From Aryanem Vaejah To Iran:the Historic and Etymologic Adventure of a Concept From Zoroaster To Early Islamic Era

Abstract

This study discusses the evolution and expansion of the concept of Iran in the historical process. The concept of Iran covering different layers of meaning and reflecting different intonations of the three dynasties (Persian, Parthian, and Sasanian) is examined with relation to geographical, religious, political and national theme/dimensions. Afterwards, it is explored how the concept of Aryan/Iran, which found its existence beyond a fictional claim, was perceived in the Islamic period. This study elaborates the etymological adventure of Iran, whose conceptual structure has changed and transformed in the process. The data of the religious literature consisting of the Avesta and its interpretation of the Zends and the royal inscriptions, inscriptions and classical sources from Persians to Sasanians shed light on the main theme of this study. Aryanem Vaejah, a region where the Aryan race lives and mentioned in religious literature, especially in Avesta, has transformed over time into Eran/Iran with some phonetic changes. In addition to referring to a geographical space, this concept also refers to an ethnic origin and people living in this place, and a religious context. This word is also frequently mentioned in the context of the lineage and geography on which Zoroaster and the mythological dynasties (Pesdadian-Kayanian) lived and that related to him in Avesta literature. So that Aryanem Vaejah, the first piece of land created by Ahura Mazda, is also depicted as the homeland of the first created beings; for example, the first human Gayomard. Aryans, on the other hand, represents the elite generation who did not leave the sacred geography of Gayomard.The distinguished inhabitants of the holy place, the Aryans are mentioned as the ancient ancestors of the founding kings of the Persian empire beyond the religious literature narrative. Although it has gained a set of meaning expanding from Persians to Sasanians, this concept, which was constructed in a mythological language, does not go beyond the ethno-religious emphasis and accompanying geographical determination for Persians. Even if this term is a key concept at revealing the dominance of ancient dynasties, it remains inadequate in reflecting the color of the political orientation of the Persians. The disappearance of the Persian empire from the stage of history with the campaign of Alexander the Great marks a silent period regarding the concept. Despite the fact that the Parthians regained dominance in the Iranian geography, the concept of Aryan/Iran has merely mentioned in the ethno-religious context. The role of the Hellenistic influence in the emergence of such an approach should not be denied. In this respect, the full expansion of the projections of the concept on the ethno-religious and geopolitical meanings takes place in the Sasanian period.Although it contains geographical, political, national and religious dimensions, the concept, which is mentioned in a lower tone with reference to the ancient past of the Persians, attains its four-layered structure with the Sasanians. The theo-political context, founding the philosophy of the Sasanians, enables the term Aryan/Iran to be recirculated with its derivatives (Er(an), An-Eran, Eranshar). The fact that the founder kings (Ardasir I, Sapur I) established a close bond between religion and political authority and gave a central position to the concept of Iran by leaning on the ancient past, reveals the ethno-religious dimension of the term. The connection of Ardasir's lineage to the mythological Kayanian dynasty, which embraced Zoroastrianism through Sasan, appears as a ground of legitimacy for Aryan origin. This point of view regarding the existence of ethnicity with religious identity/belonging turns into the basic building block of Sasanian geopolitics. Hence, the Iranian and non-Iranian distinction (Eran, An-Eran) is also strengthened by the Sassanid interpretation of the Avesta, the Zand texts, and is discussed in relation to both ethnic and religious contexts. In this respect, dominating of non-Iranians and hegemonizing the Iranian geography (Eranshar) become the discourse of Sasanian geopolitics. In other words, the word Iran, which is the embodiment of the Sasanian founding thought, is the key concept of geography, political sovereignty, religious identity, and ethnic origin. As a matter of fact, Iranian and its derivative terms, which are loudly voiced from royal inscriptions to coins minted, give clues to the Sasanian founding philosophy.The semantic net constructed by Iran and its derivative terms, in which the Sassanian Empire found its existence on the political plane with ethno-religious toning, loses its contextual framework with the Islamic conquests. So that this conceptual framework, which was heavily used by the Sasanians, lost its political ground concurrently with the Islamic conquests. The religious teaching that feeds the concept rising from an ancient and sacred past is also affected by this loss. The voices of the founding words of the defeated political power is lowered with the domination of Islam. For this reason, the Iranian conceptual framework is neglected in the early Islamic records. Instead of the concept that gives color to the Sassanid domination with all its layers of meaning, concepts such as MODIFIER LETTER LEFT HALF RINGAjam and Fars/Furs are started loudly to be expressed. Thus, the key concepts of Sasanian historiography become words that no longer have a political meaning for Muslim scholars, but words used in the past and limited to that period. The semantic pattern of the term Iran, which came into circulation slowly after the 11th century, when modern Persian began to form, becomes a means of emulating the pre-Islamic period.