ey do not account it lawful
to erect, nay they even charge with folly those who do these things; and
this, as it seems to me, because they do not account the gods to be in
the likeness of men, as do the Hellenes. But it is their wont to perform
sacrifices to Zeus going up to the most lofty of the mountains, and the
whole circle of the heavens they call Zeus: and they sacrifice to the
Sun and the Moon and the Earth, to Fire and to Water and to the Winds:
these are the only gods to whom they have sacrificed ever from the
first; but they have learnt also to sacrifice to Aphrodite Urania,
having learnt it both from the Assyrians and the Arabians; and the
Assyrians call Aphrodite Mylitta, the Arabians Alitta, 13601 and the
Persians Mitra.

132. Now this is the manner of sacrifice for the gods aforesaid which
is established among the Persians:--they make no altars neither do they
kindle fire; and when they mean to sacrifice they use no libation nor
music of the pipe nor chaplets 137 nor meal for sprinkling; 138 but when
a man wishes to sacrifice to any one of the gods, he leads the animal
for sacrifice to an unpolluted place and calls upon the god, having
his tiara 13801 wreathed round generally with a branch of myrtle. For
himself alone separately the man who sacrifices may not request good
things in his prayer, but he prays that it may be well with all the
Persians and with the king; for he himself also is included of course
in the whole body of Persians. And when he has cut up the victim into
pieces and boiled the flesh, he spreads a layer of the freshest grass
and especially clover, upon which he places forthwith all the pieces of
flesh; and when he has placed them in order, a Magian man stands by them
and chants over them a theogony (for of this nature they say that their
incantation is), seeing that without a Magian it is not lawful for
them to make sacrifices. Then after waiting a short time the sacrificer
carries away the flesh and uses it for whatever purpose he pleases.

133. And of all days their wont is to honour most that on which they
were born, each one: on this they think it right to set out a feast more
liberal than on other days; and in this feast the wealthier of them set
upon the table an ox or a horse or a camel or an ass, roasted whole in
an oven, and the poor among them set out small animals in the same way.
They have few solid dishes, 139 but many served up after as dessert, and
these not in a single