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AMṚTAPRABHADHĀRAṆĪ, name given by H. W. Bailey to a fifty-line text in Late Khotanese (transcribed in Bailey, Khotanese Texts V, Cambridge, 1963, pp. 61-64). The name occurs in line 30, and a dhāraṇī (Skt. “spell, sacred formula”) begins with the word amritta-prrabhe in line 32. The as yet untranslated text…

ĀMŪ DARYĀ, Gk. Oxos, Lat. Oxus, Sasanian Mid. Pers. Wehrōd, Ar. Jayḥūn (to the 7th/13th cent.), Chinese Kui-shui, Wu-hu, or Po-tsu, river about 2,500 km long, regarded in ancient times as the boundary between Iran and Tūrān. The modern name may be derived from Āmol, the town at which in…

AMURDĀD (Pahl. form of Av. Amərətāt, NPers. Mordād, Amordād), one of the seven great Aməša Spəntas of Zoroastrianism, the hypostasis of the concept of “not dying,” that is Long Life on this earth or Immortality in the hereafter (cf. Ved. amṛtatva). Amurdād/Amərətāt is regularly linked with Hordād/Haurvatāt, Wholeness or Health, and…

AMYRTAEUS (II) (Egyptian Demotic Imn-ir-di-s[w] “The God Ammon has given him”; Aram. ʾmwrtys), King of Egypt, 404-398 B.C., the only member of Manetho’s 29th dynasty (Kienitz, Geschichte, pp. 75-78, 191). Originally from Sais, he was probably the nephew of Amyrtaeus (I), the protagonist together with Inarus of the revolt against…

AMYTIS, Median and Persian female name, attested only in the Greek form Ámytis, which perhaps may reflect (with vowel metathesis) an old Persian *Umati—equivalent to Avestan humaiti—“having good thought” (see W. Eilers, Semiramis, Vienna, 1971, pp. 17 and 57, n. 101). The most famous bearers of this name are: (1)…

Am-Ar ENTRIES: CAPTIONS OF ILLUSTRATIONS   online entry caption text AMĀNAT KHAN ŠĪRĀZĪ Figure 33. Amānat Khan’s Signature on the Dome of the Tāj Maḥall. AMESTRIS Figure 1. Silver stater coin of Amastris, queen in Paphlagonia. Obverse: the queen’s head in profile. Reverse: seated Aphrodite/Anāhid, holding the figure of Victory;…

AMƎŠA SPƎNTA, an Avestan term for beneficent divinity, meaning literally “Holy/Bounteous Immortal” (Pahl. Amešāspand, [A]mahraspand). Although the expression does not occur in the Gāthās, it was probably coined by Zoroaster himself. Spənta is a characteristic word of his revelation, meaning “furthering, strengthening, bounteous, holy.” Vedic usage suggests that the Indo-Iranians…

AN LU-SHAN, frontier general of mixed Sogdian and Turkish ancestry who rose to high rank during the latter part of the reign of Hsüan-tsung (713-56); he was one of a number of officers of non-Chinese ancestry who were given supreme command over frontier armies. According to the somewhat mythologized account…

AN SHIH-KAO, or An Ch’ing (the latter is said to be his personal name, the former his courtesy name), the earliest known translator of Buddhist texts into Chinese. There is little reliable information about him, though he is mentioned in some early colophons and prefaces. The earliest extant biography, embellished…

AN-HSI (Middle Chinese an-sik), name by which the Parthian empire was known to the Chinese, a transcription of Aršak-, the name of the Parthian ruling house. (Chinese -n corresponds regularly to foreign -r in transcriptions of the Han period.) The first reference to An-hsi is in the report of the…

ANABASIS (Greek anábasis, “going up, way up, expedition up [from the coast]”), title of ancient campaign accounts stylistically influenced by the so-called Periplus books; more especially, title of the famous firsthand account by Xenophon of Cyrus the Younger’s campaign (the so-called March of the Ten Thousand), the model for Arrian’s…

ANĀHĪD (Old Pers. Anāhitā, New Pers. Nāhīd, Armenian Anahit, Greek Anaitis), Mid. Pers. form of the name of the Iranian goddess Anāhitā. The subject will be treated in four sections: i. Ardwīsūr Anāhīd. ii. The cult and its diffusion. iii. Anaitis. iv. Anāhitā in the arts.   i. Ardwīsūr Anāhīd Ardwīsūr…

ANĀMAKA (a-n-a-m-k-), name of the tenth month (December-January) of the Old Persian calendar (see Kent, Old Persian, p. 161a), equivalent to Akkadian Ṭebētu and Elamite Šermi (for the latter in the Persepolis tablets, see R. T. Hallock, Persepolis Fortification Tablets, Chicago, 1969, pp. 74, 756b). The Old Persian name occurs…