Search Results for “mithra”

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  • MITHRA

    Multiple Authors

    i. Mitra in Old Indian and Mithra in Old Iranian   ii. Iconography in Iran and Central Asia   iii. in Manicheism

  • MITHRA i. MITRA IN OLD INDIAN AND MITHRA IN OLD IRANIAN

    Hanns-Peter Schmidt

    Indo-Iranian god, with name based on the common noun mitrá “contract” with the connotations of “covenant, agreement, treaty, alliance, promise.”

  • MITHRA iii. IN MANICHEISM

    Werner Sundermann

    The Iranian Manicheans adopted the name of the Zoroastrian god Mithra (Av. Miθra; Mid. Pers.Mihr)and used it to designate one of their own deities.

  • MITHRA ii. ICONOGRAPHY IN IRAN AND CENTRAL ASIA

    Franz Grenet

    On coins of the Arsacids the seated archer dressed as a Parthian horseman has been interpreted as Mithra. In the Kushan empire Mithra is among the deities most frequently depicted on the coinage, always as a young solar god.

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  • MITHRAISM

    Roger Beck

    the cult of Mithra as it developed in the West, its origins, its features, and its probable connection with Mithra worship in Iran.

  • MEHRAGĀN

    Simone Cristoforetti

    an Iranian festival apparently dedicated to the god Miθra/Mehr, occurring also in onomastics and toponymy.

  • DĀTAMIΘRA

    Rüdiger Schmitt

    Iranian personal name resulting from an inversion of Miθra-dāta- “given by Mithra” and continued in the New Persian Dādmehr.

  • CAUTES AND CAUTOPATES

    William W. Malandra

    the two dadophoroi or torch bearers who often flank Mithras in the bull-slaying scene and who are sometimes shown in the birth scenes of Mithras.

  • AŠTĀD

    G. Gnoli

    Old Iranian female deity of rectitude and justice.

  • AHURA

    F. B. J. Kuiper

    designation of a type of deity inherited by Zoroastrianism from the prehistoric Indo-Iranian religion.

  • RAŠN

    William Malandra

    Avestan Rašnu, the deity of the ancient Iranian pantheon who functions as the divine Judge.

  • GORZ

    Jalil Doostkhah

    or gorza, gorz-e gāvsār/sar, lit. "ox-headed club/mace,"  a weapon often mentioned and variously described in Iranian myths and epic. In classical Persian texts, particularly in Ferdowsi’s Šāh-nāma, it is characterized as the decisive weapon of choice in fateful battles.

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  • ARIZANTOI

    C. J. Brunner

    one of the six tribes of the Median nation as listed by Herodotus.

  • DURIS OF SAMOS

    RÜDIGER SCHMITT

    (Gk. Doûris), (ca. 340-281/270 B.C.E.), Greek historiographer of the early Hellenistic period.

  • AHURA.ṰKAĒŠA

    M. Boyce

    an infrequent Avestan adjective meaning “following the Ahuric doctrine.”

  • BĀGAYĀDIŠ

    R. Schmitt

    name of the seventh month (September-October) of the Old Persian calendar, mentioned in Darius I’s Behistun inscription.

  • ČISTĀ

    Jean Kellens

    and Čisti; Avestan derivatives of the verb cit “to notice, to understand.”

  • APĄM NAPĀT

    M. Boyce

    (Son of the Waters), Zoroastrian divinity of mysterious character whose true identity, like that of his Vedic counterpart, Apām Napāt, has been much debated.

  • HERTEL, JOHANNES

    Almut Hintze

    Hertel’s lasting contributions to scholarship are his earlier works on Sanskrit narrative literature and its transmission. They culminated in the publication of a four-volume edition of the Pañcatantra in the Harvard Oriental Series, vols. 11-14 (1908-15). After his appointment to the Indology chair in Leipzig, he turned to Vedic studies and, from 1924, to Avestan.

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  • AŠI

    B. Schlerath, P. O. Skjærvø

    Avestan feminine noun meaning “thing attained, reward, share, portion, recompense” and, as a personification, the goddess “Reward, Fortune.”

  • MIHR YAŠT

    Almut Hintze

    Middle Persian form of the name of the tenth of the 21 Yašts of the Avesta; It constituted the seventh Fargard of the Avestan Bagān Yašt Nask, of which a Pahlavi summary survives in the Dēnkard. The Mihr Yašt is the hymn of the sixteenth day of the 30-day month of the Zoroastrian cal­endar.

  • IŠKATA

    Rüdiger Schmitt

    in the Avesta the name of a mountain and of the land (situated in the Hindu Kush region) which is dominated by this mountain.

  • CUMONT, FRANZ VALÉRY MARIE

    Jacques Duchesne-Guillemin

    classical philologist and historian of religions, whose research resulted in a substantial contribution to the understanding of Mithraism and other oriental reli­gions in the Roman empire.

  • GABAIN, ANNEMARIE VON

    Peter Zieme

    Von Gabain was particularly interested in the question of the extent to which the religious ideas of the Central Asian peoples had been influenced by Zoroastrianism or other Iranian beliefs, and this perspective is reflected in several of her publications.

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  • ANTHROPOMORPHISM

    J. Duchesne-Guillemin

    in Iranian religions. Ahura Mazdā in the Gāthās was conceived of, although invisible and immortal, as of human form, with eyes, hands, and tongue; but he was of gigantic size. 

  • COSMOGONY AND COSMOLOGY ii. In Mithraism

    Roger Beck

    That Mithraism had an elaborate cosmology, central to its doctrines, is proven first by the structure of its cult shrines (mithraea), which took the form of caves (real or artificial). As Porphyry (6) stated, the cave is an “image of the cosmos.” 

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  • MAGOPHONIA

    Muhammad A. Dandamayev

    An appropriate Iranian word for magophonia is the Sogdian mwγzt- (killing of the Magi).

  • AĒŠMA

    J. P. Asmussen

    “wrath” in Younger Avestan, both metaphysically, as a distinct demon, and psychologically as the function and quality of that demon realized in man.

  • SRAOŠA

    William W. Malandra

    a major deity (yazata) in Zoroastrianism, whose great popularity reserved a place for him in Iranian Islam as the angel Surōš. In Avestan, the word occurs both as a noun and as a name. Its basic common meaning is “to hear and obey.”

  • M~ CAPTIONS OF ILLUSTRATIONS

    Cross-Reference

    list of all the figure and plate images in the letter M entries.

  • DĒN YAŠT

    Jean Kellens

    a relatively short text, consisting for the most part of repetitive or formulaic sentences.

  • ALBORZ i. The Name

    W. Eilers

    etymology and meaning.

  • DAIVA

    Clarisse Herrenschmidt and Jean Kelllens

    Old Iranian noun (Av. daēuua-, OPers. daiva-) corresponding to the title devá- of the Indian gods and thus reflecting the Indo-European heritage (*deiu̯ó-).

  • ARDAŠĪR II

    A. Sh. Shahbazi

    Sasanian king of kings, A.D. 379-83; he was deposed by the nobles in favor of Šāpūr III.

  • ALBORZ ii. In Myth and Legend

    M. Boyce

    stories about the Alborz mountains in Iran and Zorastrianism.

  • Bahrām I

    A. Sh. Shahbazi

    the fourth Sasanian king and son of Šāpūr I.

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  • DĀMI

    Jean Kellens

    Avestan word, probably the noun of agency connected with Old Avestan dāman- “stake," thus “the one who drives the stake.”

  • ARIYĀRAMNA

    A. Sh. Shahbazi

    Old Persian proper name.

  • CLASS SYSTEM i. In the Avesta

    Prods Oktor Skjærvø

    The evidence for the existence of a highly developed class structure in the community in which the Avestan texts were composed is very slight, and the available information must be culled from sources chronologically as far apart as the Avesta itself and the Pahlavi texts.

  • ĀBĀN YAŠT

    Mary Boyce

    Middle Persian name of the fifth hymn among the Zoroastrian hymns to individual divinities. It is the third longest, with 131 verses.

  • BABYLONIA ii. Babylonian Influences on Iran

    G. Gnoli

    In the Achaemenid period, the influence of Babylonia was strong in the fields of the arts, science, religion, and religious policies, even affecting the concept of kingship.

  • HERMES

    Albert de Jong

    Hermes was identified with the Roman god Mercury, god of commerce and trade, and came to be symbolized with the moneybag. In Egypt, he was identified with the god Thoth; he was the source of a large number of writings outlining the ways in which the soul could be released from the bonds of matter.

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  • COSMOGONY AND COSMOLOGY i. In Zoroastrianism/Mazdaism

    Philip G. Kreyenbroek

    The “orthodox” myth. The extant Avesta contains no systematic exposition of the cosmological beliefs of the people among whom it was composed and who eventually brought Zoroastrianism to western Iran.

  • ABARSĒN

    C. J. Brunner

    Middle Persian form of the Avestan name Upāiri.saēna, designating the Hindu Kush mountains (Av. iškata; Mid. Pers. kōf, gar) of central and eastern Afghanistan.

  • ARDWAHIŠT

    M. Boyce

    one of the six great Aməša Spəntas who, with Ahura Mazdā and/or his Holy Spirit, make up the Zoroastrian Heptad. Of the six, Aša has the clearest pre-Zoroastrian antecedents.

  • SCHMIDT, HANNS-PETER

    Touraj Daryaee

    (1930-2017), a German Indo-Iranist who specialized in studies on Indian mythology and the Zoroastrian religion.

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  • ARTAXIAS I

    J. Russell

    reigned 189-160 B.C., founder of the Artaxiad dynasty in Greater Armenia.

  • ARD YAŠT

    P. O. Skjærvø

    Middle Persian name of the Avestan hymn dedicated to Aši.

  • ČEHR

    Bruce Lincoln

    two homographic neuter substantives čiθra- in Avestan, one meaning “face, appearance,” which is translated in Pahlavi as paydāg, and another rendered in Pahlavi as tōhmag and denoting “origin, lineage,” as well as “seed,” although the latter sense is attested only in compounds.

  • ARTĒŠTĀR

    W. Sundermann

    a learned calque on and translation of the Avestan raθaēštā.