Page:Next-of-kin Marriages in Old Iran.djvu/98

There was a problem when proofreading this page.
IN OLD IRÂN.
83

but their brother, and they further regret that the disappearance of their brother from this life should deprive them of their only support in this world. Again, the Pahlavi word (Symbol missingAvestan characters) chegún, "like," implies a condition similar to that of a wife and not the actual condition of a wife. Such an expression of similarity was quite unnecessary, if those sisters were actually the wives of Virâf. On the other hand, there is a difference in the words of the two oldest texts from which all subsequent copies were transcribed. A copy which is preserved in the collection of Dr. Haug's MSS., and dated Samvat 1466, has quite a different word—zanân, "wives,"—instead of akhtman, "sister." If we should accept the former word, the meaning would be "Virâf had seven wives, who were all sisters." By-the-bye it is difficult to conceive how Virâf, one of the most pious men of his day, should have been so luxurious or licentious as to take as his wives all his seven sisters, an instance altogether unparalleled in the whole history of Ancient Persia. The passage in

This article is issued from Wikisource. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.