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The Avestan goddess Ardvī Sūrā Anāhitā was a river-goddess linked with fertility and mantic wisdom. Some verses of the Avestan hymn to Anāhitā (Yašt 5) appear to have been composed and added to the hymn in the time of Artaxerxes II who celebrated the worship of the goddess through cult images. There are verses in the hymn which describe the protective deities (yazata) as standing in statuesque stillness; and then the goddess is hailed as being dressed with royal magnificence in a golden embroidered robe, with golden crown, necklace and earrings, a golden breasts-ornament, and gold-laced ankle-boot. An Old Babylonian inventory text which lists the clothing and ornaments of Ištar of Lagaba (not apparently a major shrine) includes a number of ornaments of gold and silver, such as are described in the Avestan verses (Boyce 1982: 203). Indeed, the image of Anāhitā in Yašt 5.128, wearing ‘above (the head) a diadem (studded) with one hundred stars, golden, having eight towers, made like a chariot body, adorned with ribbons, beautiful (and) well made’ immediately recalls that of Ištar with her high hat and the eight-pointed star behind (Panaino 2000: 38). As Ištar was associated with planet Venus, so the Persian spirit of the planet Venus was called Anāhiti in the Achaemenid times which bridged a gap between Ištar and the Avestan goddess (Boyce 1988: 280). A further link between the Mesopotamian goddess Ištar and the Iranian one is recognizable in the Parthian title bānū “the Lady”, a characteristic Mesopotamian epithet unknown in Avesta. The goddess Anāhit is called “the Lady” just as Ištar was known among the Babylonians and Assyrians as Bēltum, or Bēlit ‘lady’, or Bēltī “my lady” (Eilers EI, 715). The Great Goddess Anāhitā plays a role in the investiture ceremony from Achaemenid until the Sasanian era, bestowing the crown and the sceptre and the warlike characteristics to the king, most probably according to the Near Eastern models of Ištar, e.g. the Ištar of Arbela (Gnoli 1971: 247-248).
Source (list of abbreviations) (source links will open in a new browser window)
Avesta, Khorda Avesta, Yašt 5
Bibliography
| Boyce 1982, 203 | Boyce, Mary. A History of Zoroastrianism. Vol. 2: Under the Achaemenians. Leiden, Cologne: E. J. Brill 1982. |
| Boyce 1988, 280 | Boyce, Mary. “The Lady and the Scribe. Some further reflections on Anahit and Tir.” In: Jacques Duchesne-Guillemin, W. Sundermann and F. Vahman (eds.). A Green Leaf. Papers in honour of Professor Jes P. Asmussen. Acta Iranica 28. Hommages et Opera Minora 12. Leiden: Brill 1988, 277-282. |
| Gnoli 1971, 247-248 | Gnoli, Gh. “Politica religiosa e concezione della regalità sotto i Sassanidi.” In: Atti del Convegno internazionale sul tema: La Persia nel Medioevo. Problemi Attuali di Scienza e di Cultura 160. Rome: Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei 1971, 225-253. |
| Panaino 2000, 38 | Panaino, Antonio. “The Mesopotamian Heritage of Achaemenid Kingship.” In: S. Aro and R. M. Whiting (eds.). The Heirs of Assyria. Melammu Symposia 1. Helsinki: The Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project 2000, 35-49. [PDF] |
Andrea Piras
URL for this entry: http://www.aakkl.helsinki.fi/melammu/database/gen_html/a0000628.php
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