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The Earliest Persians in Iran Toponyms and Persian Ethnicity

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The Earliest Persians in Iran Toponyms and Persian Ethnicity Samuel Jordan Center for Persian Studies and Culture www.dabirjournal.org Digital Archive of Brief notes & Iran Review ISSN: 2470-4040 No.7.2020 Special Issue: Hellenism and Iran 1 xšnaoθrahe ahurahe mazdå Detail from above the entrance of Tehran’s fijire temple, 1286š/1917–18. Photo by © Shervin Farridnejad The Digital Archive of Brief Notes & Iran Review (DABIR) ISSN: 2470-4040 www.dabirjournal.org Samuel Jordan Center for Persian Studies and Culture University of California, Irvine 1st Floor Humanities Gateway Irvine, CA 92697-3370 Editor-in-Chief Touraj Daryaee (University of California, Irvine) Editors Parsa Daneshmand (Oxford University) Shervin Farridnejad (Freie Universität Berlin/Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Wien) Judith A. Lerner (ISAW NYU) Book Review Editor Shervin Farridnejad (Freie Universität Berlin/Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Wien) Advisory Board Samra Azarnouche (École pratique des hautes études); Dominic P. Brookshaw (Oxford University); Matthew Canepa (University of Minnesota); Ashk Dahlén (Uppsala University); Peyvand Firouzeh (Cambridge Univer- sity); Leonardo Gregoratti (Durham University); Frantz Grenet (Collège de France); Wouter F.M. Henkel- man (École Pratique des Hautes Études); Rasoul Jafarian (Tehran University); Nasir al-Ka‘abi (University of Kufa); Andromache Karanika (UC Irvine); Agnes Korn (CNRS, UMR Mondes Iranien et Indien); Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones (University of Edinburgh); Jason Mokhtarain (University of Indiana); Ali Mousavi (UC Irvine); Mahmoud Omidsalar (CSU Los Angeles); Antonio Panaino (University of Bologna); Alka Patel (UC Irvine); Richard Payne (University of Chicago); Khodadad Rezakhani (History, UCLA); Vesta Sarkhosh Curtis (British Museum); M. Rahim Shayegan (UCLA); Rolf Strootman (Utrecht University); Giusto Traina (University of Paris-Sorbonne); Mohsen Zakeri (University of Göttingen) Copy Editor: Philip Grant Logo design by Charles Li Layout and typesetting by Kourosh Beighpour Contents Articles 1 Domenico Agostini: On Jerusalem and Luhrāsp: A Closer Look 1 2 Daryoosh Akbarzadeh: Collapse of Sasanian Empire 7 3 Kiumars Alizadeh: The earliest Persians in Iran toponyms and Persian ethnicity 16 4 Elshad Bagirow: Sassanid toreutics discovered in Shemakha, Azerbaijan as artistic metalwork 54 in the art of Sasanian Iran 5 Majid Daneshgar: An Old Persian-Malay Anthology of Poems from Aceh 61 6 Morteza Djamali, Nicolas Faucherre: Sasanian architecture as viewed by the 19th century 91 French architect Pascal-Xavier Coste 7 Shervin Farridnejad: Cow Sacrifijice and the Hataria’s Dedicatory Inscription at the Zoroastrian 101 Shrine of Bānū-Pārs 8 Hasmik C. Kirakosian: New Persian Pahlawān 112 9 Khodadad Rezakhani: Notes on the Pahlavi Archives I: Finding *Haspīn-raz and the Geography 119 of the Tabarestan Archive 10 Yusef Saadat: Contributions to Middle Persian lexicography 128 11 Diego M. Santos; Marcos Albino: Mittelpersisch rōzag ‘Fasten’ 149 12 Ehsan Shavarebi; Sajad Amiri Bavandpour: Temple of Anahid and Martyrdom of Barshebya 168 Special Issue: Hellenism and Iran 13 Jake Nabel: Exemplary History and Arsacid Genealogy 175 14 Marek Jan Olbrycht: Andragoras, a Seleukid Governor of Parthia-Hyrkania, and his Coinage 192 15 Rolf Strootman: Hellenism and Persianism in the East 201 Reviews 16 Chiara Barbati: Review of Benkato, Adam. Āzandnāmē. An Edition and Literary-Critical Study 229 of the Manichaean-Sogdian Parable-Book. Beiträge Zur Iranistik 42. Wiesbaden: Reichert Verlag, 2017. 216 p., 42 images, ISBN: 9783954902361. 17 Majid Daneshgar: Translation of Persian and Malay Literary Works in Malaysia and Iran 232 18 Yaser Malekzadeh: Review of Ghafouri, Farzin. Sanǧeš-e manābeʿ-e tārīḫī-ye šāhnāme dar 236 pādšāhī-ye ḫosrō anūšīravān [The Evaluation of Historical Sources of Shāhnāme in the Reign of Khusraw Anūshīravān]. Tehran, Mīrās̱-e Maktūb. 2018. 577+17 pp. ISBN 9786002031310. Digital Archive of Brief notes & Iran Review No.7.2020 ISSN: 2470 - 4040 © Samuel Jordan Center for Persian Studies & Culture University of California, Irvine Special Issue: Hellenism and Iran 2020, No. 7 © Samuel Jordan Center for Persian Studies and Culture, University of California, Irvine ISSN: 2470 - 4040 The earliest Persians in Iran: toponyms and Persian ethnicity Kiumars Alizadeh (Freie Universität Berlin) 16 Abstract t is the aim of this paper to go into the localization of toponyms, including Parsua, Parsāya, Parsuaš, IParšua, and Parsumaš in Assyrian, Babylonian, and Urartian documentary sources.1 By analyzing the accounts found in Mesopotamian kings’ itineraries, annals, and administrative records, it is shown that from the 9th century BCE till the emergence of Achaemenid Empire in the mid-6th century BCE, two groups of toponyms can be identifijied. Parsua, Parsuaš, Paršua (group A), and Parsumaš (group B) are mentioned at the same time, but in a very diffferent topographic context. It is evident that Babylonian and Assyrian (and Urartian) scribes applied a distinction between two toponyms: they generally reserved the spelling with -umaš for the southern entity and the spelling -ua for the northern. Furthermore, Parsua, Parsuaš and Parsāya always were used as a toponym and never marked by the determinative LÚ and there is no concrete proof to relate them with Persians. Also, a reference to Parsumaš in southwest marked by both KUR and LÚ, does not simply mean that Parsumaš is an exclusive mark of Persian ethnic in the pre-Achaemenid period. In other words, ‘Parsumašian’ refers to many tribes (including Persians) who dwelled in the Neo-Elamite eastern territories, and it would be better to diffferentiate Parsumašians from LÚParsāya (Persians→ Akk.) and Parsirra/ Parsip (Persians→ El.) in Achaemenid cuneiform sources. 1- The present paper, extract ed and a revised version from my Ph.D. thesis, is the outcome of a six-month research st ay at Freie Universität Berlin. I would like to express my deep gratitude to the Soudavar Memorial Foundation for its generous support during my st ay in Berlin. 17 A.0.102.5 A.0.102.10 A.0.102.12 A.0.102.13 A.0.102.14 A.0.102.14 A.0.102.14 A.0.102.16 A.0.102.16 A.0.102.38 rs in south ā Lower Ḫubuš- Ḫubuš- century BCE, Arbil Kullar Kullar Kullar Zāb Zāb … th Zāb kaea kaea nally P i fij Ḫubuš- Ḫubuš- Zamua Munna Munna Kullar Hašimur Muṣaṣir Muṣaṣir Parsua kaea kaea Urartian Urartian Munna Allabria Parsua Allabria Namri Madaḫišā Madaḫišā Abdadānu Cities Cities Mannae- Mannae- Allabria Parsua Allabria Parsua Parsua Gilzānu Gilzānu Tugliaš an an century BCE to the reign of the reign century BCE to II. It Sargon th Samuel Jordan Center for Persian Studies and Culture Ab- Mannae- Mannae- Parsua Abdadānu Abdadānu Mēsu Zirtu Zirtu … dadānu ans ans Ab- Ḫaban Namri Ḫaban Amadāiia Mannaš Ḫarrānia Mannaš Ḫarrānia dadānu Ḫaban Namri Ḫaban Namri Araziaš Ḫarna Šašagānu Ḫarna Šašagānu Namri Tugliaš Tugliaš Tugliaš Ḫarḫar Paddira Andia Paddira Andia ya/Parsuaš/Paršua, but a meticulous examination of but a meticulous examination especially from sources, ya/Parsuaš/Paršua, millennium BCE till the rise of in the 6 Empire Achaemenid ā st Šumurza Parsua … Land of Parsua Parsua rs region and not in the central Zagros. It seems that the central Zagros is a suitable Zagros It seems that the central Zagros. and not in the central rs region ā ya, Parsana, Parsuaš, Parsamaš, Parsumaš, Parsumašians, Parsu, Paršua, and Parsip. and Parsip. Paršua, Parsu, Parsumašians, Parsumaš, Parsamaš, Parsuaš, Parsana, ya, ā Bīt- Parsua Namri Nergal of in documentary evidence during the reign 1: Parsua Shalmaneser III Table half of the 1 st cally the P i Tugliaš Ḫalman fij From the 1 From Ellipi Introduction several toponyms and ethnonyms have been mentioned in Assyrian, Babylonian, Urartian, and Elamite and Elamite Urartian, been mentioned in Assyrian, Babylonian, have and ethnonyms toponyms several Pars Parsua, sources: specify the location of tried to these toponyms. scholars have CE till now, the early eighteenth-century From and including south of Zagros, regions, Urmia, the central In this case, several Lake localize is a consensus among scholars to there As it will be shown, been suggested. have Iran western the 9 from region most of Zagros in the central these toponyms is also believed that following the reign of the reign in the southern Zagros that following they should be localized is also believed Sennacherib, speci area, location only for Parsua/Pars of many II, and Ashurbanipal, will challenge Sargon these theories and shed V, the period of Šamši-Adad new light on the subject. 2020, No. 7 Not only is the localization of these toponyms difffijicult, but their afffijiliation with Persian tribes before the emergence of the Achaemenid Empire in the Elamite highlands has also produced a great deal of difffijiculty.2 Many scholars have gone so far as to suggest that the toponym Parsua from the reign of Shalmaneser III can be interpreted as the ‘fijirst real mention’ of the Persians after their arrival in western Iran.3 Knowing as we now do that there is no clear evidence to support this hypothesis, it seems it is a far from convincing one. If so, which one(s) of these toponyms and proper names can be our ‘early Persians’?4 In this paper, I try to go over the issue once again and clarify the links of such toponyms with early Persians. While attempting to achieve these aims, the following points must be kept in mind. The analysis of toponyms takes a reign-by-reign approach. Firstly, it tries to localize the toponyms, immediately followed by an attempt to determine their afffijiliation with the Persians. It should be noticed that there are many obstacles in connecting toponyms to ethnonyms, and it can hardly be construed as a straight-forward approach. Also, one might expect to get some answers from archaeological surveys, but for the present, the archaeological evidence needed to fijix a Persian ethnonym in pre-Achaemenid period in western Iran is very scanty: if one relies only on pottery, it would be very hazardous to come to any conclusion.5 Even if we had many archaeological surveys, that would only tell us about such things as settlement patterns and ceramic cultures, not about ethnic groups as such.
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