Aryan of Persia. [Barbier]
1800 BCE Height of Old Babylonian Empire. About this time, the Aryans of the Eran/Iranian plateau become three distinct groups. One group moves on the Indus Valley and one group migrates to the Zargros Mountains. Those that remain on the plateau are the tribes of Medes and Persians. The latter eventually come to dominate and follow the great prophet Zoroaster. [176]
ZOROASTER as the first in a line of succession, this Zoroaster establishes a religion named after him and based on ‘Fire Worship’. Zoroaster created the writings known as the Gathas, which will become the only surviving literature of the ancient Persians. Eventually the Gathas will be incorporated in the Zend Avesta or Persian Holy Scripture. The writings nominate good and bad as the two primal spirits or cosmic forces, who reveal themselves in vision as the Twins. The Zend Avesta that has come down to us is thought to be only a breviary of the original work of prayers and litanies of the Parsees [Persians] The work contains fragments of the original wisdom of Zeradosht, the original Zoroaster probably dating from 6000 BCE. The primitive Avesta was divided into 21 parts called ‘Nosk’ recording the details of nature, much like the Vedas of the Hindus. Part of the Avesta treats of the origin of Beings and the birth of the Universe. The origins of the Zend wisdom are thought to be Chaldean. The undeciphered inscriptions of Persepolis [Isthakr] are of the same tongue as the original sacred books of the Zend. Zend in turn is a dialect of Sanskrit. (300)
Double headed column capital from Persepolis. [Barbier]
The branch of the Aryans moving to settle in the Punjub (upper valley of the Indus River of India) met with the resident occupants who are dark-skinned people known as the Dravidians. The Dravidians have an advanced culture and are possibly related to the Chaldeans of Mesopotamia. Also present in the Punjub area are wilder tribes speaking Munda idioms and having affinity with the Negroids of Indo-China and Australia. These three groups of people, the Aryans, Dravidians and Munda, eventually will become intermixed, with the addition at some point of the Mongolian ethnic group.
The original inhabitants of India were matriarchal (as for most earlier races). The Aryan/Iranian impose their male dominated caste system on the other inhabitants as Sun worship over comes Moon worship. History and mythology of the Aryans is known through the Vedic and Brahmanic philosophical literature of ancient India. (40)
Zurvan, god of time gives birth to Light and Dark. [Larousse]
c1800 This time is also the start of the Second Intermediate Period in the land of Egypt. Dynasties 13-17 between the ‘Middle Kingdom’ and the ‘New Kingdom’, is a period when decadence and disorganization reign as the invasion of the Hyksos, Semitic nomads, takes place. However, these nomads will adopt Egyptian customs and artistic-religious ideas.
The Middle Minoan Period of Crete civilization also gets underway as well as the early Mycenaean period on the Greek mainland. This is the Heroic age of Troy and the Mystery Religions of Greece where at Eleusis (west of Athens) the Pan-Hellenic sanctuary of Demeter and Kore/Persephone is established for the performance of the Eleusinian mysteries. The Temple of initiation, the Telesterion, could seat 3,000. From 6thcentury BCE Eleusis will be dominated by Athens and the ‘Sacred Way’ connect Athens to Eleusis.
Gods and Heroes of Asia Minor
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