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

CHAP, III.] THE AVESTA LANGUAGE. 155

and Pouruchisti; and from the Pehlevi works that he had three sons—Isadvastara, Urvatatnara, and Havarechithra, We will now speak of the language in which the great Prophet wrote. The Avesta laneuage belongs to the Iranian branch of the Aryan stock. Dr. Haug divides the Iranian branch into two classes—Ist, the East Ivanian or Bactrian branch; and 2d, the West Iranian, or the languages of Media and the adjoining countries.

The Avesta language belongs, as stated, to the former branch. Of the Parsi Scriptures which are now extant, a portion, and that the more important, is written in the Gatha dialect of the Avesta language. The five Gathas (chapters xxvii. to liv. of Yasna), known as the writings of the great Prophet himself, and various other pieces, here and there, are composed in this dialect. The rest is written in the ordinary Avesta language.

According to Dr. Haug, both these dialects—the Gatha and the ordinary Avesta dialect—represent the same Avesta language at two different periods of time. The Gatha dialect, from its more ancient and fuller grammatical forms, as well as from its more primitive state, appears to be older than the ordinary Avesta language by about two or three centuries. The difference between these two dialects is the same as that between Vedic Sanscrit and the ordinary classical Sanscrit.