Herodotus and the Empires of the East/Customs, Religion, and Language
CUSTOMS, RELIGION, AND LANGUAGE.
Worship of Ishtar.
Herdotus has supplemented his historical remarks with comments on manners and customs of the different peoples. In some of these he misrepresents and exaggerates the actual condition of society. This is true of the Ishtar worship. Prostitution in the service of this goddess, as Herodotus declares (I., 199), was practiced in various temples, notoriously at the Nanâ temple at Erech. But this was doubtless confined to the women who dwelt in the temple (Ḳadištu). That the offering of chastity was demanded once from all virgins is not substantiated by the cuneiform records. We can suppose that Herodotus erroneously represents as a universal custom certain lewd practices, which existed in individual temples. We must believe that in his time the effeminating influence of the Persians was sapping the moral vigor of the Babylonians, and that the offering of chastity may have been especially prevalent in the vicinity of certain temples and at certain feasts.
Babylonian Dress.
Herodotus describes the dress of the Babylonians as follows: " Their dress is a linen coat which reaches to the feet. Over this they wear a second coat of wool, and a white mantle as a wrap. . . . They let their hair grow long, and bind their heads with turbans." (I., 195.) The representations which are preserved on the Assyrian and Babylonian palaces confirm these accounts. The undergarments, reaching to the feet, and the somewhat shorter, richly decorated over-garment are clearly seen in the reliefs of the Assyrian kings. The clothes were tightly fitting. Furthermore, the white mantle can be seen on several representations.
The statements of Herodotus naturally concern themselves with the general fashion. Soldiers and workmen wore more convenient, shorter garments, as seen in the representations. The custom of doing the hair, which we observe on the monuments, corresponds exactly to the description which Herodotus gives. The long hair was carefully fastened in braids; even soldiers wore their hair in this fashion.
The Woman Market.
The accounts of Herodotus concerning the bride market are remarkable. In each year, he says, all the maidens in the separate villages who are marriageable are collected and brought to one place. The most beautiful are sold at a great price. Out of the net proceeds was derived a dowry for the uglier ones. No purchaser could take away a maiden without surety, but he must promise and give surety that he would take her for his wedded wife. (Hdt. I., 196.) Herodotus further adds that this custom, which he considers as the wisest and the best of all the Babylonian practices, no longer existed at his time, but belonged only to the good old days.
It is hard to determine whether this description is correct in all particulars. Strabo and Nicolaus Damascenus also mention such a practice. From the contract tablets we are informed only that women were purchased. These were intended, generally, for the harem of the chief, but many also became lawful wives.
Commerce on the Euphrates.
We know from Herodotus (I., 194) that Babylon was the central point of an extensive commerce. Armenian traders brought their wares to Babylon, on the Euphrates, and returned home by land. The manner of shipbuilding seemed strange to Herodotus. The ships were made out of woven willow twigs, covered with skins. "In every boat," says Herodotus, "is a living ass, and in the greater ones more. After the traders have arrived at Babylon and sold their cargo, they immediately offer the ribs and reeds of their boat for sale, pack the skins on the ass, and go back to Armenia." (I., 194.) The swift current of the Euphrates made such shipbuilding especially advantageous. Layard found in a palace at Nimrud representations of boats which correspond to the description of Herodotus. To-day the traffic on the Tigris is carried on by means of rafts consisting of inflated skins of sheep or goats. The Assyrian reliefs from Khorsabad show that this kind of raft has been in vogue for more than two thousand years. That the commerce of Babylon and Nineveh, before the time of Herodotus, possessed great significance is shown by several places in the Old Testament. Ezekiel (xvii. 4) calls Babylonia a land of traffic. Nahum (iii. 16) says of Nineveh: " Thy traders are more numerous than the stars of heaven."
The Seals of the Babylonians.
Herodotus observes (I., 195) that each Babylonian possessed a seal. As the inscriptions show, these seals were constructed of a conical stone or piece of metal, or were in the shape of a hollow cylinder. Such cylinders were generally worn on a string about the neck. The inscription of the seal consists frequently of three or four lines, which give the name of the owner, with the stereotyped formula, "A., the son of B., the son— i. e., the protégé"—of the god C."
The Religious Tolerance of Cyrus and Cambyses.
The Cyrus cylinder shows that the great founder of the Persian empire strove to win the favor of the conquered populations. He grants the requests of the Babylonian priesthood concerning the restoration of the images of the gods; he encourages the worship of the god Merodach, whose temple stood near the royal palace; he calls himself, as did the former kings, "builder (banim) of Esagila and Ezida." It is well known how Cyrus not only permitted the return of the Jews and the rebuilding of their temple, but gave back their holy vessels which Nebuchadrezar had seized. Remarkable are the words of the decree at the close of the book of Chronicles (cf. Ezra i. 2): " Thus spake Cyrus king of Persia, All the kingdoms of the earth has Jehovah, the God of heaven, given me, and has commanded me to build for him a temple at Jerusalem." These words do not show, as some commentators suppose, that Cyrus was a monotheist, and on that account was especially friendly to the Jews. They correspond rather to that general mode of expression in which Cyrus styles himself the executor of the Divine counsel. To the Babylonians he was the tool of Merodach; to the Jews, on the other hand, he was the servant of Jehovah. His good will toward the Jews was manifest, however, by the fact that he restored the holy vessels which Nebuchadrezar had seized. Presumably the Jews had given strong expression to their joy over the fall of Babylon.
Cambyses was as tolerant as Cyrus toward the prominent religions of the Persian empire. The annals of Nabû-na'id (rev. III., 25) state that Cambyses, immediately after the taking of Babylon by Cyrus, entered the temple Ê-šapa-kalama-summu. On the other hand Herodotus gives us a statement in regard to Cambyses which does not seem consistent with this liberality, for he attributes the killing of the Apis bull to the wrath of Cambyses at the joy which he supposed the Egyptians felt over his defeat. But the insult to the Egyptian idols (III., 27) would show that Cambyses was not inclined to spare the religious feelings of foreign nations. The several Egyptian documents, however, make the account of Herodotus exceedingly improbable. From an Egyptian inscription, preserved in the Vatican, we learn that Cambyses, after the conquest of Egypt, performed those religious duties which devolved upon him as the successor of the Pharaohs. He was initiated into the mysteries of the goddess Neith, and brought the holy offering to Osiris in the inner room of the temple. At his command the temple of Neith, in Sais, which had been seized by the soldiers, was purified and restored to its sacred use. (Compare "Justi, Geschichte des alten Persiens," p. 49.) According to Sayce, this bull, which Cambyses is said to have slain, was found in a granite sarcophagus. In the sculpture thereon Cambyses is represented as praying before the bull, and an inscription tells us that the bull was buried with customary rites, in which Cambyses also took part.
The Language of the Persians.
Herodotus says that Persian proper names correspond to the personal appearance and rank of each individual; and they terminate, without exception, in the same letter, which the Dorians call "sail" and the lonians "sigma." (I., 139.) This statement is untrue, since Persian nominatives of a-stems (I. Eur.o-s) have lost final's. In fact only stems in i and u retain the sibilant in the nominative—e. g., Gaumāta, Bardiya, beside Dārayava(h)ush, Caishpish, etc. (Spiegel, § 24; Tolman, " Persian Inscriptions," § 16; Brugmann, I., §§ 556, 3, 558, 4.) The Greek form of these names probably influenced this supposition of Herodotus.
The following will serve as examples of the meaning of Persian names: Dāraya-va(h)ush, Darius, (dar, "hold;" va(h)u, "wealth") "possessing wealth" (cf. Hdt. VI., 98); Vahyaz-dāta cf. Avestan, Vaňhazdāh, " giver of the best;" Khshayārshan, Xerxes, (khshaya, "ruler;" arshan, "male"); Hakhamanish, Achaemenes (Skt., sákhā, "friend").
The Old Persian language belongs to the Aryan group of the great Indo-European family. The chief representatives of this group are the Indian—i. e., the Vedic dialect and the classical Sanskrit and the Iranian—i. e.the Old Persian (West Iranian) and Avestan, sometimes called Zend (East Iranian). A common characteristic of this Aryan group is the failure to observe that distinction between a,e,o, which originally belonged to the Indo-European. Such sounds are represented in these languages simply by a—thus, Indo-European, *é-bhero-nt (Gr., ἔφερον); Sanskrit, ábharan; Old Persian, abara(n). In Avestan this a suffered later euphonic changes.
Herodotus little knew that the Persian language was but a sister tongue of his own. How closely it resembles the Greek, and how far it varies from the mother language, the Indo-European, the following examples of comparative morphology serve to illustrate:
Persian, aspa ("horse"); Indo-European, *éḱwo; Sanskrit, áçva; Greek, ἵππο-ς; Latin, equo-s.
| Persian. | Greek. | Indo-European. | ||||
| Nom. | *aspa | ἵππος | *éḱwos | |||
| Acc. | *aspam | ἵππον | *éḱwom | |||
| Gen. | *aspahyā | ἵπποιο (Hom.) | *éḱwosyo | |||
| *éḱwesyo | ||||||
| Abl | *aspā(d) | *ἵππο(τ)? Cf. Ϝοίκω, Rhein. Mus. LI. p. 303 | *éḱwōd | |||
| *éḱwēd | ||||||
| Loc. | *aspaiy | *ἵπποι; cf. οἴκοι | *éḱwoi | |||
| *ἵππει; cf. οἴκει | *éḱwei | |||||
| Instr. | *aspā | *ἵππη; cf. πήποκα. (Att. πώποτε), Cyprian ἠ "if" (Att. ἐᾱν for ἠ ἄν) | *éḱwō | |||
| *éḱwē |
Persian, bar ("bear"); Indo-European, bher; Sanskrit, bhar; Greek, φέρω; Latin, fero.
| Present active. | ||||
| Persian. | Greek. | Indo-European. | ||
| * | barā-mi | φέρω | * | bhér-ō |
| bara-hy | φέρεις | * | bhére-si | |
| bara-tiy | φέρει | * | bhére-ti | |
| * | bara-mahy | φέρομεν | * | bhér-mes |
| bara-(n)tiy | φέροντι (Dor.) | * | bhéro-nti | |
| Imperfect Active. | ||||
| Persian. | Greek. | Indo-European. | ||
| * | abaram | ἔφερον | * | é-bhero-m |
| * | abaras | ἔφερες | * | é-bhere-s |
| abara(t) | ἔφερε(τ) | * | é-bhere-t | |
The Customs of The Persians.
Herodotus states that it is not the practice of the Persians to erect statues, temples, or altars to their gods. (I., 131.) But Darius tells us in the Behistan Inscription (I., 14) that he restored the sanctuaries which Gaumāta destroyed. This passage, the interpretation of which is somewhat doubtful, ought probably to read: "I restored the places of prayer which Gaumāta the Magian destroyed; I preserved the aqueducts (?) for the people, the possessions, the dwelling places, and whatever else Gaumāta the Magian had taken from them with the help of his clansmen (vithibish[1])."
On the tomb of Darius at Naqshi-Rustam, opposite the standing form of the king, is carved an altar, upon which the sacred fire is burning, while above is a disk, probably the representation of the sun, of which the fire blazing at the shrine is the symbol. Over all is the image of the supreme god Auramazda.
Again Herodotus erroneously confused Mitra with Aphrodite. Mitra, or Mithra, was the personification of the sun, while Anaitis corresponds to the Greek Aphrodite. Both names occur in the inscription of Artaxerxes Mnemon at Susa: " Let Auramazda, Anahita, and Mithra protect me." ([A(h)uramazda] Anah[i]ta ut[a Mijthra [mam patuv].) The following selection from the Mihir Yasht of the Avesta will serve as a specimen of the praise of Mithra, the all -beholding sun: " Mithra, of far courses,[2] we worship with sacrifice, a god, truth-speaking, eloquent, of a thousand ears, well-shapened, of ten thousand eyes, tall, with broad windows—i. e., as in a fortress, where one may have a broad view—strong, sleepless, ever watchful, giving instruction as a reward, lord of hosts, possessor of a thousand spies, ruler, master, all-knowing."
It is to Auramazda that Darius owes his throne and his victories. He repeatedly states in his inscriptions:
"By the grace of Auramazda I am king" (e. g., Bh., I., 5); "Auramazda gave me the kingdom" (e.g., Bh., I., 5 and 9); "By the grace of Auramazda (these countries) became subject to me" (e. g., Bh., I., 7); "Auramazda bore me aid, by the grace of Auramazda my army smote that rebellious army utterly" (e. g., Bh., L, 8).
The Magi were guardians of the priestly mysteries, and without them, Herodotus says, it was not lawful to sacrifice. (I., 132.) The Magi may have been a Median tribe of great political importance, for it was the Magian Gaumāta who, under the name of Smerdis, laid claim to the throne. As the priestly class, they held a supremacy which was unique and abiding. Their dress was white; on their head was worn a turban, which, by cheek pieces (Avestan, Paitidāna), protected the mouth. The sacrificial rites, described by Herodotus, agree pretty closely with the rules prescribed in the Avesta. Herodotus declares it is secretly mentioned that the dead body of a Persian is never buried until it has been torn by dog or bird; the Magi, however, practise this custom openly. (I., 140.) This is fully in accord with the requirements of the Avesta, which implicitly prescribe that the naked dead be exposed to birds of prey on a high structure (dakhma) outside the city. So the modern Parsis place the body on the "Tower of Silence" to be consumed by vultures.
The killing of obnoxious animals is commended. Herodotus relates that the Magi kill ants, snakes, and other creeping, as well as flying, things; but they spare the dog. (I., 140.) Vendidad XIII., of the Avesta, refers to the dog and to its treatment—e. g., the punishment for killing a dog, the duties of the dog, the proper food for the dog, the care of a diseased dog, the vices and virtues of the dog, the praise of the dog. But Vendidad XIV. sanctions the killing of snakes, ants, and worms.[3]
The education of the Persian youth, according to Herodotus, consists of three things—i.e., to ride the horse, to shoot the bow, and to speak the truth. (I., 136.) Herodotus further relates that to tell a lie is considered among them the greatest disgrace. (I., 138.) The Behistan inscription amply proves the apparent contempt of the Persian for deceit. "It was a lie," says Darius, "that made the provinces rebellious." (Bh., I., 10; IV., 4.) "Gaumāta the Magian deceived the state." (Bh., I., n.) So over the prostrate forms of the rebels is written: "This is A: he lied; this he said." (See p. 88.)
- ↑ Cf.Foy, "Kuhn's Zeitschrift," XXXIII., p. 425: "Spiegel, Bang und Tolman sollten übrigens auch bei ihren übersetzungen besser vithaibish als vithibish." The latter (vithin) is literally "belonging to a clan."
- ↑ Lit, "cow-ways;" Wrongly Darmesteter, "Lord of wide pastures;" and Jackson, "having wide pastures" (Avesta Grammar, §867).
- ↑ Also Vendidad XVI. prescribes the killing of ants.