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Avestan (/ ə ˈ v ɛ s t ən / ə-VESS-tən) [1] is the liturgical language of Zoroastrianism. [2] It belongs to the Iranian branch of the Indo-European language family and was originally spoken during the Old Iranian period (c. 1500 – 400 BCE) [3] [f 1] by the Iranians living in the eastern portion of Greater Iran.
Avestan o is a special form of Pahlavi l that exists only in Aramaic signs. Some letters (e.g. ŋ́, ṇ, ẏ, v), are free inventions. [4] Avestan script, like Pahlavi script and Aramaic script also, is written from right to left. In Avestan script, letters are not connected, and ligatures are "rare and clearly of secondary origin". [3]
The Avesta (/ ə ˈ v ɛ s t ə /) is the primary collection of religious literature of Zoroastrianism, [1] in which all texts are composed in the Avestan language and are written in the Avestan alphabet. [2]
In the late 11th or early 12th century, Indian Zoroastrians (the Parsis) began translating Avestan or Middle Persian texts into Sanskrit and Gujarati. Some Middle Persian texts were also transcribed into the Avestan alphabet. The latter process, being a form of interpretation, was known as 'pa-zand'.
Middle Persian, also known by its endonym Pārsīk or Pārsīg (Inscriptional Pahlavi script: 𐭯𐭠𐭫𐭮𐭩𐭪, Manichaean script: 𐫛𐫀𐫡𐫘𐫏𐫐 , Avestan script: 𐬞𐬀𐬭𐬯𐬍𐬐) in its later form, [1] [2] is a Western Middle Iranian language which became the literary language of the Sasanian Empire.
These Avestan language exegeses sometimes accompany the original text being commented upon, but are more often elsewhere in the canon. An example of exegesis in the Avestan language itself includes Yasna 19–21, which is a set of three Younger Avestan commentaries on the three Gathic Avestan 'high prayers' of Yasna 27.
Old Persian is one of two directly attested Old Iranian languages (the other being Avestan) and is the ancestor of Middle Persian (the language of the Sasanian Empire).Like other Old Iranian languages, it was known to its native speakers as ariya (Iranian).
Avestan ṣ̌ continues Indo-Iranian *-rt-.Its phonetic value and its phonological status (one or two phonemes) are somewhat unclear. The conditions under which change from -rt-to -ṣ̌-occurs are fundamentally ill-defined, though it is likely to occur if the preceding vowel is accented.