Produced by Adrian Mastronardi and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) THE HISTORY OF ANTIQUITY. FROM THE GERMAN OF PROFESSOR MAX DUNCKER, BY EVELYN ABBOTT, M.A., LL.D., _FELLOW AND TUTOR OF BALLIOL COLLEGE, OXFORD._ VOL. V. LONDON: RICHARD BENTLEY & SON, NEW BURLINGTON STREET, Publishers in Ordinary to Her Majesty the Queen. 1881. Bungay: CLAY AND TAYLOR, PRINTERS. CONTENTS. BOOK VII. _THE ARIANS OF EASTERN IRAN._ CHAPTER I. PAGE THE LAND AND THE TRIBES 3 CHAPTER II. THE KINGDOM OF THE BACTRIANS 19 CHAPTER III. THE SCRIPTURES OF IRAN 49 CHAPTER IV. ZARATHRUSTRA AND THE DATE OF THE COMPOSITION OF THE AVESTA 68 CHAPTER V. THE GODS OF THE ARIANS IN IRAN 106 CHAPTER VI. THE REFORM OF THE FAITH 129 CHAPTER VII. THE DOCTRINE OF THE AVESTA 149 CHAPTER VIII. THE PRIESTHOOD OF IRAN 184 CHAPTER IX. THE LAW OF THE PRIESTS 201 CHAPTER X. THE LATER DEVELOPMENT OF EASTERN IRAN 239 BOOK VIII. _THE EMPIRE OF THE MEDES AND PERSIANS._ CHAPTER I. THE FOUNDATION OF THE MEDIAN KINGDOM 267 CHAPTER II. THE EMPIRE OF THE MEDES 292 CHAPTER III. THE TRIBES OF THE PERSIANS 319 CHAPTER IV. THE FALL OF THE MEDIAN KINGDOM 335 CHAPTER V. THE RISE OF THE PERSIAN KINGDOM 382 BOOK VII. THE ARIANS OF EASTERN IRAN. EASTERN IRAN. CHAPTER I. THE LAND AND THE TRIBES. Between the valley of the Indus and the land of the Euphrates and Tigris, bounded on the south by the ocean and the Persian Gulf, on the north by the broad steppes which the Oxus and Jaxartes vainly attempt to fertilise, by the Caspian Sea and the valley of the Aras, lies the table-land of Iran. Rising to an average height of 4000 feet above the level of the sea, it forms an oblong, the length of which from east to west is something more than 1500 miles. The breadth in the east is about 1000 miles, but at the narrowest point, from the Caspian Sea to the Persian Gulf, it is not much more than 500 miles; while the western edge, reaching from the Persian Gulf to the mountains of Aderbeijan, again extends over a distance of about 750 miles.