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XXXIV. Remarks on the Zend Language, and the Zendavesta; in a Letter 
Jrom the late Professor Emanvrt Rasx, F.M.R.A.S., Sc. §c., to the 
Honourable Mounrstuarr Expurnstone, M.R.A.S., then President of 
the Literary Society at Bombay. 
(Communicated by the Bombay Branch Royvat Astaric Soctery.) 
Read the 5th of May 1832. 
Tue foundation for the following remarks, or the text, as it were, on 
which I shall comment, will be Mr. Erskrye’s very learned and curious 
essay ‘on the sacred books and religion of the Pursis.”’* My opinion, it 
is true, differs almost entirely from that of Mr. Erskine ; but I feel convinced 
that neither this truly liberal and amiable scholar, nor the Lirrrary Sociery, 
will be displeased at seeing the same object represented in two different 
points of view. Either of the opposite opinions, or perhaps both of them, 
may be false, and yet the discussion of the subject may effect a step towards 
that truth and clearness which are the noble ends of every reasonable 
inquiry. But should you think my remarks fall too far short of this object, 
or are otherwise too crude and imperfect, I beg you will pardon the attempt, 
and purify the pages in the favourite element of the Parsis.t 
M. Anaqueti: pu Perron, who first translated the Zend books into 
French, did not doubt that the Zend was the old language of Media, and 
that the books preserved in that ancient dialect were the authentic works of 
Zoroaster, written of course five or six centuries before Christ. Mr. 
Erskrnr, on the contrary, imagines, first, the Zend to be a dialect of 
Sanscrit, introduced from India for religious purposes, and never spoken in 
any part of Persia; and, second, the Zend books to have been composed, 
or at least restored from memory, changed, augmented, and brought into 
their present form, in the reign of ArpasHir BABacAn, about 230 years 
after Christ. 
* Vide Transactions of the Bombay Literary Society, vol. ii. p. 295. + Or fire worshippers. 
