History of the Parsis : including their manners, customs, religion and present position : with coloured and other illustrations : in two volumes

CHAP. Il.] THE MEANING OF ZOROASTER. 149

the inscriptions of Cyrus and Darius B.c. 559-521) was what is now known as the Cuneiform tongue, while the writings of Zoroaster are in the Avesta language. The latter has been ascertained to be the parent language from which the former descended. Thus in about B.c. 559, when we come in contact with the Cuneiform inscriptions, Avesta had already become a dead language, and had been succeeded as the spoken dialect by another descended from it—viz. the Cuneiform. To effect such a vast change as that of converting a vernacular into a classical language and bringing out of it, in the slow process of formation, a new dialect, a very long period of time must have necessarily elapsed, and it cannot be computed at less than a thousand years. Consequently this long period must have separated the age of Zoroaster from the times of the Achzemenian monarchs.

Various meanings have been suggested for the name Zoroaster. Professors Burnouf and Lassen and Drs. Windischmann, Miiller, and Haug have all attempted to attribute to it a different signification. Dr. Haug himself has suggested not fewer than three. Of all these several meanings, Mr. Kharshedji Kama, the Parsi scholar, has adopted the first that was suggested by Dr. Haug, but which was subsequently withdrawn by him, viz. that of “old camel-keeper,”

from Zend zarath, Sanscrit zaradh, meaning “old,” and