34. Appendix 5.1: Introduction to the History of Ferishta to the Era of Alexander (§§627-781)

627. From: The History of India As Told By Its Own Historians — The Muhammadan Period

Posthumous Papers of H. M. Elliot, edited and continued by J. Dowson,

Vol. VI, London, 1875, p. 532ff. Appendices, Note E

“Note E.

INTRODUCTION TO FIRISHTA’S HISTORY.

628. [{The name is spelled either Ferishta or Firishta.} Firishta’s history is preceded by an Introduction, giving, as his translator, General Briggs, has stated, “a rapid and imperfect account of Hindu history previous to the Muhammadan invasion.” Sir H. Elliot spoke very disparagingly of this part of the work, and compared it with the first ten Books of Livy, or Dr. Henry’s first volume of the History of Great Britain based on the poems of Ossian.(1) General Briggs made only a partial translation of the Introduction, and evidently held a very low opinion of its value; but notwithstanding this, and the openly expressed condemnation of Sir H. Elliot, a desire has been often felt and expressed for a complete translation. The subject treated of in the Introduction is one of the greatest obscurity, and inquirers who are striving to penetrate the gloom of Hindu antiquity are eager for the smallest ray or spark of light. Firishta deals with it in a very bold and decided manner, nothing doubting; and a perusal of General Briggs’s abstract, or a partial examination of the Persian text, might well excite a wish for a perfect translation. The Editor has therefore made the following complete version of all the historical part of the Introduction. If it does not satisfy, it will at least extinguish expectation; and the work will no longer be looked upon as a partially worked mine containing undiscovered or unappreciated gems of light. As a literary production, the work is certainly curious. Scattered Hindu traditions, which the author had gleaned from various sources, are unhesitatingly connected with the teachings of the Kuran and the legendary lore of the Shah-nama: like as in Christendom there have been writers who have striven to bring all history into unison with the Old Testament. Musulmans and their idolatrous forefathers are persistently represented as lords paramount of Hind, the land of infidels, and as regularly receiving and enforcing payment of tribute. It may be that there are in the account some faint glimmerings of

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(1) Supra, p. 210.

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<p. 533> fact, some “synchronisms,” as Sir H. Elliot says, “between Persian and Indian heroes;” but whether such are to be found or not, the investigator of Indian history will now no longer be debarred, by ignorance of the Persian language, from a complete investigation of this Muhammadan summary of ancient Hindu history. The translation has been made from General Briggs’s lithographed edition, but a MS. belonging to the Royal Asiatic Society has also been used.]

629. TRANSLATION.

“This Introduction contains an account of the tenets of the people of India, a record of their Rais, and a description of the rise of the Muhammadan power in that country. At the present time there is no book more extensive and more trustworthy among the Hindus than the Maha-bharat. This book was translated from Hindi into Persian by Shaikh Abu-l Fazl Faizi, son of Shaikh Mubarak, in the reign of the Emperor Jalalu-d din Muhammad Akbar. It contains more than a hundred thousand couplets. The writer of these lines has undertaken the work of making an abstract of the book, and here gives an epitome of it, so that inquirers may obtain a knowledge of its contents from the beginning to the end. It is no secret that in this country there nas been a variety of opinion among philosophers, devotees and doctors as to the creation of the world. Of these various views, thirteen are mentioned in the Maha-bharat; but no one of the writers has been able to give satisfaction on the subject to an inquiring mind, or to gratify his desires in the smallest degree. (Couplets.)

630. “According to the faulty belief of the Hindus, the revolutions of time in this changeful world are marked by four ages — the first is called Sat Yug; second, Trita Yug; third, Dwapar Yug; fourth, Kali Yug. Whenever the Kali Yug shall be completed, the Sat Yug will come round again, and an end will be put to the Kali Yug. The affairs of the world have always gone on in this way, and no sign has been given either of its beginning or its end. In one of the books of authority it is related that a person of false and frivolous character once asked the Leader of the Faithful: “Who existed three thousand years before Adam?” His Highness <p. 534> answered, “Adam!” and as he repeated this three times, the man was silenced, and hung down his head. His Majesty then continued, “If you asked me three thousand times, ‘Who was before Adam?’ I would still reply ‘Adam.’” So the age of the world cannot be ascertained, and the Hindu dogmas upon this point are sheer absurdities. From a saying of one of the old Brahmins it appears that the world will have an end, and that a day of resurrection is certain. Their most acute and authoritative doctors confirm this doctrine.

631. “The duration of the Sat Yug was seventeen lacs and twenty-eight thousand years (1,728,000). During this age the works of the dwellers in the world were good and righteous. The lowly and the noble, the poor and the rich, never turned aside from the way of truth and rectitude, and from doing the will of God. The natural life of man in this age is said to have been one hundred thousand years. Gracious God, what a statement is this, and what a lifetime! (Verses.) The length of the Trita Yug is twelve lacs and ninety-six thousand years (1,296,000). In this age threefourths of mankind lived in obedience to the law of God, and the natural life of man was ten thousand years. In the third age, Dwapar Yug, there are eight lacs and sixty-four thousand years (864,000). In this age the dwellers in the world were of honest conversation and of upright conduct; and the age of man was one thousand years. But the age of the patriarchs Adam, Noah, and others, was a thousand years, or nearly a thousand years. The people of India aver and maintain that as these patriarchs lived towards the end of the Dwapar Yug, their lives were of this short duration. The fourth or Kali Yug extends to four lacs and thirty-two thousand years (432,000). In this age three-fourths of mankind live an unrighteous and discreditable life; and the natural age of man is one hundred years. The duration of each age is ordered in this way: the length of the Kali Yug being doubled, gives the duration of the Dwapar Yug; the years of the Dwapar being augmented by the number of the Kali Yug, shows the length of the Trita Yug; and the years of the Trita Yug being increased in the same way, the duration of the Sat Yug is found. At the present time, in the year one thousand and fifteen (1015) of the Hijra, the <p. 535> people of India in their reckoning make the date to be 4684 of the Kali Yug. (Verses.)

632. “According to the belief of the people of India, the Almighty first created five elements, four of them the familiar (or terrestrial) elements, the fifth being akas or ether. After that he made a person devoid of form, but a concentration of wisdom, who was called Brahma. According to various accounts, God brought him forth from the void of non-entity into palpable existence, and made him the first means of creation, and the cause of the foundation of the world. The meaning of the word akas in the language of the common people of Hind is heaven (asman); but the select few deny this, and say that the sages of Hind are not convinced of the existence of a heaven, and that which surrounds the mortal world is air. The planets (kawakib) are the celestial forms of departed great men, who, by keeping under their natural desires, and by devout worship, having obtained bright forms and spiritual embodiments, have been made like unto God in their nature and qualities, and move in the most elevated heights, where, in mortal phrase, they are the birds of the world above. Some who have attained to a high degree of perfection have become great stars, and they never return to the world below. Those who are of a lower standard of perfection, having enjoyed, according to their merit, a life in the highest sky, return again to the lower world. So the word akas, as used in the Hindu books, has a variety of meanings; and it seems inexpedient to enter into a long explanation of it here. (Verses.)

633. “Brahma, having by the will of the Creator brought man out of the invisible condition into manifest existence, created four castes — Brahmin, Khatri, Bais, and Sudra. He appointed the first caste to maintain a holy warfare, to practise austerities, to uphold the laws, and to enforce restrictions. To them he confided the direction of the mortal world. The second class he seated upon the throne of rule and government, and giving to it the sovereignty of the world, he provided for the due government of men. The third caste was appointed to carry on agriculture, trades, and crafts. The fourth caste was created to serve their superiors. By divine direction and holy inspiration, Brahma brought forth a book about the future and the present life. This book was called Bed {the Veda}. Under the guidance <p. 536> of the Supreme, his active and discriminating intelligence laid down principles for the guidance of all sorts and conditions of men; and having gathered his rules and precepts together in a book, he called it the Sacred Book. Mankind was thus supplied with a controlling power, so that, having a guide before and a guard behind, they might pursue a straight course without deviation. The Bed contains a hundred thousand sloks. The word slok signifies a verse of four charan (feet), and a charan cannot be of less than one nor of more than twenty-six achars. The word achar signifies a letter, or a compound letter. The sages of Hind agree that the lifetime of this Wonder of Creation, the author of the book in question, reached one hundred years; but these years were extraordinary ones, for each consisted of three hundred and sixty days, and each day contained four thousand years of the age above referred to, and each night, like the day, contained one thousand Yugs. The learned Brahmins of Hind affirm that up to the time when I write this book, several Brahmas have come into the visible world, and have departed into the unseen. I have heard from my Brahmin friends, that the present Brahma is the one thousand and first; that fifty years and half a day of his life are past, and he has entered into the latter half of his existence. (Verses.)

634. “Story-tellers and fabulists relate that, in the latter half of the Dwapar Yug {on this transposed date see the Additional Note, Initial Remarks, at the end of the citation}, there was a Khatri Raja at Hastinapur, in Hindustan, who sat upon the throne of justice, and protected the rights of his people. His name was Raja Bharat He was followed by seven descendants in direct succession, who carried on the government, and departed to the other world. The eighth successor of his race was Raja Kur. Kur-khet (or) Thanesar, which is a large city, still bears his name. His descendants were called Kuruvas. After six generations a son was born, who became famous under the name of Chaturburj. He was a great king, and had two sons, one called Dhritarashtra, the other Pand. Dhritarashtra was the elder, but he was blind; and so the government and sovereignty devolved upon his younger brother Pand. His power so increased that his sons were called Pandavas, after his name. His sons were five, Judishtar, Bhim-sen, and Arjun, whose mother was named Kunti; and Nakul and Sahadeo, whose mother was called Madri. <p. 537> Dhritarashtra had one hundred sons by Gandhara, who was daughter of the Raja of Kandahar.(1) The eldest son was Duryodhan. He had another son by a daughter of a corn-merchant, who was named Yuyuchha. These sons were known by the name of Kuruva.

635. “When Pand died, Dhritarashtra took the kingdom by right of relationship, and his sons shared the honours of royalty with him. Duryodhan, his eldest son, being impressed with the duty and expediency of defending the State against enemies, became suspicious of the Pandavas. and resolved to overthrow them. Dhritarashtra also, being informed of the hostility of the Pandavas, ordered them to build a residence farther away from the city, and to go and live there; so that a stop might be put to the ill-feeling. Duryodhan directed the architects and workmen to build the roof and walls of that house with lac and pitch, so that a spark might set fire to it, and that no vestige of the Pandavas might be left. The Pandavas got information of this; so, to secure themselves, they one night set their house on fire, and went off along with their mother to the desert. A woman named Bhil, with her five sons, who had been commissioned by Duryodhan to set the house on fire, was there watching for an opportunity; and on that night she and all her sons were burnt. The spies of Duryodhan, thinking that this woman and her sons were the Pandavas with their mother, and that the Pandavas were all burnt, conveyed the glad intelligence to the Kuruvas, who were greatly rejoiced.

636. “After this catastrophe, the Pandavas, as the translation of the Maha-bharat testifies, changed their names and appearances, left their desolated home, and went to the town of Kampila. There by artifice they married Draupadi, the daughter of the Raja of Kampila, and all five brothers had her as their common wife. It was settled that each was to have her for seventy days; and upon this understanding, they lived in peace and unity. Some Hindus maintain that this was unlawful, and explain the fact away: God knows the truth! But the nobility of their character was evident, and the fame of them spread abroad until it reached Duryodhan, who, having made inquiries, ascertained the facts, and that the report of the burn-

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(1) This name is written with {Arabic K or Q} as the modern Kandahar is written, but Gandhari got her name from the old Gandhara on the Indus.

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“<p. 538>ing of the Pandavas was untrue. With friendly professions, but selfish designs, he brought them to Hastinapur. After courteously entertaining them, he divided the hereditary dominions as between brothers. So Indarpat, which is near Old Dehli, with half the territories, fell to the lot of the Pandavas; and Hastinapur, with the other half of the territories, remained in the possession of the Kuruvas.

637. “In course of time many of the chief nobles, observing the intelligence and excellent qualities of the Pandavas, entered into their service: outwardly they were loyal to the Kuruvas, but in their hearts they were hostile to them. At this time it came into the mind of Judishtar that he would perform the sacrifice called Rajasuya, that being the name given to a large fire which is kindled, into which all kinds of odoriferous things, fruits, grain, etc., are thrown, to be consumed in fire, the mother of the elements; that performing this sacrifice with due ceremony and all the proper observances, he would thus seek for a nearer approach to the deity. One of the requirements of the Rajasuya sacrifice is, that the princes of the whole world should assemble and pay homage at the time of its performance. Judishtar accordingly sent out his four brothers in four different directions to effect the conquest of the remainder of the world. Under the favour of the Almighty, this object was in a short time accomplished. The enterprising brothers, under Divine guidance, marched through the world, and brought the reigning monarchs of every country, from Khatai, Rum, Abyssinia, Arabia, Persia, Turkistan, Mawarau-n nahr, and all the other regions of the world, with vast treasures, to Indarpat; and having performed the Rajasuya sacrifice, accomplished the object of their wishes.

638. “At the sight of all this greatness and glory and power, Duryodhan was unable to contain himself. The fire of envy which was smouldering in his bosom burst forth, and he took counsel with the crafty men of the time. Gambling was then very prevalent. It was resolved to play at ka’batain (two dice), which, like back-gammon (nard), is a kind of gambling game. It was agreed that Duryodhan should play with Judishtar and his brothers. Accordingly the Pandavas were invited with great ceremony from their capital Indarpat to Hastinapur. They were entertained sumptuously; and when <p. 539> they became engrossed in play, the ka’batain above mentioned were brought forward. The Pandavas, in the honesty of their hearts, never thought that they were playing against cheats; and having no knowledge of the game of ka’batain, they lost wealth, kingdom, and everything. Duryodhan was desirous of ruining them, and kept his mind intent upon the game. The final stake was made. If the Pandavas won, they were to get back all that they had lost; but if they failed, they were to leave their home for twelve years, and, putting on mendicants’ attire, were to go out into the wilds, and dwell with the birds and beasts. After the completion of that time, they were to go to some city, and pass one year in seeking for a livelihood, but so that no one should know them. If this condition was not fulfilled, they were to go out once more into the wilds for the same period of time, and undergo all the same hardships. They played again, the dice were against them, and they lost. So, in fulfilment of the wager, the five brothers expatriated themselves, and dwelt for twelve years in the wilderness. In the thirteenth year they proceeded to the country of Wain,(1) which is one of the districts of the Dakhin. There they passed a year in such a way that, although Duryodhan made active search and inquiry, they were not discovered.

639. “At the termination of the prescribed period, they sent Kishan {the later deified Krishna}, son of Basdeo {Vasu-deva}, as an ambassador to demand the restoration of their country. Duryodhan complained about the condition not having been fulfilled; and as he had no honesty of character, he failed to carry out the agreement. The affairs of the Pandavas became known to the nobles of the country, and war was resolved upon. The Pandavas assembled their forces, and the rival armies met in the field of Kur-khet, which is situated near Thanesar, in the early years of the Kali Yug. The opposing armies wore drawn out in array according to the rules of warfare, and a battle began, which lasted for eighteen days, when the victors could not be distinguished from the vanquished. But the career of the wicked ends in shame, so at length Duryodhan and his allies were overpowered, and fell upon the field of battle. According to the belief of the Hindus,

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(1) A town on the banks of the Krishna, near the fort of Pandu-garh, twenty miles north of Sattara. — Briggs.

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“<p. 540> there were in this battle eleven kushuns on the side of the Kuruvas, and seven kushuns on the part of the Pandavas. Kushun(1) is a word used by the Hindus for twenty-one thousand six hundred and seventy (21,670) elephant-riders, an equal number of chariot riders, sixty-five thousand six hundred (65,600) horsemen, and one lac nine thousand six hundred and fifty (109,650) infantry. It is said that not more than twelve men of both sides were left alive. Four persons survived of the army of Duryodhan: first, Kripa Acharj Brahmin, the preceptor of both parties, who was both a man of the sword and a man of the pen; second, Ashwatthaman, son of the sage Dron, who also had been a preceptor of both parties; third, Kiratu Varman, of the race of the Yadavas; fourth, Sanji, who was distinguished at the Court of Dhritarashtra for his wisdom. Of the Pandavas, eight men survived: Judhishtar and the rest of the five brothers; the sixth was Sanak, of the tribe of the Yadavas, who was renowned for his bravery; seventh, Jujutash,(2) the half-brother of Duryodhan; eighth, Kishan {Krishna}, the blazon of whose fame is beyond description, but some little will be written about him.

640. “Kishan was born at Mathura. There are various opinions about him current among the Hindus. Some stigmatize him as the greatest rogue in the world, and the most artful cheat of all the sons of Adam. Some believe that he was a prophet, others raise him to divinity. It is well known that the astrologers, having obtained fore-knowledge of his graceless character from his horoscope, gave information to Raja Kans, the chief of the Yadavas; and he issued an order for putting Kishan to death. Kishan passed eleven years in the house of Nand, who was by occupation a milk-seller and cowherd. At length, by tricks and stratagems and magic, Kishan killed Raja Kans, and gave the name of king to Ugrasen, father of Kans. He himself was openly carrying on the government. By degrees,

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(1) Kushun, as used in Persian, is, as Firishta says, a word of Hindu origin, being an abbreviation of the Sanskrit Akshauhini. The copies vary as to the numbers. The published text has been followed here; but it is not quite accurate, as, according to Sanskrit authorities, the akshauhini consisted of 21,870 elephants, 21,870 chariots, 65,610 horse, and 109,350 foot, making a grand total of 218,700. As Briggs observes, these numbers are quite incredible. He proposes to reduce them by “the sacred and mystical figure” 9, which divides them without a fraction. But the reason for this process seems insufficient, and his method of applying it is unintelligible.

(2) Or, as called above, “Yuyucha.”

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“<p. 541> and with the aid of deception and impostures, he set up a claim to divinity, and large numbers of people put faith in his absurd pretension. For thirty-two years after his departure from the house of Nand, he passed his life among the libertines of Mathura, and his wonderful pranks and actions are notorious. Raja Jarasandh, of the country of Bihar and Patna, marched against Mathura with a large force to overthrow him. Another Raja also, called Kal Yavan, of the race of the Mlechhas, that is to say, a race that did not follow the Hindu religion, came up from the west to attack him. It is said that this Raja came from Arabia (‘Arabistan). Krishna was not able to withstand the attack of these two Rajas, so he fled to Dwaraka, which is on the sea-shore, one hundred kos from Ahmadabad in Gujarat. There he fortified himself, and continued to dwell there for seventy-eight years. He strove for his deliverance, but without effect, until he had attained his one hundred and twentyfifth year, when, through the malice of Gandhari, the mother of Duryodhan, he was treacherously killed. It is the belief of some that he withdrew into retirement, and that he is still alive.

641. “The cause of Gandhari’s hatred was very curious, so I will record it. The story runs, that when the time drew near for Gandhari to give birth to a child, she reflected that, as her husband Dhritarashtra was blind, and would never see his child, she also, to sympathize with her husband, would keep her eyes from the child in this world. So on the day that Duryodhan was born, she bound up her eyes, and kept them so bound for many years, until her son Duryodhan grew up, and went to war with the Pandavas. When the forces were assembled, and the opposing armies drew near for battle, on the day before the fight, she said to her son, “Oh light of my eyes! the eyes of parents are to the person of their son a sure protection and defence against all troubles and calamities. To-morrow the battle will begin, and as your tender body is not defended with this armour, I am fearful lest some evil should befall thee. Therefore come naked before me, so that I may uncover my eyes, and look upon your figure.” Duryodhan asked how he should attend upon her, and she replied, “My son, there is no one in the world like unto the Pandavas in intelligence, wisdom, excellence, truth, and integrity; — hasten to them, and make inquiry.” Duryodhan went <p. 542> alone to the Pandavas, and told them the reason of his coming. They showed him the greatest hospitality, and, although they knew that there was the most violent animosity between them, they never let the thread of rectitude slip from their hands, but spoke out with sincerity, and said, “The child comes naked from his mother’s womb, and the eyes of his parents fall upon him first in that state. As this is the first time your mother will have seen you, to-day is as the first day of your existence; therefore it is right that you should strip yourself naked, and so go into the presence of your mother, so that her eyes may behold the whole of your person, and preserve it from dangers.” Duryodhan took leave, and started to return. On the way he was met by Kishan, who asked him what was the reason of his coming alone into the army of his enemies. Duryodhan informed him. Kishan said to himself, “What a pity! if he acts upon the advice of the Pandavas, his body will become as brass; no weapon will take effect upon it, and he will prevail over us.” So he laughed loudly, and deceitfully said, “O simple man, they who seek the advice of their enemies, and follow the course which they prescribe, will assuredly fall into the pit of destruction. They have been making sport of you. When you were born, your members were small and mean; but you are grown large and vigorous,(1) how can you show yourself to your mother without shame!” When Duryodhan heard this, unsuspicious of deception, he seized the garment of Kishan, and said, “What the Pandavas told me was true; but I will throw belts with long ends over my shoulder, so that the privy parts of my person may be covered.” Duryodhan did so, and went before his mother, and said, “Behold, here I am: uncover your eyes.” His mother, believing him to have been instructed by the Pandavas, and being assured that they had not spoken improperly, uncovered her eyes. When she perceived the sword-belt, she uttered a cry, and fell down in a swoon. Upon recovering her senses, she wept bitterly, and said, “O my son! did the Pandavas tell you to adopt this trick of the sword-belt?” And he told her that Kishan had advised it. Gandhari raised her hands in prayer, and in deep affliction cursed Kishan. Then, wringing her hands in sorrow, she said, “O my son! in the very place which

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(1) The language of the text is much more explicit.

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“<p. 543> thou hast hidden from my eyes shalt thou receive a wound, which, shall prove thy death.” Kishan, as above stated, died after great suffering.

Judishtar, upon the death of Duryodhan, and the extermination of the Kuruvas, was established in the sovereignty of Hind and other places, and ruled as monarch. Thirty-six years after this event, he, under divine guidance, became convinced of the emptiness and instability of this world; so, before entering into the future state, he gave up the vanities of the world, and along with his four brothers retired into seclusion, and at length departed this life.

642. “The Kuruvas and the Pandavas reigned together for seventy-six years. Duryodhan reigned alone for thirteen years, and after the termination of the war, Judishtar reigned over the whole world for thirty-six years, making altogether one hundred and twenty-five years as the duration of their supremacy. Gracious God, what a marvellous and out-of-the-way story is this! In no history throughout the world, excepting in Hindustan, is such a circumstance to be found.

643. “Old historians have recorded that in later days, after two breaks, the son of a son of Arjun was born, and he, having ascended the throne, carried on the government with justice and clemency; and making the events of the past the monitors of the future, he acted in obedience to the will of God. One day it came into his mind to inquire what was the cause of the dissensions of his predecessors, and what were the facts of the war between them. He made inquiries of a learned man of the age named Bhisham Bain (Vaisampayana), and Bhisham told him that his preceptor, the sage Byas {Vyasa}, had witnessed the various events, and was minutely acquainted with their causes; so he had better make inquiries of him. The King showed the sage Byas every princely courtesy, and sought from him the information which he desired. Byas, through the weakness of old age and spiritual pre-occupation, had given up talking; but he slowly reduced to writing this story with its precepts and counsels, and formed it into a book. He called the work Mahabharat, the signification of which name, as I have heard from common report, is, that maha means great, and bharat war; for as the book commemorates the great wars, he gave it the name of <p. 544> Maha-bharat. But there is an objection to this, because bharat in the language of Hind does not mean “war.” The book records the history of the race descended from a famous king named Bharat, and so apparently the book is named after him, the letter a having been lengthened by use — but God knows! This Byas is considered to be an emanation of the Divine Spirit, and it is believed that he is still alive. Some Hindus affirm that a person named Byas appears in every Dwapar Yug to record the events which occur among mankind; but others believe that he is a person who makes his appearance in time of war.

644. “It is admitted by common consent that Byas compiled the Bed, which was delivered by the tongue of Brahma, and arranged it in four books. 1. Rig Bed. 2. Jajur Bed. 3. Sam Bed. 4. Atharban Bed. It was by doing this he got the name of Byas, because the meaning of that word is compiler or arranger. His original name, as it was known in the middle of the Doab, was Dadi Bain (Dwaipayana). Wonderful and incredible stories are related about this Byas; but, fearing to be prolix, I have not repeated them. This wonderful book consists of sixty lacs (6,000,000) of sloks. After its completion, he (Byas) repaired to the banks of the Sarsuti, near Thanesar, and his labours being ended, he there prepared a great feast, to which he invited the learned from all parts and quarters of the world. The festival was kept up for a lengthened period, and he enriched the people with valuable gifts. The sixty lacs of sloks are divided as follows: Thirty lacs were allotted to the deotas, who are heavenly spirits or divinities. Fifteen lacs were assigned to the inhabitants of the Satar-lok (Satya-loka), who dwell in the world above. Fourteen lacs were appropriated to the Gandharas, one of the varieties of created beings endued with the property of life. One lac he left for the benefit of mankind. This he divided into eighteen parbs (parvvas) or books, for the benefit of men of merit. This one lac of sloks is still extant among men, and is known by the name of Maha-bharat. Twenty-four thousand sloks are occupied with the wars of the Kuruvas and Pandavas; the remainder consists of precepts, homilies, apologues, stories, explanations, and details of the dissensions and wars of former generations. The Brahmins believe that a prophet or apostle in each Yug writes a book, and <p. 545> that, notwithstanding the long periods of time which have elapsed, these works are still extant.

645. “The infidels of Khata, Khutan (Tartary), Chin, and Hind deny that the deluge of Noah reached their country, or rather they have no belief at all in the deluge. It is the belief of some (Hindus) that the Brahmin and Khatri castes have existed from the most ancient times. There are many other castes which came into existence at the end of the Dwapar Yug or third age, and the beginning of the Kali Yug or fourth age. Thus the Rajputs were not known at first, but sprang into existence in later times. After the death of Raja Bikramajit Khatri, who lived 1600 and some years before the time in which I write, they (the Rajputs) attained the sovereign power, and the manner of their gaining it is thus related: According to a custom which is still prevalent, the rais of the Khatris make their damsels wait upon them during the day, but give them liberty to do as they please at night; so each fair one chooses whom she will, and gives birth to children. These are brought up with great care, and are looked upon as the children of the great rais. As sons of the house, they consider themselves as of noble birth, and call themselves sons of the Rajas. If you ask one of them whose son he is, he will tell you he is a Rajput, that is, son of a Raja ; for Raj means the same as Raja, and put signifies “son.” It is related that the sons of Raja Suraj, whose history will be told subsequently, were called Rajputs.

646. “Another article of faith among the Hindus is that Adam(1) formed of earth has existed from the beginning of creation, and will continue to exist hereafter. The world is ancient (kadim), and will never pass away. But it is no secret to men of wisdom and perspicacity, that although from the beginning of creation, a period supposed to be 800,000 years, it may be that as many thousands of Adams have appeared on the face of the earth, they have all passed away behind the curtain of oblivion. Jan bin Abu-l Jan, whose history is recorded in the Holy Book, is the only exception; but he was not born of the earth. Some were formed of air, some of fire; but the race was always given to disobedience and rebellion, and

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(1) The word used is “Adam,” but it seems to be used here both for Adam and mankind in general.

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“<p. 546> under the behests of the God of vengeance, they were destroyed. Another race sprang np, who were not formed of earth. It appears indeed that the Hindus supposed these beings to be men formed of the dust; but how can this be? For the statements they make about the magnitude of their bodies and the length of their lives, and the wonderful and miraculous powers which they attribute to Ram, Lakhman. and others, are inappropriate to the nature of man. All this is mere talk and sound, and is of no weight in the balance of intelligence. If by accident there are any such, they must belong to that class of which mention has been made. Before Abu-l Bashar (the father of mankind), there was no Adam of earthy extraction; and from the time of Adam to the time when I write, not more than 7000 years have passed. So what the Hindus say about hundreds of thousands is all extravagance, and mere falsehood. The truth is, that the country of Hindustan, like other parts of the habitable world, was populated by the descendants of Adam, and the explanation of the matter is this: After the deluge, the Patriarch Noah, under the orders of the Creator of heaven and earth, sent his sons Sam (Shem), Japhet, and Ham into different parts of the world, and directed them to engage in agriculture.

647. “History of the sons of Noah. {On the modernized names for the descendants of Noah used in the Oriental genealogies see under the following Appendix on the traditional history of the Turks, §782, below, >>} — Sam {Shem} was the eldest son and representative of Noah. He begat nine sons.(1) Arshad, Arfakhshad, Kai, Nud, Yud, Aram, Kabta, A’ad, Kahtan, were their names. All the tribes of the Arabs and their congeners draw their descent from them. So the patriarchs Hud and Salih and Abraham sprang from Arfakhshad. The second son of Arfakhshad was Kayumars, great ancestor of the Kings of Persia. He had six sons, Siyamak, Fars, ’Irak, Tuz, Sham, and Damaghan. Of these Siyamak was the successor of his father. The other sons separated, and they gave their names to the countries in which they severally settled. Some men believe that one of the sons (pisar) of Noah was named Ajam, and that the country of Ajam takes its name from his descendants. The eldest son of Siyamak was named Hoshang, from whom the Kings of Persia down to Yazdajird and Shahriyar all descended.

648. “The children of Yafat {Japheth}. — In obedience to the command of his father, Yafat went towards the east and north. There children were born

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(1) Genesis x. 22.

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“<p. 547> to him. His eldest son was named Turk, and all the races of the Turks, the Mughals, Uzbeks, Chaghatais, Turkomans of Iran and Armenia, are all descended from him. Yafat’s second son was named Chin, and from him the country of China was named. The third son of Yafat was Ardes, whose descendants settled all the north country to the extreme regions of darkness: the Tajiks and the people of Ghor and Sclavonia sprang from him.

649. “Account of the descendants of Ham, with a brief description of the settlement of Hindustan. — Ham, under his father’s command, went southwards, and engaged actively in settling that country. Six sons were born to him, named Hind, Sind, Jash, Afranj, Hurmuz and Buyah. The countries of the south received their names from them. Hind, the eldest son of Ham, went to that country, which from him received the name of Hind, and employed himself in settling the country. His brother Sind settled in Sind, where he built the cities of Thatta and Multan, which received their names from his sons’ names. {Sind = Sheba, Hind = Dedan, the sons of Raamah, son of Cush, son of Ham, see §782, below, >>.} Hind had four sons — 1. Purb; 2. Bang; 3. Dakhin; 4. Nahrwal; and they populated the countries which are known by their names. {Note on these eponymous ancestors: Terry: “Bengala, a most spacious and fruitful Province, but more properly to be called a Kingdom, which hath two very large Provinces within it, Purb and Patan [Pachcham]; the one lying on the East, the other on the West side of the River Ganges.” [Purb = Purab, Purva = “Former, or, Eastern,” like Heb. Qedem, this word, Purva, according to Gesenius-Tregelles s.v. Parvaim, being the likely origin of the Biblical topographical name Parvaim, which would be, employing Ferishta’s terminology, the “tribe of Purb;” accordingly, “gold of Parvaim” (II Chron 3. 6) is a synonym in the Hebrew Scriptures of “gold of Ophir,” and Ophir the father of Sind and Hind in an alternative genealogical scheme, §679.3, below, >>.] Another author: “Former ancient rulers of Bang … on account of the vast quantity of water which accumulates throughout the province in the rainy season, caused causeways to be constructed twenty cubits wide and ten high, termed al … and from the proximity of these als, the people styled the province Bang-al.” The modern Bengalis still trace their origin back to a tribe called Bang, which is Vanga or Banga in Sanskrit, named after Vanga son of Bali, of the Lunar line, a descendant of Yayati’s fourth son Anu, Vishnu Purana 4. 18 (Wilson, 1840, p. 444), and his kingdom likewise Vanga.} Dakhin {= “South,” like Heb. Yemen}, the son of Hind, had three sons, among whom he divided the territories of the Dakhin. Their names were Mahrat, Kanhar and Tilang; and these three races are still extant in the Dakhin. Nahrwal also had three sons, Bahroj, Kambaj and Malraj;(1) whose names he gave to cities which he founded. Bang also had sons by whom the country of Bengal was peopled. Purb, who was the eldest son of Hind, had forty-two sons, and in a short time their progeny became numerous. They raised one of their number to be their ruler, and he exerted himself in bringing his country into order. His name was Kishan.

650. “History of the reign of Kishan. {See §316.1.2, above, >>.} — It must not be concealed that the first person who ascended the throne of royalty in Hind was Kishan. He was not the celebrated Kishan about whom the marvelous stories are told, wonderful adventures are related, and to whom a divine origin is attributed. This Kishan was wise, learned, brave and generous. He was of gigantic form, and unable to ride; so, after mature reflection, he gave directions for catching elephants and other wild beasts in snares. His plans having succeeded, he had animals

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(1) Broach, Kambay, and — ?

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“<p. 548> on which he could ride. During his reign a person named Brahmin, descended from Bang, the son of Hind, made his appearance. He was very wise and intelligent, and Kishan made him his minister. Many crafts, such as carpentry and working in iron, sprang from his intelligence; and some maintain that writing and reading also derived their origin from him. In those days the city of Oudh was built, which was the first city established in India. Kishan was cotemporary with Tahmurasp {who was identified by Arab chroniclers with Nimrod son of Cush, see note at §669, below, >>}, and he lived more than four hundred years. During his reign nearly two thousand towns and villages were built. He left thirty-seven sons, the eldest of whom, Maha Raj, succeeded him.

651. “History of Maha Raj, son of Kishan. — With the assent of the chiefs of the tribe and of his brothers, Maha Raj ascended the throne; and he was more active even than his father in settling the country, and in establishing a government. The men who descended from Purb he appointed to the duties of rule and government; and to those who descended from Brahmin he allotted the duties of acting as ministers and clerks and the sciences of astrology and medicine. One tribe he appointed to carry on trade and agriculture, another he directed to practise all sorts of crafts and trades. He also busied himself in the spread of agriculture, so that he brought many distant parts of Hindustan under cultivation, and founded many cities. In these cities he settled men of knowledge and character, whom he gathered together from all parts. He also built many temples and colleges, and assigned the revenues of the lands near to them as endowments. The sannyasis and jogis and brahmins were engaged in teaching, doing good, and in scientific pursuits. His reign lasted seven hundred years. The kingdom of India reached a high degree of prosperity and glory, and vied with the empire of Jamshid and Faridun. {Faridun was identified with Noah by Arab chroniclers.} To secure the stability of the government, and to promote the happiness of his soldiers and people, he made excellent laws and regulations, some of which are acted upon to the present day. He gave to each tribe a distinctive name, such as we now find in the Rahtors, Chauhans, Powars and the like. He kept up friendly relations with the Kings of Iran. But one of his brother’s sons being offended with him, went to Faridun, and that monarch sent Gurshasp, son of Atrud, with a valiant army, to <p. 549> assist the fugitive. So Gurshasp marched to Hindustan, and inflicted great evil on the country, ravaging and devastating it for the space of ten years. Maha Raj gave his nephew a portion of territory, and so satisfied him. He also sent a rich tribute by Gurshasp to Faridun. Towards the end of his reign, the zamindars of Singaldip (Ceylon) and Karnatak came up with their forces, and expelled Sheo Rai, the ruler of the Dakhin. He came to seek assistance of Maha Raj, who sent his eldest son with a large army and mighty elephants along with Sheo Rai. The zamindars of the Dakhin united, and having collected a large and powerful force, made ready for battle. A terrible conflict ensued, in which the son of Maha Raj was killed, all the baggage and elephants were lost, and Sheo Rai, with his auxiliary army, fled wounded and defeated. At the news of this defeat, Maha Raj writhed like a snake, and bit his hands with vexation; for up to that time none of the zamindars of distant lands, such as the Raja of Tilang,(1) Pegu and Malabar, had ventured upon disobedience or rebellion.

652. “About this time Sam Nariman,(2) under the orders of the King of Iran, marched to invade Hindustan, and came up to the Panjab. The commander-in-chief, Mal Chand, with the flower of the army of Hindustan, went to oppose him; but he was not able to arrest his progress. Being compelled to treat, Mal Chand sent clever envoys with gold and jewels and elephants, and made peace by ceding the Panjab to Sam Nariman. Some writers maintain that from the reign of Faridun the Panjab was held by the Kings of Ajam, and that the descendants of Gurshasp, among whom were Rustam and his ancestors, held the Panjab, Kabul and Zabul, Sind and Nimroz in jagir. Mal Chand was a distinguished general, and the country of Malwa derived its name from him. After returning to Maha Raj, he marched without delay in great force against the Dakhin. As soon as the enemy heard of his approach, their hearts sank, and they

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(1) The original words are, “zaminddran-i jasdir-i dur dast misl raja-i Tilang,” etc. Briggs’s translation is: “The islands of Acheen and Malacca and Pegu.” Malacca is clearly an error for Tilang; but some warrant may be found for “the islands of Acheen” in the words, “jasair-i dur,” which mean literally “distant islands;” but the following words, “such as Tilang, Pegu, and Malabar,” show that the word jazair is not used literally.

(2) Grandfather of Rustam.

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“<p. 550> dispersed. Mal Chand so used the sword of retribution upon them, that not a vestige of them was left. He placed garrisons in several places, and on his march he founded the forts of Gwalior and Bayana. Mal Chand brought back with him from Telingana and the Dakhin the sciences of singing and music. He spent much of his time at the fort of Gwalior, and there he had many children by the singers whom he had brought back with him; — so music flourished in that country. After seven hundred years, Maha Raj died, leaving fourteen sons, and he was succeeded by the eldest, Keshu Raj, who took his seat upon the glorious throne of Hindustan.

653. “History of Keshu Raj, son of Maha Raj. — At the very beginning of his reign, he sent his brothers (on service) in various directions while he marched by way of Kalpi to Gondwara. Then he pursued his course to the Dakhin, and rode as far as the boundaries of Singaldip. There he exacted tribute from the rebellious rais, and exerted himself in bringing the various tribes into subjection. On his return, the zamindars of the Dakhin leagued together, and raised the banner of hostility. Day by day their forces increased, till they became powerful enough to threaten Keshu Raj. Finding himself unable to resist, Keshu Raj made peace, and returned home. He sent letters and many gifts to Minuchihr, and begged for his aid. Minuchihr then sent Sam Nariman with a powerful army. Keshu Raj went to Jalandhar to meet his ally, and after having entertained him, marched with him towards the Dakhin. The rais of the Dakhin were dismayed at the approach of the army of Iran, and so that country came back into the possession of the Raja of Hind. Keshu Raj showed every attention to Sam Nariman, and accompanied him homewards to the borders of the Panjab. Then he sent presents and rarities to Minuchihr, and went to dwell in the city of Oudh. There he spread the protection of his justice over the realm of Hind, and secured the happiness of his people. After he had reigned two hundred and twenty years he died, and was succeeded by his eldest son.

654. “History of Firoz Rai(1) son of Keshu Raj. — Firoz Rai was well versed in the Hindu shastras or sacred books. He was fond of the society of learned and religious men, and took no thought of riding

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(1) Briggs’s translation calls him “Munere Ray.”

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“<p. 551> or warfare. He devoted himself entirely to religious men, and bestowed much money on the poor. He went twice to the city of Bihar, and there dispensed large sums in charity. The city of Munir was built in his reign. One very improper action of which he was guilty was this: When, through the death of Sam Nariman, weakness fell upon the government of Minuchihr, Afrasiyab, seizing the opportunity, raised a force against him, and defeated him. Firoz Rai, then, throwing aside his obligations to Minuchihr and Sam Nariman, marched an army to the Panjab, and wrested that country from the possession of Zal,(1) son of Sam Nariman. He then made Jalandhar his capital, and sent an ambassador with presents to wait upon Afrasiyab, and to enrol himself among the numbers of his tributaries. The Panjab remained in the possession of the rais of Hind, until the reign of Kai-kubad. When Rustam, son of Dastan,(1) the champion of the world, had won the fame of a hero by his own deeds, he marched to recover the Panjab. Firoz Rai was unable to resist his attack, so he fled to the hills of Tirhut. Rustam having taken Sind, Multan, and the Panjab, set off towards Tirhut. Then Firoz Rai, in the greatest fear, fled by way of the desert to the hills of Jharkand and Gondwara. He never saw another happy day, but died soon afterwards, having reigned five hundred and thirty-seven years.

655. “Account of Rustam’s bestowing the sovereignty of Hind upon Suraj. — They say that when intelligence of the death of Firoz Rai reached Rustam, son of Dastan, the dishonesty and faithlessness of the deceased Rai made him averse to permitting any one of his sons to succeed to the throne. Accordingly he raised to the regal dignity one of the chiefs of Hind, named Suraj, who had been early in making his submission. Rustam then returned to Iran. Suraj established his authority, and became a powerful King. From the shores of the sea (darya) of Bengal to the confines of the Dakhin, his governors and officers sat (in authority). He was very active in promoting the erection of buildings and the spread of agriculture. During his reign, a Brahmin came from the hills of Jharkand to wait upon him, and as he was deeply versed in the occult sciences and magic, he obtained a complete ascendancy over the mind of Suraj, and converted him to idolatry.

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(1) Zal and Dastan are names of the same person, the father of Rustam.

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<p. 552> Establishment of Idolatry. — They say that Hind obeyed and worshiped the true God, as he had seen and heard of his father Ham, the son of Noah. His descendants, generation after generation, pursued the same course. At length, in the reign of Maha Raj, a person came from Iran, who inculcated the worship of the Sun. That worship spread widely, and some men became worshipers of the stars, others of fire. But when idol-worship arose, it spread more widely than all. Because that Brahmin told Suraj that whoever made a large image of an ancestor(1) in gold or silver or stone, would find the way to salvation; so many people, small and great, formed images of the departed, and engaged in the worship of them. Suraj, having built the city of Kanauj on the bank of the Ganges, applied himself to idolatry. This sentiment spread among the people, and every man formed an idol according to his own devices, and paid it his adoration. So ninety tribes, each in its own way, engaged in idolatry. Suraj made the city of Kanauj his capital, and dwelt there for some years. During his reign, it spread to the distance of twenty-five kos. Suraj died after a reign of two hundred and fifty years. He was cotemporary with Kai-kubad, and every year used to send tribute to him. He also acknowledged the claims of Rustam, son of Dastan, gave him his own sister’s daughter in marriage, and continually sent him presents and rarities. He had thirty-five sons, the eldest of whom, Bah Raj, succeeded him.

656. “History of the reign of Bah Raj, son of Suraj. — When Bah Raj ascended the throne, he built a city, which he called Bahraj,(2) from his own name. He studied music for many years. He exerted himself actively in completing the city of Benares, which his father had founded in the latter days of his life, but had not been permitted to finish. Showing great affection and kindness to his brothers, he made them happy with suitable jagirs. Some assert that Bah Raj gave to his brothers, the sons of Suraj, the name of Rajput. He also gave names to other tribes. But he set at nought the regulations of Maha Raj, which had been the mainstay of the State; so the affairs of government fell into disorder, and madness seized upon

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(1) “Buzurg,” simply, “great,” — and hence “ancestors” or “great men.” The subsequent use of guzashtagan “the departed,” makes clear what was meant.

(2) Bahraich or Bahroj (Broach)?

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“<p. 553> every brain. A brahmin named Kidar came down from the Siwalik hills, and raised a rebellion against him. After some fighting, the brahmin obtained the mastery, and the sovereignty of Hind fell from the hands of Bah Raj. His reign lasted for thirty-six years.

657. “Account of the reign of Kidar Brahmin. — When this man took the bride of the sovereignty of Hind to his bosom, he was well acquainted with the science of government, and became a great king. He acknowledged himself tributary to Kai-Kaus and Kai-Khusru, and sent offerings to them. He built the fort of Kalinjar. Towards the end of his reign, a powerful man named Shankal came from Kuch, and raised a rebellion. First he got possession of Bang (Bengal) and Bihar. Then he collected an enormous army, and fought several hard battles with Kidar, over whom he obtained the victory. Kidar reigned nineteen years.

658. “History of the reign of Shankal.(1) — After Shankal obtained the throne, he affected great pomp and state. He founded the city of Lakhnauti, better known under the name of Gaur. For two thousand years that city was the capital of the Kings of Bang (Bengal), but in the days of the descendants of Timur, the place went to ruin. Tanda became the seat of government, instead of it. Shankal got together a force of four thousand elephants, one hundred thousand horse, and four hundred thousand infantry, and was very proud and magnificent. In his time Afrasiyab sent a messenger to demand payment of his tribute and dues; but Shankal sent him back again with great scorn and contempt. Afrasiyab was greatly enraged at this, and sent his general Piran Wasiya {Piran Vesa, see §673, below, >>, for the genealogy of this Turanian hero}, with an army of fifty thousand fierce Turks, to Hindustan. Shankal resolved to fight, and having assembled a mighty force, marched to the encounter. The armies met in the hills of Kuch, near the frontier of Bengal, and the battle began. For two whole days the conflict raged. The Turks showed great resolution and bravery, and put fifty thousand of their opponents to the sword; but the enemy was so numerous that they made no great impression upon them. The Turks on their side had lost seventeen thousand men, and matters at length went so hard with them, that on the third day they were compelled to retreat. Their country was far away, and the enemy overwhelming;

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(1) See supra, Vol. II. p. 159.

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“<p. 554> so they fled into the hills of the neighbourhood, and got possession of a stronghold. Piran Wasiya drew up a despatch containing an account of his condition, and sent it by some brave young men to Afrasiyab. Piran was engaged night and day in fighting, for the Hindus swarmed around, and pressed him vigorously. They endeavoured to force an entry with showers of arrows, and all were in perplexity as to how matters would end.

659. “Arrival of Afrasiyab in Hind and Relief of Piran Wasiya. — At this time Afrasiyab was at the city of Kankdazh (Kunduz?), between Chin (China) and Khutan (Tartary), one month’s march on the other side of the city of Khanbaligh. When he was informed of the situation of Piran Wasiya, he resolved to go to his rescue with a hundred thousand choice cavalry. Pressing on with all speed, he arrived just as Shankal had summoned his Rais, and by means of the vast force he had collected was pressing Piran Wasiya to extremity. Afrasiyab instantly made his attack, and the Hindus were so dismayed that he scattered them like chaff. All their equipments and baggage fell into his hands. Piran Wasiya being released from the grasp of the enemy, waited on his master. Afrasiyab then pursued Shankal; and as often as he came up with him, he inflicted loss upon his men. Shankal fled into Bang, and went into the city of Gaur; but the Turks pressed after him so closely that he could only stay there one day, but continued his flight into the mountains of Tirhut. The Turks so completely devastated the country of Bang that no trace of a town was left. Afrasiyab got information about Shankal, and prepared to pursue him. But Shankal was driven to extremity; so he sent some prudent men with a message to Afrasiyab, asking forgiveness, and offering to do homage. Afrasiyab consented, and Shankal came to his presence, with a sword and shroud (hanging on his neck), and begged permission to be allowed to go with him to Turan. Afrasiyab approved of his proposal, and bestowed the throne upon Shankal’s son. So Afrasiyab took Shankal with him, and Shankal served him faithfully till he was killed by the hand of Rustam in the war of Hamawaran. Shankal reigned sixty-four years.

{Note on incidents connected with the slaying of Shankal by Rustam: Tabakat-i-nasiri, Raverty 1881 p. 561 and ibid. n. 9:

“They relate, after this manner, that, in ancient times, Shah Gushtasib (note 9) [see Raverty’s note 9 infra] returned from the country of Chin, and came towards Kamrud, and, by that route, got into Hindustan, and founded that city [Burdhan-kot]. A river flows in front of that place, of vast magnitude, the name of which is Beg-mati; and, when it enters the country of Hindustan, they style it, in the Hindu dialect, Samund; and, in magnitude, breadth, and depth, it is three times more than the river Gang.”

“[Raverty’s note] 9. Some copies have Gushtasib and some Garshasib, and one has Gudarz. In the Iranian records Garshasib, son of Zau, is not mentioned as having had aught to do with Hind or Chin. The wars of Gushtasib with Arjasib, son of Afrasiyab, King of Turan, are narrated, but there is no mention of Gushtasib’s going into Turan or Chin; but his son, Isfandiyar, according to the tradition, reduced the sovereign of Hind to submission, and also invaded Chin. In the account of the reign of Kai-Khusrau, Gudarz, with Rustam and Giw, invaded Turkistan to revenge a previous defeat sustained from Afrasiyab who was aided on this occasion by the troops of Suklab and Chin, and Shankal, sovereign of Hind, was slain by the hand of Rustam. Our author, in another place, states that Gushtasib, who had gone into Chin by that route, returned into Hind by way of the city of Kamrud, and that up to the period of the invasion of Kamrud by Iktiyar-ud-Din, Yuz-Bak-i-Tughril Khan, governor of Lakhanawati — some years after Muhammad-i-Bakht-yar’s expedition — twelve hundred ‘hoards’ of treasure, all still sealed as when left there by Gushtasib, fell into the hands of the Musalmans.”

End of citation inserted from Raverty.

The correct reading is Gudarz or Godarz, who was the slayer of Piran Vesa (Wasiya).}

660. “Rahat, son of Shankal, raised to the throne by Afrasiyab. — Rahat was a devout and well-meaning Raja. He divided the revenues of his <p. 555> kingdom, which stretched from Garhi to Malwa, into three portions. One he dispensed in charity, the second he appropriated to the support of his father Shankal and the tribute to Afrasiyab, and the third he devoted to the maintenance of his army and cattle. Through this arrangement his army diminished, and the Raja of Malwa, who was subject to him, and paid him revenue, threw off the yoke of obedience, and wrested the fort of Gwalior from the possession of his officers. Raja Rahat had built the fort of Rohtas, and he had erected a large idol temple, where he was then engaged in worship. He led an army against the Raja of Malwa, but returned unsuccessful.(1) Rahat reigned eighty-one years, when he died. As he had no son who had attained to years of discretion, a disturbance arose at Kanauj, which was the capital. A man named Maha Raj, of the Kachhwaha tribe, and a native of Marwar, raised a rebellion, seized upon the capital Kanauj, and became King.

661. “History of the reign of Maha Raj Kachhwaha. — After a time, and when Maha Raj had established his power, he led a large army against Nahrwala. He wrested that country from its zamindars, who were ahirs or cowherds, and established ports on the sea-shore for the purposes of traffic. There he built ships and launched them, after which he returned. He died after a reign of forty years. His cotemporary was Gushtasp {not the Gushtasp contemporary with Zoroaster, but the later Gushtasp, viz. Hystaspes, the father of Darius I}, to whom he sent tribute every year.

662. “History of the reign of Kaid Raj. — Kaid Raj was nephew by the sister’s side of Maha Raj, in accordance with whose will and testament he ascended the throne. At this time, Rustam, son of Dastan, had been killed, and as the Panjab had for some time had no vigorous governor, Kaid Raj led his army thither, and easily obtained possession of the country. He dwelt for some time in one of its ancient cities named Behra, and then built the fort of Jammu. In it he placed one of his adherents, a man of the Gakkhar(2) tribe named Durg, and made him governor of it. From that time to the present, that fortress has remained in the possession of that tribe. After a while the Gakkhar tribe, and a tribe called Chobeh, who are zamindars of consequence in the Panjab, allied themselves with the

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(1) The lithograph is defective here.

(2) This is clear enough in the lithograph, but Briggs’s translation has “Boolbas,” and a MS. “Malnas.”

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“<p. 556> dwellers in the desert, and with the people who live in the hills between Kabul and Kandahar. The allies marched against Kaid Raj, and he, being unable to resist, relinquished that country (of the Panjab) to them. From that time this tribe spread, and took possession of every hill which had a chief. It would seem that this tribe is the same as the Afghans of the present day. Kaid Raj reigned for forty-three years.

663. “History of the reign of Jai Chand. — Jai Chand was the commander in-chief of Kaid Raj, and, finding himself strong enough, placed his feet upon the throne. In his reign there was a great famine; and as he was not of royal race, he had no sympathy for the sufferings of the people. He spent his days at Bayana in debauchery and pleasure, while his soldiers and subjects were perishing. Many villages and towns went to ruin, and Hindustan was many years before it recovered from the effects of his neglect. Jai Chand reigned for sixty years. His cotemporary was Darab, to whom he sent tribute every year. He left a son of tender years, whom his mother placed upon the throne, she herself carrying on the government as regent. But Jai Chand’s brother, named Dihlu, conspired with several chiefs, put the boy aside, and placed the crown upon his own head.

664. “History of the rebellion of Raja Dihlu. — Dihlu was a Raja of considerable courage and daring, and he was kind and gentle to the people. His great object was to promote their happiness. He built the city of Dehli, and named it after himself. When he had reigned forty years, a man named Fur, who was related to the Raja of Kamaun, and dwelt in that country, broke out in rebellion. He first got possession of the country of Kamaun, and then he marched against the fort of Kanauj. A great battle was fought between him and Raja Dihlu, in which Dihlu was taken prisoner; and Fur sent him to be confined in the fort of Rohtas.

665. “Reign of Raja Fur.(1) — Fur soon afterwards led an army to Bang, and extended his sway as far as the shores of the Indian Ocean. He became a very great Rai, and, according to Munawwar Khan, no Rai was ever equal to him. After he had ascended the throne, ho relinquished the practice of sending tribute to the King of Iran.

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(1) Porus.

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“<p. 557> Iskandar {Alexander of Macedon} led his army to India; aud as Fur would not submit, Iskandar marched with his army like a swarm of locusts or ants to encounter him. A great battle was fought near Sirhind, and Fur was killed. Fur reigned for seventy-three years. It must not be concealed that the Rais of the Dakhin also had grown in power and dominion; —- such as Kul Chand, who built the city of Kulbarga; Mirich Chand, who built the town of Mirich, to which he gave his own name; Biji Chand, who built and populated the city of Bijanagar, and made it the seat of the government of the Dakhin. There were other Rais besides these; but to name them all would be a tedious task. When Iskandar came to India, there was a great Raja named Bidar, who had built the fort of Bidar. The tribe of Rajbidars, which still exists, and is renowned as one of the bravest of all the tribes of the Dakhin, is of his lineage, and by the decrees of Fate is established in the sovereignty of the Dakhin. When this Raja heard of the arrival of Iskandar, and the death of Fur, he sent his son, with valuable presents and elephants, to Iskandar, with the object of inducing him to abstain from the conquest of his kingdom, and to return to Iran. After the death of Fur, and the return of Iskandar, a man named Sinsar Chand(1) seized the reins of authority in Hindustan, and in a short time became master of the whole country, which had fallen into a state of anarchy. He had seen with his own eyes the destruction of Fur; so, through fear, he every year sent the tribute before it was demanded to Gudarz, who at that time was reigning in Iran. His reign lasted seventy years. A man named Junah then obtained the throne by force.

666. “Rebellion of Junah. — Some state that Junah was son of a daughter of Fur. After he ascended the throne, he performed many good deeds, and exhibited many excellent qualities. He endeavoured to promote the prosperity of the kingdom, and established many towns and villages on the banks of the Ganges and Jumna. He also made great efforts to administer justice. He was contemporary with Ardashir Babagan. One year Ardashir marched against India, and reached as far as the neighbourhood of Sirhind. Junah was very much alarmed, and hastened to do homage to him. He presented pearls and gold and jewels and elephants as tribute, and so induced

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(1) Chandragupta {the translator adds an unnecessary question mark} ?

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<p. 558> Ardashir to return. Junah then went back to Kanauj, and lived there for some time in tranquillity. After a reign of ninety years, he died, leaving two sons, the elder of whom, Kalyan Chand, succeeded him.”

b. Note on the Traditional Persian King List which was synchronized with Ferishta’s Hindu line

667. Several synchronisms are made in Ferishta’s Introduction between the kings of India and the kings of Persia. Muslim historians believed the Persians had preserved the most accurate account of early post-diluvian history. Doubtless this was because the predecessors of Zoroaster’s contemporary Vishtaspa in Balkh had passed down to the first millennium BC their native traditions of the second millennium, which were independent of the scribal traditions of Mesopotamia and Elam. These were preserved faithfully thereafter by the Zoroastrian priesthood. The traditional Persian history can be summarized as follows:

668. Fredun (Faridun, Feridun, etc.) “Born Of the Waters,” was the most notable of the Dynasty of the Peshdadians, the first of the traditional Iranian dynasties, which endured till the end of the second millennium BC. The name Fredun (Avestan Thraetaona) means “The hero with Three Quivers” (Burnouf), and, accordingly, Fredun is said to have divided the earth up amongst his three sons by writing the names of the three regions on arrows, and letting the sons choose one each (Tabari). Persian and Arabic writers identified Fredun with the Biblical Noah (Tabari), who similarly divided the world up amongst his three sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth. The three sons of Fredun are Selim (Salm, etc.), Tur and Iraj, or, in Avestan, Sairima, Tura and Airyu. Sairima means “Sheltered,” and corresponds to the Hebrew Ham, “Sheltered, or, Shelterer.” Tura is from the name Torgom = Togarmah, the eponymus of the Turks, §900, below, >>, which was applied both to Togarmah’s father Gomer as Abu’l Turk, “father of the Togarmah-folk/Turks,” and likewise to Gomer’s father Japheth, so Tur = Abu’l Turk = Japheth. §782, below, >>. Airyu means “noble” (whence the term “Aryan”) and corresponds to the Hebrew Shem, “Man of repute, Noble.” Selim (Sairima) was ancestor of the peoples inhabiting the lands around the Mediterranean coastlands, west and south of Iran, viz. of the Hamites, Tur (Tura) of the Turanians or Turks and related peoples of the lands north and east of Iran, viz. of the Japhethites, and Iraj (Airyu) of the Iranians of central Asia, viz. of the Semites. The equivalence of the Iranian and Hebrew tribal names confirms the identification of Fredun with Noah. The other identification of Fredun was with Nimrod, son of Canaan. So, in Dinawari AD 828-895 (trans. online as at 05/15 at http://www.mrjb.ca/current-projects/abu-hanifah-ahmad-ibn-dawud-al-dinawari): “They say: Numrud {Fredun = Numrud, Nimrod, in Dinawari} had three sons: Iraj, Salm, and Ṭus {Tur}. His kingdom passed to Iraj, and he set Salm over the sons of Ḥam, and Ṭus over the sons of Yafiṯ. {As Fredun = Nimrod in Dinawari, the three Iranian figures are eponymous chiefs ruling over the respective Biblical tribes.} His two brothers envied Iraj since his father favored him with power excluding them, though he was younger in years than they. The two grew insolent towards him, and slew him. The kingdom went to the son of his son, Manushihr son of Iraj, and he turned away from his two sons Salm and Ṭus. Then he died, and Manushihr son of Iraj ruled.” But also in the same chronicle Shem the founder of the line is himself identified directly with Iran, the Aryan eponymus (earlier section Idris and Nuh), Iran being an alternative form of Iraj. The dynastic name, Peshdadian, was derived from Fredun’s ancestor Hoshang, also known as Peshdad (“Early Judgment”). Hoshang was identified by Arab chroniclers with the Biblical Enoch (Abu Ma‘shar). Hoshang was the ancestor of Fredun, as Enoch was the ancestor of Noah.

669. Fredun sent his general Sam Nariman to subdue Cush, titled Fildendan, “Elephant-Tooth,” the ancestor of the Ethiopians referred to in the Bible, who ruled the coasts of Africa around Zanzibar from which ivory was obtained (hence the epithet), and had earned his enmity by awarding himself divine honors. Sam Nariman brought Cush back into subjection. (Lebtarikh, Pt. II, Cap. I: “Cush Fildendan, the brother of Zohak, having presumed to exalt himself to the rule of Barberia [Berbera, a coastal region south of Zeilah in Somalia in the Horn of Africa], wanted to give himself the title of ‘God.’ Feridun sent Sam to Samziman [Zanzibar, that is, the Ocean and coastal regions adjoining] against him, and he defeated him in a series of fierce battles, finally reducing him to obedience. Nimrod son of Canaan was descended from this same Cush Fildendan.”) Fredun was known as a demon-slayer, more famously as the destroyer of Dahhak (Zohak), the “Biting Serpent,” the accomplice of Nimrod, or Nimrod himself, who had murdered his ancestor Yim. Yim is Jamshid, Tammuz, that is, as ancestor of Fredun, the pre-diluvian Tammuz, but the Persian traditions fused the histories of the pre-diluvian and post-diluvian figures. In Ferishta Yim (Jamshid) is post-diluvian, and so is his relative Tahmurasp.

Tahmurasp: earlier Tahma Urupi, “Mighty (tahma) Fox/weasel (urupi),” or “Mighty Body-form.” According to the first interpretation, this would be an Iranian transmogrification of the Mesopotamian Ur-gula = “mighty (gula) dog/lion (ur > urupi)” = Labbu, a title of Nergal, viz. of Hercules Libycus = Ushumgal-ana, see §626.17.4 Further Observations, above, >>. According to the second interpretation it would be a transmogrification of the title Era-gal (= Nergal) itself, the first element being a formation from the Semitic ‛-r = “skin, body,” ibid. There was a pre-diluvian and a post-diluvian Ushumgal-ana, and Ushumgal-ana was identified with Dumuzi (Tammuz). Dountless the name was intended to echo phonetically the Sumerian divine names Damu (> Takhma), and Ur (> urupi), Tammuz and Nergal. Arab chroniclers equate Tahmurasp with Nimrod (Enmerkar [Nimrod] = Ushumgal-ana). In a Parsi Rivayat Tahmoruw (Tahmurasp) is the brother of Jamshid, and is devoured by the Satanic Ahriman, only to be retrieved finally from his bowels and properly disposed of by Jamshid. This is a reflex of the relationship between the Dioskouric brothers Sidon (Tammuz, Jamshid) and Heth (Ushumgal-ana, Tahmurasp), as bi-polar cosmic principles, the residents of the realms of light and darkness, of the upper-world and under-world, and of the retrieval of the latter by the former from the negative spiritual powers supposed to be exercised by Ahriman over the deceased, failing proper disposal of the corpse.

Fredun pursued the followers of Nimrod till he tracked their leaders down and eradicated them (Tabari). Both Fredun and his ancestor Yim were identified by Arab chroniclers with Dhu’l Karnaim, Lord of the East and West, otherwise the Immortal Al Khidr.

670. The Arab genealogists traced the Persian kings from Shem, the eldest of Noah’s (Fredun’s) sons, specifically from Emim, son of Lud, son of Aram, son of Shem. The eponymus (Arabic ’-m-y-m) is transcribed “Umaym” in recent literature, but in the early Renaissance (von Lilienstern, Geschichte der Araber vor Muhamed, 1836, p. 72) was transcribed “Emym.” This was the common medieval transcription of the Hebrew Emim (Heb. ’-m-y-m, identical to the Arabic consonantal form of the name of the son of Lud, which latter is “Emim” in Sachau, Albiruni, p. 28), meaning “giants.” (See Koehler-Baumgartner, Lexicon #439, ’–y-m-y-m, for optionality of plene spelling with yod.) It is employed in Arabic histories rather like the plural eponymus Lehabim in the Defloratio Berosi as a personal noun or epithet of the founding patriarch of the nation. The Emim were the gigantic occupants of Canaan, otherwise known as Zamzummim, Rephaim and Nephilim. Some of the sons of Emim broke off to join Gomer, son of Japheth, in the East, Gomer being titled “Adam,” or in Persian “Gayomart” (“Mortal Life”), hence Emim likewise came to be styled “Gayomart.” (Tabari, Albiruni.)

This tradition makes “Gayomart” or “Adam” (Gomer) a son of Japheth. In the Sibylline Oracles Japheth = Iapetos. In Zosimus (ed. Berthelot, III. xlix. 7) Adam, as a bipartite being, soul and body, is identified with Prometheus (= soul), and Prometheus’ brother Epimetheus (body), whilst Pandora is identified with Eve. This allows an identification of Prometheus and/or Epimetheus, son of Iapetos, with Gomer (= Adam = Prometheus and/or Epimetheus), son of Japheth (= Iapetos). The equation of Gomer with Prometheus is made explicitly in Forcadel, De Gallorum Imperio et Philosophia, 1595, p. 8f., there stated as a fact, not a conjecture, implying it was accepted as a fact in the medieval chronicles drawn on by Renaissance antiquarians in his circle. Accordingly, Prometheus is named, along with the post-diluvian sons of Ouranos (= Noah) who were at war with each other, viz. Titan (= Ham) and Kronos (= Shem), in Polyhistor’s epitome of the Sibylline Oracles (in Syncellus, ed. Mosshammer, p. 46 = ed. Dindorf, p. 81, and in the Armenian version of Eusebius’ Chronicle, section titled ‘Alexander Polyhistor on the Building of the Tower,’ differently translated in Karst and Bedrosian [g38] but both mentioning Prometheus in relation to the Titan War: the passage in Syncellus reads “God blew with winds and overthrew them, and gave each their own language, which is why the city was called Babylon. After the cataclysm flourished Titan and Prometheus ….”), suggesting in this context Prometheus is the Biblical Gomer and/or Emim.

Returning now to the Iranian tradition: the post-diluvian kings of Persia were identified with pre-diluvian figures. The successor to Emim, Arphaxad son of Shem, was titled “Iran” (Airik, Iraj etc.), meaning “ancestor of the Iranians,” and this was also the designation of Hoshang (Enoch). Thus it was disputed amongst the ancient chroniclers whether the building of Balkh, ascribed to “Iran” or “Iraj,” was actually the work of Hoshang or of the son of Fredun. (Mirkhond.) The royal line began, according to the Persian genealogists, with Airik (Iran, Iraj, Arphaxad), who they referred to as the youngest of the sons of Fredun (Noah), though in the line of the firstborn Shem. Airik was heir to the middle regions of the earth, — Shem’s portion, — including Iran itself and Iraq. Airik’s two brothers, Salm and Tug (Tur), the princes of the other two divisions “slew them all, Airik and his happy sons, but Fredun kept the daughter in concealment, and from that daughter a daughter was born; they became aware of it, and the mother was slain by them. Fredun provided for the daughter also in concealment, for ten generations, when Manus-i Khurshed-vinik was born from his mother …” (Greater Bundahish xxxi. 10f.). This is the same story of the destruction of the male Semites in the days of Nimrod by the Hamites subject to Nimrod, and their allies of the race of Japheth. It is demonstrated, inter alia, by the fact Salm and Tug allied themselves with Nimrod’s father and Zohak’s “brother” Cush “Elephant-tooth,” — the eponymous ancestor of the Ethiopians, who made himself a god in the mode of Nimrod himself, — for the purpose of destroying Airik (Iraj). (See the summary of the Kush-nama infra.) Accordingly, the successor of the post-diluvian Hoshang (viz. Airik, Arphaxad), was his relative Takhmorup (Tahmuras[p], Tahmurath etc.), i.e. Nimrod, and the latter’s son and successor, was Yim (Jamshid). (The genealogical connections between these figures are variously stated, reflecting the diverse interests of the transmitters of the tradition.)

671. The male line between Fredun and Manus-i Khurshed-vinik was as follows: Fredun, Airik, Guzak, Fraguzak, Zusak, Frazusak, Bitak, Thritak, Airak, Manus-khurnak (i.e. Manus-i Khurshed-vinik, a.k.a. Mam-sozak). Manus-khurnak’s son was Manus-khurnar, and his son Manuskihar (Minuchihr in Ferishta). (Ibid., 14.) The latter was a contemporary of Jethro and Moses. An alternative genealogy preserved by Tabari was: Manuskihar son of Manus-khurnar son of Ifriqis son of (the Biblical patriarch) Isaac son of Abraham. The slaughter of Airik was avenged by Manuskihar, who destroyed Salm and Tug. (Here, presumably, the names Salm and Tug are ethnic or royal titles, representing the heads of the respective tribes.)

672. The line of descent between Manuskihar and Vistasp (Gushtasp), the contemporary of Zoroaster, was as follows: Manuskihar, Nodar, Agaimasvak, Auzobo the Tuhmaspian, Kai-Kavad (exposed as an infant, later reared, the first of the Dynasty of the Kayanians, which succeeded that of the Peshdadians, and to which the contemporaries of Zoroaster belonged), Kai-Apiveh, Kai-Pisin, Manus, Auzav, Loharasp (Lohrasp), Vistasp (Gushtasp). (Ibid., 23f., 28f.) 1000 years separated Vistasp from Fredun. The descent of Zaratust (Zoroaster) from Manuskihar was as follows: Manuskihar, Durasrob, Ragan, Ayazem, Vidast, Spitaman (hence Zoroaster’s title Spitama), Hardar, Hardarsn, Paitirasp, Kakhshnus, Haekadasp, Aurvadasp, Paitirasp, Porushasp, Zaratust (Zoroaster). (Ibid. xxxii. 1.)

673. The descent of Kai-Kaus and Kai-Khusrob (Kai-Khusru) from Manuskihar was as follows: Manuskihar, Nodar, Agaimasvak, Auzobo the Tuhmaspian, Kai-Kavad, Kai-Apiveh, Kai-Kaus, Siyavaksh, Kai-Khusrob. (Ibid. 23-25.) Kai-Khusrob’s mother was Vispan-frya the daughter of Frasiyav (Afrasiyab). (Ibid. 18.) This last name means “Great Terrorizer,” and is really a title, applied also to subsequent Turanian invaders of Iranian territory. Frasiyav (Afrasiyab) the father of Vispan-frya was the Uighur king Buku Khan. (Juvayni, Tarikh-i-Jahan-Kushay, and Jami ut-Tevarikh.) The Uighurs were the “Allies” (hence their name) of Oghuz Khan c. 1850 BC, the descendant of Turk (= Gomer) son of Japheth. They inhabited at first the borders of the River Orkon, whose source was in the mountains of Karakorum, then divided into two nations. After 500 years Buku Khan led them out against the neighboring Mongols, Kirghiz, Tanguts and Khitays, and thus founded an early Uighur empire. The Persians traced Frasiyav’s descent from Tug, as follows: Frasiyav son of Pashang, son of Zaesm, son of Turak, son of Spaenyasp, son of Duroshasp, son of Tug son of Fredun. (Ibid. 14.) “[16. Pashang {father of Frasiyav} and Visak were both brothers. 17. By Visak were Piran {this is the Turanian “Piran Wasiya,” that is “Piran of the House of Vesa,” of Ferishta, §658f., above, >>.}, Human, Shan, and other brothers begotten. 18. By Frasiyav were Frasp-i Chur, Shan, Shedak, and other sons begotten; and Vispan-frya, from whom Kay Khosraw was born, was daughter of Frasiyav.”

674. From Turak in this same line of Tug was traced the genealogy of the heroic Keresasp as follows: Keresasp son of Athrat (Thrita), son of Sahm, son of Turak, etc. to Tug son of Fredun. (Ibid. 26f.) Sahm (Sam) the ancestor of Keresasp gave his name to the latter hero, who was also known as Sam Nariman. (Sam here means “descendant of Sam,” and Sam himself is represented as a son of Nariman, the “manly-minded,” hence his epithet, in the Shah-nama.) Sam gave birth to Zal and Zal to the great hero Rustam.

675. The Sam Nariman who was sent by Fredun against Cush Fildendan was not the father of Zal, as he flourished towards the end of the second millennium BC, but rather his ancestor Sa(h)m, whose name became an epithet of later kings in that line. Sahm in the Greater Bundahish represents the fourth generation from Tug, which corresponds to that of Frazusak, fourth in descent from Airik, in the genealogy of Manuskihar; and the generation of Frazusak was two generations higher than that of the Biblical patriarch Abraham, according to the alternative genealogy of Manuskihar quoted by Tabari. Traditionally Sam and Nariman, and their comrade-in-arms, Keresasp (or Gurshasp), were dateable to the era of Fredun himself (as in Ferishta). All three names were attached to a single person, alternatively the names were attached to separate figures. Note that in Ferishta and in Lebtarikh Sam Nariman of the era of Fredun (Noah) was involved in a war on behalf of Fredun against pagans of the race of Cush: sun-worshipers of India in Ferishta, Cush himself in Ethiopia in Lebtarikh. His invasion of India brought the Punjab under his control, and under the control of his army, for a considerable period thereafter. Sam Nariman himself was taken to be of Turanian (Japhethite, Indo-European) origin, since the Iranians under whom he served (descended from Emim, “Gayomart,” son of Lud, son of Aram, son of Shem), had mixed with the line of Gomer, son of Japheth. Hence the Turanian eponymus Tur was also counted a son of Jam or Jamshid (Shem). The Punjab invaded by Sam Nariman was the location of the ancient Indus civilization. The infiltration of Indo-European elements, sometimes by violent means, amongst an earlier non-Indo-European aboriginal stock in India (according to Ferishta, of Cushite origin), is well attested, and is believed by many to have begun in the days of the Indus civilization. In fragments of the Book of Giants, see further §677.13.3, below, >>, Sam and Nariman are equated with the Anakite Nephilim Ohya and Ahya, the sons of Shemyaza, whilst Ahya in another Talmudic source is the father of the giant Og of Bashan. Supposedly Shemyaza engendered these post-diluvian giants on Ham’s wife at the time of the Flood. Ohya and Ahya are associated with Gilgamesh in the post-diluvian period. As Gilgamesh is the Amraphel of Genesis 14, and in light of the Abrahamic era of the earlier Sam, referred to supra, we may take it that these Anakite heroes are the Anakites who aided Abraham in his battle against Amraphel, viz. against the Cushite idolaters (“Cush Fil-dendan”) of Shinar. The Iranian names match those of the Anakites: Sam means “united in one,” which is Ohya in Aramaic (if from the root ’–ḥ-h = “unite”) and Nari-man means “have the disposition, mind [man] of a man [nari],” which is Aramaic Ahya (if from the same root in the sense “be united in fellowship, be in accord with one’s fellow-man”). The latter element in the Iranian name Nari-man, commonly taken to mean “mind,” might also be the Indo-Aryan word for “man, human” (like the Sanskrit Manu), and an indirect reference to the Anakite patriarch Arba since he is specifically termed in the Hebrew Scriptures (Joshua 14. 15) the “great Adam (= Manu) among the Anakites.” Karesaspa means “lean/emaciated horses,” and Anak (‛-n-q) means “emaciated, thin,” especially of the neck of animals (cf. Gesenius-Tregelles under the variant root ’-n-q), hence the Iranian Karesaspa may be taken to be the equivalent of the Hebrew eponymus Anak. Ohya the Nephilite (Anakite) corresponds, accordingly, to Iranian Sam, otherwise titled, — when not differentiated from, — Nariman and Karesaspa. Presumably this draws on an early Avestan source in which the Hebrew names were rendered directly into Avestan. The arrival of Hebrew monotheism in Balkh under Zoroaster (Oxuartes), the disciple of Jonah, must have propelled the process forward. The battle of the Iranian heroes so named against the sun-worshipers of Ethiopia and India (Cush) is a reflex of the battle of the faithful Anakites of Abraham’s retinue with the Cushite or Sabaean sun-worshipers of their native habitat in the land of the Min-folk as well as with the more powerful political proponents of the sun-cult in Mesopotamia. The reverberation of this conflict according to tradition, and probably in historical fact, was felt also in the Sabaean colonies of Africa and the Indus valley.

676. Some further details of the history behind these events are preserved in the Majmal al-Tawarikh (followed by Mirkhond). Cush was first brought in fetters from the Far East to the domain of Feridun (Fredun, Noah) in Khanirath, that is, the central inhabited zone, the clime of Babylon (Tabari), by Feridun’s general Karun son of Gavah, presumably because of idolatrous rebellion like that of Cush’s son Nimrod. He received mercy and was allotted a region to rule in the South and West (viz. Cush, Ethiopia). It was there he had to be brought to heel a second time by Sam Nariman (Ohya, the son of Ham’s wife), as recounted in Lebtarikh. Note also in the following account the more widespread operations against idolatrous enclaves initiated by Feridun. The sources of these accounts are Persian epics similar to the Gershasp-nama of Asadi and the Sam-nama. A Persian book called “Kush-pil-dandan” (“Cush Elephant Tooth”) is mentioned by the author of the Majmal al-Tawarikh as one of his sources, Elliot-Dowson, op. cit. infra, p. 102, and go to §677.0.1ff., below, >>, for a summary of this work preserved in a single MS in the British Museum. The word fil or pil is the Aramaic pil, “elephant,” with which Jastrow compares the word naphil (Talmudic Dictionary, s.v. pil), the singular of nephilim, “fallen one, giant.” Thus “Elephant-tooth” is a covert reference to Cush’s giant origin. (See also on tusk = moon, and on the cult of Cush Fildendan in India, §316.1ff., above, >>, and on the continuation of the naphil imagery in Hinduism, §316.2, above, >>.)

677. Mirkhond, History of the Early Kings of Persia, trans. Shea, London, 1832, p. 143f., orthography slightly modified (with additional details from Majmal al-Tawarikh, apud Spiegel, in ZDMG 3er Band, 1849, p. 249f., which provides an earlier account of this series of episodes): “…. When Feridun was seated on the imperial throne, he restored all that Zahak [Zohak] had violently extorted from the nobility and the people: after which, he, in person, made war upon the tribe of A’d: they were entirely discomfited, and he became master of their country: from thence he advanced against other nations, and in this manner subjected to his rule the greatest part of the civilized world. {A’d or Ad, ancestor of the giant Adites, including the brothers Shaddad and Shaddid, was a son of Qoft, the eponymus of the Copts, the son of Masr-Osiris, the Biblical Mizraim, according to the genealogy quoted in §626.17.2, above, >>. Therefore the battle, in part, if not principally, was against the earliest kings of Egypt, the immediate successors of Masr-Mizraim-Men. Note the sequel here in which Feridun continues his campaign against idolaters in the lands of Cush, brother of Mizraim, on the southern and western borders of Egypt.} It is stated by other writers, that when Feridun had terminated happily whatever regarded Zahak, he detached Gurshasp and Nariman to Turkestan, and Gavah of Isfahan to Rum [lit. “Rome,” i.e. Asia Minor and the regions ruled in a subsequent era by Byzantium, the New “Rome,” in the eastern Mediterranean], as before mentioned; and that these commanders succeeded in utterly subduing the regions assigned to them: also, that Gurshasp, on his return from the East, went, by the command of Feridun, to Tinjah-i-Mughrab (Tangiers); on his return from which expedition he descended to the grave. About this time, Karun, the son of Gavah, was sent to Chin [Far East, China], for the purpose of seizing Goshpul Dandan [= Cush Fildendan], and bringing him in fetters and humiliation to the foot of the throne to the imperial residence. Nariman was also detached to Mazenderan, to deliver into the clutches of affliction and woe, Gurdaz Shah, who had manifested rebellious intentions. Nariman shortly after returned from his expedition, victorious and triumphant; and then proceeding to India, brought under the yoke of disgrace the Raja of Hindustan, who had long continued in a state of revolt; but finally, they entered into an accommodation. Nariman having returned in safety and triumph, laden with spoil, to the court, the asylum of the world, was then ordered to advance to Rum: he there utterly dispersed the idolaters who had collected in great numbers in that country. On his return from Rum, he passed some time in besieging Sikavend: the enemy, however, watching an opportunity, threw on his head, while he slept, such a mighty stone, that he never more awoke. After his death, Feridun partitioned the world among his sons. {Majmal: “Feridun had Selm and Tur accompanied by Sam son of Nariman (Ohya, the son of Ham’s wife), who made their authority recognized in Rum and Turkestan, then returned.”} About this time, Mahraj [Maha Raj in Ferishta], the sovereign of many kingdoms in Hindustan, being grievously oppressed by the Sagshar {a tribal name, Majmal (Spiegel): “the Sagsars”}, Feridun fixed on Saum, the son of Nariman [Sam Nariman], to bring him assistance: by this champion’s aid, the soul of Mahraj was no longer troubled by his enemies, and his kingdom was purged of the rebellious. After this event, Goshpul Dandan [Cush Fildendan] was distinguished by the royal munificence, and entrusted with the government of some countries in the western and southern parts of the empire {Majmal: “Feridun set at liberty Cush Fildendan, and entrusted him with the government of the countries of the West, but he rebelled soon afterward.”}; in the course of which events, Selm and Tur, deviating from rectitude, conspired to destroy Iraj …. ”

677.0.1. The epic from which these details about Cush were drawn has been preserved in a MS in the British Museum. This represents a lost prose account of the legend rendered into verse by the author. In Lebtarikh, Cush Fildendan is himself the brother of Zohak, whereas in this version, Cush Fildendan is the son of Cush the brother of Zohak. The son is a reincarnation of his father, as appears from the fact he lived an incredible 1,500 years, and flourished in the Abrahamic era of Faridun (c. 1800 BC), as well as in the era of Manuchehr, and of Kay Kavus and Rostam, and even in that of Alexander of Macedon in the fourth century BC, 1,500 years subsequent to the era of Faridun! He became in the course of that long life a wanderer like Al Khidr, at first in the form of the god-man with Elephant’s tusks and ears, but latterly, by the influence of a kind sage, as a convert to the worship of the One God, and with his monstrous visage surgically repaired. One might speak, therefore, of Cush the father and the son, or of Cush in multiple reincarnations. The “conversion” of Cush represents the conversion of his Cushite descendants to monotheism at some time between the era of Rostam and that of Alexander, viz. in the first half of the first millennium BC. The “Mahanesh” named as the sage who told the story of Cush to Alexander is probably “Manes,” meaning Mani in the form of Buddha, who is dateable to the era of Alexander, and the wise man similar to Mahanesh, who is said to have converted and transformed Cush, an earlier incarnation of Buddha/Mani prior to the era of Alexander, most probably Zoroaster. (Mani saw himself as a reincarnation precisely of Buddha and Zoroaster.) The conversion of Cush by the kind sage represents, in that case, the spread of Zoroastrianism amongst the descendants of Cush in the north of India. Buddhism similarly was popular with the kings of Kushan (of oriental Cushite descent) in the early Christian centuries. If these identifications are correct, the story originated amongst, or was transmitted through, a Manichaean source. Kushan east of Mesopotamia (“across the Oxus”) is specifically said to have been founded by, and named after, Cush Fildendan. Thus, the descendants of Sheba and Dedan (Sind and Hind), sons of Raamah, son of Cush, in the east, as well as the Ethiopians of Abyssinia and Nubia are included by implication in his family line. The elder Cush is the eponymus of the Ethiopians in Africa, and the younger Cush, the eponymus of Kushan, a colony of, or otherwise dependent community of (a “son” of), the Ethiopian Cushites in the east (which is where Cush II was born). It is remarkable that this (§677.0.1.12, below, >>) and analogous Iranian legends refer to an incursion by Cush Fildendan (viz. Kushan, including the Cushites of India) into Abyssinia and Nubia in the time of Kay Kavus (Kai Kaus), which is chronologically somewhat after the Exodus: an entry in Syncellus’ Book of Sothis (Syncellus, Chronographica ed. Mosshammer, p. 177 = ed. Dindorf, p. 286) dates an incursion and settlement of “Ethiopians from the River Indus” on the borders of Egypt in the days of the Amenophis commemorated in the colossus of Memnon, that is, Amenophis III, and he similarly reigned somewhat after the Exodus, c. 1400 BC. (The Exodus took place in 1446 BC at the end of the reign of Thutmosis III and during the coregency of his son Amenophis II.) A summary and account of the “Kush-nama,” or “Epic of Cush,” is found in the online Encyclopedia Iranica, as follows, the name Cush Fildendan or Cush Elephant-tooth being translated “Kuš the Tusked:”

Encyclopædia Iranica, Articles: http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/

December 15, 2008, Jalal Matini:

“KUŠ-NĀMA

part of a mythical history of Iran written between 1108 and 1111, dealing with the eventful life of Kuš the Tusked.

677.0.1.1. KUŠ-NĀMA, part of a mythical history of Iran written by Ḥakim Irānšān b. Abu’l-Ḵayr between the years 501-04/1108-11 (lines 167-70; 5538-47) dealing with the eventful life of Kuš the Tusked (or Pil-guš, “The Elephant-eared”), the son of Kuš (brother of Żaḥḥāk). Kuš the Tusked is said to have lived 1,500 years; however, the only manuscript of the Kuš-nāma lacks an account of the last years of his life.

677.0.1.2. The work (lines 5553-64) is dedicated to the Seljuk ruler Ḡiāṯ’l-Din Moḥammad b. Malek-Šāh (r. 498–511/1105-18). The writer’s name does not appear in the work. The only source that refers to him, albeit indirectly, is Mojmal (written in 520/1126), which in mentioning another work by the author, the Bahman-nāma, says, “I [the author of Mojmal] have found no reference [to the death of Zal] except in the Bahman-nāma, written by Ḥakim Iranšāh b. Abu’l-Ḵayr…” (p. 92). In two out of the four manuscripts of Mojmal, the author’s name is recorded as “Irānšān,” while in the other two it is “Iranšāh” and “Inšāh” (Kuš-nāma, intro. pp. 28-9). The poet refers to his poem as Kuš-nāma twice (lines 30, 4802), while Mojmal (pp. 2, 189) refers to it as Qeṣṣa-ye Kuš-e Pil-Dandān (“the tale of Kuš the Tusked”) and Aḵbār-e Kuš-e Pil-Dandān (“accounts of Kuš the Tusked”). Iranšān was a Muslim, but it is hard to say whether Sunni or Shi’i.

677.0.1.3. A unique manuscript of the work is found in a collection held in the British Museum (OR 2780). The collection contains five maṣnavis: namely, Asadi Ṭusi’s Garšasp-nāma, Ahmad Tabrizi’s Šāhanšāh-nāma, Tāriḵ-e Čangiz Ḵān va Jānešinānaš (“The History of Genghis Khan and his Successors”) the Bahman-nāma, and the Kuš-nāma. The manuscript is dated Ṣafar 800/October 1397. This manuscript of the Kuš-nāma is composed of 10,129 lines. It contains a number of gaps and a relatively large number of errors, which escaped the notice of the scribe. The work contains very few headings, but for ease of analysis it can be divided into an introduction and two parts. The introduction (lines 1-226) begins by extolling God, then refers to the Bahman-nāma, and the Kuš-nāma, the reasons behind their composition, and ends with praise of the patron. Part I (lines 227-918) can be considered a kind of introduction to Part II. Part II (lines 919-10,129) describes the exploits of Kuš the Tusked. This figure also appears in Ferdowsi’s Šāh-nāma, the Bahman-nāma, and the Farāmarz-nāma.

677.0.1.4. In Part I the reader encounters the same Kuš with his hideous face and deceptions as in Part II; the only difference between the two is that in the former part he calls himself the “head of the Arabs and the king of Iran” and his base is Baghdad. By contrast in Part II, after the death of his father, Kuš is appointed by Żaḥḥāk ruler of an area known in Persian literature as Čin va Māčin. In the first part Kuš tricks the ruler of Rome into giving him tribute and hostages. Since the Kuš of Part I is learned —unlike the Kuš of Part II—the Roman ruler sends him nine books, four on medicine and five on the history of the kings of Rome. In one of these books, Alexander while in Ḵāvar encounters black cannibals and through a statue with an inscription learns of Kuš. This causes the Macedonian king to search out more about him. He is directed to a mountain on which a man named Mahāneš (m-h-a-n-š) lives by himself. Mahāneš introduces himself as one of Jamšid’s descendants and explains that Jamšid married the daughter of the king of Čin, who bore him two sons: Nunak (n-w-n-k) and Fārak (f-a-r-k). After Żaḥḥāk had conquered Iran, Jamšid sent his family into hiding in the Arḡun (a-r-ḡ-w-n) forest in Čin. They took refuge there waiting for the day when some member of the family would take revenge on Żaḥḥāk. Jamšid said that the avenger would be one of the sons of Nunak. When Fārak saw that he would have no part in the vengeance, he devoted himself to worshipping God. Mahāneš tells Alexander that he is from Fārak’s line. The king asks him whether he is familiar with Kuš, and Mahāneš puts the manuscript at his disposal. Whereupon the story of Kuš the Tusked begins.

677.0.1.5. Comparison of Ferdowsi’s Šāh-nāma and the Kuš-nāma is instructive. Though they both cover the same ground, their versions of the following figures and topics in the legendary history of Iran are wholly different: Jamšid; Żaḥḥāk, the growths that emerge from his shoulders, and his imprisonment; Garšāsp; Ābtin; Farārang (Farānak in the Šāh-nāma); Faridun; Iraj; Salm; Tur; Manučehr; Kāvus; Rostam in the Māzandarān war; Širu; Qobād son of Kāva; Qāran and Narimān. For example, Ferdowsi’s account of Żaḥḥāk and his reign is cursory, while the Kuš-nāma devotes some 5,000 lines to it and to Iran’s relations with Čin and Māčin. Another salient difference is that in the Kuš-nāma Żaḥḥāk and Faridun (before he divided his kingdom among his sons) rule over and are responsible for the security of the known world: from the furthest reaches of the east in China and India to the westernmost parts in Egypt and south in Abyssinia and Nubia (also called Māzandarān). For this reason some of the most important battles in the poem take place in Čin va Māčin and Maghreb.

677.0.1.6. Before turning to a summary of the Kuš-nāma, it is worth noting that a prose version of the work existed during Irānšān b. Abu’l-Ḵayr’s time. The poet writes in the Kuš-nāma (lines 127-38) that after he had completed the Bahman-nāma, at the suggestion of a person he calls his “patron” (mehtar) he produced a verse version of the poem.

677.0.1.7. Summary of the Kuš-nāma. The work encompasses events that take place during the reigns of Żaḥḥāk and Faridun. But for a brief section at the beginning, it deals with the heroic feats, triumphs, deceit and philandering of Kuš the Tusked. It also recounts the times that he claimed to be divine. The tale begins when Żaḥḥāk is on the verge of slaying Jamšid, who predicts that a person from his royal line shall avenge his death. To prevent this Żaḥḥāk sends his brother Kuš as governor of Čin to rid the world of Jamšid’s line. These people have in their possession Andarz-e Jamšid (“Jamšid’s Testament”), a book that foretells events in the family’s future and counsels them on what to do when they do. Following the advice of this book, Jamšid’s descendants remain hidden, roaming the forests, where Kuš cannot reach them. Instead, he battles the Pilguš Tribe (literally, the “elephant-eared”) and takes a woman from the tribe as his bride. She bears him an elephant-eared and tusked son. But when Kuš sees his son, he first kills his wife for giving birth to such a demonic creature and then abandons the child in the forest, which, as it happens, is the hiding place of the house of Jamšid. By this time Ābtin, the third generation of Jamšid’s line (Jamšid > Nunak > Mahāru > Ābtin), has appeared on the scene. As narrated in the Kuš-nāma, Ābtin’s wife shelters the abandoned child and raises him. The child shows early signs of being a physical prodigy. For a time he fights against Kuš in Ābtin’s army, but later father and son recognize one another and join forces against Ābtin.

677.0.1.8. When the going becomes difficult for Ābtin, he consults Jamšid’s Testament, which tells him that whenever he finds himself in trouble, he should take refuge with the king of Māčin. As it happens there are two Māčins: one is contiguous with Čin and ruled by Bahak (b-h-k), the other is an island a month’s journey by sea away and ruled by Teyhur (T-y-h-w-R).

677.0.1.9. Teyhur receives Ābtin warmly and he stays for a time on the island known variously as “Basilā,” “Kuh,” and “Jazira.” Ābtin also marries Teyhur’s daughter Farārang. Finally a dream tells Ābtin to return to Iran. This episode is an example of the important role dreams play in the narrative. After Teyhur’s approval, Ābtin and Farārang aided by an ancient mariner sail for fourteen months and reach the Sea of Gilān and Āmol (the Caspian). In Iran Farārang gives birth to Faridun. When the child is four years old, his father, once again informed by a dream, entrusts him to Salkat (s-l-k-t) the commander of a fortress in Damāvand that Żaḥḥāk has not been able to take. Agents of Żaḥḥāk then kill Ābtin. Meanwhile, after Kuš the Tusked learns of Ābtin’s flight to Jazira, his marriage to Farārang, and his return to Iran, he craftily takes the island, which had been unconquered for 3,000 years, and destroys it. At this point news of Faridun’s capture of Żaḥḥāk reaches Kuš and he returns to Čin. Teyhur dies and when his son Kāram (k-a-r-m) replaces him on the throne, there is an exchange of gifts between the new king and Faridun. Faridun shackles Żaḥḥāk hand and foot, puts a yoke around his neck, and imprisons him in Damāvand.

677.0.1.10. After Faridun overcomes Żaḥḥāk he decides to put an end to Kuš the Tusked’s tyranny in Čin. He sends an army there but nothing comes of the campaign. Kuš builds a city in the lands across the Oxus calling it Kušān; there he erects a statue of himself and forces the inhabitants to worship it. Eventually Faridun sends Qāran with a vast army to Čin. Qāran captures Kuš in hand-to-hand combat. Kuš is sent back to Iran and imprisoned beside Żaḥḥāk in Damāvand, where he remains for forty years, until armies from Abyssinia and Nubia (Māzandarān) once again attack northern Africa, advancing as far as Egypt. When the inhabitants appeal to Faridun for aid, he repeatedly sends troops, but as soon as the Iranians leave, armies from the south attack despoiling the land and killing its inhabitants. At a meeting of advisors called by Faridun the consensus is that they must send a bloodthirsty tyrant to Maghreb. The unanimous choice is Kuš, who is taken from Damāvand and brought before Faridun. Kuš begs forgiveness for his past acts and swears to serve the king. They write a proclamation to which the gentry bear witness and Kuš at the head of the army is dispatched to the territory. He defeats the enemy and sends the spoils back to Faridun. He also founds several cities.

677.0.1.11. But in time Kuš, forgetting his pledge, openly rebels against the king and reverts to his old ways. He kills the Iranians in his army and orders that each home have an effigy of him and that the people worship it daily. After many years, Faridun sends one of his sons Salm to subdue Kuš, which he does. Kuš flees to the west, but that is not the end of his meddling. At this time two sons of Faridun, Tur and Salm, were aligned against the third son Iraj who demanded tribute from them. They kill Iraj and take on Kuš as an ally. The three divide the world and manage to pry some territory from Faridun. Several years pass until Manučehr comes of age and with a large army goes into battle against the two sons and Kuš. Tur and Salm are killed in battle, and Manučehr wounds Kuš with his bull-headed mace. Kuš escapes to Ḵāvarān and becomes so powerful there that no one has the capacity to confront him. In the meantime armies from Abyssinia and Nubia attack once again.

677.0.1.12. Kuš goes into battle against them, but this time makes no progress. So he goes to Kay Kāvus (king of Iran) and describes Māzandarān (Nubia and Abyssinia). He convinces the Iranian ruler to go to war, but their combined forces become so tired that they are unable to proceed. The great hero Rostam saves the day. This part of the Kuš-nāma despite all of its differences is comparable to parts of the Šāh-nāma that deal with Kāvus’ campaigns in Māzandarān, his battles with the demons, etc.

677.0.1.13. Despite these setbacks, another incident shows Kuš remains undeterred in his divine aspirations. One day while hunting, he becomes separated from his companions and loses his way. He reaches a palace and asks the lord for help. The lord asks, “Who are you?” “I am God, the Giver of Daily Bread and Guide,” he replies. The owner finds the idea of a lost Guide laughable. Kuš is finally forced to abandon his claims to godhood. In return the lord performs plastic surgery on him that restores his face to human form. The lord of the palace also wins him over to the cause of justice. Kuš stays with this wise lord 46 years learning a variety of disciplines from him. He convinces Kuš to return to his homeland where the transformed monster encourages everyone to worship God. It turns out that the wise lord was one of Jamšid’s descendants, like Mahāneš, who gave the story of Kuš-e Pil-Dandān to Alexander. At this point the Kuš-nāma ends.

677.0.1.14. Ḥakim Irānšān’s approach to epic verse places him third, as far as literary merit is concerned, to Ferdowsi’s Šāh-nāma and Asadi Tusi’s Garšāsp-nāma. Though he does not mention the Šāh-nāma by name, it certainly influenced the way he wrote. He mentions Masʿudi’s Šāh-nāma once. The Kuš-nāma beautifully renders a number of subjects. Especially remarkable are the poet’s descriptions of battlefields, nature, and the states of lovers and their beloveds. But these exemplary verses notwithstanding, the work is not free of a considerable number of insipid lines. In several cases one finds lapses in technique as well. The Kuš-nāma also affords readers glimpses of beliefs and customs some of which are unique to this book.

Bibliography:

Ḥakim Irānšāh b. Abu’l-Ḵayr, Bahman-nāma, ed. Raḥim ʿAfifi, Tehran, 1370 Š./1991.

Ḥakim Irānšān b. Abu’l-Ḵayr, Kuš-nāma, ed. Jalāl Matini, Tehran, 1377 Š./1998.

Farāmarz-nāma, Bombay, 1306 Š./1889 [note from Mahmoud Omidsalar].

Molé, M. “Un Poèm Persan du comte de Gobineau,” La Nouvelle Clio. Revue mensuelle de la

découverte historique, Bruxelles, 1952, pp. 116-30.

Moḥammad b. Najib Bakrān, Jahān-nāma, ed. Moḥammd Amin Riāḥi, Tehran, 1342 Š./1963, pp. 71-2.

Qazvini, Zakariā, ʿAjāyeb al-Maḵluqāt wa Ḡarāyeb al-Mowjudāt, Tehran, n.d., p. 103.

Nihongi, Chronicles of Japan from the Earliest Times to AD 796, tr. W. G. Aston, Tokyo, vol. I, pp. 57, 166 ff.

Ḥodud al-ʿālam, tr. Minorsky, pp. 228-29.

Jalāl Matini, “Faridun va sarzamin-e āftāb-e tābān,” Irānshenāsi, 2, pp. 160-77.

Encyclopædia Iranica | Articles http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/kus-nama-part-of-a-mythical-history-of… Rajabzāda, Ḥāšem, “Jāpon dar Kuš-nāma,” Ketāb-e māh: tāriḵ va joḡrāfiā, 56-7, Tehran, 1381, pp. 65-71.

Idem, “Kuš-nāma va pādšāhi-e Jāpon,” Nāma-ye Anjoman, n.s., 3, Tehran, pp. 128-58.

December 15, 2008 (Jalal Matini)

Originally Published: December 15, 2008

Last Updated: December 15, 2008”

End of citation from the Encyclopedia Iranica online.

677.1. On the traditional Iranian chronology (trans. Darmesteter, Babylonian and Oriental Record, Vol. VI [1892-3], p. 90ff., from the Greater Bundahish, an appendix on the calamities which have descended on Iran-shahr in the different millennia):

“1. When Zanak Minoi (Ahriman) broke out, at the beginning of the first millennium, he contaminated the Bull and Gayomart. When Mashya and Mashyana committed their act of ingratitude, they remained fifty years without breeding. In the same millennium Hoshang and Tahmuraf {= Tahmurasp} reigned seventy years; those two massacred the demons; at the end of the hazara the demons sawed Jim.

“2. The second hazara commenced: Azhi Dahak exercised tyranny, he exercised it during a thousand years. At the end of the millennium, Fretun took him and bound him in chains.

“3. The third millennium began when Fretun divided the Keshvars. Salm and Tuj killed Iraj and destroyed his blessed posterity. In the same millennium was born Manushcihr, who avenged Iraj.

“4. After that came Afrasyap: he drove back Manushcihr with the Iranians in the Patashkhvargar mountains {the mountain-range of Tabaristan}; he decimated them by pestilence and famine; Frash {brother of Notar} killed Notar, son of Manushcihr; at last a new treaty brought back the Iran-shahr to Frasyap.

“5. When Manushcihr was killed, Frasyap came back a second time, made numerous ravages in the Iran-shahr, desolated it, removed rain far from the country, until Usav, son of Tuhmasp came, drove back Frasyap and made the rain fall, which was known under the name of the New Rain.

“6. After Usav, Frasyap made new ravages in the Iran-shahr until Kavat was seated on the throne. Under the reign of Kai Us, during the same millennium, the demons became powerful, and Oshnar was assassinated; they suggested to him the thought of going to war with heaven, he fell very low and was despoiled of the royal Glory. After that he depopulated (?) the world of horses and men, and they were chained by stratagem in the land of Yambaran {Yemen} with their chiefs and princes.

“7. There was then a demon called Zinigab who had poison in his glance; he had come from the country of the Arabs to reign over Iran-shahr; all those whom he looked on with his evil eye he slew. The Iranians called Frasyap into their country; he killed this Zinigab, seized the power in Iran-shahr, took many men from Iran-shahr, established them in Turkestan, desolated Iran-shahr, and ravaged it until Rushtahm of Saistan, being prepared, seized the king of Yambaran, delivered Kai Us and the other Iranians from captivity, entered into a conflict with Afrasyap in the basin of the Ulai, which is called Ispahan, and defeated him there; he met him in new battles until he repulsed him and drove him into Turkestan. Rustahm brought back prosperity to Iran-shahr.

“8. Frasyap renewed the struggle; Kai Syavukhsh went to fight him, but by the mistake of Sutapih — Sutapak was Kaus’ wife — he did not come into Iran-shahr [but went] to Frasyap; having been received under his protection, he did not return near Kaus, but went himself into Turkestan, and married a daughter of Frasyap; he had a son, Kai Khosrav.

“9. He was assassinated there and in the same millennium, Kai Hosrav killed Frasyap; he himself withdrew into Kangdez and transferred the power to Lohrasp. When king Vishtasp had reigned thirty years this millennium ended.

“10. The fourth millennium then commenced. In this millennium Zartusht received the law of Auhrmazd and brought it; king Vishtasp received it and put it in force. He conducted some marvellous wars against Arjasp, and Iran and Aniran were in conflict.”

677.2. The Long Period, or duration of the universe, is 12 millennia, each millennium or hazara being under the direction of one of the signs of the Zodiac. The first six millennia comprise three millennia of spiritual creation, followed by three millennia of material creation, but withheld from the action of Ahriman (the evil spirit). In the seventh millennium (the first of the next cycle referred to in the citation supra §1), good and evil begin to interact, and the struggle between them continues during the following millennia. Zartusht (Zoroaster) appears half way through the cycle, at the beginning of the tenth millennium, and the cycle closes with the twelfth millennium, marked by the appearance of Saoshyant, the Savior, the ruin of Ahriman, and the resurrection. It is remarkable how closely the scheme matches the early Christian belief: the world was created in six days (equivalent to the first six millennia of creation in the Iranian scheme), and history would last six thousand years (= days), beginning from Adam (who corresponds to the Iranian Gayomart in §1), till the end of the age, when the millennium of the Book of Revelation (the cosmic Sabbath or seventh day of Rest) would commence with the first resurrection and the reign of Christ. Zoroaster’s date is c. 800 BC, therefore we are not far from the end of the cycle, according to the Iranian system. The same date allows us to work back to the date of Feridun (Fretun) c. 1800 BC. Feridun is a fusion of two figures, Noah and Nimrod son of Canaan, and the latter is identified with Zames, son of Ninus c. 1800 BC (according to the chronology of Cephalion). Ten generations of the reign of Zohak (Azhi Dahak §2) takes us back another 1000 years to the era of Jamshid (Jim, §1) c. 2800 BC, Jamshid being a fusion of the pre-diluvian and post-diluvian figures of that name. Another millennium back in time gives a date for Gayomart (Adam) c. 3800 BC. Gayomart is Adam as a union of both male and female. Mashya and Mashyana (§1), meaning “Mortal Man” and “Mortal Woman,” are Adam and Eve (so the Arab commentators, e.g. Masudi, Tabari, Albiruni) as separated beings, and subject to the fall (through accepting a lie — the “ingratitude” of §1), following which they become aware of sexual desire and beget seven male-female couples. From them the world is populated. (Bundahish xv.)

677.3. The chronology between Feridun (Faredun) and Vishtasp is as follows in the Pazend Jamaspi ch. IV: Reign of Faredun 500 years; from the murder of Arej 330 years of concealment of the wife of Arej by Faredun; Manashviar rules 120 years, Huzuba Tukhmaspan 5 years, Kaikobad Kayan 100 years, Kaikaus 150 years, Kaikhusrab Siavakhshan 60 years, Kai Lohrasp 120 years, Vishtasp. The reign of Vishtasp, therefore, began 885 years after the end of the reign of Feridun, viz. c. 915 BC, the reign of Manuskihar was c. 1470-1350 BC, Kai-Kavad c. 1345-1245 BC, Kai-Kaus c. 1245-1095 BC, Kai-Khusrob c. 1095-1035 BC, Lohrasp c. 1035-915 BC.

There is nothing in this scheme which conflicts with the Biblical chronology.

677.4. Accordingly in Juansher’s Georgian chronicle a summary of the traditional Iranian history from Feridun to Kay Kaus and Kay Khusrob is inserted between the era of Nimrod and Haig and that of Vishtasp, and Kay Kaus is dated to a period just after the Exodus, when stories of the miraculous events surrounding the Israelites’ deliverance from Egypt began to circulate amongst the pagans. This coincides with the Biblical chronology, as already established. In the following account it is noticeable that specific details of interaction between the traditional Iranian kings and the Georgians imply the Georgians had an historical, rather than a mythical, understanding of the Iranian traditions.

From Bedrosian’s translation online as at 08/12 at http://rbedrosian.com/gc2.htm

Juansher’s Concise History of the Georgians

[The original manuscript lacks this title or attribution to Juansher.]

Chapter 1.

677.5. [1] Let us recall the fact that the Armenians, Georgians, Aghbanians/Aghuanians/Aghuans, Movkans, Herans, Leks, Kovkases and Egers had one father named T’orgom, son of T’iras, son of Gamer, son of Japheth (Yabet’), son of Noah [end of grabar (Classical Armenian) text page 7; henceforth shown as, for example, g7]. He was a brave, gigantic man. At the time of the destruction of the Tower [of Babel] and the division of tongues and the dispersion of mankind throughout the world, [T’orgom] came and settled between the Masis and Aragats mountains. He had many women; sons and daughters of his sons and daughters were born, and he lived for six hundred years. But the country did not suffice for the multitude of his folk. Therefore, they spread out and enlarged their boundaries: from the Pontic sea to the sea of Heret’ and Kasp and by the mountains of the Caucasus.

677.6. They selected eight of the bravest and most renowned of his sons. First was Hayk {Haig}, second K’art’los, third Bardos, fourth Movkan, fifth Lekan, sixth Heros, seventh Kovkas {eponymus of Caucasus}, and eighth Egres. But Hayk was the strongest and bravest. There was no one like him on earth, not before the deluge nor after it, to the present. T’orgom divided his land among them: half [2] [g8] he gave to Hayk and half to the sevens sons, according to their merit. To K’art’los he gave the Tsmak land of the north, [with borders] in the east by the Berdahoj river, in the west the Pontic sea and from the Tsmak area by the Caucasus mountains, by Klarj and Tayk’ as far as Lexk’ (Lixk’). To Bardos he gave [territory] from the same Berdahoj river to the region of the Kur river to the sea where the conjoined Erasx and Kur rivers enter it. First [Bardos] built the city Partaw in his own name. [T’orgom] gave to Movkan [territory] from the Kur river northward to the head of the Alazani [river] as far as the great sea. And [Movkan] built Movkanet’ city. He gave to Heros [land] from the head of the Alazani as far as Lake Mayroy which presently is called Gaghgagha. He built a city at the confluence of the two rivers calling it after his own name, Heret’. The place today is called Xorant’a. [T’orgom] gave to Egros [territory extending] from the shore of the sea by Lixk’ as far as the western sea, by the Xazaret’ river to where the sea unites with the Caucasus. In his name he built the city Egris, presently called Bedia. Now [lands extending] from Mount Caucasus to the great Ghumek river which were uninhabited, he gave to his two sons Kovkas and Lekan, by whose names [these lands] have been called to the present.

677.7. [3] Hayk inherited half of the patrimony, with the stated borders. He was prince of the seven brothers and stood in service to the giant Nimrod (Nebrovt’) who first ruled the entire world as king. Now after a few years had passed [g9], Hayk assembled his brothers and said to them: “Hear me, my brothers. Behold, God has given us might and many people. Now, for the mercy upon us, let us not serve a foreigner but rather the true God.” All consented. Rebelling, they did not provide the tax and brought over to their side the surrounding peoples. When Nimrod heard about this he was angered, assembled a multitude of many giants and rabble, set out against them and came to the Atrpatakan land. Hayk was with his people by the foot of [Mount] Masis. Nimrod dispatched sixty giants with a great multitude. [The two sides] clashed with each other with a fearsome intense crash like the sound of thunder clouds. There were countless, incalculable numbers slain on both sides. Hayk stood at the rear of his people encouraging steadfastness. Like lightning, he himself raided around and felled the last of those sixty giants and their troops. He and the seven brothers remained safe by the grace of God, and they glorified their omnipotent savior. When Nimrod learned about what had happened, he became extremely agitated and he himself went against Hayk. But Hayk, not having as many soldiers as [Nimrod], fortified himself into the rough places of the Masis valleys. Nimrod was heavily armored with iron, from head to foot. He ascended the crest of a hill and summoned Hayk to [return to] his former [4] obedience. But Hayk did not respond to him; rather, he said to his brothers: “Cover me from the rear and I shall descend to Nimrod.” He approached him and shot an arrow at [Nimrod’s] breast-plates, which went straight through to the other side. Turning about he expired forthwith and his entire army fell; and the House of T’orgom reposed without a care. Then Hayk ruled his brothers and all the neighboring peoples as king [g10]. Now K’art’los went to the mountain called Amraz and built there his home and fortress; and his entire land from Xunan to the sea of Sper was called K’art’li after him. He constructed Orbet’, now called Shamshoylte and the brick-built fortress Ghunan. After living many years, he died leaving five brave sons: Mts’xet’os, Gardbos, Kaxos, Koghk’is and Gajis. Mts’xet’os was their senior. He buried his father at the head of K’art’l(i), the mountain Armaz. The wife of K’art’los built Mayraberd [Mother-Fortress, Dedats’ixe] and the city called Risha which is Partizak’aghak’ [Garden City, Postan-kalalki: Rust’aw] and divided the entire land among her five sons. Gajeos built Gajen city, Kaxos built Ch’elt’ and Kaxet’, and Mts’xet’os built the city of Mts’xet’a and ruled [his] four brothers. [Mts’xet’os] had three [5] renowned sons: Op’los, Odzrxos and Jawaxos to whom he gave the country of his inheritance. Odzrxos built two fortress-cities, Odzrxe and T’uxrsi. Jawaxos built two towns with fortresses, Tsanda and Artahan, which was formerly known as K’ajats’ k’aghak’ (City of Braves). Up’los built Up’lists’ixe, Urbnis and Kasb. As far as the gate of Tayk’ this lot was called Lower K’art’li. The T’orgomeans built fortresses out of fear of the Nimrodians, who harassed them to exact blood vengeance for their ancestor Nimrod. But until Mts’xet’os’ death they were unable to conquer them because of their unity….

[6]

Chapter 2.

677.8. …. After this the people of Nimrod grew in the East and a man named Abriton {Afridun, Feridun} appeared among them. They say about him that by using sorcery he bound in irons on the uninhabited mountain Rayis the prince of the snakes, called Biwraspi, as is written in the book of the Iranians. He made many peoples tributary [g14], ruled Iran, and dispatched his military commander a descendant of Nimrod to the country of Iberia/Georgia. He came, destroyed cities and fortresses, killed those Khazars he found, and ruled the country. He built Daruband by the seashore. It means “Closed Gate.” This Adarmos built Mts’xet’a with stones mortared with lime, and started [constructing] the wall [extending] from Amraz mountain to the Kur river. And prior to this, Iberia, which is K’art’li, did not know the art of lime and stone. Now when Abriton was dividing among his three sons [8] [the peoples] he had subjugated, he gave the Iranians and the Iberians to one son named Iarederax {Iraj}. Adarmos lived as prince of Iberia for many years. After him his place was occupied by four chiefs. After this, discord appeared among the sons of Abriton, and two brothers allied and slew Ariadarex. Finding the time opportune, the Iberians, aided by the Ossetians, killed the chief of the Iranians while he was diverting himself in the country. They also killed others from his army, and remained unconcerned about the Iranians. However the country of Aghbania/Aghuania and Heret’ remained with Iran. After this the king of Iran, named K’ekapos {Kai Kaus}, once more grew powerful. He came to Movkan and Heret’ and planned to enter Leket’. But the chief of the Lek was a relation of Xuzanix and a sorcerer. By enchantment he blinded K’ekapos and his soldiers. They turned back and thereupon their eyes were opened. Placing Iberia under taxation, they departed [g15].

677.9. At this time wondrous stories spread about concerning Moses, the friend of God, that he had crossed through the Red Sea with the twelve tribes, 60,000 strong, and was living in the wilderness of Sinai where they ate bread which fell from Heaven mana. When all the pagans heard this they praised and blessed the God of Israel.[9]

677.10. In this period all the T’orgomean peoples, united with the Armenians, stood off from Iran, fortifying cities and keeps. The embittered K’ekapos sent his commander, P’araborot, against the T’orgomeans with many troops. The Armenians and Iberians went before them in Atrpatakan, and striking forth killed many of them. P’araborot fled with a few men. Angered, K’ekapos dispatched his grandson named K’ue Xosrov {Kai Khosrav}, son of Biuab the Fair (who was killed by the Turks) {Biuab = Syavakhsh}. The Armenians and Iberians were unable to resist him and generally were trampled beneath his feet. [K’ue Xosrov] designated his officials and built in Atrpatakan a house of prayer, after their faith, then returned to his own country. He commenced fighting the Turks, who had slain his father. Some men of the Turks twenty-eight houses fled from him and came to the tanuter of Mts’xet’a requesting [g16] of him a cave on the eastern side of the city. They walled this dwelling place of theirs and named it Sarakine, which means Iron Mine. Since K’ue Xosrov was too preoccupied to concern himself with the Armenians and Iberians, [the latter] gathered strength and killed the Iranian prince and built fortresses.

677.11. In the same period there came to the country of Iberia some fugitives from the Greeks, Syrians, and Khazars who were harassed by their enemies. [The Iberians] accepted them to [10] aid themselves against the Iranians. Also at that time came Jews who had escaped from Nebuchadnezzar (Nabugodonosor), who had captured Jerusalem. And they requested a place for worship from the tanuter of Mts’xet’a; and he gave them [an area by] a stream on the Arag river called Zanaw, now called Xerk. Up to this point the language of Iberia was Armenian. But then [the Iberians] started to be changed by the peoples dwelling among them, and there occurred a mixing up of everything, leading to that which is presently called Georgian. Subsequently they elected a religion and a conduct more immodest and indecent than all people’s. For in marriage they made no differentiation among [the same and related] lines, they ate every creeping reptile, insect, and carrion, and had no graves.

677.12. Now after this, once more still another Iranian king named Spandiar, son of Vashdapish {Vishtasp}, came against Armenia and Iberia. But when he reached Atrpatakan, he heard the bad tidings that the nation of the Turks had killed his father’s brother. He departed thence to T’urk’astan, while Armenia and Iberia relaxed. Following this, Spandiar’s son Vahram (also called Artashesh) [g17], ruled Iran as king. He was stronger than all the [previous] kings of Iran. He took Babylon and placed under taxation Asorestan, Greece and Iberia.

[11] At that time six languages were spoken in Iberia: Armenian, Khazar, Syriac, Hebrew, Greek, and the result of their commingling, Georgian [g18].

Chapter 3.

677.13. Then there arose in the land of Macedonia Alexander the Great, son of Nek’taneb the Egyptian, who conquered the three corners of the world. Coming from the northwest, he passed through the east, entering the Tsmak country, crossing Mount Caucasus into the land of Iberia. ……….”

End of citation

677.13.1. A similar fusion of elements of Biblical, Armenian and Iranian traditional history is found in Syriac and Armenian chronicles, in which Nimrod is identified with Bel, the opponent of Haig, and the interval between the reign of Nimrod-Bel and Ctesias’ line of Assyrian kings, starting with Belus the father of Ninus, is filled with an account drawn from Iranian sources, transmitted through Arabic intermediaries. The following account is extracted mainly from the Chronicle of Michael the Syrian (and the Armenian version of the same), the Armenian Chronological History of Mkhithar and Agapius’ Kitab al-Unvan. Nimrod is succeeded by the king Qombaros, the builder of Isfahan (Kumros [Kûmrôs] in the Cave of Treasures, the builder of Samosata, and other cities in Iraq, and the builder of Susa and opponent of the Chaldaeans in Agapius, ut cit. infra); Qombaros is succeeded by Samiros, who slays the male children of the daughters of Ashkenaz and Togarmah, known as Amazons (see further on this episode §904.1, below, >>); he is described as being of the race of Shem, and as having overmastered the tribe of Ham; he has three eyes and horns; Samiros is slain by the “Parthian” Kisaronos, who is consulted by Aphintos the builder of Babylon (Old Cairo) in Egypt to import the worship of Cainan (= Hermes) into his country from the Chaldaeans; Kisaronos places the horns of the slain Samiros on his own head, and is thus known as the “Two-horned” (Dhu’l Karnaim), which title is commonly understood to signify dominion over two directions, East and West: this implies two only of the three regions or tribes ruled by Samiros became subject to Kisaronos (viz. the tribes of Japheth [East] and Ham [West] not the central or chief tribe of Shem); Kisaronos in turn is slain by Saharon (Khadrun or Khazrun in Agapius, unpointed Arabic ḥṣrwn, like the Hebrew Hezron, Vasiliev transcribes it as “Khoudroun”), the brother of Terah, son of Nahor, in a campaign initiated by Saharon to drive the “Parthians” out of Babylon, the conflict having arisen between them on account of the golden idol of Cainan worshiped in the House of Nahor; finally, Arphaxad succeeds to the throne. The reigns of Belus, Ninus etc., follow after a short inter-regnum. The Armenian version of the Chronicle of Michael of Syria (trans. Bedrosian, online as at 08/18 at https://archive.org/​details/​ChronicleOfMichael​TheGreatPatriarch​OfTheSyrians) is in some respects fuller than the other accounts:

“[11] …. Forty years after the death of Nimrod and the destruction of the kingdom of Ham in Babylon, the Chaldean Kambiwros {= Qombaros} reigned 56 years in the time of Serug. He built the city of Shosh, which they call Isfahan. In that period the making of weapons spread, and there started the enslavement and sale of people. In the 70th year of Serug, the Chaldean King Kambiwros warred [g18] against the Kalatu people, defeated them, and they went up into the mountains. Serug taught Nahor the Chaldean doctrine of sorcery and divination by the star signs. Kambiwros ruled for 85 years. Following him, the third to rule as king in Babylon was Samiros in the 106th year of Serug. [Samiros] ruled for 72 years. He warred with the Greeks, the Franks, and the Canaanites and put them under taxation. He built many cities in the land of the Chaldeans and Parthians and it was he who began [to designate] weights and measures. It was he who put patterns and images on cloth, established the making of silk, and all sorts of dyes. This is what Samatros the mage said about him in his history, that he had three eyes and a horn. [Samiros] was a brave giant and removed the Nimrodians from the Chaldeans and destroyed their line ….

“[12] Now let us return to our narration beginning with the series of monarchs of Babylon, where Nimrod reigned during the first 69 years. His crown was woven [from cloth], as Menander the mage wrote, and not forged [from metal]. After his death, the Chaldean Kambiros {= Qombaros} ruled in the 56th year of Serug. It was he who built the city of Sho’sh, called Isfahan, 40 years after the death of Bel. [Kambiros] also began the practise of selling captives, and of mining gold and silver. He died after ruling for 85 years. Samir succeeded him in the 106th [or 190th] year of Serug, and ruled for 72 years. [Samir], of the line of Shem, warred against the Greeks and the Franks. He also warred against the descendants of Ham and the Galatians, forcibly expelling them from the mountains, and placing the line of Ham under taxation. [Samir] also built many cities in the land of the Chaldeans and the Parthians. It was he who began using weights and measures, dyeing, painting and decorating of temples, and money and dahekans with his name stamped on them, fabric weaving, and fabrics with patterns [or, pictures] on them as the Mage Samandros noted. [Samandros] also said that [Samir] had three eyes and horns, was a powerful, gigantic personage, and expelled the line of Nimrod from Chaldea … Now in the 7th year of Terah, Arphaxad became king in Babylon, and ruled for 18 years. After this, rule of the Chaldean kingdom was interrupted for 7 years until Belus (Vilos) ascended. This [interregnum] was due to the fact that the Chaldeans, Assyrians, and Medes were battling each other for the kingdom. Finally the Assyrian Belus ended [Assyria’s] submission to the Babylonians, took power, and ruled all of Asia for 62 years. Now the city of Assur is located near Mosul, and the land was called Assyria because it was originally fortified by Ashur. A certain Xarus {= Kisaronos} ruled in Babylon and was slain by Terah’s brother, Saheron, because, it is said, he fashioned a golden statue of Nachor, chief priest of the idols of Caanan.”

677.13.2. The context is Iranian (Isfahan built by Qombaros, Kisaronos the “Parthian” etc.). We would expect the principal named figures to be Iranian, and the Biblical context and Biblical identities to have been supplied by Arabic intermediaries. In Agapius’ Kitab al-Unvan, these kings are said to have been recorded in the books and traditions ascribed to Zoroaster (ed. trans. Vasiliev, pt. I, p. 634). The last-mentioned king before the era of Ctesias’ Belus is Arphaxad, and Arphaxad is identified in Arabic chronicles with the Iranian Iraj, son of Feridun. Iraj is mentioned in a similar chronological position in the Georgian chronicle. Arphaxad’s predecessor might naturally be expected to be Iraj’s father Feridun, who was identified by Arabic writers with Al Khidr, and, accordingly, Khadrun or Khazrun (viz. Khidr, Khizr) in Agapius, precedes Arphaxad. Feridun himself fought against and defeated Zohak, who was identified with Nimrod son of Canaan (Amraphel), and the latter was commonly identified with Dhu’l Karnaim. “Kisaronos,” the predecessor of Khadrun (Al Khidr, Feridun), is identified by Agapius and Albiruni with Dhu’l Karnaim, the “Two-horned.” (The name is explained in the Syriac sources by Kisaronos’ adoption of two of the horns of Samiros). These are contemporaries of Terah and his family. Kisaronos also looks like a transcription of the Arabic name Khizr or Khidr in some non-Arabic language, Dhu’l Karnaim being identified with Al Khidr in Arabic tradition. Effectively therefore the Syriac tradition duplicates the figure of Al Khidr as Kisaronos and Khadrun, one being the opponent of the other. Feridun can be shown to have taken on the roles of Dhu’l Karnaim and Al Khidr alternatively in other contexts (§189, above, >>). The equation of Feridun with Dhu’l Karnaim and the successive reigns of Feridun and Iraj, the former synchronized with Nimrod and Abraham, is brought out in Abu’l Fida’s Pre-Islamic History (Fleischer, Abulfedae Historia Anteislamica [Latin trans.] Leipzig, 1831, pp. 69-71). Albiruni preserves another name of Kisaronos, viz. “Atarkes” (unpointed Arabic: ’ṭrks), which appears to be a transcription of the name of the sacred fire of the Magi, worshiped also as a god, the “Good Fire,” Atar-kesh, Atar and Feridun being equivalent figures in the underlying Iranian mythology. In the Georgian chronicle Feridun (Abriton) has a lieutenant called Adarmos or Adarma, who subdues the territory of the Georgians: the name Adarmos is probably a corruption of Atarkesh, or a compound of Atar (Adar) and some other epithet (perhaps Azar Mehr, Fire of Mithra); in which case, Atar appears here as the alter ego (lieutenant) of Feridun, rather than being identified with him, or depicted as his opponent. (Cf. the name Azar, Azer [= Atar] of the foster-father of Abraham, otherwise identified with Terah, in Arabic tradition.) Feridun-Atar’s grand opponent is Zohak, who is eventually slain by Feridun, and the opponent of Khadrun is here Kisaronos (supra, Zohak = Nimrod son of Canaan = Dhu’l Karnaim = Kisaronos), who is similarly slain by Khadrun. Preceding both Kisaronos and Khadrun is Samiros. Samiros is found in at least one Armenian chronicle (Mkhithar) employed as a transcription of what in other (mainly Syriac) chronicles is the Hebrew name Shemyaza (so also in the Tabakat-i-Nasiri, “Samiarush”), as the leader of the pre-diluvian apostates on Mount Hermon: the Armenian chronicle depicts Samiros (Shemyaza) as the first of the Babylonian pre-diluvian kings set up by the backslidden “Sethites” (in place of Berossus’ Aloros, Samiros being followed by Alaparos and the rest of Berossus’ pre-diluvian royal names). This suggests Samiros-Shemyaza has a similar role here, but in the post-diluvian era. The nephilim or “giants,” of which Shemyaza is the leader in the Enoch literature, are located chronologically in Genesis 6 both before and after the Inundation of Noah. In these Syriac sources the context is wholly post-diluvian, Samiros representing a giant line of Semites opposed to the Nimrodians. Preceding the fall of the sons of God in the Genesis account, and actually the prototype of that fall, is the fall of Adam. Adam in Iranian tradition is Gayomart, and this name seems to be represented in the Syriac sources in the form Kumros, Qombaros etc., the predecessor of Samiros, but here too in a post-diluvian Iranian context. This post-diluvian Iranian Adam, Gayomart, is doubtless Emim, the son of Lud, the son of Aram son of Shem, the supposed founder of the Persian royal line, and eponymous ancestor of the giant Ludites. Emim is said to have mingled with the Japhethite line of Gomer (Gomer being called Gayomart, Adam) and thus to have become identified with Gomer-Gayomart-Adam. Here accordingly Qombaros is the builder of the Persian city Isfahan and of Susa.

677.13.3. The order of names follows the typical Iranian pattern, but in the Biblical post-diluvian context of the generation of Terah: Gayomart (Kumros, Qombaros), followed by Hoshang (in this account Hoshang = Enoch = Hermes-Mercury-Cainan, the god of Kisaronos, see further infra in Al-Makin and the Book of Giants), followed by Jamshid (= Samiros, see infra), opposed by Zohak (Dhu’l Karnaim, Kisaronos), who is ousted by Feridun (Khadrun = Al-Khidr), the last being succeeded by his son Iraj (Arphaxad). In the Iranian tradition Feridun is preceded by Jamshid, after an interval of the evil reign of Zohak. We should seen therefore in Samiros, the predecessor of Khadrun (= Feridun), after the interval of the reign of Kisaronos, the figure corresponding to Jamshid. Samiros, as suggested supra, is Shemyaza or Shahmizad (the latter being the form of the name in the Book of Giants). The constellation Orion, Aram. Naphil, Niphla, the “Fallen One,” is the eponymus of Shemyaza’s nephilim, and the same constellation is the astral form of Tammuz in Mesopotamia, whilst Tammuz is the Iranian Jamshid. Commonly Jamshid is identified in Arabic/Iranian sources with the post-diluvian line of Shem, thus Jamshid = Shem, or Arphaxad, or Shelah, or the succeeding patriarchs of that line. Accordingly Samiros (Shemyaza, Shahmizad) is said here to have been of the race of Shem, and to have fought against the Nimrodians on behalf of the Chaldaeans (of the line of Arphaxad). The sons of God, that is, the sons of Seth, who fell (nephilim) in the pre-diluvian era, are paralleled in this account by the sons of Shem (Shem being the post-diluvian Seth), who are the nephilim of the line of Lud son of Shem in the post-diluvian era. Eliezer the adopted son of Abraham = Al Khidr = Jamshid, an offspring of Shem (Jamshid) through Abraham, and also Al Khidr = Og = Canaan/Eliezer, whilst Canaan is “Yam” (= Jam/Jamshid), the “fourth son of Noah,” drowned in the flood, according to an apocryphal Arabic tradition. The mythologies of Shemyaza, ancestor of the Nephilim or Anakites of Og’s line, and of Jamshid (Yam) fuse in this miasma of post-biblical midrashim.

677.13.4. In the Book of Giants preserved by Manichaeans, some few remnants of which are extant amongst the Turfan fragments, and in scroll-fragments from Qumran, Shemyaza/Shahmizad is the father of Ohya and Ahya, otherwise known in Persian and Sogdian respectively as Sahm (more fully Sam Nariman) and Pat-Sahm (alternatively Nariman), whilst Shemyaza and his son Ahya in the Talmud, Niddah fol. 61a, are the ancestors of the giant Og of Bashan. “Sihon and Og were brothers, for a Master stated: ‘Sihon and Og were the sons of Ahya the son of Shemhazai.’” (ibid.) In the Book of Giants they are the contemporaries of Gilgamesh, who features under that name in the Qumran fragments, and this means the context in the Book of Giants is post-diluvian. A diluvian, if not strictly post-diluvian, episode in the Shemyaza myth as it relates to the generation of the post-diluvian giants Sihon and Og is Shemyaza’s dalliance with Ham’s wife. This is referred to in a few medieval Rabbinic sources, for example Yalkut Reubeni on Genesis 7. 7, and Bahya, Sefer Hadar Zekenim and Sefer Daat Zekenim sec. Hukkat (Numbers 21) sub fin. Ham’s wife elsewhere is Balthi (Noah’s concubine, §321ff., above, >>), and she is Ishtar (Inana) or Eshterah, the latter, of course being the object of Shemyaza’s interest in the pre-diluvian era. The Eshterah before the flood avoided Shemyaza’s advances and ascended to heaven, but Ham’s wife is alleged to have been impregnated by him and thus to have brought forth Sihon and Og, who henceforth were treated as Ham’s sons, rather than the offspring of Shemyaza.

Yalkut Reubeni on Bereshit (Genesis) 7. 7: “Sihon and Og were the sons of Shemhazael [sic] who was one of the sons of God who had intercourse with Ham’s wife shortly before the embarkation onto the container, and Sihon was born on the container, which explains why Ham had sexual relations on the container: to provide cover for his wife.”

Identically Bahya on Bamidhbar (Numbers) 21. 34: “I have found a midrash that both Og and Sihon were sons of Shemhazael, who was one of the sons of God. And he had intercourse with Ham’s wife shortly before the embarkation onto the container, and Sihon was born on the container, which explains why Ham had sexual relations on the container: to provide cover for his wife.”

Sefer Daat Zekenim on Bamidhbar (Numbers) 21. 34: “There is also a statement by Rabbi Yechiel bar Yoseph, according to whom Og was born before the onset of the flood. And his mother became pregnant with Sihon in the year of the flood, and she went and became married to one of Noah’s sons, whilst she was already pregnant by one of those sons of God who consorted with some of the daughters of man, and Sihon was born on the container.”

Sefer Hadar Zekenim on Bamidhbar (Numbers) 21. 34: “The mother of Sihon was the wife of Ham son of Noah, and she gave birth to him after the flood. And for that reason they are not reckoned among the sons of Ham, because those only were reckoned who were chiefs over the seventy peoples. But Sihon and Og were children of those of whom it is said, And the sons of God saw the daughters of man that they were fair. And Sihon and Og were brothers ….”

677.13.5. An identical post-diluvian context for the Nephilim is demonstrated by the wording of the entry in the Gelasian Decree: Decretum Gelasianum, p. 54, ll. 298-9 (ed. Dobschütz): Liber de Ogia nomine gigante qui post diluvium cum dracone ab hereticis pugnasse perhibetur apocryphus, “The apocryphal book about the giant named Ogia {Ohya} who is said by heretics to have fought with a dragon after the flood.” Seemingly in that work help is sought from the translated sage Enoch (= Hoshang, Hermes-Mercury-Cainan in the Syriac sources) to elucidate a dream about the fate of these giants, and their ultimate defeat is predicted. Here we see Gilgamesh (Amraphel, Nimrod son of Canaan, Kisaronos) brought into connection with Shemyaza (Samiros), the giants’ ancestor, these giants being defeated by him. The historical setting is the conflict between the First Dynasty of Kish and its allies in Canaan, and the new elite which spread into Egypt and other regions in the West from Mesopotamia after the Tower episode. Individual figures are identified in §354.9ff., above, >>. The Biblical context is the expedition of Chedorlaomer and Amraphel against the allies of Sodom in Genesis 14. This not only includes a battle against Anakite giants or nephilim (Shahmizad/​Shemyaza/​Samiros), it also includes, according to the Rabbinic interpretation, an allusion to the giant Og, the descendant of Shemyaza, who “escaped” the Inundation. The Deforatio Berosi, dating back to a source c. 300 BC, refers to an otherwise unknown “Ochus” as a son of Ham (Chem, Cam, Camesis), in addition to the sons named in Genesis, Cur (Cush), Osiris (Mizraim), Cana-Phoenix (Canaan), and Phaeton or Pheriton (Put, Phut). (Genealogical Chart, following §886.2, below, >>, Fourth Section, listing the posterity of Cam.) This Ochus is probably Ohya, son of Shemyaza and Ham’s wife.

677.13.6. The Iranian Gayomart (Kumros, Qombaros) represents the Semitic Ludite generation following Nimrod-Bel: this was succeeded by the line of Jamshid (alternatively Shahmizad/​Shemyaza/​Samiros), that is the giants descended from Arphaxad son of Shem, including particularly Ohya and Ahya, viz. Sam and/or Nariman (and/or Karesaspa [Gurshasp]), who fought against Cush and his idolatrous faction (§669, above, >>). That line, in turn, was overthrown by Kisaronos (the “Parthian,” that is Iranian, Khizr), viz. Nimrod son of Canaan (Amraphel, Gilgamesh), who had a double, Khadrun (Adarmos, otherwise spelled Adarma, Adarmay, Adramay [Thomson] in the Georgian chronicle, described as a descendant of Nimrod and general of Feridun), viz. Azer, the relative of Terah.

677.13.7. Khadrun is the more correct spelling of the name (Khidr) represented in these same sources by Kisaronos. The doubling of his character reflects the various identifications of the god of underworld fire (Atar, Azer, Nergal, Eragal): for example, with the Mesopotamian Hercules, Gilgamesh who invaded the Caucasus and the Levant, and with the Egyptian Hercules, Arueris (Heth son of Canaan, Djet of the First Dynasty of Egypt, Ama-ushumgal-ana). The latter came into conflict with Egypt’s Asiatic neighbors to the east and north of the Nile Delta, and was held to have been re-embodied, so to speak, in the person of En-sukish-ana of Aratta, viz. Chedorlaomer of Elam, the master of Amraphel. In this version the emphasis is on Asia Minor and Egypt, for the reasons stated in §354.9ff., above, >>. Samiros slaughters the male offspring of the Amazons of Asia Minor, and the attention of his successor Kisaronos is on Egypt. In the Georgian chronicle, by contrast, Abriton (Feridun), through the offices of his lieutenant (double) Adarmos, the descendant of Nimrod, fights against the eponymus of Mount Caucasus, as Belos Thourras in Peri Theon of the line of Nimrod (= Ares, Mars, Nergal, Gilgamesh, the Mesopotamian Hercules, Amraphel) conquers the eponymus of Mount Caucasus, and is subsequently worshiped as a god by the Persians (Parthians) and Thracians. The reference here is to the campaign of Chedorlaomer and Amraphel against the giants of Canaan in Genesis 14. In the Syriac chronicles the focus is on Kisaronos’ contact with Egypt: thither he imports the cult of Cainan (Hermes), and, in the end, suffers for it at the hand of his double, the Cainan-worshiping “Saharon” (Khadrun, Khidr, by transposition of the first and second consonants). In other words Amraphel was crushed by the spirit of the fire-god Azer (Khadrun), embodied both in Amraphel’s conqueror Chedorlaomer and in Abraham of the line of Terah-Azer, who defeated him in Canaan in Genesis 14.

677.13.8. Similarly in the world chronicle of Gergis Al-Makin (“Elmachinus,” p. 31, p. 36, apud Hottinger, Smegma Orientale, Heidelberg, 1658, p. 282ff., 342ff.), Feridun (= Kisaronos) is the successor of Mercury (= Hermes, Cainan) in the dynastic line of Nimrod. Feridun is first described as a worshiper of the same Mercury, whose spirit appears publicly on his altar in a fiery light, consuming the sacrifice, and speaks to the assembled magnates with an audible voice, propelling Feridun to the kingship. The era is stated to be the year 400 of the Nimrodic empire, viz. the generation of Belus and Ninus or thereabouts, viz. towards the end of the period intervening between Nimrod and Belus, which is the era of Kisaronos in the Syriac chronicles. The generational series Nimrod (Enmerkar), Belus (Hermes, Cainan, originally Lugal-banda), and Ninus (Feridun, Kisaronos, originally Gilgamesh), and legendary material related to those figures, seem to underlie the account in Al-Makin, particularly the notion that Gilgamesh (Feridun, Ninus) introduced a cult of his deceased predecessor (Belus, viz. Lugal-banda, as in the fragmentary Death of Gilgamesh, called Mercury in Al-Makin) involving the lighting of lamps at his tomb. Feridun is himself succeeded by his eldest son Shaharbaz (otherwise spelled Shaharnar, Shaharnas, perhaps Sairima (Selim), brother of Iraj, and subsequently by a second “son” Mahan, perhaps Manus-kihar, Manush-cihr, meaning “offspring of Manu,” and so forth. These are put under the supervision of his vizier Bahman, called “Lord of the World.” Bahman is the Avestan Vohu Manah, “Good Thought,” the first of the seven “Bounteous Immortals” or archangelic expressions of Ahura Mazda. The chief representative of Ahura Mazda is here the vizier of Feridun, implying an identification of Feridun and Ahura Mazda as different forms of the good principle victorious over the evil principle (Ahriman, Zohak).

677.13.9. In the Syriac chronicles, Kisaronos is succeeded by Arphaxad, viz. Iraj. Iraj represents the line of Shem, from which the Assyrian and Iranian kings, amongst others, traced their descent. Iraj is slain by a confederation of the Hamites and Japhethites against him. This represents the rise of the “Kushan,” viz. Hamitic, kingdom of Sabatius Saga (Sabtah son of Cush son of Ham) and his son Barzanes, who come into conflict with Belus (successor of Arphaxad-Iraj), and his son Ninus, and of the Japhethite Aram and his son Ara, of Armenia, who similarly fight with Belus and Ninus. The line of monarchs in the Syriac tradition duplicates the pattern in the Sumerian King List as reconstructed: the first three sections of the First Dynasty of Kish = Nimrod, Qombaros and Samiros, the First Dynasty of Uruk = Kisaronos, the Dynasty of Agade (Akkad) = Arphaxad, followed by the Old Assyrian Empire of Ninus = Shamshi-Adad I.

677.13.10. In more detail the scheme is:

1) Nimrod and the other two princes at the Tower, one of whom is Phinehas = Pu-annum (in the first line of kings in the First Dynasty of Kish), followed by

2) Qombaros = Emim, Enme-nuna (= Arba, the Adam [Gayomart] of the Anakites) of the sub-dynasty of Enme-nuna within the First Dynasty of Kish, followed by

3) Samiros = Shemyaza = Jamshid = Shem/Melchizedek = Enme-baragesi of the final sub-dynasty of Enme-baragesi within the First Dynasty of Kish (his “son” Aka = Anak), followed by

4) Kisaronos (Gilgamesh of the First Dynasty of Uruk-Erech), followed by

5) the Semite Iraj (“Arphaxad”), viz. Uri or the Semitic First Dynasty of Uri (Akkad), followed by 6) the line of Ninus (the Old Assyrian Empire of Shamshi-Adad I).

Dynasties in the Sumerian King List and Mesopotamian Sources		Succession in Syriac Chronicles
First Dynasty of Kish:	First line of kings of Kish =	(3 Princes at the Shinar Tower including their chief) Nimrod
	Sub-dynasty of Enme-nuna =	Qombaros
	Sub-dynasty of Enme-baragesi =	Samiros
First Dynasty of Uruk/Erech	=	Kisaronos
Dynasty of Agade/Akkad/Accad	=	Arphaxad
Old Assyrian Empire	=	Belus and Ninus

677.14. A further observation is that the Armenian history of Haig (Hayk) and his line is synchronized in the Georgian chronicle with the Iranian Peshdadian and Kayanian dynasties. In Mar Abas Catina the Armenian line is synchronized, by contrast, with Ctesias’ Assyrian king-list (Ninus and his descendants), and the related list of Cephalion. Cephalion, as summarized in the Armenian version of Eusebius’ Chronicle, notes that in the time of the 18th Assyrian king, Belochus (to be carefully distinguished from the 8th king Belochus, the contemporary of the Exodus), lived Perseus and Dionys(i)us, and that Perseus fled at that time to the land of the Medes after having been defeated by Dionys(i)us. (Bedrosian’s translation, Armenian version of Eusebius’ Chronicle, p. g93: “Perseus [son] of Danae arrived in his land [viz. the land of “Belimus” = Belochus, see infra] with 100 ships. He was escaping from Semele’s son, Dionysius. After describing the defeat of Perseus by Dionysius …. etc.” online as at 08/12 at http://rbedrosian.com/euseb3.htm. Ibid. p. g97f. for the correct form of the king’s name Belochus, not “Belimus” as on p. g93, the 18th from Ninus [I] in Cephalion’s Assyrian king-list. For the full passage in translation see §889.2.3.6.1, below, >>.) Since Belochus’ reign synchronized with the Conquest of Canaan by the Hebrews and the era of the Judges, it also synchronized with the reign of Kai Kaus, according to the chronology of the Iranian kings established here; though, it should be kept in mind, the common Iranian custom was to apply the name of the founder to other kings of the same family line. Arab writers claim Kai Kaus was a God-fearing king, who honored the many prophets who attended his court: he was a contemporary of, and had some contact with, the Hebrew prophet and Judge Samuel (Sale et al., Universal History, Volume V., London, 1747, p. 359, note [H].) Now, Kai Kaus is the Iranian name for the constellation Cepheus, and Syavakhsh or Siyavush for Perseus, Syavakhsh being the son of Kai Kaus. (C. H. Schier, Globus Coelestis Arabicus, Leipzig, 1865, p. 69.) The Perseus referred to in Cephalion, the contemporary of Belochus, and therefore also of Kai Kaus, is likely to be Syavakhsh, and the traditional descent of the Persians from “Perses son of Perseus,” a reflex of the tradition that the Persian Achaemenids were descended from the Kayanians of the line of Kai Kaus and Syavakhsh. The name Kayanians for this dynasty (including the Achaemenids) is formed from the word Kai (earlier Kava) in the name Kai Kaus and in the names of other kings of this line, and means “King.” Kai Kobad, the father (or, grandfather) of Kai Kaus, was the founder of the dynasty. The name Kaus was earlier Kava-Us, and the word Kai/Kava appears twice in his name: Kai Kaus = Kava Kava-Us. Similarly Cepheus was the eponymus of the “Cephenes.” The Greek tribal name “Cephenes” is equivalent to the Iraninan designation “Kayanians,” of the “Kava” dynasty, the form Kava (as in Kava-Us) being represented in Greek as Kepheus, Cepheus (alternatively spelled Kapheus, cp. the Georgian form “-Kapos” and the Arabic form Qabus = Kaus). Originally, according to the Defloratio Berosi (chart following §886.2, below, >>.), the name Cepheus belonged to Japheth, son of Noah, father of Gomer, and it would make sense that the Kayanians descended from Gayomart-Gomer, Gomer being the Junior Japheth, would apply the title of Japheth to their kings. Doubtless Kava of the era of Zohak, an agriculturalist and smith who initiated the rebellion against him and whose smith’s leather apron (the pelt of a leopard, Tabari I. 2175) became the national banner of Persia, was the original Cepheus, Japheth himself. In China Fu-hsi (Japheth, see §813.13, below, >>) is still depicted with a leopard skin girt around him. Thereafter the leopard-skin was worn as an emblem of priesthood and kingship, because Japheth was the adopted son of the prophetically appointed priest-king Shem. It was raised on a standard or pole, and Cepheus appears in Graeco-Roman star-maps at the polar (royal) position in the night sky, the stars tumbling down around him like the spots on his leopard-skin. The root k/q/g-w/b in Hebrew (whence, it may be presumed, the name Cepheus etc.) means to pierce, mark, hollow out, form an arch/mass/body, or cover, and would nicely be represented by a covering of the body, a pelt, marked with the stars of the arch of the night sky. The same root also provides the word for nation (goy, g-w-y), which is used of the “isles or sea-coasts of the goyim” settled by the sons of Japheth (Gen. 10. 5). As a personal epithet g-b-y-h (gaveyah) means “Eminent,” lit. “arched up,” and might be represented in Greek as Kapheus (Cepheus). Cepheus or Kava is an appropriate sobriquet of Japheth as the “Eminent one,” and otherwise as the “protector,” lit. “coverer,” of these goyim. Feridun took up the standard raised by Kava, which indicates Chedorlaomer (Haig, Hayk, Feridun) became the political linchpin of the Japhethite advance against Nimrod. The geographical center of the alliance was Aratta (Ararat), where the cult of Tubal-Cain (Nagar, Tammuz) and the smith-god’s fire originated. The Cephenes are described by Greek writers as a Persian tribe, but their name is also said to have passed on to the Chaldaeans. The transfer of the name to the Chaldaeans occurred historically when the Achaemenid Kayanians occupied Chaldaea under Cyrus: the Chaldaeans were absorbed at that time into the empire of the “Kayanians,” or “Cephenes,” that is, of the Achaemenid Persians. Cepheus was also believed to have had dominion over Ethiopia, and similarly in Persian tradition the African Ethiopia, as well areas of India, which was the Oriental “Ethiopia” in ancient terminology, were held to have been subject to Kai Kaus for a time. (See §283, above, >>, under Kidar Brahmin, and §677.0.1.12, above, >>.) Arab chroniclers preserved a tradition that Kai Kaus was Nimrod son of Canaan, that is, a reincarnation of the spirit of Nimrod son of Canaan: Cepheus is described similarly as a son of Phoenix (= Khna/Canaan). Kai Kaus fell by exalting himself against God, as did Nimrod son of Canaan when he adopted the tyrannical attitude, and so became fused with the personality of, Nimrod son of Cush. Nimrod son of Cush buried alive, otherwise “stole the soul” of Japheth (Atlas [Maurus], Cepheus), and usurped his priestly position, and priestly leopard-skin robes, as Shem’s adopted son: hence, no doubt the belief that Kai Kaus (the latter-day Cepheus) was a re-embodiment of Nimrod son of Canaan and/or Nimrod son of Cush. In the earlier, or more positive phase of his history, Nimrod son of Canaan was identified with Feridun. The association of Nimrod and Perseus (as different forms of the Mars-like hero, Gilgamesh, Feridun, Azar, Haig, etc.), reflecting events in the third millennium BC, has been duplicated, so to speak, in this second incarnation in the latter half of the second millennium BC, in the persons of Kai Kaus and Syavakhsh. The Perseus of the third millennium BC was Chedorlaomer (Perseus = Parsi = Mars) and/or Amraphel (Gilgamesh, Nimrod son of Canaan) who defended the interests of their Japhethite allies (Cepheus, Capheus) against Sabaean Min-folk of Canaan and Sinai. In the mythic interpretation of this episode Perseus employed a magic talisman with malignant eyes to defend Cepheus’ kingdom, viz. the head of the Sabaean (North African) Gorgon slain by him. The Perseus of the 14th century BC was Syavakhsh (Eurymedon, Perseus). Syavakhsh means “Black man,” and signifies, like Perseus, the god of the underworld. He entered service with the Japhethite king of Turan, who was an ally of the king of Iran (Kava Kava-Us) against Arabian (Yemenite, Sabaean) invaders: the latter are symbolized similarly in this Iranian tradition by a demon with malignant eyes (Zinigab).

The traditional Iranian history of Syavakhsh is as follows.

From the Greater Bundahish Appendix, ut cit. supra §677.1, above, >>: “6. …. Under the reign of Kai Us {Kai Kaus = Cepheus}, during the same millennium, the demons became powerful, and Oshnar was assassinated; they suggested to him the thought of going to war with heaven {this lapse accounts for the belief that the spirit of Nimrod, the rebel against heaven, was in him}, he fell very low and was despoiled of the royal Glory. After that he depopulated (?) the world of horses and men, and they were chained by stratagem in the land of Yambaran {Yemen} with their chiefs and princes.

“7. There was then a demon called Zinigab {a Gorgon-like monster} who had poison in his glance; he had come from the country of the Arabs to reign over Iran-shahr; all those whom he looked on with his evil eye he slew. The Iranians called Frasyap {Afrasiyab, a title of the king of the Turanians, here the Uighur king Buku Khan} into their country; he killed this Zinigab, {but Frasyap subsequently} seized the power in Iran-shahr, took many men from Iran-shahr, established them in Turkestan, desolated Iran-shahr, and ravaged it until Rushtahm of Saistan, being prepared, seized the king of Yambaran, delivered Kai Us and the other Iranians from captivity, entered into a conflict with Afrasyap in the basin of the Ulai, which is called Ispahan, and defeated him there; he met him in new battles until he repulsed him and drove him into Turkestan. Rustahm brought back prosperity to Iran-shahr.

“8. Frasyap renewed the struggle; Kai Syavukhsh {Syavakhsh} went to fight him, but by the mistake of Sutapih — Sutapak was Kaus’ wife — he did not come into Iran-shahr [but went] to Frasyap; having been received under his protection, he did not return near Kaus, but went himself into Turkestan, and married a daughter of Frasyap.

{Note: The Andromeda of the Greek myth, the daughter of Cepheus rescued from the monster by Perseus, is Shehernaz (Gehernaz, etc.), the sister of Kai Kaus, in the Iranian tradition, and it is her name that is attached to the constellation, Schier, ibid. Shehernaz was given in marriage to Rustam, the Vahagn-like uncle, mentor, and avenger of Syavakhsh. (Vahagn = Mars = Hercules = Perseus.) She is doubtless a reincarnation of the earlier and more famous Shehernaz, the sister of Jamshid, who was taken captive by Zohak. (The role of Zohak is equivalent to that of the monster slain by Perseus.) She was subsequently set free by, and wedded to, Feridun, the earlier incarnation of the hero-god (Vahagn = Mars = Hercules = Perseus).}”

The name Cepheus, eponymus of the Cephenes, belongs to the later era, of Kai Kaus (Cephenes = Kayanians, the dynasty of Kai Kaus), but elements of the earlier mythology relating to Nimrod son of Canaan, besides the genealogy merely “son of Phoenix,” were intertwined with the name Cepheus in Greek myth: for example, Perseus, by Andromeda the daughter of Cepheus, is said to have fathered Perses, the eponymus of the Persians: this reflects an earlier Iranian tradition, preserved in Tabari, that Fars (the eponymus of Fars = Persia, equivalent to the Greek Perses/Perseus) was Manuskihar, of the era of the Exodus: Manuskihar identically was descended from the daughter of Feridun (viz. of Nimrod son of Canaan = Kai Kaus = Cepheus), by the liaison of Feridun with his own daughter, that is, by Feridun in a later incarnation, or in the form of one of his own descendants (corresponding to Perseus, the Mars-like hero, Atar, Azar, etc.). Manuskihar was also titled Firoz, the “Victorious,” meaning the Victor in the battle of light over darkness, and this word, formed from the same consonants as Parsi = Nergal (= Perseus), the “Shatterer,” the god of underworld and night-time fire, is doubtless the origin of the national name. It is the name also of the rabbit or hare in the moon (representing the waxing light of the lunar disk), into which Buddha was said to have been transformed in the Jataka Tales. In Japanese Buddhism the same lunar rabbit is Amida Buddha and Tsukuyomi, the Shinto god of the moon. He is the right (male) eye, and right-hand mirror image, of Izanagi (= Ishana, Shiva, Soma, Yama, Manjushri). The latter is the Yama or Jamshid of Kashmir, who is the patriarch Shem: the designation Jamshid was passed down to his descendants, including principally to his adopted son and heir, Japheth, and his further descendants in the line of Arphaxad, as well as to Hamites, like Cush who married into his line. Thus Manuskihar was “Firoz” (Perseus/Perses/Fars), and so too was Syavakhsh (the refugee Eurymedon of Argos), notable “victors” in their battles both against the forces of darkness.

Fu-xi (Fu-hsi, the Chinese name for the patriarch Japheth, §813.13, below, >>,) clothed in the skin of a leopard

c. Additional Note on the Traditional History of India

678. From: The History of India As Told By Its Own Historians — The Muhammadan Period

Posthumous Papers of H. M. Elliot, edited and continued by J. Dowson,

Vol. I, London, 1867.

Following is an excerpt from the Majmal al-Tawarikh wa al-Qasas, a book written in Persia in AD 1126 by an unknown author. The title means “The Collection of Histories and Tales.” This section of the work was taken from a Persian translation (made in AD 1026), of an earlier Arabic translation (date unknown) of an even more ancient book written in the “Hindwani” (Sanskrit) language. The nineteenth-century scholar Reinaud thought the Sanskrit original may have been composed about the beginning of the Christian era. Some parts left untranslated in Elliot-Dowson are translated here from the French of Reinaud.

Initial Remarks

679. The section describes the Jats and Meds as descendants of Ham who lived at first in Sind, but the Jats later migrated away, and were known as “Hindus” by the Arabs. Thus Jats are of the line of Ferishta’s Hind, that is, of Dedan son of Raamah son of Cush son of Ham son of Noah. The first king appointed by the descendants of Hind in Ferishta is Kishan, who is Cush Fil-dendan of the Kush-nama. Cush Fil-dendan is the brother of Zohak and Zohak is the son of Maran son of As son of Arem son of Sam (Shem) son of Nuh (Noah). (For this genealogical line down to Zohak see Ni’mat Allah, History of the Afghans, vol. IV. p. 47.) In the Majmal al-Tawarikh the Pandavas and Kuruvas are traced back to Ham also, through “Mahran” (= Maran) who is said to have lived “in the days of Zohak and Feridun.” That is, we may presume, this source traces the Pandavas from the same primal king Kishan = Cush Fil-dendan, “brother of Zohak,” both brothers being sons of Ma(h)ran of the line of As (Uz) and Aram. (The more precise form of the genealogy is Zohak son of Merdas [“Death,” otherwise Mara/Maran/Mahran] son of [Ad son of] Uz son of Aram son of Shem, see further §707.19, Note 2, below, >>.) As a son of Uz, Maran is the brother (alternatively son) of Ad, and the latter is described in a variant of the genealogy as the son of Amlak son of Ham, and Amlak otherwise as the son of Lud son of Shem, brother to Emim son of Lud. Thus Maran and his sons, that is, Zohak and his brother Cush Fil-dendan, are Hamites by one of these lines of descent, though Cush of course, also, the eponymus of Ethiopia (and of the oriental Ethiopia, India), is a direct son of Ham according to Gen. 10. 6.

679.0.1. Ferishta in his king list details the history from the immediate post-diluvian period and forward, in which the action centers in the city of Oudh (Ayodhya), the most ancient city in India, according to Ferishta, as well as in native Hindu tradition. It was the capital of the powerful kingdom of Kosala (Kaushal), situated on the banks of the River Gogra (Ghaghara or Saryu), a tributary of the Ganges, in the Faizabad district of Uttar Pradesh. According to Ferishta the first king to reign in Oudh (Ayodhya) was Keshu Raj, and according to the native Hindu tradition the first king of Ayodhya was Ikshvaku. This, and the obvious similarity in the form of the names, implies Keshu = Ikshvaku.

In Briggs’ translation of Ferishta (p. lxviii) the relevant passage relating to Keshu and Oudh reads as follows (emphases mine): “Kesoo {= Keshu} Ray, having ascended the throne, detached his brothers in command of armies to make conquests, while he himself, taking the route of Kalpy, entered Gondwana, and marched as far south as Shewala Dweep; levying tribute on all the rajas through whose country he passed. On his return, however, being attacked by these same rajas, and unable to oppose them successfully, he made overtures for peace, and was permitted to return to his capital without molestation. On his arrival, he despatched an ambassador to the King of Persia, begging his assistance. Munoo Chehr sent Sam, the son of Nureeman {= Ohya, the son of Ham’s wife}, with an army, to support him; and Kesoo Ray having met him with his own troops at Jalundur in the Punjab, proceeded to the Deccan. The rajas, intimidated by the Persian troops, acknowledged allegiance to Kesoo Ray, who having accompanied the Persians as far as the Punjab on their return to Eeran, marched back to Oude {= Oudh, Ayodhya}, where he reigned for a period of two hundred and twenty years, and was succeeded by his son Munere Ray.”

Ayodhya was the capital of the so-called “Solar” line of kings, the Suryavansha — the name apparently an outgrowth of the worship of the sun (Surya) practiced in that region, — and the later kings of this line traced their descent from Rama, the hero of the Ramayana. The Majmal focuses on the line of the Pandavas, whose history is summarized by Ferishta in the introductory section to his king list. There the Pandavas are traced through seventeen generations from Bharat(a), the ancestor of the Bharata line, and he is traced back through eleven or twelve generations in the Ramayana to Ikshvaku (a longer genealogical chain between Bharata and Ikshvaku appears in the Vishnu Purana cited infra). The line of the Pandavas is the “Lunar” race, the later kings of which traced their descent from Krishna Vasudeva, Delhi and Hastinapur being two of their principal cities.

679.0.2. In the Majmal, as we have noted, the Pandavas are traced back to the family of Zohak, the offspring of Ma(h)ran. Cush Fil-dendan, the brother of Zohak, is the other principal member of that family. An alternative form of the eponymus Cush is Cushan or Kushan (as stated in the Kush-nama), and Kishan is a typical Semitic variation on the latter form. Kishan means “black,” as does the Hebrew Cush (kush), and is used in these chronicles to represent the Sanskrit name Krishna, which likewise means “black.” (Briggs consistently translates the name Kishan in Ferishta as Krishna.) Thus Kishan (= Kushan) is the first king of the people of Hind, and his devoted son is Maha Raj, whilst in the Kush-nama Maha Raj king of India participates in the rebellion of Cush Fil-dendan (Cush/Kushan) against the line of Jamshid, though no mention is made there of a genetic relationship between them. In Ferishta the Suryavansha or “Solar” race from which the Rajputs are descended are traced back genealogically to a first king Kishan, of the line of Ham, and likewise, by implication in the Majmal, the Induvansha, Chandravansha or Somavansha, the “Lunar” race, are traced back to Cush Fil-dendan (Cush/Kushan), the son of Ma(h)ran, of the line of Ham. In the native Hindu tradition both lines, Solar and Lunar, are traced back to a common source also, in fact to a first king called Ikshvaku, the founder of the “Ikshu” people. The latter name, as aforesaid, has an obvious phonetic similarity, not only to Keshu, but also to Cush (Kush, Cushan, Kushan, Kishan, from the Semitic bi-consonantal root k-sh, whence k-w-sh, Cush), who is the founder of both lines in the Persian and Arabic accounts.

679.0.3. Ikshvaku is the son of Manu Vaivasvata (“Man, son of the Sun” = the post-diluvian Adam or “Man,” i.e. Noah), the latter being the hero of the Hindu Flood Story. Ikshvaku is said to have been born from the sneezing (kshava) of Manu, which can be understood as a covert reference to the exposure of Noah by Ham when Noah was sleeping in his tent (hence Manu’s “sneezing”), that is, to the unwitting seizure by Ham of Noah’s concubine. By the transfer of Noah’s concubine to Ham, all the children of Ham, Cush being the firstborn, became children of Noah (Manu) also, in the sense that their new “mother” was the one-time consort of Noah (Manu). Hence in the Hindu tradition Ikshvaku (the Cushite/Kushan eponymus) is the “son” of the Hindu Noah, Manu. (On the details of this relationship see further infra.) The “Solar” line was so named because Manu was a son of the “Sun” (Vaivasvata), and the Sun was therefore the ultimate ancestor of that line, whilst the “Lunar” race was so named because they descended from a son of Ikshvaku called Ida or Ila, who was “changed into a woman” and then married Budha (Mercury), son of Soma (the Moon). Thus the Moon was the ultimate male ancestor of the Ailakas or descendants of Ikshvaku’s daughter Ida/Ila.

679.0.4. The Biblical name Cush was seen in the Sanskrit Ikshvaku already in the 18th century (by William Jones, followed by Maurice), as well as in the names of Ikshvaku’s son, Kukshi, and the latter’s son Vi-kukshi (“derived from [vi-] Kukshi”), and in the name or surname of Vi-kukshi’s son Kukutstha, otherwise known as Puranjaya. (Maurice and Jones quoted extensively in Hamilton, A Key to the Chronology of the Hindus, vol. I, Cambridge, 1820, esp. p. 159f., though Hamilton argues against them on the untenable theory that the line of Ikshvaku was pre-diluvian.) Cush’s son (grandson) Sheba was translated Hind/Ind or “Cushi” (Cushite), otherwise he was the “father” of Hind, his grandson being, according to the Defloratio Berosi (Book II Chart, §886.2, below, >>), Indus (Hind/Ind) himself, the eponymus of the Cushite Hindus, whilst Raamah was the principal “Cushi” or son of Cush. These four Biblical generations called “Cushi” in the immediate post-diluvian era correspond to the four generations in the Hindu tradition in the immediate post-diluvian era containing the element k-sh. Thus 1) Cush himself becomes Ikshu (the sugar-cane), whence Ikshvaku, “He of the sugar-cane race;” 2) Raamah (son of Cush) becomes Kukshi, which is a phonetic echo of the eponymus Cushi, Cushite, and at the same time a translation of the root meaning of the Hebrew name Raamah, viz. “inwards” (ra‛amah as if from the root r‛m = rḥm, bowels), Sanskrit kukshi, “inwards;” the Sanskrit word is analogous and radically related to the Greek kusos, hinder part (cf. Heb. k-w-sh), and Latin coxa, hip-bone; 3) Sheba (son of Raamah) becomes Vi-kukshi, lit. “derived from (vi-) kukshi,” which is at one and the same time a phonetic echo of the eponymus Cushi, “descendant of Cush,” and a translation of the root meaning of the Hebrew name Sheba, interpreted in the sense “lacking (vi-) appetite (kukshi, lit. stomach, inwards),” that is “satiated,” as if formed from the root sb‛, “to be satiated;” and 4) Hind son of Sheba (sic in Arabic sources) becomes Kukutstha, for the reasons stated infra.

679.0.5. Ferishta’s account draws on an Iranian source, with Iranian forms of the names: 1) Kishan = Kushan, that is, the eponymus of the Cushites of Asia, and his son, 2) Maha Raj, “Great (maha) king (raj).” Maha Raj may be an alternative interpretation of the Hebrew eponymus Raamah, understood to signify “exaltation, greatness,” from the root r‛m = r’m = rwm, “be high, exalted, great” (see Jastrow, Talmudic Dictionary s.v. r‛m): its first two consonants form a word for “king” (Heb. r‛ = “shepherd, king,” Iranian Raj), whilst the last two consonants (m-h) are phonetically echoed in the word Maha. Ferishta’s Kishan and Maha Raj appear in the Kush-nama as Cush Fil Dendan and his ally Maha Raj. In Ferishta Maha Raj is succeeded by his son, the first king of Oudh (Ayodhya), Keshu. In the native Hindu tradition Ikshvaku is the first king of Ayodhya. Keshu is a short form of the divine name Keshava, the “one with long locks/rays,” that is, of Vishnu (and/or Krishna, Kishan), and therefore also of Ikshvaku, the incarnation of Vishnu (Ikshvaku = Vishnu, §679.1, below, >>). Ikshvaku (Keshu son of Maha Raj son of Kishan/Cush) might be considered a son of Manu in the same way his relative Sabatius (Sabtah son of Cush) was considered a son of the Defloratio’s Janus-Noah, viz. as one of the “Ianili:” these were Noah’s adopted sons who supported him in his religious mission to the post-diluvians. (On Sabatius and the Ianili see §940 note, below, >>.) Noah was believed to have traveled to the maritime regions of the Indian Ocean in the course of that mission. (See the summary of Couillard’s account, §889.2.3.9, below, >>, where Noah travels into the Indian Ocean and to the islands of the great eastern Ocean, viz. the principal maritime regions surrounding Asia, comprising the territory of Shem. These include the coasts of India.) Keshu is succeeded in Ferishta by his son Firoz, “Victorious.” Firoz is an Iranian translation of Vijayadatta, “Victorious,” which is the name of the hare in the moon, and the emblem of the moon-god himself, Soma. (See further infra.) Soma in the Hindu tradition is the ancestor of the Somavansha, the Lunar race, by the marriage of Soma’s son, Budha, to Ila or Ida daughter/wife of Ikshvaku or of Manu. The eponymous phrase “Kishan father of Firoz” denotes, therefore, the historical fact that the Somavansha (Firoz) descended from Ikshvaku (Keshu) by the latter’s daughter Ila. In Ferishta Firoz is replaced ultimately by Suraj (= Surya), the eponymus of the Suryavansha, or Solar race, whose exemplars are the Rajputs. The Solar line rose to prominence, according to Ferishta, at the transition between the Dvapara and Kali Yugas (§645, above, >>). This is a reflex of the native Hindu tradition that the Solar Brahmins under Parashurama (“Brahmin”) ousted and, indeed, all but annihilated the Lunar Haihaya kshatriyas or warrior class in that same transitional period. On which, see further infra. Ferishta dated the transition between the Dvapara and Kali Yugas to the era of Suraj, which is about mid-way between Ham and Roja Fur (Poros of the time of Alexander of Macedon), that is, historically around 1300 BC. To summarize: Firoz and Suraj were sons of Keshu, son of Maha Raj, son of Kishan, son of Purb, brother of Bang, the sons of Hind, son of Ham. This is a genealogical expression of the following historical statement: the Somavansha (Firoz) and Suryavansha (Suraj) were descended from Ikshvaku (Keshu), the eponymus of the Cushite Maha Rajas (Maha Raj) of the line of Kushan (Kishan) ruling at Ayodhya in the Eastern Region (Purb) of Bengal, which received its name from Vanga (Bang) of the Somavansha, and was located in the region east of the Indus (Hind), settled by the sons of Ham (Ham).

679.0.6. The following kings in Ferishta’s account can be identified through the last of them, Rahat, the eponymus of Fort Rohtas, who corresponds to Rohit (Rohita, Rohitashva) son of Harischandra in the native Hindu tradition, Rohit being similarly the eponymus of Fort Rohtas. In Ferishta Rahat’s father is Shankal, and Rohit’s father, the raja-rishi (king-sage) Harischandra bore the patronymic Traishankavana or Trishankhu, which clearly is the original Sanskrit form of Ferishta’s Shankal. Shankal rose to prominence in the time of a Brahmin called Kidar, and Harischandra in the time of the Brahmin Kartavirya Arjuna. Harischandra’s daughter was the mother of Kartavirya Arjuna. Kidar = Kartavirya. (The name Kartavirya appears in an even more deformed form as Kuyahurat in the Majmal.) It was at this pivotal point in Indian history at the close of the second millennium BC that the Brahmins of the Suryavansha began the process of supplanting the Lunar Haihaya kshatriyas (warrior-class), conflict between them arising originally on account of the machinations of the king and Brahmin Vishvamitra for the Haihaya side, who marshaled his occult powers against the sages Vasishta and Jamadagni of the Suryavansha. Vishvamitra is probably the “brahmin” who is said to have appeared and taught “idolatry” in the time of Suraj, the eponymus of the Suryavansha. In consequence the Brahmin warrior Parashurama slew the Haihaya hero Kartavirya Arjuna. According to the native Hindu tradition, the slaughter was vengeance for his assault on the house of Parashurama’s father Bhrigu Jamadagni. The latter must be the Bah Raj of Ferishta’s account, against whom Kidar (Kartavirya) rebeled: Bah Raj is the eponymus of what appears to be the city of Broach in Ferishta, as Bhrigu is the eponymus of Broach, that is Bhrigu’s city, in the native Hindu tradition. Thus successively in the line of the Suryavansha, which is the line of Suraj in Ferishta’s account: 1) Bah Raj = Bhrigu Jamadagni, a son of Suraj because he was the son of the Suryavansha princess Renuka; he was opposed by 2) Kidar Brahmin = Kartavirya Arjuna of the rival Somavansha Haihayas; 3) Shankal = Traishankavana Harischandra of the Suryavansha, who was removed from his kingdom and taken into captivity; and 4) Rohat son of Shankal = Rohit son of Harischandra, the eponymus of Fort Rohtas. In Ferishta the Persians and Turanians of Afrasiyab play an important role in the transition of power at this period, and likewise in the native Hindu tradition the “Five Hordes,” which include notably the Pahlavas (= Pahlavis, Persians, Parthians, lit. the people of Pahlu = Balkh), and the Shakas (Scythians, Turanians). These are said, in mythological terms, to have emerged from the cow of Jamadagni and Vasishta, Kamadhenu, that is, from the animal embodiment of the prosperity of the kingdom of the Suryavansha. Shankal is said to have been taken away from his realm in slavery to the Turanians, as Harischandra was forced into slavery by Vishvamitra, the sage king of the Bharatas, whose kshatriya army was drawn from the Five Hordes. The events which transpired during this transition at the end of the second millennium BC have been telescoped in Ferishta’s account and in the Majmal with those which transpired at the time of the Mahabharata war and its aftermath, that is, over the period c. 1100 BC to c. 600 BC, on account of the fact that they all occurred during the supernaturally long life of the Immortal Parashurama. Likewise in the earlier section of Ferishta’s account a couple of eponymous kings only (Firoz and Suraj) are mentioned between Keshu (Ikshvaku) and the period of Bah Raj, though the intervening period was several centuries long (from c. 2200 BC to c. 1300-1100 BC). The reason here, too, no doubt, is that all the events transpired within the supernaturally long life of the reincarnated sage Vasishta in the native Hindu tradition, who was the guru of the immediate family circle of Ikshvaku in the late third millennium BC, and also of the circle of Jamadagni at the end of the second millennium BC. The long lives of these Immortals are represented by the arrows beneath their names in the chart infra. Since the long life of Parashurama was held to have continued into the seventh century BC (indeed in Hindu tradition he is held to still be alive, though in retirement), Ferishta resumes his list of kings c. 600 BC with a contemporary of Gushtasp = Hystaspes father of Darius I (Dow). The succeeding kings in Ferishta are not known from other sources, but Fur, the last of them, is the Indian king Poros who was defeated by Alexander of Macedon, and his successor Sinsar Chand is Chandragupta of the Maurya Dynasty, who ruled at Pataliputra (Palibothra, Patna) in the time of Seleucus Nicator. Presumably this list was derived from native Median and Persian sources. The Mede Ahasuerus (Cyaxares I), the ally of Nabopolassar and Nebuchadrezzar II in the destruction of the Assyrian Empire c. 612 BC, and the husband of the Hebrew Esther (of the Book of Esther), was said to have invaded the Punjab under the suzerainty of Bahman (son of Isfendiyar son of Gushtasp son of Lohrasp of Balkh) at the end of the seventh century BC, as referred to in the Majmal and detailed more fully in Tabari (p. 652ff.). He acquired at that time an Empire based at his capital Susa, stretching from India in the East to the Halys in the West, and along the sea-coast of the Indian Ocean as far as Ethiopia. The Achaemenians of Cyrus’ Persian Empire exercised power in the same region thereafter.

679.0.6.1. Note on Ahasuerus = Cyaxares I, the husband of Esther and his connection with India. India (Hebrew Hoddu = Hind) is mentioned in the Bible in connection with Ahasuerus king of the Medes, the husband of Esther (Esther 1. 1). That the Hebrew Ahasuerus is the same person as Cyaxares I is indicated by the fact that according to native Mesopotamian and foreign Greek sources Nebuchadrezzar was assisted by Cyaxares I (in the Babylonian dialect Uvakishtar) king of the Medes in his destruction of Nineveh, and in the Book of Tobit, a native Jewish source, Nebuchadrezzar is assisted by Ahasuerus king of the Medes in the same enterprise. Both the Greek form of the Median royal name, “Cyaxares,” and the Hebrew form “Ahasuerus” are representations of the Avestan royal name Hu-khshathra. Further, Cyaxares I was the contemporary of an obnoxious anti-Semite Haman, as was Ahasuerus, according to the Book of Esther. All this will be demonstrated infra. The dynasty to which Cyaxares I belonged was that which destroyed the Assyrian Empire in the time of Asshur-da’’in-apla (Sardanapalos), 824 BC, see §95, above, >>, §1001, below, >>. Dynasty of the Medes, Syncellus ed. Mosshammer, p. 233, 252 = Dindorf, p. 372, 401: Arbakes (Latin Arbaces), first of the kings of Media, the overthrower of the Assyrian Empire, 28 years, followed by Mandaukes, 20 years, Sosarmos, 30 years, Artukas, 30 years, Dioikes (Herodotus’ Deiokes), the founder of Ecbatana, 54 years, followed by Aphraartes [or Phraortes], 51 years, and then Cyaxares I [Gk. Kuaxares], 32 years. {There follows first a summary of the reign of Cyaxares I {“Kuaxares”} from Herodotus, Book 1} “1. 103. When Phraortes had brought his life to an end, Kuaxares the son of Phraortes, the son of Deiokes, received the power. This king is said to have been yet much more warlike than his forefathers; and he first banded the men of Asia into separate divisions, that is to say, he first arrayed apart from one another the spearmen and the archers and the horsemen, for before that time they were all mingled together without distinction. This was he who fought with the Lydians when the day became night as they fought, and who also united under his rule the whole of Asia above the river Halys. And having gathered together all his subjects he marched upon Nineveh to avenge his father, and also because he desired to conquer that city. And when he had fought a battle with the Assyrians and had defeated them, while he was sitting down before Nineveh there came upon him a great army of Scythians, and the leader of them was Madues the son of Protothues, king of the Scythians.” Herodotus here interjects a long passage about how these Scythians battled with and pursued the Kimmerians eastwards and by a route lying north of the Caucasus, and how they drove out the Medes from “Asia” which he later defines more closely as “Upper Asia” (the eastern highlands of Iran, Book 4. 1). They held power in that region for twenty-eight years within the 40-year reign of Cyaxares, and also ran rampant even to the borders of Egypt under Pharaoh Psammetichus I (reigned 664-610 BC). And ibid. 106: “Then Kuaxares with the Medes, having invited the greater number of them {the Scythians} to a banquet, made them drunk and slew them; and thus the Medes recovered their power, and had rule over the same nations as before; and they {the Medes} also took Nineveh, — the manner how it was taken I shall set forth in another history {now lost or never written}, — and made the Assyrians subject to them excepting only the land of Babylon.” And ibid. 107: “After this Kuaxares died, having reigned forty years including those {28} years during which the Scythians had rule, and Astuages son of Kuaxares received from him the kingdom.” According to the Fall of Nineveh Chronicle, a cuneiform account of the final days of the Assyrian Empire, Cyaxares (called Umakishtar or Uvakishtar [by transposition in the initial two syllables Uvak-ishtar > Kuva-ishtar > Kua-xare-s/Cyaxares]) destroyed the Assyrian religious center Ashur in the summer of 614. The following is extracted from Livius.org. “The Medes went along the Tigris and encamped against Ashur. They did battle against the city and destroyed it. They inflicted a terrible defeat upon a great people, plundered and sacked them. The king of Babylonia and his army, who had gone to help the Medes, did not reach the battle in time.” Cyaxares and the Babylonian king Nabopolassar joined forces. The Babylonian historian Berossus writes that the alliance was cemented by a marriage: the Babylonian crown prince Nebuchadrezzar married Amytis, the daughter of Cyaxares’ son Astyages. Two years later, Nineveh was captured by the two armies: “The king of Babylonia mustered his army and marched to [lacuna]. The king of the Medes marched towards the king of Babylonia. They met one another. The king of Babylonia and Cyaxares […] encamped against Nineveh. From the month Simanu [May/June] until the month Abu [July/August] — for three months they subjected the city to a heavy siege. On the [lacuna] day of the month Abu they inflicted a major defeat upon a great people. At that time Sin-shar-ishkun, king of Assyria, died. They carried off the vast booty of the city and the temple and turned the city into a ruin heap. […] On the twentieth day of the month Ululu [10 August 612] Cyaxares and his army went home.” All in all, we can be certain about three events during Cyaxares’ reign: the destruction of Ashur in the summer 614, the capture of Nineveh in July 612 and the battle against the Medes on 28 May 585. This fits into the chronological framework of Herodotus’ Histories, where we read that Cyaxares reigned for forty years and his son Astyages for thirty-five. We know that Astyages was defeated by the Persian king Cyrus the Great in the sixth year of his Babylonian colleague Nabonidus, i.e., between 10 March 550 and 28 March 549. Counting backward, we arrive at 625/624 to 585/584 as the regnal years of Cyaxares. This suggests that Cyaxares died almost immediately after the battle against the Medes. Under Cyaxares, the Median empire reached its greatest extent, but under his son Astyages, it was destroyed. When in 522 BC a Mede with the name Phraortes and a Sagartian named Tritantaechmes revolted against the Persian king Darius I the Great, they both claimed to be a descendant of Cyaxares, even though the great king was dead for more than sixty years.

679.0.6.2. Tabari’s account of Ahasuerus and Esther (History of al-Tabari, vol. 4, University of New York, 1987, trans. Perlmann, MS. p. 652ff.): “After that, Babylon and its environs were ruled on behalf of Bahman {Bahman son of Isfendiyar, son of Gushtasp (Vishtaspa) the convert of Zoroaster the disciple of Jonah} by one of his relatives called Ahasuerus b. Cyrus b. Jamasb. Nicknamed the sage, he {Ahasuerus} was one of the four dignitaries selected by Bukhtrashah {another name for Nebuchadrezzar in Tabari} when he set out for Palestine on behalf of Bahman. Ahasuerus had come to Bahman well recommended by Nebuchadrezzar, and it was at that time that Bahman appointed him to rule Babylon and its environs. He was appointed, so it is asserted, because a man who had administered the region of India (Sind and Hind) for Bahman, Karardashir b. Dashkal, rebelled with six hundred thousand followers. Bahman therefore appointed Ahasuerus over the region and ordered him to go to Karardashir, which he did. He waged war on the rebel, slaying him and most of his supporters. Bahman continued adding to the administrative duties of Ahasuerus, giving him various parts of the realm to rule over. The latter stayed at Susa, gathered nobles around him and wined and dined them; he ruled the region from Babylon to India, and Ethiopia and the coast. On a single day he gave each of one hundred twenty military commanders a banner and a thousand choice soldiers, each of whom equaled one hundred warriors. Ahasuerus became entrenched in Babylon but spent much time at Susa, and he married a woman from among the Israelite captives. She was called Esther, the daughter of Abihail. She had been raised by an uncle of hers, Mordechai, who was her milch-brother, as Mordechai’s mother milk-fed Esther. The reason he married her was that he had killed one of his wives, a noble, beautiful, bright woman, named Vashti. He had ordered Vashti to appear before the people in order that they might see her majesty and beauty, but she refused. Ahasuerus slew her but then became anxious about it. It was suggested to him that he review the women of the world, which he did. He became attracted to Esther by a divine design for the sake of the Israelites. The Christians assert that she bore him a son on his way to Babylon, and that he named it Cyrus. They also assert that the rule of Ahasuerus lasted fourteen years, that Mordechai taught him the Torah, and that Cyrus embraced the faith of the Israelites and learned from the prophet Daniel and his companions, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah.” In this Arabic tradition Bahman, located in Balkh, is the ultimate authority behind Ahasuerus (Cyaxares I), doubtless on account of the spiritual authority with which he was credited as the successor to Zoroaster’s disciple Gushtasp.

679.0.6.3. To understand the Biblical background we refer to the Book of Tobit. There, Tobit is depicted as a captive from the Northern Kingdom of Israel, removed by the Assyrians to Nineveh. His relative is Ahiqar, who became a famous sage in Eastern literature, and whose legend is preserved in manuscripts dating from as early as five centuries before Christ. Tobit expected the fall of Nineveh prophesied by Jonah, and according to the Book of Tobit (XIV. 15) that prophecy was fulfilled in the destruction of Nineveh by “Nebuchadnezzar and Ahasuerus.” Here the Median royal name Ahasuerus stands in place of the Median royal name Cyaxares, or Uvakishtar, who historically allied with Nebuchadnezzar/​Nebuchadrezzar (and his father Nabopolassar) to destroy Nineveh. The same “Ahasuerus” is the “father” (actually grandfather) of “Darius the Mede” in Daniel 9. 1, cf. 5. 31, since a passage of Josephus quoted by Theodoretus on Daniel 5. 31 identifies Daniel’s Darius the Mede as the king the Greeks called Cyaxares II, the son of Astyages, the son of Cyaxares I (“Ahasuerus”) . Presumably his proper name was Darius and his patronymic was Cyaxares (“Ahasuerus”). The Hebrew Ahasuerus (a-ḥa-sh-ve-r-o-sh [’–ḥ–š-w-r-w-š] or K’tiv in Ezra 4. 6, a-ḥa-sh-r-sh [’–ḥ–š-r-š]) is most probably, therefore, a simple transcription of the original Avestan royal name Hu-Khshathra (“Good [hu-] Ruler [khshathra]”) = Akkadian Uvakishtar = Cyaxares: the original pointing was presumably as follows: ’–ḥ–s-w-r-w-s read U-khshoros with transposition of the two last consonants < U-khshosro, and ’–ḥ-s-r-s read U-khshors < U-khshosr, the second element -khshosro or –⁠khshosr transcribing the original -khshathra, with the “th” sound (pronounced as in “thin”) becoming a sibilant (s), as it did in later Iranian dialects (-thr- > –ç– > sr) as well as commonly in Hebrew. This is the Ahasuerus who was the husband of Esther referred to supra. In Ezra 4. 6 a later “Ahasuerus” is referred to, chronologically located immediately after Darius I, in the later 6th century BC, and this, no doubt, is one of the two princes who, according to the Behistun inscription, attempted to usurp Darius I, and set up their own kingdoms for a while, viz. Phraortes and Tritantaechmes: both of these claimed to be “of the family of Uvakhshatra (Cyaxares I)”, and might therefore be called U-khshors (“Ahasuerus”) in Hebrew, the patronymic replacing the personal name, as suggested in the case of Darius the Mede. The historical background of the Biblical story of Esther and Mordechai, to resume, is the Assyrian captivity of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, though they themselves were exiled from Jerusalem by Nebuchadrezzar. The historical and religious context of the account in Tobit includes the prophetic work of Jonah and his disciple Zoroaster (Munir Suarta, Xuartes) in Assyria and Balkh, the reception of Zoroaster’s revelation by Vishtaspa (Gushtasp), his son Isfendiyar, and his son Bahman, and Bahman’s influence over Ahasuerus (Cyaxares I) king of the Medes, who campaigned in and retained sway over an expanse of territory around the Indus, as well as a huge area of western Asia. Tobit 1. 1-22 (KJV with slight orthographic modifications): “1. The book of the words of Tobit, son of Tobiel, the son of Ananiel, the son of Aduel, the son of Gabael, of the seed of Asael, of the tribe of Naphthali; 2. Who in the time of Enemessar {Shalmaneser V} king of the Assyrians was led captive out of Thisbe, which is at the right hand of that city, which is called properly Naphthali in Galilee above Asher. 3. I, Tobit have walked all the days of my life in the ways of truth and justice, and I did many alms-deeds to my brethren, and my nation, who came with me to Nineveh, into the land of the Assyrians. 4. And when I was in mine own country, in the land of Israel being but young, all the tribe of Naphthali my father fell from the house of Jerusalem, which was chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, that all the tribes should sacrifice there, where the temple of the habitation of the most High was consecrated and built for all ages. 5. Now all the tribes which together revolted, and the house of my father Naphthali, sacrificed unto the heifer Baal. 6. But I alone went often to Jerusalem at the feasts, as it was ordained unto all the people of Israel by an everlasting decree, having the first-fruits and tenths of increase, with that which was first shorn; and them gave I at the altar to the priests the children of Aaron. 7. The first tenth part of all increase I gave to the sons of Aaron, who ministered at Jerusalem: another tenth part I sold away, and went, and spent it every year at Jerusalem: 8. And the third I gave unto them to whom it was meet, as Deborah my father’s mother had commanded me, because I was left an orphan by my father. 9. Furthermore, when I was come to the age of a man, I married Anna of mine own kindred, and of her I begat Tobias. 10. And when we were carried away captives to Nineveh, all my brethren and those that were of my kindred did eat of the bread of the Gentiles. 11. But I kept myself from eating; 12. Because I remembered God with all my heart. 13. And the most High gave me grace and favor before Enemessar, so that I was his purveyor. 14. And I went into Media, and left in trust with Gabael, the brother of Gabrias, at Rages a city of Media ten talents of silver. 15. Now when Enemessar was dead, Sennacherib his son reigned in his stead; whose estate was troubled, that I could not go into Media. 16. And in the time of Enemessar I gave many alms to my brethren, and gave my bread to the hungry, 17. And my clothes to the naked: and if I saw any of my nation dead, or cast about the walls of Nineve, I buried him. 18. And if the king Sennacherib had slain any, when he was come, and fled from Judea, I buried them privily; for in his wrath he killed many; but the bodies were not found, when they were sought for of the king. 19. And when one of the Ninevites went and complained of me to the king, that I buried them, and hid myself; understanding that I was sought for to be put to death, I withdrew myself for fear. 20. Then all my goods were forcibly taken away, neither was there any thing left me, beside my wife Anna and my son Tobias. 21. And there passed not five and fifty days, before two of his sons killed him, and they fled into the mountains of Ararat; and Sarchedonus {Esarhaddon} his son reigned in his stead; who appointed over his father’s accounts, and over all his affairs, Achiacharus {Ahiqar} my brother Anael’s son. 22. And Achiacharus intreating for me, I returned to Nineveh. Now Achiacharus was cup-bearer, and keeper of the signet, and steward, and overseer of the accounts: and Sarchedonus appointed him next unto him: and he was my brother’s son.” And 14. 1-5, 11-15: “1. So Tobit made an end of praising God. 2. And he was eight and fifty years old when he lost his sight, which was restored to him after eight years: and he gave alms, and he increased in the fear of the Lord God, and praised him. 3. And when he was very aged he called his son, and the sons of his son, and said to him, My son, take thy children; for, behold, I am aged, and am ready to depart out of this life. 4. Go into Media my son, for I surely believe those things which Jonah the prophet spake of Nineveh, that it shall be overthrown; and that for a time peace shall rather be in Media; and that our brethren shall lie scattered in the earth from that good land: and Jerusalem shall be desolate, and the house of God in it shall be burned, and shall be desolate for a time; 5. And that again God will have mercy on them, and bring them again into the land, where they shall build a temple, but not like to the first, until the time of that age be fulfilled; and afterward they shall return from all places of their captivity, and build up Jerusalem gloriously, and the house of God shall be built in it for ever with a glorious building, as the prophets have spoken thereof …. 11. Wherefore now, my son, consider what alms doeth, and how righteousness doth deliver. When he had said these things, he gave up the ghost in the bed, being an hundred and eight and fifty years old; and he buried him honorably. 12. And when Anna his mother was dead, he buried her with his father. But Tobias departed with his wife and children to Ecbatana to Raguel his father in law, 13. Where he became old with honor, and he buried his father and mother in law honorably, and he inherited their substance, and his father Tobit’s. 14. And he died at Ecbatana in Media, being an hundred and seven and twenty years old. 15. But before he died he heard of the destruction of Nineveh, which was taken by Nabuchodonosor {Nebuchadrezzar} and Assuerus {Ahasuerus = Cyaxares I}: and before his death he rejoiced over Nineveh.”

679.0.6.4. Ahiqar (Achiacharus) was the steward of Esarhaddon king of Assyria (680-669 BC), Esarhaddon being the son of Sennacherib: this according to the earliest (Elephantine) version of the story and the more correct later versions. Unfortunately many of these later versions reverse the historical genealogy and represent Ahiqar as the steward of “Sennacherib son of Esarhaddon” which removes him from his true historical context. In the Book of Tobit Ahiqar is said to have adopted as his own son a son of his sister called Haman (bearing the same name as the villain in the Book of Esther), “Aman” in the current Greek texts, renamed in the story of Ahiqar, Nadin or Nathan (with a variety of orthographic variants). The floruit of this adopted son of Ahiqar, therefore, would be the generation following that of Esarhaddon, viz. that of Ashurbanipal, son of Esarhaddon, and the last kings of the Assyrian Empire. Tobit 14. 10 (Tobit speaking) “The day you bury your mother next to me, do not even stay overnight within the confines of the city. For I see that there is much wickedness in it, and much treachery is practiced in it, and people are not ashamed. See, my son, all that Nadin did to Ahiqar, the very one who reared him. Was not Ahiqar brought down alive into the earth? Yet God made Nadin’s disgraceful crime rebound against him. Ahiqar came out again into the light, but Nadin went into the everlasting darkness, for he had tried to kill Ahiqar. Because Ahiqar had given alms he escaped from the deadly trap Nadin had set for him. But Nadin fell into the deadly trap himself, and it destroyed him.” The reference here is to the events which followed the failure of Nadin’s plots against Ahiqar, when the king of Assyria gave Nadin over to Ahiqar for punishment and Ahiqar had him chained in a dark dungeon. (The Story of Ahikar, ut cit. infra, p. 156, Arabic version.) The story of Ahiqar is attested as early as the 5th century BC in the Aramaic texts from Elephantine in Egypt, and the date of composition could easily be c. 600 BC which is contemporary with Ahasuerus (Cyaxares I) and Esther themselves! Nadin (Haman) is said to have suffered ultimately a fate like that of Judas: he swelled up and his bowels burst asunder (a consequence of being hung in Judas’ case): it is depicted as divine punishment for turning on and betraying the Israelite Ahiqar who adopted him, and according to the prophetic pronouncement of Ahiqar himself. Ahiqar says: “‘God will judge between us.’ Thereat Nadan {sic} swelled up like a bag and died.” Or as the Arabic version puts it more graphically: “He swelled up immediately and became like a blown-out bladder. And his limbs swelled, and his legs and his feet and his side, and he was torn and his belly burst asunder and his entrails were scattered, and he perished and died.” (The Story of Ahikar, trans. J. Rendel Harris, etc., 2nd. ed., Cambridge, 1913, from a Syriac ms Cod. Add. 2020, p. 127, and from the Arabic version, p. 161, trans. A. S. Lewis.) The generation of Haman coincided with that of the successor of Esarhaddon, Ashurbanipal (see §295, above, >>, on the chronology) in the second half of the seventh century BC, about the time Ahasuerus (Cyaxares I) was rising to power in Media. It would be natural for a high minister in the court of Assyria, as this Haman was, to transfer his allegiance (and his anti-Israelite animus) to the court of the Assyrians’ conqueror Ahasuerus, given the opportunity. This he is depicted as having already done, potentially, by writing secretly to the “king of Persia and Elam” when his adoptive father was in his heyday, instructing him to attack Assyria. (The Story of Ahikar, ut cit., p. 110.) On account of his hostility to the Jews, the Haman of the Book of Esther ended up sentenced to hang by the Median king, in a fate reminiscent of the identically-named, anti-Israelite high minister in the Ahiqar stories. Haman is described in the Book of Esther as a member (“son”) of the “Agagite” (’agāgiy) clan “Medatha” (ha[m]-Medāthâ, the Medah/Medath clan). Josephus translates Agagite as “Amalekite.” According to Rashbam and Ramban (on Numbers 24. 7), all the kings of Amalek were called Agag in the same way all the kings of Egypt were called Pharaoh, all of the kings of the Philistines were called Abimelech and all the kings of Jerusalem Zedek (Justice). The name Agag is attached especially to one Amalekite king (I Sam. 15), and is otherwise spelled Gog in ancient versions of Numbers 24. 7 (MT Agag, Samaritan G-w-g, LXX, Gôg, also Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion), whilst Gog as a tribal eponymus (which is what Agag appears to be in the Book of Esther) is commonly translated “Scythian” in the ancient sources. The personal name Haman (Heb. H-m-n) is a formation from the root h-m-h (Gesenius-Tregelles, s.v.), whence also hamon in the term Hamon-Gog of Ezekiel 36, the “multitude/host/horde [hamon] of Gog,” equivalent to the phrase “umman-Manda” (the Manda horde) used in Assyrian texts as an archaizing term for the Medes, when it originally denoted the Gutians (Stol in Reallexikon der Assyriologie, 14, s.v. Umman-Manda §3. 1, 5). The Gutians have been credibly thought to be the Goths (“Scythians”) of a later era (§814, below, >>), and the Goths, in turn, are commonly equated in post-Biblical sources with the Biblical Gog, see chart at §906.4, sons of Magog, below, >>. (On the etymology of Akkadian um[m]anu, and its possible derivation from the same root as hamon, see Muss-Arnolt, Assyrian Dictionary, s.v. umanu 2.) In other words, this “member of the Medah clan” was an “Haman,” that is, an “Umman[-Manda],” of the Gog/Agag tribe. There is an obvious phonological affinity between Medah/Medatha and Manda. Accordingly, in the same way Haman the “Agagite of the clan Medatha” in the Book of Esther plotted to remove Ahasuerus’ queen Esther by instigating an uprising throughout the Empire against her people, but was defeated after being unmasked at a royal banquet, so in the account of Herodotus the “Scythians” (= Gog = Agag) under “Madues” or “Madios” (presumably = “he of the Medah/Medath[a]” clan), acting at first in a way which benefited the Medes’ enemies, the Assyrians, subsequently came into uneasy alliance with the Medes and finally were put down by Cyaxares (Ahasuerus) at a royal banquet, following a period when they held the balance of power across Cyaxares’ Empire. Herodotus’ not otherwise historically attested account appears to be a politicized version of the events related in the Book of Esther. Madues is described in Herodotus as the son of Protothues. The latter is commonly taken to be the Scythian king called Partatua in Assyrian (“king of the land of Ishkuza [Scythia]”), the contemporary of Esarhaddon. Some exploits of Madu(e)s are referred to in Strabo (Geog. I. 61): “…. the emigrations of the … [Celtic] Trerans [from Europe] … and likewise also the expeditions of the princes to lands far remote (I refer to Madus the Scythian … Kobos the Treran …) are not likewise matters of off-hand knowledge to everybody. And those Kimmerians whom they also call Trerans (or some tribe or other of the Kimmerians) often overran the countries on the right of the Pontos and those adjacent to them, at one time having invaded Paphlagonia, and at another time Phrygia even …. Oftentimes both Kimmerians and Trerans made such invasions as these; but they say that the Trerans and Kobos were finally driven out by Madus, the king of the Scythians.” Protothues (Partatua) is known from the Assyrian inscriptions to have sent emissaries to the Assyrian king Esarhaddon expressing a desire to make an alliance with him through marriage to one of his daughters. (Fuchs in Reallexikon der Assyriologie, 10, s.v. Partatua.) We may presume he succeeded, if not in that royal submission, at least in one hardly less prestigious: a matrimonial contract entered into with the sister of the Assyrian king’s famous counselor, the Israelite Ahiqar, by which he became the father of Madues (Haman). In Herodotus, accordingly, the heyday of Madues is the reign of Cyaxares, who invited him to his court and entertained him, and that is the generation immediately subsequent to the reign of Esarhaddon, just as Haman (Madues under another name) is a high official in the court of Ahasuerus (Cyaxares) in the Book of Esther.

The history of Haman can, therefore, be reconstructed as follows: his father Partatua (Greek Protothues), a chieftain of the Scythians, petitioned Esarhaddon king of Assyria for a wife and received the sister of Esarhaddon’s Israelite counselor, Ahiqar. She bore Partatua a son who was given the Hebrew personal name Nadin, and was subsequently adopted by Ahiqar. Nadin was commonly titled “Haman,” meaning, in Hebrew, the prince of Hamon-Gog/Agag (or the “Agagite”), that is, the Scythian, and “he of the clan Medah” (Madues in Greek). Haman spurned the love of his Israelite adoptive father, Ahiqar, and came to harbor in his heart a bitter hatred for him. He attempted to turn the Assyrian king against Ahiqar, in order to destroy him, succeeding to some extent in the first instance, but ultimately failing. Thereafter, when Assyria came under attack by the Medes and Babylonians, Haman led his Scythian kinsmen against the forces of the Median king Ahasuerus (Cyaxares I, c. 624-584 BC). Haman managed initially to thwart the Median hosts. Thereafter, he entered an uneasy alliance of sorts with Ahasuerus, and this continued even after the defeat of Assyria. Ahasuerus married the Jewess Esther (though her race was deliberately concealed from him). Esther’s adoptive father was the Jew Mordechai from Jerusalem, who had been exiled by Nebuchadrezzar in 597 BC. Haman saw in Mordechai only another despised Israelite, a second Ahiqar, and used his position of influence with Ahasuerus to obtain a decree from the king that all Jews throughout Ahasuerus’ kingdom should be eradicated. However, at a royal banquet requested by Queen Esther, Haman was exposed before Ahasuerus and his plot unmasked. As a result Haman was sentenced to hang on the very gallows he himself had commissioned for Mordechai.

The eponymous ancestor of the “Gog” clan to which Haman belonged on the paternal side was doubtless the Gogus of the Defloratio Berosi, the son of Saba Turifer (Sheba) and father of Ganges and Indus (Defloratio Book II Chart, §886.2, below, >>): the Indus folk (Sind/Hind) of the eastern branch of the Sabaean people merged with the Scythians of the upper reaches of the Ganges to form a mixed nation known to the Greeks as “Indo-Scythians.” Bahman’s commission of the Indian expedition to Ahasuerus would naturally lead to the incorporation of a number of Haman’s native Gog/Scythian tribesmen in the forces of the Median king. For the same reason, no doubt, Gog “of the land Magog [Scythia]” is named prince of the confederation prophesied to invade the land of Israel at the end time in Ezekiel 36. The Edomite Amalekites merged with Sabaeans (Min-folk) in the desert regions south of the Dead Sea, hence also, most probably, the employment of the Agag/Gog eponymus by the Amalekites.

679.0.6.4.1. Ahasuerus (Heb. Akhashverosh) is translated Artaxerxes in the LXX. The common misdating of Esther to the time of Artaxerxes I “Longimanus” (earliest in Josephus, Ant. 11. 184 [XI. vi. 1]) can be explained by the transfer of the epithet “Longimanus” (“Long-hand” deraz-dast) from Bahman the grandson of Gushtasp in the latter part of the seventh century BC to Artaxerxes in the fifth century BC, — though the transfer is usually assumed to have been in the opposite direction, — and to the nominal form Ardashir Bahman, in which (it appears) the patronymic Bahman is attached to Artaxerxes (Ardashir) I. As usual in such cases the later Iranian king came to be identified with (and/or viewed as a reincarnation of) the earlier. Again, it is possible the seventh-century Bahman’s fuller name was actually Ardashir Bahman, or rather that Ardashir (Artaxerxes = Ahasuerus, LXX), being the “long hand” of the seventh-century Bahman, viz. his military and chief executive commander in far-away lands, the sobriquet became attached to Bahman and Ardashir accordingly: “Bahman whose long hand is Ardashir” and/or “Ardashir the long hand of Bahman.”

679.0.6.5. The synchronisms with Iranian figures in Ferishta in the following chart are examined at §283ff., above, >>.

Hindu Tradition		Ferishta
{Firoz and Suraj are sons of Keshu, son of Maha Raj, son of Kishan, son of Purb, brother of Bang, the sons of Hind, son of Ham. This is a genealogical expression of the following historical statement: the Somavansha (Firoz) and Suryavansha (Suraj) were descended from Ikshvaku (Keshu), the eponymus of the Cushite Maha Rajas (Maha Raj) of the line of Kushan (Kishan) ruling at Ayodhya in the Eastern Region (Purb) of Bengal, which received its name from Vanga (Bang) of the Somavansha, and was located in the region east of the Indus (Hind), settled by the sons of Ham (Ham).}		Ham
		Hind [= Dedan son of Cush son of Ham]
		Purb son of Hind
		Kishan (or, Krishna) [= Cush Fil-dendan a.k.a./son of Cush son of Ham]
		Maha Raj son of Kishan
Ikshvaku		Keshu Raj son of Maha Raj
	Vasishta ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓
The Moon = Soma = Vijayadatta = Firoz, the eponymus of Somavansha (the Lunar royal line).		Firoz Rai son of Keshu Raj
The Sun = Surya = Suraj, the eponymus of Suryavansha (the Solar royal line).		Suraj of Hind c. 1300 BC
Bhrigu (= Bah Raj) Jamadagni son of a princess of the Suryavansha called Renuka		Bah Raj son of Suraj, eponymus of Broach = Bhrigu City
Kartavirya (= Kidar) Arjuna	Parashurama ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓	Kidar Brahmin c. 1100 BC
Harischandra Traishankavana (shankavana = Shankal)		Shankal
Rohit (= Rahat) son of Traishankavana, eponymus of Rohtas		Rahat son of Shankal, eponymus of Rohtas
		A disturbance arose because there was no heir to the throne
		Maha Raj Kachhwaha c. 600 BC
		Kaid Raj nephew of Maha Raj r. c. 546-503 BC
		Jai Chand commander-in-chief of Kaid Raj r. c. 503-443 BC
		Interregnum of the queen regent for the infant son of Jai Chand
		Roja Dihlu brother of Jai Chand eponymus of Delhi r. c. 443-403 BC
		Roja Fur rebel against Roja Dihlu r. c. 400-327 BC. Known to the Greeks as Poros, defeated by Alexander of Macedon 327 BC
Chandragupta		Sinsar Chand

679.1. Ikshvaku is traditionally interpreted to mean “ancestor of the Sugar Cane [ikshu] race.” Clearly the real root of the name is the Semitic k-w-sh, Cush, which in Hebrew and Aramaic means “Reed, cane,” as well as “dark-skinned.” Sugar-cane produces the notably dark sugar syrup, and this is alluded to in the Sanskrit name. Ikshvaku is considered the seventh incarnation of Vishnu, and is therefore, in the mystic Islamic tradition, a form of Al Khidr, who is Hermes = Amun-Min. The animal embodiment of Amun-Min was a bull. Ikshvaku is considered an epithet of the man called Rishabha (the Bull) amongst the Jains, and he is their First Tirthankara (“ford-maker”), the founder of pre-Aryan Jainism, who is said to have taught the Brahmi script (actually of Semitic Hebrew origin) to his daughter Brahmi. This script is still in use amongst the Tamils, the living remnant of the dark-skinned Cushite natives of India. Similarly the first Egyptian Hermes, Thoth, is said to have invented writing before the Noachide Flood, and transmitted it to the post-diluvian world through his subsequent re-embodiments, the second Hermes (Cush) and the third (Eliezer), whilst the fourth Hermes (Moses-Mousaios) was credited with the discovery of the Hebrew script, from which the Brahmi was derived, at the time of the Exodus. In Ferishta Kishan (= Krishna = Vishnu), eponymus of the Asian Cushites and the grandfather of Keshu (Ikshvaku, “He of the Ikshu/Cushite race”), is said to have been the sovereign under whom, “according to some,” writing was first introduced into the country by the guru named “Brahmin” of the line of Bang son of Hind. This is an obvious reference to the invention of the Brahmi script.

679.2. It will be noticed that there are two chief patriarchs of the Hindus in the post-Biblical scheme: Sheba and Dedan, corresponding to the Arabic Sind and Hind in Saadia, the eponymi of the River Indus (Sindh) and the Indians or Hindus who acquired their name from the river. In the native Hindu tradition there are two royal lines, the Solar and the Lunar, the former descending from Manu son of the “Sun” through Manu’s son Ikshvaku and the latter’s son Vikukshi (the embodiment of the god Indra), or Vikukshi son of Kukshi son of Ikshvaku, hence known as children of the Sun, and the latter

Bull-figure from Mohenjo Daro, Indus Valley, late third-millennium BC

descending from Manu through Ikshvaku’s son Ida (Aida) or Ila (Aila), otherwise named Sudyumna, who, transformed by the divine influence of Shiva into a female, and becoming the bride of Budha (Mercury) son of Soma (the Moon), brought forth those known henceforth as the children of the Moon. Since the name Indus is derived from the same root as the divine name Indra (indh, sindh, syandh, flow, drip, give forth moisture), we might see in “Indra” (Vikukshi) son or grandson of Ikshvaku, the Sind/Hind of the Arabic tradition. If further, for the reasons stated supra, Maha Raj son of Kishan stands for the Biblical Raamah son of Cush, then 1) Keshu (= Ikshvaku) son of Maha Raj corresponds to one of the “Cushite” sons of Raamah (in this case, Sheba, cf. the following reference) and 2) Vikukshi (Indra) corresponds to the next generation “Cushite,” Hind son of Sheba of the Arabic sources, which is simply the eponymus of the Indians of the Indus (Sindh) River, attached alternatively to Sheba himself. As argued infra, we can conclude Indra-Vikukshi = Sheba, and Ida-Sudyumna = Dedan:

679.3. Though doubtless originally, as explained supra, a form of the Semitic eponymus Cush, this human name of “Indra,” Vikukshi, means in Sanskrit “lacking (vi-) appetite (kukshi),” and he was so named, according to legend, because he was a hunter who ate hares, being titled Sasada, the “hare-eater.” Sasa (hare) derives from a root “kas” (kas > has > sas), and this similarly echoes phonetically the Semitic eponymus Cush. Vikukshi committed a ritual fault in the eating of a hare, which ought to have been offered to the deity, and was consequently titled “hare-eater.” The hare symbolizes the moon. The moon is termed “hare-marked” by the Hindus, because it bears on its surface markings reminiscent of the shape of an hare, and represents the child-sacrifice which Nimrod invented (§329, above, >>), and which was adopted by his fellow Cushite idolaters. In the cosmic interpretation the consumption of the lunar hare relates to the identification of Cush with the moon and its consumption each month by darkness, as explained at §316.1ff., above, >>. The Biblical name Sheba means, amongst other things, “satiated (with solid nourishment),” which is precisely “lacking appetite” (Sanskrit Vikukshi).The corresponding word in Aramaic (s-b-’ [with initial samekh]), as well as meaning “satiated,” also means “gray,” and the root “kas” (in Sasada, from sas- = has– = kas-) likewise means “gray,” being applied to the hare on account of its gray fur. Thus “kas” is a covert reference to the Cushi (Cushite) Sheba, and “hare-eater” (Sasada) to the twin themes of “gray” and “satiated” referenced in the same tribal name. Indra-Vikukshi son of Ikshvaku corresponds for all these reasons to Sheba-Sind/​Hind, son of Cush. That suggests Vikukshi’s brother Ida, Aida or Sudyumna, corresponds to Dedan, brother of Sheba, the second sibling in the Sind/Hind pair. Dedan is commonly derived from the root of the word dad, “breast” (dad = shad, tad, Gesenius-Tregelles, s.v. dad, cf. the forms of the ethnic noun Dedan attested in Akkadian Tidnu, Tidanu), which is davah, dy etc. (On the root, see Jastrow Talmudic Dictionary, s.v. dad.) The meaning of the root is “ooze, flow, shoot forth,” in the case of the breast, dad, with milk. In Aramaic the identical form Dedan means “a tree of fatness/oil,” that is, the tree which “oozes” an oily substance (Jastrow s.v. d-d-n-y-n, the plural of Dedan, compares the Greek daidinos, “pine tree,” which “oozes” resinous sap), and similarly the verb dahan = davah = “drip, ooze, drop down, be languid, be fat,” a dialectal variation of which is ravah, with d > r, meaning “be fat,” in the sense “satiated with fatness, liquids etc.” The names Sheba and Dedan both mean “satiated,” therefore, the first in the sense of being satiated with solid nourishment (hares in the Sanskrit tradition) and the latter in the sense of being satiated with liquid or non-solid nourishment. The form dahan (= davah, davy, da’y, dy), also gives rise to the noun dahanunitha (or dehinunitha) meaning “fat earth.” It is probable the Sanskrit name Ida, “earth,” is a phonetic echo, if not a direct derivative, of the Semitic davah, davy, da’y, dy, the form of the Sanskrit name reflecting the root in Semitic preceded by y or w, comparable to the Arabic wada, “flow,” which Fürst sees as equivalent to the Hebrew dy, and the related Hebrew words yadah, hadah, “shoot out, flow forth,” whence, no doubt, ultimately the very noun Hoddu for India in Hebrew, Hind, Indh etc. The Talmudic Rabbis saw the same root (sh-d as in shad = dad, tad, “breast”) in the word siddim, furrows, (Jastrow, Talmudic Dictionary, s.v. sed), which, in turn, is derived from the same root as sadeh, “land, field.” Thus Hebrew Sadeh, “land,” would correspond to Sanskrit Ida, “earth.” Dedan is a reduplicated form (as if = De–da’–an, literally “drip, drip”), the infant who “continually oozes” or “continually drips liquid” from his mouth, or receives nourishment from the “continually oozing” breast, being “satiated” therewith. From the variation on this root with initial “s” (as in sed, shad, etc.) we may presume arose also the variant form Sud-yumna (from a presumed underlying Semitic Sudyan = Dedan), for the male Ida/Ila. The name “Hind” for this line descended from Dedan is doubtless identical to the name Indu given to the moon (otherwise known as Soma, Chandra), whence the Ailakas or descendants of Ida/Ila are termed the Induvansha, the race of the Moon. Tod accordingly derived the name Hindu from Indu, the moon. Sind and Hind are otherwise represented in Arabic sources as the sons of Ophir son of Joktan son of Eber son of Shelah son of Arphaxad son of Shem (earliest in Kitab al Tabaqat al Kabir ibn Saad from https://archive.org/details/TabaqatIbnSaadVol12English/page/n39/, Volume 1, Parts 1.6.7, and as late as the Sudanese tradition in MacMichael, A History of the Arabs in the Sudan, vol. II, Cambridge, 1922, p. 231, corr. Tukir to Yufir, y > t, f > k [q], common transcriptional errors arising from unpointed Arabic script): Ophir accordingly is translated “India” in the Vulgate (Job 28. 16). Ophir (Epirus) is the father rather than the brother of Havilah (Obulas) in the Chart in the Defloratio Berosi (Book II Chart, §886.2, below, >>), and Havilah is the ancestor of the Ganges-folk and the gymnosophists of India, §680, below, >>, and §904.1, below, >>. Habesh, the eponymous ancestor of the Abyssinians, son of Phut (or Put, Ar. “Qut”) son of Ham, was identified with Cush son of Ham, the ancestor of the Indians, of Sind and Hind, §626.48, above, >>, hence in Tabari (MS. p. 217, trans. Brinner): “Put journeyed to the land of Sind and Hind, where he settled; the inhabitants there are said to be his descendants.”

679.4. The concubine is called Ila (“Earth,” cf. Isis = Earth), and is described variously as the daughter of Ikshvaku (as she is of Cushite descent in Mesopotamian myth, §322, above, >>), and of Manu himself (see §328, above, >>). Vikukshi was believed to be the embodiment of the warrior and storm god Indra. Indra was the opponent of the demonic Ahi (Azi Dahaka), as Ninurta/Inurta was of Asag/Asakku. (See §189, above, >>.) Indra may be a phonetic echo of the Sumerian Inurta. Vikukshi’s son was Puranjaya, which means “Conqueror of the city.” The city was interpreted to mean the netherworld city of the asuras or anti-gods. Puranjaya led the hosts of the gods in battle against the asuras, as Inurta led the gods against the demon Asakku or Hercules championed the gods against the anti-gods in the Titan War (Amraphel versus the Anakites in Genesis 14, Gilgamesh versus Huwawa, etc.). During this episode Puranjaya rode on the back of Indra in the form of a bull, and was therefore titled Kukutstha, “Rider on the Hump of the Bull,” and Indravahana, “He whose vehicle is Indra.” This alludes to the celestial alignment whereby the god of the netherworld (in Mesopotamia called “The Old Man,” a title of Nergal-Hercules = Gilgamesh, Amraphel) was identified with the constellation Perseus, which is located over the “back” of the celestial Bull, Taurus. (See §80, above, >>.) The interpretation arose, no doubt, as a result of the Sanskritization of the original eponymous title of Puranjaya, viz. Cushi (= Indus, the eponymus of the Cushite Indians) into Kukutstha, understood as indicating “placed (-stha) on the hump (kakud).” Cushite would mean, according to this interpretation, one “placed” on the “bank” (hump) of the Indus river (Indus = Cush), the bull being a symbol of the river itself. The word kakud, “hump,” is a phonetic echo of the Heb. k-w-th (= k-w-sh, Cush), with reduplication of the initial consonant, and k-w-sh can mean similarly “heap-up, accumulate.” As regards Kukutsta’s name Indravahana: the “vehicle” (vahan) of the god is his mode of manifestation and operation, therefore Kukutstha is hereby identified as the god-man whose mode of manifestation is the god Indra. Otherwise Kukutstha (Puranjaya) is Indra himself. As the root of the name Indra is the same as that of Indus and Hind, Kukutstha = Indus. The kalingattu-Parani omits Vikukshi and represents Puranjaya as a direct son of Ikshvaku. All three, therefore, Kukshi, Vikukshi and Kukutstha, are represented in the sources as sons of Ikshvaku, rather than more remote offspring, whilst they are, in reality, different forms of the eponymus “Cushi” = Ind (Sind/Hind), applied variously to the descendants of Sheba, and to the descendants of Sheba’s father Raamah, and to the descendants of Raamah’s father Cush.

679.5. On the other hand there are the Somavansha, the descendants of Ikshvaku by his daugter Ila. These are the “Rais of Hind” of Ferishta’s account, the descendants of Firoz (= Soma) Rai, who spanned the interval between Sam Nariman, viz. Ohya, the son of Ham’s wife, of the Abrahamic era (late 3rd millennium BC) and Rustam (late 2nd millennium BC): their dominion preceded that of the Suryavansha, the descendants of Ferishta’s eponymous Suraj. The name Firoz, “Victorious,” is found elsewhere (in Khalilah and Dimnah) employed as a translation of the Sanskrit Vijayadatta, “Victorious,” Vijayadatta being the Hare in the Moon. Vijayadatta is the moon-god Soma-Rudra himself, otherwise Indra, the celestial light or fire “victorious” over the demon of darkness. Hence Firoz is simply an epithet of Indra (Hind/Ind[us]). Indra is Vritrahan, the Avestan Verethraghna, the “Obstacle-remover,” and the latter (Verethraghna, Vahagn) was equated in antiquity with Herakles/Hercules. It is doubtless, therefore, Firoz, also called Munere Rai, the founder of Munir, that is, Manir Sharif, Patna, who is the “Herakles” of Megasthenes (apud Diodorus, II. 39) credited with the founding of Palibothra (= Pataliputra, modern Patna). Palibothra is located at the junction of the

Herakles (god of the underworld) with club, skin of a wild feline, serpents and dog (Kerberos)	Heruka (Bhairava god of the underworld) with club, skin of a wild feline, serpents and dog (Shvan)

Ganges with what Megasthenes calls the Erannoboas (Middle Indian Hirannaha, the River Son), and this is precisely the location of Manir Sharif, forming the western gate of Palibothra/Patna, though the river-bed of the Son now follows a different course.

679.6. In the following extracts from Megasthenes’ account of India, dating to the era of Alexander of Macedon c. 300 BC, Dionysus (Dionusos) is Manu-Noah, as in Tzetzes (§125, above, >>), and Herakles is Soma, the eponymus of the Somavansha or Lunar Race (explained supra). Herakles is in Megasthenes the father of a single daughter called Pandaia. Pandaia in this context can only be the female eponymus of the Pandavas of the Lunar Race. Soma is otherwise known as Rudra, Shiva, or Bhairava, the club-wielding god dressed in the skin of a wild cat whom the Greeks identified with the lion-skinned, club-wielding Herakles. This deity was believed to have founded Palibothra (Pataliputra, Patna) by the following extraordinary process. Shiva (= Bhairava, Herakles), the third member of the Hindu Trinity or Trimurti, cut off the fifth head of Brahma, the first member of the Trinity. The second member of the Trinity, Vishnu, in vengeance, slew Shiva’s female aspect, Devi, with his weapon, the discus Sudarshana, dismembering her. Shiva carried Devi’s remains on his shoulder, dropping various dismembered parts on different locations in India, which became shrines of the goddess. One such, her thigh and cloth covering (pat), fell where Patna is located, naming that particular spot and rendering it sacred. A related myth is that Kanya (Virgin) Devi, an avatar of the wife of Shiva, was to marry Shiva, but as Shiva failed to turn up for the wedding, the rice intended for the wedding feast remained uncooked, and the hard rice grains turned into stones and pebbles on the shore. In Java similarly the Rice Goddess Dewi Sri (= Devi), the object of incestuous affection on the part of her adoptive father Batara Guru (Shiva), is killed by the gods, and from her body parts buried in the earth, spring up multitudes of useful plants: from her head coconut, from her nose, lips, and ears various spices and vegetables, from her hair grass and various flowering plants, from her breasts fruit plants, from her arms and hands teak and other trees, from her genitals sugar palm, from her thighs different types of bamboo, from her legs tuber plants, and finally from her navel a very useful plant that is called padi (rice). In Thailand she is Mae Phosop, the Rice Mother, in Laos Nang Khosop, and Po Nagar amongst the Cham people of Cambodia and Vietnam. She is depicted in the typical pose of Virgo (Kanya) with a sheaf of harvested rice in her hand. These myths are variations on the ancient Mesopotamian cosmogony summarized by Berossus, alleged to have been preached by Oannes (Adam) when he emerged out of the Indian Ocean, wherein the Demiurge or Creator Bel cut off his own head (that is, severed heaven from earth), and formed the world from his body members. In the version found in Enuma Elish, the functions of Berossus’ single deity Bel are distributed amongst three forms of Mummu (the creative Logos), corresponding to the three members of the Hindu Trimurti: Mummu I = Apsu, Mummu II = Enki, Mummu III = Bel Marduk. Mummu-Enki kills Mummu-Apsu (as Shiva decapitates the earlier form of himself, Brahma) and Mummu-Bel then dismembers Apsu’s spouse and female aspect Tiamat, forming the universe out of her corpse (as Vishnu dismembers Devi, the female aspect of his alter-ego Shiva). Similar motifs are found in Classical Greek myth, particularly in the castration (= severing, dismembering) of the three successive divine generations Ouranos, Kronos and Zeus, either by the god’s own hand or by that of the god’s successor. We can deduce from the following account that the “thigh” of Devi in the Patna myth is a reference to Mount Meru (understood to be Meros, the “thigh,” by the Greeks), a form of the goddess Devi herself, as the cosmic Paradisiacal mountain on which the vessel of the new Adam (Manu-Noah) grounded.

679.7. Diodorus Siculus, Bibliotheke, II. 38, from Megasthenes: “It is said that India, being of enormous size when taken as a whole, is peopled by races both numerous and diverse, of which not even one was originally of foreign descent, but all were evidently indigenous; and moreover that India neither received a colony from abroad, nor sent out a colony to any other nation. The legends further inform us that in primitive times the inhabitants subsisted on such, fruits as the earth yielded spontaneously, and were clothed with the skins of the beasts found in the country, as was the case with the Greeks; and that, in like manner as with them, the arts and other appliances which improve human life were gradually invented, Necessity herself teaching them to an animal at once docile and furnished not only with hands ready to second all his efforts, but also with reason and a keen intelligence. The men of greatest learning among the Indians tell certain legends, of which it may be proper to give a brief summary. They relate that in the most primitive times, when the people of the country were still living in villages, Dionusos {Dionysos, Dionysus} made his appearance coming from the regions lying to the west, and at the head of a considerable army. He overran the whole of India, as there was no great city capable of resisting his arms. The heat, however, having become excessive, and the soldiers of Dionusos being afflicted with a pestilence, the leader, who was remarkable for his sagacity, carried his troops away from the plains up to the hills. There the army, recruited by the cool breezes and the waters that flowed fresh from the fountains, recovered from sickness. The place among the mountains where Dionusos restored his troops to health was called Meros; from which circumstance, no doubt, the Greeks have transmitted to posterity the legend concerning the god, that Dionusos was bred in his father’s thigh {Gk. meros}. Having after this turned his attention to the artificial propagation of useful plants, he communicated the secret to the Indians, and taught them the way to make wine, as well as other arts conducive to human well-being. He was, besides, the founder of large cities, which he formed by removing the villages to convenient sites, while he also showed the people how to worship the deity, and introduced laws and courts of justice. Having thus achieved altogether many great and noble works, he was regarded as a deity and gained immortal honors. It is related also of him that he led about with his army a great host of women, and employed, in marshaling his troops for battle, drums and cymbals, as the trumpet had not in his days been invented; and that after reigning over the whole of India for two and fifty years he died of old age, while his sons, succeeding to the government, transmitted the scepter in unbroken succession to their posterity. At last, after many generations had come and gone, the sovereignty, it is said, was dissolved, and democratic governments were set up in the cities.

679.8. {Diod. III. 66

Concerning Dionusos.

“Now some, as I have already said, supposing that there were three individuals of this name, who lived in different ages, assign to each appropriate achievements. They say, then, that the most ancient of them was Indos {or, if understood adjectivally, the “Indian” (sc. Dionusos)}, and that as the country, with its genial temperature, produced spontaneously the vine-tree in great abundance, he was the first who crushed grapes and discovered the use of the properties of wine. In like manner he ascertained what culture was requisite for figs and other fruit trees, and transmitted this knowledge to after-times; and, in a word, it was he who found out how these fruits should be gathered in, whence also he was called Lenaios. This same Dionusos, however, they call also Katapogon {“long-bearded”}, since it is a custom among the Indians to nourish their beards with great care to the very end of their life. Dionusos then, at the head of an army, marched to every part of the world, and taught mankind the planting of the vine, and how to crush grapes in the wine-press, whence he was called Lenaios {“He of the wine-press”}. Having in like manner imparted to all a knowledge of his other inventions, he obtained after his departure from among men immortal honor from those who had benefited by his labors. It is further said that the place is pointed out in India even to this day where the god had been, and that cities are called by his name in the vernacular dialects, and that many other important evidences still exist of his having been born in India, about which it would be tedious to write.}

679.9. “(39.) Such, then, are the traditions regarding Dionusos and his descendants current among the Indians who inhabit the hill-country. They further assert, that Herakles also was born among them. They assign to him, like the Greeks, the club and the lion’s skin. He far surpassed other men in personal strength and prowess, and cleared sea and land of evil beasts. Marrying many wives he begot many sons, but one daughter only. The sons having reached man’s estate, he divided all India into equal portions for his children, whom he made kings in different parts of his dominions. He provided similarly for his only daughter, whom he reared up and made a queen. He was the founder, also, of no small number of cities, the most renowned and greatest of which he called Palibothra {Pataliputra, modern Patna, the capital of the Maurya empire under king Chandra-gupta in the time of Megasthenes himself and of Alexander’s invasion of India}. He built therein many sumptuous palaces, and settled within its walls a numerous population. The city he fortified with trenches of notable dimensions, which were filled with water introduced from the river. Herakles, accordingly, after his removal from among men, obtained immortal honor; and his descendants, having reigned for many generations and signalized themselves by great achievements, neither made any expedition beyond the confines of India, nor sent out any colony abroad. At last, however, after many years had gone, most of the cities adopted the democratic form of government, though some retained the kingly until the invasion of the country by Alexander. Of several remarkable customs existing among the Indians, there is one prescribed by their ancient philosophers which one may regard as truly admirable: for the law ordains that no one among them shall, under any circumstances, be a slave, but that, enjoying freedom, they shall respect the equal right to it which all possess: for those, they thought, who have learned neither to domineer over nor to cringe to others will attain the life best adapted for all vicissitudes of lot: for it is but fair and reasonable to institute laws which bind all equally, but allow property to be unevenly distributed.”

680. In the Majmal the Hindus or Cushites of the line of Sheba and Dedan are said to have been at an earlier period in their history the same people as the Jats of Sind (Sind being the region of the Indus). The Jats trace their origin back to the Samma patriarch Jam or Jamshid, whom they identify with the Biblical patriarch Shem son of Noah. The name Jamshid, and the Iranian traditions of the people of Sind in general, indicates a significant Iranian presence in this north-western region of India, and latterly in more easterly parts of the continent, which is confirmed by the account of Ferishta. Through the Iranian component, it would seem obvious, the Indo-Aryan language (Avestan in Iran, Sanskrit in India) penetrated the region. Now it is noticeable that of the two races who formed the pillars of Indian history, the Solar and the Lunar lines, one of them, the Lunar, was traced back to Ikshvaku (the Asian Cushite eponymus) through a female, Ida/Ila, the male line ascending through her husband Budha the son of Soma, otherwise Mercury the son of the Moon. This indicates not only a different line to that of the Cushites, but also a “divine” (that is, a priestly) line, which would be what was, in a subsequent period, the line of the Sanskrit-speaking priesthood. Here, doubtless, we have the native Hindu tradition corresponding to that in the Majmal, which traces a significant element in the Hindu population from the “Jats” of Sind, that is, from the descendants of Jamshid. Jamshid was interpreted in Arabic sources to mean “glory (shid) of the Moon (Jam).” Jamshid or Jam, therefore, the Samma ancestral patriarch, is the Moon, corresponding to the Hindu Soma, Chandra or Indu. Soma in the Hindu scheme is the son of Atri, who was one of the seven pre-diluvian rishis present, as the Hindus believed, on the boat of Manu (Noah). This idea doubtless arose as a concomitant of the conception that the seven pre-diluvian sages (Adam through Enoch in the Biblical scheme) were re-incarnated, so to speak, in the eight members of the family of Noah. Shem (Jamshid), in addition, was held to be the “re-embodiment” of Methuselah, the son of the seventh pre-diluvian sage, Enoch (the Arabic Idris, cf. the Sanskrit Atri). See further on Shem and Methuselah §349.0.3.2, above, >>. Thus, Soma “son” of the seventh rishi Atri, is equivalent precisely to Shem-Methuselah, “son” of the seventh sage Enoch. Just as Soma had a son Budha in the Hindu scheme, so likewise Jam or Jamshid in the Samma scheme had a son Budha. Budha is the planet (here the god-man) Mercury. Originally this was Shelah-Cainan (and/or Arphaxad), son of Shem (Jamshid) — Cainan being the god-man Hermes or Mercury (Budha). §207.2, above, >>. Hence the Indians or Hindus were commonly traced back in the medieval period to Shelah son of Arphaxad. Bede De Temporibus Cap. XVIII and Isidorus, Chronica, MGH, AA XI, Cron. Min, Vol. II, Berlin 1894, p. 429: “Arfaxat in his 135th year begot Sale (vars. Salam, Salem etc.), from whom came the ancient Samaritae (correct to read Salamitae, as in the text of Isidorus, ed. Rome 1803) or Indians (var. Medes).” Liber Generationis Ab Adam, ed. Migne, PG XCII, col. 1045f.: Arphaxad begot Shelah and Shelah begot Eber, whose son was Joktan, father of Almodad (Elmodal), from whom originated the Indians (Indi) and Havilah, from whom came the Gymnosophists (of India). Cf. Syncellus, Chronographica, ed. Mosshammer, p. 48, note to line 12. In Syncellus, Almodad son of Joktan is similarly ancestor of the Indians, but Sheba son of Joktan is ancestor of the “Arabs of the Indians” (Sheba = Arabian Sabaeans) as well as Havilah of the Gymnosophists (ibid. p. 49). Shelah-Cainan = Hermes = Budha son of Jam in the Samma, and Budha son of Soma in the Hindu scheme, ancestor of the Semitic Lunar line. Further on the descent of the Pandavas in Kashmiri tradition from Jamshid (“Solomon”), see §707.1ff., below, >>.

680.0.1. We see, therefore, that the division between the Jats and the Meds of Sind was through the intermarriage of the Samma chief Budha with the Cushite princess Ida/Ila. Thereafter conflict arose between the two peoples, as the Jats allied with the Cushites in the East against their compatriots, the Meds, who remained in the ancestral homeland of Sind. Through this alliance the Indo-Aryan language of the male line passed down from Budha to the Cushite family of Ikshvaku, so that the whole scheme of Cushite history in India was refashioned in a Sanskrit form, resulting, amongst other things, in the Sanskritization of the royal names (Ikshvaku for Cushite etc.). Eventually, as described in the initial section of the Majmal account, both Jats and Meds became reconciled under princess Duhshala of the Lunar race, whose royal family both sides accepted as their rightful sovereigns: this will have been on account, it would appear, of their common descent from the Samma patriarch Budha. The merger of the line of Ikshvaku with the descendants of Budha son of Jam is indicated even more strikingly by the tradition that the Samma tribe of the Rathor, a branch of the Suryavansha, the Solar line, descends ultimately from Budha son of Jam. (Tuhfatu-l Kiram translated in Eliot, History of India, vol. I, p. 337.) This is evidence that Budha son of Jam of the Samma tradition became at some point the ancestor of certain Suryavansha, though in the main line these were the offspring of Ikshvaku through Puranjaya. Some prominent Rathor clans trace their Solar lineage back to Kusha son of Rama of the Solar line c. 700 BC. In the Hindu tradition, of course, Budha is the ancestor of the Lunar line, not the Solar (Suryavansha). However, the Padma Purana relates that after the slaughter of the kshatriyas (warrior-class) of the Lunar tribe of the Haihayas by the Solar Brahmin Parashurama, the bereft females of the Lunar line consorted with the newly dominant Brahmins, and from these intermarriages arose the so-called Jatharas (“womb-race”). These are commonly held to be the forefathers of the Jats and Khatris (kshatriyas) of the Punjab. Rama father of Kusha, the Rathor ancestral patriarch, was a contemporary of Parashurama, and in this case the chronology suits the Jathara tradition. Some believed and still believe that the Jats received their name from the Jatharas. Thus by crossing of the lines c. 700 BC Budha son of Jamshid (Soma) gave rise amongst others to the Suryavansha Rathor Jats.

The following Chart illustrates the identifications of Ferishta’s earliest kings of India examined supra, and suggests the end of the Indus civilization and concomitant settlement of migrants from the Indus in Ethiopia c. 1300 BC, as well as the rise of the Vedic Suryavansha, was the direct or indirect result of Rustam’s campaign against Firoz.

Megasthenes	Avestan/Iranian	Sanskrit/Hindu	Ferishta
Dionysos-Indos	Thraetaona/Feridun (= Noah, and Thraetaona = Traitana = Triton = River Nile = Osiris = Dionysos)	Manu (the Primal Man [Adam] and hero of the Universal Flood [Adam/Noah])	Noah (= Dionysos [Tzetzes])
	(Cush Fil-Dendan)		Kishan (= Krishna)
	(Maha Raj, supreme ruler of India and ally of Cush Fil Dendan)		Maha Raj
	(Feridun sends Sam Nariman [Ohya, the son of Ham’s wife] to India)
		Ikshvaku (first king of Ayodhya and first of the Aikshvakas)	Keshu (first king of Oudh = Ayodhya)
(Herakles father of Pandaia, female eponymus and ancestress of the Pandaians)	Jamshid (Yama Xshaeta [= Shem son of Noah] = the Moon)	Soma ([the Moon, the founder of the Lunar line of kings, the Somavansha, by the marriage of his son Budha to Ila/Ida daughter/wife of Manu and/or of Ikshvaku, the ancestress of the Lunar Pandavas] = Shiva/Rudra/Bhairava/ Heruka/Yama = Indra = Vritrahan = Verethraghna = Herakles)	Firoz (= Vijayadatta the Hare in the Moon = Soma)
↓	↓	↓	↓
15 generations	15 generations: 1) Airik, 2) Guzak, 3) Fraguzak, 4) Zusak, 5) Frazusak, 6) Bitak, 7) Thritak, 8) Airak, 9) Manus-khurnak, 10) Manus-khurnar, 11) Manuskihar, 12) Nodar, 13) Agaimasvak, 14) Auzobo the Tuhmaspian, 15) Kai-Kavad	The Lunar line of kings, the Somavansha a.k.a. Chandravansha or Induvansha descends to Tansu, who is contemporary with the Solar king Yuvanáswa, and the latter flourishes 15 generations after Ikshvaku in the Solar reckoning: thereafter, in the gap between the Lunar kings Tansu and Ilina, reigns Arjuna Kartivirya, who is the incarnation of Sudarshana. The latter founds Patna from the dismembered limbs of the female aspect of Soma (= Firoz), see infra.	The line of the Rais of Hind (Hind = Indos)
↓	↓	↓	↓
(The club-wielding, feline-skinned, dog-mastering Herakles [= Verethraghna = Vritrahan = Indra = Shiva] builds Palibothra [Patna] at the confluence of the Ganges and the Son)	(Kai-Kavad sends Rustam against Firoz)	(Patna [Palibothra, Pataliputra], is named after Patan Devi or Patali = Durga, the female aspect of the club-wielding, feline-skinned, dog-mastering Bhairava/Shiva, who drops the thigh and cloth [pat] of her dismembered body at the confluence of the Ganges and the Son, thus founding the city. His wife had been dismembered by the Sudarshana or Chakra [discus] of Vishnu, which is further said to have been incarnated in the person of Arjuna son of Kartivirya. This Arjuna is located in the gap in the Lunar genealogy between Tansu and Ilina, as supra. Sudarshana [the discus]) is allegorically described accordingly as the “father” of Patali [the eponymus of the city] inasmuch as it was the instrument which effected the dismemberment.)	(Firoz [= Vijayadatta = Soma = Shiva], builds and is the eponymus [“Munere Rai”] of Maner Sharif, Patna[Palibothra], at the confluence of the Ganges and the Son, and is opposed by the Iranian hero Rustam)
	Cush Fil Dendan (eponymus of the Cushites of India and Africa) invades Ethiopia with Kay Kaus in the time of Rustam c. 1300 BC. (Note: 1. People from the Indus settle near Egypt c. 1300 BC [Manetho Book of Sothis s.n. 40]. 2. Harappan or Indus civilization terminates c. 1300 BC.)	Rise of the Solar line of kings, the Suryavansha, and their Brahmins, who come into conflict with, and finally overthrow the kshatriyas (warrior-class) of the Lunar line	Firoz is expelled by Rustam c. 1300 BC, and Rustam then installs the lowly Suraj (eponymus of the Suryavansha, including later the Rathor Rajputs).

680.1. Note in the story of Budha and Ida/Ila the interaction of a family of planet-gods with the daughter of Manu/Noah, which is reminiscent of the interaction between the descendants of Cush, who identified themselves with planet-gods, and Noah’s concubine. As in the accounts of Castor and Thallus, describing the war between the Titans and the gods in the immediate post-diluvian period, this family of Hindu planet-gods fell out and fought amongst themselves in the period immediately following the Flood of Manu. Soma (the Moon) and Brihaspati (Jupiter) quarreled over the favors of Tara (Star). The conflict between them was called the Tarakamaya or War Over Tara. Tara corresponds to the Babylonian Ishtar (Sumerian Inana), which likewise means “Star,” and is a divine name. The favor of Ishtar represents divine authorization to rule. The same is true of the favor of Tara. The Hindu gods sided with Brihaspati, i.e. Jupiter, as the gods were allied with Jupiter (= Canaan) in the Titan war, and the anti-gods (asuras) with Soma, the Moon, which here represents the party of Shem-Melchizedek. In essence the war was a religious conflict between the monotheists of the line of Shem (Soma) and the sun-worshipers of the line of Cush (Ikshvaku and the Suryavansha). An important part was played in the Titan War by Damascus-Eliezer, and he was “Hermes Trismegistus” (§140, above, >>), a latter-day re-embodiment of Cainan-Hermes, the Budha of the Lunar genealogy. Damascus-Eliezer (Hermes, Mercury) was the consort of Arathis or Ariarathes, who was the eponymus of Mount Ararat, the landing-place of Noah’s container (§432 note, above, >>). Similarly in Hindu myth, Budha (Mercury, Hermes) consorted with Ila, and she was the eponymus of the mountainous zone where Manu’s boat landed after the Flood, that is, of the triple peaks of the Himalayas called Ilavrata (“Circle of Ila”). This was the home of Brahma, and abode of Ila, daughter of Manu, otherwise known as Mount Meru, the mountain of Paradise. (The connection with Paradise is due to Noah’s status as the Adam [Manu] of the post-diluvian world.) It was bounded on the north by Lake Issyk Kul, where the patriarch and Flood-survivor Japheth son of Noah had his abode, and on the south by the Ganges. Ila was both the wife and daughter of Manu, that is, the concubine of the Flood-hero, who was identified with the mountainous landing-place of the Flood-hero’s vessel in Near-Eastern and Classical myth. (§321, above, >>.)

680.2. Note on Manu as Noah in the Hindu tradition: Satapatha Brahmana 1.8.1.1. “In the morning they brought to Manu water for washing, just as now also they (are wont to) bring (water) for washing the hands. When he was washing himself, a fish came into his hands.

1:8:1:2. It spake to him the word, ‘Rear me, I will save thee!’ ‘Wherefrom wilt thou save me?’ ‘A flood will carry away all these creatures: from that I will save thee!’ ‘How am I to rear thee?’

1:8:1:3. It said, ‘As long as we are small, there is great destruction for us: fish devours fish. Thou wilt first keep me in a jar. When I outgrow that, thou wilt dig a pit and keep me in it. When I outgrow that, thou wilt take me down to the sea, for then I shall be beyond destruction.’

1:8:1:4. It soon became a ghasha (a large fish); for that grows largest (of all fish). Thereupon it said, ‘In such and such a year that flood will come. Thou shalt then attend to me (i.e. to my advice) by preparing a ship; and when the flood has risen thou shalt enter into the ship, and I will save thee from it.’

1:8:1:5. After he had reared it in this way, he took it down to the sea. And in the same year which the fish had indicated to him, he attended to (the advice of the fish) by preparing a ship; and when the flood had risen, he entered into the ship. The fish then swam up to him, and to its horn he tied the rope of the ship, and by that means he passed swiftly up to yonder northern mountain.

1:8:1:6. It then said, ‘I have saved thee. Fasten the ship to a tree; but let not the water cut thee off, whilst thou art on the mountain. As the water subsides, thou mayest gradually descend!’ Accordingly he gradually descended, and hence that (slope) of the northern mountain is called ‘Alarm’s descent.’ The flood then swept away all these creatures, and Manu alone remained here.

1:8:1:7. Being desirous of offspring, he engaged in worshiping and austerities. During this time he also performed a pâka-sacrifice: he offered up in the waters clarified butter, sour milk, whey, and curds. Thence a woman was produced in a year: becoming quite solid she rose; clarified butter gathered in her footprint. Mitra and Varuna met her.

1:8:1:8. They said to her, ‘Who art thou?’ ‘Manu’s daughter,’ she replied. ‘Say (thou art) ours,’ they said. ‘No,’ she said, ‘I am (the daughter) of him who begat me.’ They desired to have a share in her. She either agreed or did not agree, but passed by them. {This is the story of Eshterah-Naamah, the latter-day wife or consort of Noah-Manu, and the prediluvian fallen angels, so here clearly the daughter of Manu is Eshterah = Ishtar, Astlik, the “Star.” (See further §346, above, >>.)} She came to Manu.

1:8:1:9. Manu said to her, ‘Who art thou?’ ‘Thy daughter,’ she replied. ‘How, illustrious one, (art thou) my daughter?’ he asked. She replied, ‘Those offerings (of) clarified butter, sour milk, whey, and curds, which thou madest in the waters, with them thou hast begotten me. I am the blessing (benediction): make use of me at the sacrifice! If thou wilt make use of me at the sacrifice, thou wilt become rich in offspring and cattle. Whatever blessing thou shalt invoke through me, all that shall be granted to thee!’ He accordingly made use of her (as the benediction) in the middle of the sacrifice; for what is intermediate between the fore-offerings and the after-offerings, is the middle of the sacrifice.

1:8:1:10. With her he went on worshiping and performing austerities, wishing for offspring. Through her he generated this race, which is this race of Manu; and whatever blessing he invoked through her, all that was granted to him.”

680.3. A similar account is recorded in the Mahabharata (Vana-parva, vv. 12746—12802, trans. Roy, Mahabharata, Vana Parva, Calcutta, 1884, section CLXXXVII, p. 552ff.): “Markandeya replied,—‘O king, O foremost of men, there, was a powerful and great Rishi, of the name of Manu. He was the son of Vivaswan and was equal unto Brahma in glory. And he far excelled his father and grand-father in strength, in power, in fortune, as also in religious austerities. And standing on one leg and with uplifted hand, that lord of men did severe penance in the jujube forest called Visala. And there with head downwards, and with steadfast eye, he practiced this rigid and severe penance for ten thousand years. And one day, whilst he was practicing austerities there with wet clothes on, and matted hair on head, a fish approaching the banks of the Chirini, addressed him thus : — Worshipful sir, I am a helpless little fish, I am afraid of the large ones; therefore, do thou, O great devotee, think it worth thy while to protect me from them; especially, as this fixed custom is well established amongst us, that the strong fish always prey upon the weak ones. Therefore, do thou think it fit to save me from being drowned in this sea of terrors! I shall requite thee for thy good offices. — On hearing these words from the fish, the Vaivaswata Manu was overpowered with pity, and he took out the fish from the water with his own hands. And the fish which had a body glistening like the rays of the moon when taken out of the water, was put back in an earthen water-vessel. And thus reared, that fish, O king, grew up in size, and Manu tended it carefully like a child. And after a long while, it became so large in size, that there was no room for it in that vessel. And then seeing Manu (one day), it again addressed these words to him; — Worshipful sir, do thou appoint some better habitation for me. — And then the adorable Manu, the conqueror of hostile cities, took it out of that vessel and carried it to a large tank and placed it there. And there again the fish grew for many a long year. And although the tank was two Yojanas in length and one Yojana in width, even there, O lotus-eyed son of Kunti and ruler of men, was no room for the fish to play about! And beholding Manu, it said again,— O pious and adorable father, take me to the Ganga, the favorite spouse of the Ocean, so that I may live there; or, do as thou listest, O sinless one, as I have grown to this great bulk, by thy favor, I shall do thy bidding cheerfully. — Thus asked, the upright and continent, and worshipful Manu took the fish to the river Ganga, and he put it into the river with his own hands. And there, O conqueror of thy enemies, the fish again grew for some little time, and then beholding Manu, it said again, — O lord, I am unable to move about in the Ganga on account of my great body; therefore, worshipful sir, do thou please take me quickly to the sea — O Son of Pritha. Manu then taking it out of the Ganga, carried it to the sea and consigned it there. And despite its great bulk, Manu transported it easily and its touch and smell were also pleasant to him. And when it was thrown into the sea by Manu, it said these words to him with a smile: — O adorable being, thou hast protected me with special care; do thou now listen to me as to what thou shouldst do in the fullness of time! O fortunate and worshipful sir, the dissolution of all this mobile and immobile world is nigh at hand. The time for the purging of this world is now ripe. Therefore, do I now explain what is well for thee! The mobile and the immobile divisions of the creation, those that have the power of locomotion, and those that have it not, of all these the terrible doom hath now approached. Thou shalt build a strong and massive ark and have it furnished with a long rope. On that must thou ascend, O great Muni, with the seven Rishis and take with thee all the different seeds which were enumerated by regenerate Brahmanas in days of yore, and separately and carefully must thou preserve them therein. And whilst there, O beloved of the Munis, thou shalt wait for me, and I shall appear to thee like a horned animal, and thus, O ascetic, shalt thou recognize me! And I shall now depart, and thou shalt act according to my instructions, for, without my assistance, thou canst not save thyself from that fearful flood. — Then Manu said unto the fish, — I do not doubt all that thou hast said, O great one! Even so shall I act! — And giving instructions to each other, they both went away. And Manu, then, O great and powerful king and conqueror of thy enemies, procured all the different seeds, as directed by the fish, and set sail in an excellent vessel on the surging sea. And then, O lord of the earth, he bethought himself of that fish. And the fish too, O conqueror of thy enemies and foremost scion of Bharata’s race, knowing his mind, appeared there with horns on its head. And then, O tiger among men, beholding in the ocean that horned fish, emerging like a rock, in the form of which he had been before apprised, he lowered the ropy noose on its head. And fastened by the noose, the fish, O king and conqueror of hostile cities, towed the ark with great force through the salt waters. And it conveyed them in that vessel on the roaring and billow-beaten sea. And, O conqueror of thy enemies and hostile cities, tossed by the tempest on the great ocean, the vessel reeled about like a drunken harlot. And neither land, nor the four cardinal points of the compass, could be distinguished. And there was water everywhere, and the waters covered the heaven and the firmament also. And, O bull of Bharata’s race, when the world was thus flooded, none but Manu, the seven Rishis, and the fish, could be seen. And, O king, the fish diligently dragged the boat through the flood for many a long year. And then, O descendant of Kuru and ornament of Bharata’s race, it towed the vessel towards the highest peak of the Himavat. And, O Bharat, the fish then told those on the vessel to tie it to that peak of the Himavat. And hearing the words of the fish, they immediately tied the boat on that peak of the mountain. And, O son of Kunti and ornament of Bharata’s race, know that that high peak of the Himavat is still called by the name of Naubandhana (the harbor). Then the fish addressing the associated Rishis, told them these words: — I am Brahma, the Lord of all creatures; there is none greater than myself. Assuming the shape of a fish, I have saved you from this cataclysm. Manu will create (again) all beings, — gods, Asuras, and men, and all those divisions of creation which have the power of locomotion and which have it not. By practicing severe austerities, he will acquire this power, and with my blessing, illusion will have no power over him.— So saying, the fish vanished instantly. And the Vaivaswata Manu himself became desirous of creating the world. In this work of creation, illusion overtook him and he therefore practiced great asceticism. And endowed with ascetic merit, Manu, O ornament of Bharata’s race, again set about his work of creating all beings, in proper and exact order. This story which I have narrated to thee and the hearing of which destroyeth all sin, is celebrated as the Legend of the Fish. And the man who listeneth every day to this primeval history of Manu, attaineth happiness and all other objects of desire, and goeth to heaven.”

680.4. The story in the Mahabharata includes some details which do not occur in the version given in the Satapatha Brahmana. These details are: 1st. That Manu was accompanied by the seven rishis, who made up with himself eight persons, — the same number as Noah, with his wife, and his three sons and their three wives. 2nd. That Manu took with him all the seeds, just as Noah is said to have taken pairs of different animals, comprising the “seed” of all living, with him into the ark. Similar phraseology relating to the seed of all living occurs in the Mesopotamian flood legend. In another respect, viz., in describing Manu as having offered sacrifice immediately after his deliverance from the deluge, the Brahmana coincides more nearly than the Mahabharata with Genesis 8. 20 and the Mesopotamian accounts; where Noah (Naggu-napishti, Ziusudra) is also represented as having offered burnt offerings. The only feature of the story in the Mahabharata, which answers at all to the sacrifice, is the austerity which Manu is said to have performed before he began to create. The Satapatha Brahmana, on the other hand, includes references missing in the Mahabharata to Manu’s daughter-cum-wife, who corresponds to the Naamah (Eshterah) of post-Biblical tradition and the Astlik (“Star”), daughter of Noah, of the Syriac and Armenian sources, that is, to the concubine of Noah identified with the planet-goddess Venus. She is approached by Mitra and Varuna, who are doubles of the Ashvins (Gemini), representing the Nephilim of Genesis, here in a post-diluvian context. (See further §346, above, >>. On Shemyaza [= Uzza, Mars, one of a pair, that is, dual forms of the god of the underworld] as consort of the wife of Ham [= Balthi, the consort and daughter of Noah = daughter of Manu] and the post-diluvian nephilim, in connection with Sandiman/Sam Nariman in Kashmir and the Punjab, §677.13.2ff., above, >>, with cross-references.)

680.4.1. A variation on the identical theme is the myth in which the Ashvin (Gemini) twins themselves attempt to seduce Sukanya, the grand-daughter of Manu. Sukanya means “sweet (su-) virgin (kanya)” and the latter element of her name, Kanya, is also the name of the Zodiacal sign Virgo. Sukanya is the Hindu equivalent of Virgo, Balthi, and Ishtar. Amongst the chief sources are Satapatha Brahmana IV. 1-5. 1-13, Mahabharata Vana Parva, Ch. 122-5, and Bhagavata Purana, Ch. 3. The story runs as follows. Chyavana was an asura (demon) sage. Chyavana means “fallen one” or, more particularly, “one who has fallen from the divine to the human sphere,” otherwise “one who has fallen from the womb,” an “abortion.” This nicely translates the Hebrew nephel, which similarly means “abortion, that which has fallen from the womb,” and is also the singular or eponymus of the nephilim, those who had “fallen from heaven to earth.” Chyavana was a son of the great teacher and priest of the demons, Bhrigu (“blazing fire”). He was wedded to Manu’s daughter (Arushi, “fury”) and Manu’s grand-daughter (Sukanya, “sweet [su] virgin [kanya]”). By Arushi he was the father of Aurva, the ancestor of Parashurama. Chyavana was a great magician like his father, but he had grown old and decrepit. He became so absorbed in religious austerities that he was reduced to the shape of an ant-hill, covered with ants, only his eyes showing through two tiny holes like lighted embers. Sukanya, the daughter of Manu’s son Sharyati (“he of the night”), noticing the odd-looking mound with its two glowing lights, poked the latter with a thorn. This, of course, caused Chyavana terrible pain and blinded him. As a result of the sage’s injury a curse fell on the troops of Sharyati who henceforth were unable to evacuate their bowels. Discovering the reason for their distress, Sharyati offered Chyavana his beautiful daughter Sukanya to make recompense for the harm she had done him. The deal was done and she lived chastely with the sage thereafter. The Ashvins, the Divine Gemini Twins, one day arrived at the sage’s ashram and spotted his handsome bride. They burned with lust for her but were rebuffed. Admiring Sukanya’s chastity, they promised to restore the youth of her husband. They entered with him into a pool and Chyavana came up looking exactly like the youthful Ashvins. Sukanya now had to select her husband from among the identical youths. She suspected it was all a magic trick of the Ashvins, who hoped to win her as their bride, but yet was able, by the wisdom granted her from above, to discern her true husband. Chyavana was cured accordingly of both his old age and blindness. The sage was grateful to the Ashvins, who had proved in the event their prowess as physicians to the gods. Now Indra had banned the Ashvins from partaking of soma, the celestial elixir of immortality, placing them in an intermediate position between the immortal gods and mortal men. Chyavana in gratitude promised he would help them get soma, even if it meant opposing Indra, king of the gods. The restored sage organized a soma sacrifice, and invited all the devas to it, including the Ashvins. Indra was furious to see the Ashvins at the sacrificial feast and ordered them to leave. Consequently, Chyavana started a fight with Indra using his magical powers. He made a demon called Mada (“intoxication”) out of the sacrificial fire and sent it to kill Indra. Indra attempted to use his vajra or war disc, to retaliate, but found all his limbs frozen. He prayed to his guru Brihaspati (the god of the planet Jupiter), and Brihaspati advised him to give up and apologize to Chyavana. Chyavana accepted Indra’s apology, but then Indra used that moment of truce to tear the demon into four pieces. These four pieces became the game of dice, hunting, wine, and women. And all still have magical power over men.

680.4.2. Various elements of the nephilim tradition are here combined in one. The Gemini twins, the Ashvins, are represented secondarily by the ahura sage, and indistinguishable Ashvin look-alike, Chyavana; otherwise Enosh (Gemini) is “nephel” the eponymus of the anshe-ha-Shem, or nephilim. The two eyes of Chyavana are the two principal stars (alpha and beta) of Gemini. The demons associated with the nephilim are those of “intoxication” (mada), wine, women, gaming, and worldly pursuits. The post-diluvian nephilim are pictured here to have originated from the intermarriage of the representative “nephel” Chyavana with the female offspring of Manu, Sukanya, “Virgo” (the female offspring and concubine of Noah, and subsequently wife of Ham, viz. Eshterah, Ishtar, Balthi, “Virgo”). Sukanya is the daughter of Sharyati, “Night,” son of the flood-hero Manu, and “night” or “darkness” is the cosmic element which represents Ham, the “Dark One,” the son of the Biblical flood-hero Noah. (§129, above, >>.) By this process the “old” nephilim of the pre-diluvian world are conceived to have been “reborn” in the nephilim of the post-diluvian world (Chyavana’s youth restored by immersion in the pool = flood). The nephilim historically re-emerged in the Anakites and other giants of the line of Canaan son of Ham. Then follows the post-diluvian battle of the “gods” (of Erech-Uruk), represented in this story by Indra, with the nephilim (of Salem-Kish), represented by Chyavana’s demon Mada. The latter is defeated by the former and dismembered. In Mesopotamia the defeated god is Enmesharra or Nergal, the god seen in duplicate in the stars of Gemini, otherwise Asakku and Kingu, representing the First Dynasty of Kish, who is defeated by the Jupiter-like god Ninurta, Marduk etc., representing the First Dynasty of Uruk.

680.5. The relationship of Ila/Ida as daughter and wife to Manu is explained by the ancient Indo-Aryan tradition transmitted to modern times, in the account infra, through Zoroastrian sources. The following passage relating to comments found in the Zoroastrian Dinkard give an overview of the process. Spendarmat (Spenta Armaiti), the spirit of the Earth, corresponds precisely in this tradition to the Hindu Ila/Ida:

“One of these obscure passages constitutes the 80th Chapter in the 3rd Book of the Dinkard. It is very extensive, and contains a long controversy between a Zoroastrian and a Jew, concerning the propriety or impropriety of the doctrine of the Avesta as regards the creation of mankind, the different uses of the term Khvetuk-dasih …. the term Khvetuk-dasih is technically applied in this passage to supernatural unions, what are called the Khvetuk-dasih between the father and the daughter, the son and the mother, the brother and the sister.— We know that in the Avesta, Spenta Armaiti, Pahl. Spendarmat, is the female archangel, and as Ahura Mazda is called the Creator and Father of all archangels, Spendarmat is, therefore, called his daughter. Now, Spendarmat is believed to be the angel of the earth, and since from the earth God has created the first human being, Spendarmat in the later Pahlavi writings is alleged to have been spiritually associated with the Creator for such a mighty procreation as that of Gayomard, the first man according to Iranian cosmogony. Thus this supposed supernatural union passed into an ideal conception, and technically denoted what is called the Khvetuk-dasih between the father and the daughter. Again, it is said that the seed of Gayomard fell into the mother-earth by whom he was begotten. So Mashih and Mashyanih were called the offspring of that union between Gayomard and Spendarmat, or of the Khvetuk-dasih between the son and the mother; and since the first human pair was formed of brother and sister, viz., Mashih and Mashyanih, their union, which was an act in consonance with the Divine Will, came to denote “the Khvetuk-dasih between the brother and the sister.” This idea of Khvetuk-dasih, it must be remembered, is a later development of the abstract and religious notion of a direct spiritual alliance with the Deity or self-devotion. The term was afterwards applied to the unions of the first progenitors of mankind, which were believed to have been brought about by the operation of the Creator Himself. In creating Man endowed with the knowledge of His Will, it was the Creator’s design to raise up an opposition against the morally evil influence of Ahriman on earth. Accordingly, wherever the Khvetuk-dasih between the father and the daughter, the son and the mother, the brother and the sister, are referred to in the later Pahlavi writings, they do not imply any commendation of such unions among ordinary men, but only among the first human beings to whom they were naturally confined, to produce an uniform and pure race of mankind without any promiscuous blending with irrational creatures or animals. What are called the Khvetuk-dasih between the father and the daughter, the son and the mother, the brother and the sister, are, therefore, expressly the supernatural association between Ahura Mazda and Spendarmat, between Gayomard and Spendarmat, and the union between Mashih and Mashydni

…. I may, therefore, be allowed to put forward in this place my own interpretation of these paras, to show that it is not next-of-kin marriages that they in any way recommend, but only moral or social union in a tribe, race, family, or near relations ….

…. What follows describes the application of the term to the three kinds of supernatural unions which were necessary for the procreation of a kindred human pair in this world. The passage says: “There were three kinds of hampatvandih ‘co-relation,’ for example, between the father (the Deity) and the daughter (Spendarmat), between the son (Gayomard) and the mother (Spendarmat), between the brother (Mashih) and the sister (Mashyanih). These I regard as the most primitive on the basis of an obscure exposition by a high-priest of the good religion.” What follows is again a clear explanation regarding the propriety of such unions in the creation of mankind ….”

681. The traditional genealogies trace the Pandavas through twenty-eight or twenty-nine generations from Ikshvaku son of Manu (Noah) — eleven or twelve generations from Ikshvaku to Bharata (Ramayana), and seventeen from Bharata to the Pandavas (Ferishta). These can be compared to the Biblical genealogies which trace David through fourteen generations from Abraham (Matthew 1. 17), and Abraham through ten generations from Shem son of Noah (Genesis 11. 10-26), twenty-three in all. Allowing an extra five or six generations to cover the two hundred years or thereabouts which intervened between David and Zoroaster, the disciple of Jonah and preceptor of Vyasa (the latter being contemporary with the Pandavas of the era of the Mahabharata War), there is general agreement between the Biblical and Hindu chronologies.

682. The war described in the Mahabharata took place c. 900-800 BC in the “Hindu Heroic Age.” This was the era of Krishna Vasudeva of the Lunar line (the charioteer of Arjuna son of Pandu). Contemporary with Rama, the hero of the Ramayana, was Parashurama whose story appears in the Majmal (Parashurama = “Brahmin”). His reign, dated c. 700 BC, marked the rise of the Brahmin caste to supremacy over the Warrior caste: Parashurama was the champion of the Brahmins in that struggle. Both Parashurama and Rama are commonly believed to be, like Krishna, avataras of Vishnu. The sage Kashyapa lived in that same period (and features similarly in the Majmal in the story of Brahmin). He was one of the most important Buddhas preceding Gautama, and has been thought to be the Buddha (“Fo”) referred to in Chinese and Tibetan Buddhism, whose birth is fixed at various dates between c. 1100 BC and 600 BC. These dates correspond to the extraordinarily lengthened period to which the “immortal” Parashurama, the contemporary of Kashyapa, is dated in the native Hindu tradition, and implies Kashyapa has been involved in the identical chronological confusion. The whole history of the fourth century sage Shakyamuni (Scythianus) is transposed to that era in one stream of Buddhist chronology. Buddhist traditions in China (sources in Zürcher, Buddhist Conquest of China, 3rd ed., 2007, p. 288ff., esp. 311ff.) record that Kong-zi (Confucius) was the spirit-being Sumedha (Manava) who is said to have been reborn as Buddha Shakya Muni. In this same strand of tradition Lao-zi is said to have been Buddha himself, or otherwise Mahakashyapa, chief disciple of Shakya Muni. Kong-zi’s compatriot Lao-zi, the supreme exponent of Daoism, having migrated towards the end of his life to India, enrolled as the disciple of Shakya Muni (Hegemonius’ Scythianus, dateable to the end of the 4th century BC). Both he and his master Shakya Muni were known as Buddha, though originally only the disciple (Lao-zi) bore that title. Lao-zi, Buddha, taught that Kong-zi (Sumedha) had been reborn in a later incarnation as Shakya Muni, which probably was a way of reconciling the traditional doctrines Lao-zi had absorbed in his homeland from Kong-zi with the new doctrines he had learned from Shakya Muni.

Sumedha is said to have been informed in a prior existence by the Buddha Dipankara, otherwise by Buddha Kashyapa, that he was to be born as Shakya Muni. Dipankara in Tibetan Buddhism is a form of the deity Manjushri. The same Manjushri is the Buddha of the Past in the triad of Past, Present and Future Buddhas, the latter two being Shakya Muni and Metreiya respectively. Alternatively Kashyapa features as the Buddha of the Past, being the sixth Buddha, the immediate predecessor of Shakya Muni, the seventh Buddha, in the standard list. Manjushri is said to have dried up the flood-waters of Nepal, which had turned the region into one great lake, and thus to have made it habitable. The identical feat is credited to Shakya Muni in Buddhist tradition in Khotan, and in Muslim tradition to Solomon (Solomon here = Salem/Salah and the Iranian flood-hero Jamshid) in Kashmir, or otherwise to the dev Kashyapa or Kasheb, the eponymus of Kashmir, who was sent by Solomon, the master of devs, to accomplish the task. Otherwise Kashyapa is represented to be the grandson of Kasheb. Here Kashyapa and Manjushri have equivalent roles as flood heroes, as they do as the Buddha of the Past in the Buddhist triad. Manjushri (the Buddha Dipankara) might thus be dated to c. 1100-1000 BC. This is the date most commonly given for the era of Fo, the Chinese Buddha. The historical figure referred to here, as well as in the mystic birth-stories of Shakya Muni (viz. the Buddha of the Past, identified with the spirit-beings Manjushri and Dipankara) was doubtless the Hindu Kashyapa, the contemporary of Parashurama, c. 700 BC and the “grandson” of Kasheb c. 1100-1000 BC. The eponymus Kasheb/Kashyapa appears to have been applied to various figures between c. 1100 BC and c. 700 BC. The legend that Kong-zi (Confucius) looked to a great teacher in the West is probably a reflex of this tradition. The connection is reflected in the birth-stories of Buddha, in which Sumedha (Kong-zi) succeeds to Kashyapa (otherwise Dipankara, Manjushri).

In Hinduism the last incarnation of Vishnu as Buddha is dated rather vaguely to the “beginning” or “first quarter” of the Kali Yuga, which comprises no less than 432,000 years, and is commonly thought to have commenced c. 3100 BC, so the historical date would be covered in the immense period of time denoted by the fraction. The lack of clarity in the traditional chronologies because of the fluidity associated with the theory of avatars led to dislocations such as the one favored by “story-tellers and fabulists,” according to Ferishta’s Introduction, whereby Bharata the descendant of Manu Vaivasvata was dated to the Yuga preceding the Kali Yuga, and therefore prior to c. 3100 BC. A similar process, no doubt, explains the introductory passage in the Majmal which describes Dhrita and Pan as having been born to Ham at the “moment of his death” (Ham being dateable c. 3100 BC according to the chronology of the Septuagint), and the retrojection of the Mahabharata war to that same era. The result generally has been a loss of connection between tradition and history which is lifted somewhat by reference to the scheme preserved in the king-list of Ferishta and less consecutively in the Majmal.

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