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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 March 2011
The question of the age of the Avesta is one of those problems the solution of which will have the most important bearing on the history of the religions and civilizations of the East. It is not surprising, then, that it has occupied the attention of so many scholars, nor need we wonder that the results they have arrived at have been so various. From the time of Burnouf, who was the first to attack the problem with a scientific method, up to our own days, our knowledge on the point has passed through several stages. The founder of Iranian research came to the conclusion that the date of the Zoroastrian reform should be placed before B.C. 2900. On the other hand, the leading Iranian scholars of our own day, men like Spiegel, Darmesteter and Wilhelm, believe, as I do, that the Avesta, at least, is of comparatively recent date. It is therefore not a little surprising to see M. Q-eiger, the author of many learned works, returning to the former view on this matter in an essay which he presented, last year, to the Royal Academy of Münster.
page 340 note 1 Avesta, livre sacré du Zoroastrisme, traduit du texte Zend, deuxième édition. Paris, 1881. 4to.Google ScholarIntroduction à l'étude de l'Avesta et de la religion Mazdéenne, 1881—being tie introduction to the translation. I may note here that the second edition of the translation differs considerably from the first, and the introduction prefixed to it is a distinctly new work.
page 340 note 2 De l'exégèse et de la correction des Textes Avestiques, pp. 79–107. Leipzig, Gerhard, W., 1883.Google Scholar
page 341 note 1 Cf. Haug's, argument on these words—Essays, p. 239.Google Scholar
page 348 note 1 See the Muséon, 1885, Inscription at Hamadan.
page 350 note 1 Art. on the Languages of Persia, by ProfGeldner, K.,—Encyc. Brit. 9th edition, vol. xviii. pp. 653–655.Google Scholar
page 350 note 2 He still uses the word, while admitting the force of the objections to it.
page 351 note 1 Journal Asiatique, 1877, No. 3, p. 319seq.Google Scholar