ng an untruth since the fire of the Magians was
extinguished in all their temples when God sent Muhammad down as his
apostle as we shall describe, God willing, in the sequel, as well as the
appearance of Zaradusht after thirty years of the reign of Bishtasb. And
Zaradusht brought a writing which is alleged to be revelation from God
and is inscribed on 12,000 cow hides inlaid with gold. Bishtasb
deposited them in a place in Istakhar and forbade the teaching of thorn
to the vulgar.

MASUDI.

_Kitab-at-tanbih._

[Sidenote: The Kohan Nameh and the Ain Nameh.]

The Persians have a book called the _Kohan Nameh_ in which are mentioned
all the officers of the Persian monarch amounting to 600 and classed
according to their respective ranks. This book formed part of the _Ain
Nameh._[1] The meaning of Ain Nameh is the 'Book of regulations'. It is
a book containing several thousands of leaves and no one can find a copy
of it anywhere except among the _mobeds_ and others invested with
authority. The mobed of the Persians at the moment of writing this
history, that is in the year 364, for the country of Jabal in Iraq and
for the countries of Ajam, is Ammad son of Ashwahisht. Before him these
countries had for their mobed Isfandiyar, son of Adarbad, son of Anmid,
who was killed by Radi at Baghdad in 325.

[Footnote 1: A remarkable passage from this Pahlavi treatise has been
embodied in a close Arabic version in Ibn Kutayha's _Uyun-al-Akhbar._
The credit of discovering and translating this unique passage into a
European language belongs to M.K. Inostranzev.]

I have seen in the city of Istakhar in Fars in the year 303 in the
house of a high noble Persian, a large book in which were set out along
with the descriptions of several sciences the histories of the
kings of Persia, their reigns and the monuments which they had
erected,--fragments which I have not been able to find anywhere else in
Persian books, neither in the _Khoday Nameh_, nor in the _Ain Nameh_ nor
in the _Kohan Nameh_ or anywhere else.

[Sidenote: Portrait of Sasanian kings taken just before their demise.]

[Sidenote: Persian Imperial archives: Translation into Arabic.]

In this book were pictures of the kings of Persia belonging to the house
of Sasan, twenty seven in number, twenty five men and two women. Each of
them was represented as at the moment of death, whether old or young
with the royal ornaments, with the tiara, hair, beard, and all the
features of