Pahlavi References to Armenia Dan Shapira
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PAHLAVI REFERENCES TO ARMENIA DAN SHAPIRA Jerusalem Armenia and Armenians are mentioned several times in Old Persian inscriptions; e.g., in the famous Behistun inscription of Darius, Armenia appears on the list of the Achaemenid provinces between Media and Cappadocia, before Parthia, Drangiana, Haraiva, Xvarazm, Bactria, Sogdiana, etc.' Armenia, Armenians and "the King of Armenia[ns]" are mentioned in the Middle Persian, Parthian' and Greek inscriptions of the first Sasanian kings: in Šahpuhr's inscription at Ka°ba-i Zardušt,3 Armenia appears on the list of the ,?ahrs of Šahpuhr's realm, after Arabestan, following thus the Achaemenid tradition, and before Iberia Maxelonia /Siunik' Albania /'rd'n, Balasakan, up to the Mountains of Kaf and the Gate of Alanians, Mountains of Padišxvar, Media, Gurgan, etc. In Narseh's inscription at Paikuli (§ 92-3)5 in Western Iran, Armenian king (but not Armenia!) Tyldt' (Tirdat/Trdat) is mentioned after the Caucasian countries of *[Gur]gan/Ba!asajkan [?], Mskyt'n,"byr'n (Iberia)," Syk'n,9 before the Arab vassals of I:IIrah and Edessa ('mrw lhmyd'n ML(KA) 'mrw 'pgrn'n [MLKA?]). In the slightly earlier inscription[s] of the Zoroastrian "Pope" Kerdir (§ 15), Armenia appears on the list of the lands of "Iran and non-Iran" before "Iberia Albania, Balasakan up to the Gate of the Alanians".1o Here these lands are listed as parts of non-Iran, as was observed by Lukonin," but it should be recalled again that this last list belongs to the text of the fanatical Zoroastrian dignitary. However, there seems to have been existing a well-fixed order of the Caucasian countries, opening as a rule with Armenia and finishing with the Gate of the Alanians. As only a very small amount of Book-Pahlavi Zoroastrian literature has survived, one could hardly be surprised that there are rather few references to Armenia found in this corpus. On the contrary, one would say that there is quite a number of such occur- rences (especially when one searches the Zoroastrian literature in an attempt to find mentions of another Caucasian countries) of the name of this land that throughout most of its history was so tightly connected with her southern neighbor. In the Middle Persian composition Bundahišn,12 chapter 31.10-11, Armenia is listed among the lands of Iran, with Ray, identified here with Adurbadagan (... I hast Adurbadagan) to follow. This list is, however, based on the Middle Persian version of chapter 1.12-15 of Vendidad, or Widewdad, a late Avestan text, where Adurbadagan is a gloss for Ray /Ray, which "translates" the Avestan Raga (Adurbadagan, hast ke Ray gowed), and Armenia is absent from the list altogether. Nevertheless, the close examination of both lists, that one found in the Pahlavi Vendidad I, and that of Bundahišn 31, based on Pahlavi Vendidad I, demonstrates that Armenia in the list of Bundahisn was inserted instead of HaraxvaitI, Arachosia (in Pahlavi: Harahmand14). Such substitution of Armenia instead of an ancient Eastern- Iranian country implies that in, at least, one Iranian tradition Armenia was seen as part and parcel of Iran. One finds intriguing information in Bundahisn 11 a, which treats of the rivers. Bd lla.3-5: Frat rod bun xan az wimand I Hrom pad Asurestan widercd ud 0 Diglat rczcd u-š frädlh ed ku abar zamlg xvarišn kunend. Paydag ku h&n bun xan Manuš?ihr kand ud ab hamag abaz 0 ewag gyag abgand. ?iyõn gowed ku: "Yazom Frat I purr-mahig ke xvad ruwan ray Manuš?ihr kand, ab stad ud xvarenld". "The river Frat (Euphrates): its source is from the border of Byzantium, it passes in Asarestan (Mesopotamia) and pours into Diglat (Tigris), and its priority lits being Euphrates15 is that they produce food on the land. It is manifest that Manu??ihr exca- vated its source and collected the entire water in one place. As one says: "I worship Frtt, full of fish, which, for the sake of his own soul, Manu?c'?ihr excavated, took the water and let (people) drink". This passage implies that about the time it was recorded in writing, the Byzantian- Sasanian border was in the vicinity of the nowadays Erzerum in the Western Armenia. Bd 11a.6: Diglat rod az Delaman be aycd ud pad Xuzestan 0 zreh rezed. The river Diglat (Tigris) comes from Daylam and pours into the sea in Xirzestan. The Tigris does not start, of course, in Daylam, which is Tabaresan near the Caspian Sea. But it does flow through the territory occupied at the present by the Zaza, or Dim(i)li-speaking Iranian people, who, according to a theory, have migrated from Daylam into Eastern Anatolia.'6 The date of this migration is uncertain, and one proba- bly would, with caution, to look for an early indication of such migration in our Pahlavi passage. Bd 1 la 18-20: Sped rod pad Adurbadagan. Gowend ku: "Dahag ayaft az Ahriman ud dewan anoh xvast". Tord rod ke Kor-iz xvancnd az zreh Sirab be aycd ud o zreh I Gurgän rized. Zcwab? han rod i az Adurbädagän be ayed ud pad Pars o zreh rized. The river Sped (White") is in Adurbadagan. They say: "There Dahag asked for a boon from Ahriman and (his) demons ". The river Tord which they also call Kor (Kura, Mtkvari), comes from Sn-ab and pours into the Lake ofGurgän18 (the Caspian). Zew?b? is that river which comes from Adurbadag&7 and pours in Pars into the sea. Here we find the Iranian name of the principal river of Georgia and Azerbayjan. I am not, however, able to identify what is said to be its source, the Lake of In the geographical work .S??hrist?n?ha 1 Er?n3`ahr §57 we read in the section which treats of the lands in the North-Western Iran: Sahristan I Wan Wan I Guiaxsan kard ud pad zanlh 0 Kay-Kawad mad, ud drubuštlh I Arwandasp Tur I Brädrõš I karb pad jadugih kard, [pänagIh] I gyan I xvëš ray. "The city of Wan was built by Wan daughter of Gulax??n who married Kay-Kawad, and the karapan Tllr son of Br?dro.? (Bratrviiarae?a ) made it a fortress of Arwandäsp ?Arja.spj by means of magic, on behalf of protection of his own life". 19 I do not know when the city of Wan arose to any importance. The reading (in the Pahlavi script, the name is written by three identical vertical strokes) and the identifi- cation were problematic for the earlier scholar. I dare to propose my own emendation, very slight in the Pahlavi, and to read here not Wan, but *Dvin. The name of the Armenian capital in the late Sasanian and early Islamic epochs, known to Syrians as Dwyn or 'dwyn, and to Arabs as Dabil. Dvin is a Persian word, dowin, meaning "hill".2° Some serious tensions between the Christian clergy and the Zoroastrian hierar- chy were taking place there in the last decades of the Sasanian rule, and this may be the reason for the non-sympathetic reference to this city in the Pahlavi text. In the 6th century, the famous Sasanian general Wahram I who usurped the 144 .