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» Suggested prior reading: Airyana Vaeja in the Avesta
Airyana Vaeja's Features
Neighbouring Lands
In our page on Airyana Vaeja in the Zoroastrian scriptures [the Avesta's books of Yasht (13.143 & 144), Vendidad (Chapter 1, 1-16), and Yasna (10.13-14)], we made the following observations regarding the neighbours of Airyana Vaeja:
Sugd / Sogdiana
The second nation listed after Airyana Vaeja in the Vendidad, is Sukhdho / Sughdha - modern day Sugd in north-western Tajikistan and southern Uzbekistan.
Mouru / Margiana
The third nation listed after Airyana Vaeja in the Vendidad, is Mouru. Mouru is commonly identified with the area around modern Merv and the Murghab / Murgab river and its delta in present-day Turkmenistan - though this identification is by no means certain.
Balkh / Bactria & King Vishtasp
The fourth Vendidad nation is Bakhdhim / Bakhdhi / Bakhdi / Balkh located in Northern Afghanistan. Among the first "hearers and teachers" of Zarathushtra's message listed in the Farvardin Yasht (13.99) was King Vishtasp. Later texts state that King Vishtasp, a king of the Kayanian dynasty, was king of Bakhdhi/Balkh, and that Zarathushtra died in Bakhdhi/Balkh, killed by a Turanian. In these texts, the Amu Darya (Oxus) river formed the north-eastern border between ancient Bakhdhi and Turan (Sugd). Further upstream, a portion of the Amu Darya river ran through Bakhdhi.
Balkh became the capital city of the Kayanian kings and ancient Airan, the successor state to Airyana Vaeja and the predecessor state to modern Iran.
Today, all three regions noted above claim Zarathushtra as their native son and make some claim to his legacy. The claims include the region being his birthplace, where he received his revelations, where he first propounded his religion, where he composed his message and the scriptures, and where he died. No other region makes these claims to this extent.
What this indicates is, that regardless of the veracity of the claims, there is a strong possibility that Zarathushtra travelled to these regions and that they were within travelling distance of Airyana Vaeja, Zarathushtra's birthplace. By listing these nations separately from Airyana Vaeja, the Avesta's Vendidad is probably also stating that the three lands were separate from Airyana Vaeja. Since Zoroastrian texts also tell us that Airyana Vaeja was Zarathushtra's native home, we can surmise that while Zarathushtra could have travelled to these lands spreading his message, none of them was his native home.
Airyana Vaeja's Terrain
Landscape
The Meher Yasht gives us a most useful understanding of Airyana Vaeja's location. It not only helps us to rule in certain possibilities, it helps to rule out certain lands.
Verses 10.13-14 of the Meher Yasht state that the Aryan land had many mountains, valleys, and pastures (pouru vastraongho) that supported cattle (gave). It was rich in waters (afento), deep lakes (jafra varayo) and wide rivers. The land, while mountainous had alpine meadows and fertile, well-watered vales.
Rivers
Mention is made that a significant river Daraja (Darejya), on whose upper banks stood Zarathushtra's father's house, ran through Airyana Vaeja. Another river in Airyana Vaeja is the Ditya, also called Vanguhi Daitya in Vendidad 1.3. Both are mentioned as separate rivers in the Bundahishn (24.14 & .15). The Vanguhi Daitya in Pahlavi texts is also identified as the Veh or Oxus / Amu Darya river.
Middle Persian text and the Shahnameh tell us that the Amu Darya or Oxus river (see map below) formed a border of ancient Bakhdi, and that the border between Airan (the later name form of Airyana Vaeja) and Turan was also the Amu Darya. The Amu Darya river runs from the Pamirs (where it is called the Panj) to the Aral Sea and today, to some extent, forms the border between four nations, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. A portion of the Amu Darya river runs north of present day Balkh in Afghanistan.
Rivers Flowing into Neighbouring Countries
Verse 10.14 of the Avesta's Mehr Yasht, states that the rivers which originate in Airyo shayanem, the Aryan abode, flow swiftly into the countries of Mourum (Margush in modern day Turkmenistan), Haroyum (Aria in modern Afghanistan), Sughdhem (Sugd in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan) and Khairizem (Khvarizem in Uzbekistan). There are very few sets of rivers that meet this description and they originate in the Hindu Kush and other mountains radiating out of the Pamirs. Since 1. Bakhdhi (Balkh) is a significant omission from this list, 2. Khairizem is a nation not mentioned directly in the Vendidad's list of nations, and 3. the Aryan lands are called by a slightly different name, one possibility is that the list was part of the younger Avesta, by which time the original Aryan lands, Airyana Vaeja, had begun to move westward along the northern Hindu Kush slopes, towards the Kuh-e Baba and Safid Kuh - the mountain region south of Balkh.
Mountains - Hara Berezaiti
In the Meher Yasht, as well as various Zoroastrian texts, the Aryan lands are described as being mountainous with valleys in-between. Indeed, the descriptions in the texts indicate that Airyana Vaeja was surrounded by mountains on all sides. Meher Yasht 10.13-14 states that the Aryan lands had high mountains (garayo berezanto), and was the central place from which the great Hara Berezaiti mountain ranges (Pahlavi Harburz and Persian Alburz) radiated east and west. The arm extending eastward towards the oceans was probably the Himalayas. The Hara Berezaiti ranges contained two thousand, two hundred and forty four mountains peaks (Zamyad Yasht 19.1 and Greater Bundahishn 9.3). The sun rose over the high summits of the Hara Berezaiti after which it cast its rays over the Aryan lands, indicating that the taller mountains were just to the east of the habitable lower regions, the tallest being the eponymous lofty Mount Hara. The sun sets between the Hara Berezaiti's peaks to the west of Airyana Vaeja.
The environs of Mount Hara are described in the Avesta as huk-airya - good Arya, sometimes translated as good beneficence - a paradise with ideal conditions: no inclement weather, natural beauty and where the people enjoyed good health. As we shall see below, Airyana Vaeja is described in the same manner.
Mount Hara, and Airyana Vaeja lay in the centre of the largest of the seven continents, Khvaniratha (the continents were separated by water). In the eastern part of the continent Khvaniratha flowed the river Vanguhi Daitya, a river of Airyana Vaeja. In the western part of Khvaniratha flowed the river Rangha. Also, at the centre grew the mythical white haoma tree or plant - the plant of eternal life called the Gokard / Gokaren / Gaokarena (Vendidad 20.4) and the chief of the healing plants.
Mount Meru / Sumeru
The Hindu scriptures, the Vedas, refer to the Mount Hara as Mount Meru or Sumeru (the Great Meru), and describe the Himalayas as stemming from Mount Meru in the same manner that the Avesta describes Hara Berezaiti stemming from Mount Hara. Both texts state that these great mountains stand at the centre of the known world, Airyana Vaeja in the Avesta or Arya Varta (Arya Varsha) in the Vedas. The Vedas also refer to Arya Varta as Paradesha, the original country. In the Vedas, Bharatavarsha, Ancient India, lay to the south of the Himalayas.
The Wikipedia article on Jambudvipa, the environs in which Mount Meru stands, identifies Jambudvipa with the Pamir region. In the Vedas, each of the four sides of Meru are made of four different precious substances: the south of lapis-lazuli, the west of ruby, the north of gold and the east of silver (or crystal). The Pamir-Badakhshan region was noted for precisely these precious substances and home to the only known lapis mines in antiquity. Further, the lapis mines were in the south of the Pamir region.
Airyana Vaeja as Paradise. Shambhala / Shangri-La
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| Buddhist thangka showing Shambhala with Mount Meru & a temple in the centre |
As we have noted above, Zoroastrian texts describe Airyana Vaeja as being mountainous with fertile meadows and valleys. In addition, the opening words of the Avestan Vendidad's chapter listing the sixteen nations, states that if God had not made other countries beautiful in some manner, all the world would have swarmed into Airyana Vaeja on account of its great beauty and - as mentioned elsewhere in the Avesta (see next paragraph) - because of its wise king and good government, law and order, noble people and serenity. Airyana Vaeja was a paradise on earth - a land of peace and serenity, the best place to live and raise a family.
The heavenly nature of Airyana Vaeja during the Jamshidi era (see Weather Change below) reached mythic proportions in Yasht 19.33, the Zamyad Yasht. Then, the weather was neither cold nor hot, there was no untruth and envy, people were undying, water and plants never drying. All because King Jamshid ruled wisely and the people lived honestly. However, when the king lost his grace and the people lost their noble ways, Airyana Vaeja became a paradise lost.
Tibetan Buddhism's book of Kala-Chakra, the Time-Cycle, and Tibetan Buddhism's predecessor religion, Bon, built on and popularized this concept of a lost and hidden paradise on earth, now known to the world as Shangri-La.
[The founding of the Bon religion is ascribed to Tonpa Shenrab Miwoche who was born - by some estimates 18,000 years ago - in the land of Tagzig Olmo Lung Ring. Tagzig, is believed to be a form of the name Tajik. (The name Shenrab sounds Iranian as well.) The doctrine taught by Tonpa Shenrab was spread by his disciples and their student-translators to adjacent countries such as Zhang-Zhung (also Zhangzhung, Shang Shung or Xang Xung - a land north of the Himalayas, which contained Mount Kailash in today's Western Tibet), India (northern Indus valley), Kashmir, China and eventually Greater Tibet. Tonpa Shenrab is reputed to have visited present-day western Tibet once. On that visit he found the people unprepared to receive the entire body of his teachings, but he prophesied that his teachings would flourish in Tibet in the coming ages. The students of his disciples continued his mission and Tibetan Bon scriptures were translated from texts in the language of Zhang-Zhung.
[Bon claims to have spread south to the Indian subcontinent and to have influenced the development of Vedic Hinduism. Perhaps pre-Tibetan Bon was a form of the primordial Aryan religion before Zoroastrianism and Vedic Hinduism. Buddhism in turn evolved out of Vedic Hinduism (c. 400 BCE). Completing a full circle, today's Bon is so heavily influenced by Buddhism that it sounds like a Buddhist sect. Perhaps some scholars may take it upon themselves to try and isolate the precepts of the pre-Buddhism Bon.
[It may be of interest to those studying the weather change in Airyana Vaeja, that pollen and tree ring analysis indicates the Chang Tang plateau in Northern Tibet had a far more liveable environment than it has today - one that supported a primordial civilization - until the climate become colder and drier starting around 1500 BCE, a climate change that caused the population to migrate out of the northern plateau. This authors also feels that the ancient Aryan and Zoroastrian link to western Tibet is further exemplified by the common tradition of exposing the dead to birds. Also see our blog, Iranian-Aryan Connections with Western Tibet.]
At the centre of the land of Tagzig (called Shambala in the Kalachakra) was Olmo Lungring which had at its centre, Yungdrung Gutsek, a four-sided mountain similar to Mount Meru / Sumeru (see above). The mountain is surrounded by temples, cities and parks. To the mountain's south is the Barpo Sogye palace, where Tonpa Shenrab was born. The complex of palaces, rivers and parks with Mount Yungdrung Gutseg in the centre constitutes the inner region (Nang-gling) of Olmo Lungring. The intermediate region (Bar-gling) consists of twelve cities, four of which lie in the four cardinal directions. The third region includes the outer land (mTha'-gling). These three regions are encircled by snow-capped mountains and an ocean.
The mountain Yungdrung Gutsek has nine Yungdrungs (swastikas) ascending like a staircase. It is not without significance that the swastika plays an important symbolic role in both the Bon and Vedic Hindu religions. In Bon, The nine swastikas represent the Nine Ways. The swastika (Yungdrung) itself is a symbol of permanence and indestructibility of the mind-stream, the wisdom of Bon. The full name of Bon is Yungdrung Bon meaning Everlasting Truth.
The four sides of the mountain faced the four cardinal directions. From the four corners, each of which represent four archetypal thought forms, flow four rivers:
- From the thought form of a snow lion flows the river Narazara to the east,
- From the thought form of a horse flows the river Pakshi to the north,
- From the thought form of a peacock flows the river Gyim Shang to the west, and
- From the thought form of an elephant flows the river Sindhu (In Persian: Hindu which later became Indus) to the south.
A few concepts emerge from the description of Tagzig's terrain within which lies the four-sided mountain, Yungdrung Gutsek. First, while our translation states the singular, a four-sided mountain, a mountain in all the related ancient Avestan, Vedic, and Bon texts frequently refers to a group or range of mountains with several peaks. For instance Hara Berezaiti contained two thousand, two hundred and forty four mountains peaks (see above). Next, from the four-sided Yungdrung Gutsek mountain(s) arose several rivers flowing in all the cardinal directions. In addition, this region was north of the northern Indus region. (Also see our section on the four-sided topography of the Pamirs. It is unreasonable to expect the geographic descriptions in the ancient texts to align perfectly on a modern map. The ancients used approximations formulated from the accounts of travellers over several generations and good examples of this contention are the maps drawn by classical Western authors such as Ptolemy.)
Tibetan Buddhism's Kalachakra uses the Hindu Vedic legend of Mount Meru (Avestan Hara Berezaiti) and surrounds Mount Meru with the mythic kingdom of Shambhala, a Sanskrit word meaning the land of peace. Shambhala, also spelt Shambala or Shamballa, is said to be the land of the Living Fire and Gyanganj, the home of immortal wisdom and the omniscient wise god of time (descriptions some use for Ahura Mazda, God, in Zoroastrianism). The concept, description and qualities of Shambala coincide with those for Arya Varta / Airyana Vaeja, the Aryan homeland, and help provide us with added information on its possible location.
According to the Buddhist Kalachakra, Shambhala, presently hidden to the rest of the world, is a paradise of peace, tranquility, honesty and wisdom. It is home of the primordial and highest spiritual teachings, a tantra of the cycle of time now hidden from us but one that will eventually save the world from evil. Before it adopted Buddhism, the people were followers of the Mlechha, a Yavana or western, religion, some of whom worshiped the sun. Emulating the time periods in Zoroastrian eschatology which uses a cycle of time, as well as emulating the Zoroastrian concept of a final struggle between good against evil, the Buddhist legend states that as time progresses, the world around Shambala will succumb to evil. However, three millennia after ancient Shambhala king first travelled to India and adopted Buddhism, the Shambhalians will emerge to save the world. There will be a epic battle between the righteous Shambhalians and the surrounding evil forces - a battle in which the righteous Shambhalians will prevail and defeat evil forever. As we have noted, this legend closely parallels Zoroastrian legends that presage a final struggle between the forces of good and evil in which the good, the ashavan, will prevail, transforming the world to a paradise, a heaven, on earth - the vahishtem anghuim - the transformative event being frasho-kereti.
Shambhala has both an outer temporal and an inner spiritual meaning. In the outer meaning, Shambhala is a land that is only accessible to the pure in heart. Those with impure motives will lose their way in the intervening deserts and mountains, blinded by storms. Representing the inner meaning, some thangka paintings of Shambhala depict the kingdom surrounding Mount Meru as an eight-petal lotus - a symbol for the heart chakra and an indication that Shambhala is to be found in a person's heart.
This author therefore proposes that since Shambhala, the land surrounding Mount Meru, is identified as the Vedic Arya Varta, and since the Vedic Arya Varta in turn corresponds to the Avestan Airyana Vaeja (which contains Mount Hara), that the land surrounding Shambhala, Mount Meru and Airyana Vaeja are intimately linked if not the same land. If this author's association is correct, what all four traditions, Zoroastrian, Hindu, Bon and Buddhist, have preserved, is the topography of ancient Airyana Vaeja - a land of fertile valleys and alpine meadows ringed by high snow-capped high mountains.
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Weather Change in Airyana Vaeja During Jamshid's Reign
(Note: The name Jamshid is a later version of the name Yima-Srira or Yima-Khshaeta, meaning Yima the radiant, in the Vendidad. In the Avesta, Jamshid is called Yima son of Vivanghat, while in the Vedas, he is called Yama son of Vivasvant.)
According to Zoroastrian texts as well as Ferdowsi's Shahnameh, legendary king of Airyana Vaeja, King Jamshid, initiated the observance of Nowruz, New Year's day on the first day of spring. For King Jamshid to take this step, Airyana Vaeja must have experienced the beginning of spring and the end of winter around the spring equinox or March 21.
Further, Yasna 9.5 (similarly, Vendidad II.I.6) also states that "in the reign of Yima, there was neither cold nor heat" - a temperate climate by definition. Additional references (see * below), state that the weather in Airyana Vaeja at the outset of the Jamshedi era was equitable. However, the Vendidad and other texts also inform us that a thousand two hundred years into the Jamshedi era, Airyana Vaeja experienced severe and long winters (for a further discussion on the Jamshedi era and the weather change, see our page Aryan Prehistory)
[*References to King Jamshid/Yima: Vendidad II.I.1-20(41) and II.I.21(42)-43(140); Yasna 9.4-5; Farvardin Yasht 29.130; Aban Yasht 5.25-26; Ferdowsi's Shahnameh.]
Funerary Practices
Zoroastrians and Tibetans share the practice of exposing the bodies of their deceased to birds or prey, and to our knowledge they are they only two cultural groups in the world to have employed these practices with any consistency and as an intrinsic part of their traditional / religious rites of passage. They actual methods employed were quite different and the are no records of the Tibetans using towers of silence, dakhmas. This might indicate that while the conditions under which the ancient Tibetans and Zoroastrians lived were similar, they could have been neighbours but not compatriots.
Location of Airyana Vaeja, the Aryan Homeland
These observations, together with observations throughout this web site, point to a location for Airyana Vaeja, the ancient Aryan homeland, in the general vicinity of Tajikistan, southern Uzbekistan, northern Afghanistan, and south-western Turkmenistan - the approximate area in the map below.
More specifically, the observations point to the Pamir-Badakhshan region (the areas neighbouring Balkh to the east and north: the upper Amu Darya basin and the Wakhan Valley of eastern Tajikistan and northern Afghanistan), the Yagnobi , Zerafshan and Fergana valleys, as well as the Alai mountain environs in Western Kyrgyzstan.
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| Central Asia with first Vendidad lands and possible Airyana Vaeja /Aryan homeland locale |
Aria
Haroyu - Sixth Vendidad Nation
There is a country that the classical Greeks and western authors called Aria (also spelt Arian, Arii) and which they located around present-day Harirud River (Old Ir. Harayu, Gk. Arios) in north-western Afghanistan's Herat Province. (Note that the classical authors made a distinction between Aryana, all the Aryan lands, and the state of Aria which was part of Greater Aryana.) Ptolemy (90-168 CE) 6.17 and Strabo (63/64 BCE - c. 24 CE) 11.10.1 describe Aria and its location in some detail - a location close to the lands we have identified above for Airyana Vaeja. In addition, the Harirud region or present-day Herat province, are commonly identified with the sixth Vendidad nation Haroyu as well as the Achaemenian nation of Haraiva (a name that could have been derived from Arai-va). It is significant that the majority of inhabitants in Herat city, Herat Province's capital, are ethnic Tajiks, since the Tajikistan region is a strong candidate for the location of Airyana Vaeja, the Aryan homeland. (Also see or page on Haroyu / Aria.)
Aria is a candidate for the middle Aryan nation of Airan, the kingdom that features in the poet Ferdowsi's epic, the Shahnameh, and one that was formed after the Aryan nation had migrated westward. Were it not for Aria's identification with Haroyu the sixth Vendidad nation, we would be compelled to consider it as the possible location of the original Airyana Vaeja. The border between Airan and its eastern neighbour, Turan / Sugd, was the middle to lower reaches of the Amu Darya (Oxus) river. The Airan of the Shahnameh had Balkh as its capital and therefore would have included the kingdom of Bactria / Balkh / Bakhdhi as a principle kingdom. Airan was bordered by Sistan to the south.
Arrian (c.87-145 CE) in Anabasis 4.6.6 states that in antiquity, Aria was considered as particularly fertile and rich in wine. This reference by Arrian to Aria having been particularly fertile in antiquity may refer to the memory of Aria's predecessor nation, Airyana Vaeja (see above), being very fertile and a paradise on earth (rather than the present location).
Under the Sassanian dynasty (c.224 - 649 CE), the territory of Airan / Haraiva was transformed to the eastern quarter of the empire called Khurasan, Khur-a (from Khursheed meaning sun) and san (cf. stan meaning the land or place). Together, the name meant land of the (rising) sun. Greater Khorasan extended east to the Amu Darya (Oxus) River.
The maps below show the nations of the region from a Greek / European perspective. The borders and location are approximate at best, and often in error, as they are drawn from the descriptions in the classical texts. They nevertheless provide us with invaluable information. Note the mention of Aria, its location and prominence which is even more sticking in the map of the world according to Ptolemy.
(For a further discussion please see our page on Aria / Airan / Haroyu, and the section on Aryana in our page on Airyana Vaeja, the Aryan homeland.)
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| Reconstruction of Ptolemy's map of Aria and neighbouring states |
Westward Migration of the Aryan Nation
If we are correct in surmising that the centre of the Aryan homeland moved westward accompanied by a contraction in its name, then the seat of the Aryan nation would have moved westward as follows:
- The original ancient Aryan homeland Airyana Vaeja in the eastern Central Asian regions identified above, and more specifically the Pamir-Badakhshan region
- The early middle Aryan nation Airan, the seat of the Kayanian dynasty, in Balkh (northern Afghanistan)
- The late middle Aryan nation known to the Greeks as Aria, located in Harirud-Khorasan area (north-western Afghanistan / north-eastern Iran), and
- The modern (2,500 year-old) Aryan nation Parsa, known to the West as Persia, which together with Khorasan became the Iran of today.
Further reading:
» Pamirs / Badakhshan
» Aryan Prehistory
» Aryan Homeland in Scripture
» Aryan Homeland Location
» Aryan Religions
» Aryan Trade
» Western Views on Aryans
• © Author: K. E. Eduljee, Zoroastrian Heritage, 2007-12 • Contact • Page validated by W3C.org