422 PLINY'S NATURAL HISTORY. [Book XXX. 



CHAP. 2. WHEN AND WHERE THE AKT OF MAGIC ORIGINATED: 



BY WHAT PERSONS IT WAS FIRST PRACTISED. 



There is no doubt that this art originated in Persia, 5 under 

 Zoroaster, 6 this being a point upon which authors are generally 

 agreed ; but whether there was only one Zoroaster, or whether 

 in later times there was a second person of that name, is a 

 matter which still remains undecided. Eudoxus, 7 who has 

 endeavoured to show that of all branches of philosophy the 

 ma.gic art is the most illustrious and the most beneficial, in- 

 forms us that this Zoroaster existed six thousand years before 

 the death of Plato, an assertion in which he is supported by 

 Aristotle. Hermippus, 8 again, an author who has written 

 with the greatest exactness on all particulars connected with 

 this art, and has commented upon the two millions 9 of verses 

 left by Zoroaster, besides completing indexes to his several 

 works, has left a statement, that Agonaces was the name of 

 the master from whom Zoroaster derived his doctrines, and 

 that he lived five thousand years before the time of the Trojan 

 War. The first thing, however, that must strike us with sur- 

 prise, is the fact that this art, and the traditions connected 

 with it, should have survived for so many ages, all written 

 commentaries thereon having perished in the meanwhile ; and 

 this, too, when there was no continuous succession of adepts, 

 no professors of note, to ensure their transmission. 



For how few there are, in fact, who know anything, even 

 by hearsay, about the only professors of this art whose names 

 have come down to us, Apusorus 10 and Zaratus of Media, 

 Marmarus and Arabantiphocus of Babylonia, and Tarmoendas 

 of Assyria, men who have left not the slightest memorials of 

 their existence. But the most surprising thing of all is, that 



5 Or Bactriana, more properly. 



6 Magic, no doubt, has been the subject of belief from the earliest times, 

 whatever may have been the age of Zoroaster, the Zarathustra of theZend- 

 avesta, and the Zerdusht of the Persians. In the Zendavesta he is repre- 

 sented as living in the reign of Gushtasp, generally identified with Darius 

 Hystaspes. He probably lived at a period anterior to that of the Median 

 and Persian kings. Niebuhr regards him as a purely mythical personage 



7 See end of JB. ii. 8 See end of this Book. 



9 An exaggeration, of Oriental origin, most probably. 



10 These names have all, most probably, been transmitted to us in a cor- 

 rupted form. Ajasson gives some suggestions as to their probable Eastern 

 form and origin. 



