, and Khordah-Avesta.

[Illustration]

With the growth of our knowledge of the language of the sacred texts, we
have now a clear idea also of the history of Zoroastrian literature and
of the changes and chances through which with varying fortunes the
scriptures have passed. The original Zoroastrian Avesta, according to
tradition, was in itself a literature of vast dimensions. Pliny, in his
'Natural History,' speaks of two million verses of Zoroaster; to which
may be added the Persian assertion that the original copy of the
scriptures was written upon twelve thousand parchments, with gold
illuminated letters, and was deposited in the library at Persepolis. But
what was the fate of this archetype? Parsi tradition has an answer.
Alexander the Great--"the accursed Iskander," as he is called--is
responsible for its destruction. At the request of the beautiful Thais,
as the story goes, he allowed the palace of Persepolis to be burned, and
the precious treasure perished in the flames. Whatever view we may take
of the different sides of this story, one thing cannot be denied: the
invasion of Alexander and the subjugation of Iran was indirectly or
directly the cause of a certain religious decadence which followed upon
the disruption of the Persian Empire, and was answerable for the fact
that a great part of the scriptures was forgotten or fell into disuse.
Persian tradition lays at the doors of the Greeks the loss of another
copy of the original ancient texts, but does not explain in what manner
this happened; nor has it any account to give of copies of the prophet's
works which Semitic writers say were translated into nearly a dozen
different languages. One of these versions was perhaps Greek, for it is
generally acknowledged that in the fourth century B.C. the philosopher
Theopompus spent much time in giving in his own tongue the contents of
the sacred Magian books.

Tradition is unanimous on one point at least: it is that the original
Avesta comprised twenty-one _Nasks_, or books, a statement which there
is no good reason to doubt. The same tradition which was acquainted with
the general character of these Nasks professes also to tell exactly how
many of them survived the inroad of Alexander; for although the sacred
text itself was destroyed, its contents were lost only in part, the
priests preserving large portions of the precious scriptures. These met
with many vicissitudes in the five centuries that intervened between th