2012). From the remains of late antique Pahlavi texts, we can observe a sea of learning that was the product of imperial and scholastic efforts to understand the world. It was first the Zoroastrian priests who were able to incorporate Greek philosophy into a unified Zoroastrian philosophical and religious outlook. The Muslims only followed this tradition, until Al‐Ghazali challenged the late antique trend. The Pahlavi texts also exhibit a dialogue between Greek and Sanskrit and other literary traditions on the Iranian Plateau. The now lost Pahlavi text Hazār Afsān (A Thousand Tales), is a good clue for the new trend at the end of the late antique period (Beyzaie 2013), which in Arabic came to be known as the Thousand and One Nights. Lastly, such tales as the story of Sindbad may have been originally a Sasanian tradition that was associated with one of the great ancient heroes of Iran, namely the voyages of Garšāsp, which became popularized among the masses (Zakeri 2006).

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