IRAN. 747 ■which reigned for nearly five centuries (B.C. 250- A.D. 22(i). This rule yielded in turn to the Iranian monarchy of the .Sassauid* (q.v.). The overthrow of this house by the Arab Mohamme- dan invasion in the seventh century changed the history of Iran, nationally, religiouslj-, and lin- guistically. For details of these events, consult the article Persia. BiisLiuGBAi'JiY. The standard work relating to all Iranian subjects is Geiger and Kuhn, GrunJfiss dcr irunischcii Philoluyie ( Strassburg, 1895-1902), where the fullest bibliogiaphical ref- erences will be found. Besides this work, for the general history and antiquities of Iran, consult: Rawlinson, Seven Great ilonnrchks of the Aneient Eastern World (London, 1865) ; Spiegel, Era- ■nische Altertumskunde (3 vols., Leipzig, 1871- 78) ; Geiger, Civilization of the Eastern Iranians (trans., London, 1801-7(5) ; Curzon, Persia and the Persian Question (London, 1892). IRAOSriAN, or ERANIAN. The term ap- plied to peoples, some of which are now almost or altogether extinct, speaking languages belong- ing to the Aryan stock, and inhabiting the plateau l.ving between Asia Minor and the Cas- ])ian on the west and the Hindu Kush .Mountains on the east (of which modern Persia forms the chief part). The chief Iranian peoples are the Persians (Tajiks of the East; Hajcniis of the Caspian littoral, and the Teheran-Ispahan coun- try; Parsis, now principally resident in Western India, but also in the region between Ispahan and the Persian Gulf), ancient and modern, and the old Bactrians, whose descendants are said to speak still a purer Persian than that in vogue in Persia itself, together with the partly civilized Kurds; while the Tats and Azerbaijanis, the Rarts of Russian Turkestan, and certain portions of the population of Afghanistan, Baluchistan, etc., are physicallv Persians who speak, more or less, Turkic dialects. Earlier authorities classed the Armenians and the Ossetes with tha Iranians, but it is better to regard these two as independent members of the Aryan stock. The mass of the Aryan tribes of Afghanistan and Baluchistan, by some considered Iranian, show on the whole gi'eater afhnities with the Aryans of Hindustan. The Golchas of Pamir are rather an independent Aryan branch than a sididivision of the Iranians. From the dawn of history the land from the borders of Asia Minor to the moun- tains of Pamir has been inhabited, generally speaking, by tribes and nations of .Xryan stock, and chiefly of the variety called Iranian. Even beyond the Oxns, the tra<litional frontier between Iran and Turan. Iranian culture, old and new, can be traced beyond the borders of China, and no doubt some of the nomad hordes who hovered al nut Western Europe were not all Turanian in their make-up. Within the Iranian area many , blends exist. Besides the descendants of the Aryan Jledes and Persians of a fairly pure strain, and the purer Eastern Iranians, almost every people of Asia Minor and of Central Asia has added its quota to the hybrid populations. ^Ton- gclian, Arabian, Turkish conquests, and the com- mercial and colonizing instincts of Jews, Arme- nians, natives of the Caucasus, etc., have also contributed their share to the mixture. War, slavery, and peacefiil nomadism have likewis'j helped, both in ancient and in modern times. The range of culture of the Iranians is very exten- sive, reaching from the civilizations of ancient Vol. X.-^8. IRANIAN LANGUAGES. I!actrians, Medes, and Persians (and their mod- ern representatives) to the half-savage seclusion and isolation of some of the small hill-corn nmnities. Jfost authorities do not assign to the Iranians as high a rank intellectually as is possessed by the Aryans of India or by the Semites, to saj- nothing of the Aryans of Europe. The situation of the plateau of Iran between India and China on the one hand and Asia Minor and Aral)ia on the other has made it ii evitably an absorlx'r and a transmitter of cul- ture, a higliway of commerce, and a theatre of religious disputes. The great mass of the Ira- nians are now professors of Islam, but of the Shiitc or 'unorthodox' sort, a protest, as it were, of the Aran against the Semitic mind. The ancient Aryan religion, Zoroastrianism. indige- nous to the Eastern Iran, with its dualism and reverence of fire as the sacred .symbol, exercised considerable influence upon the Hebrews. Some of the Iranians (Persians and Parsis in par- ticular) have from time immemorial been de- voted to commerce, and have spread Persian in- fluence to the Red Sea on the west, and to the western shores of India in the other direction, v.liilc northward they have carried it into Siberia and China. The best side of the Iranians of the present time is seen in the educational and charitable activities of the great Parsi mer- chants of India, who in many respects are set- ting examples for the whole world. The worst is seen in some of the aspects of Persian tyr- anny. All grades between still exist here and there over the wide Iranian land. The Iranians in general are judged by Ripley to belong phys- ically to the 'Mediterranean' race, their ideal type rejiresented to a certain extent by the Farsis about the ancient Persepolis and the Luris of the mountains of Western Persia, having been modified in the southwest by the Semitic intruders, in the east and northeast (the mass of the people) by Mongolian admixture, and on the littoral of the Arabian Sea toward the southeast by Indian, or jierhaps Negritic, addi- tions. See Iranian Languages. BiBLiOGRAPHT. Besides the authorities men- tioned under the subdivisions of the Iranians, the following more general works may be men- tioned here: Spiegel, Eranisehe Altertums- kunde (Leipzig. 1871-78) ; Ayuso. Iran (iladrid, 1876): De Harlez, Et-udes Eraniennes (Paris, 1880): Fontane. Les Iraniens (Paris. 1881); Spiegel, Eran (Berlin. 188.3) ; Darmesteter, Etudes Eraniennes (Paris, 1883) ; De Morgan, ^fiss^on scientifique en Perse (Paris, 1884-97); Geiger, Civilization of Eastern Iran in Ancient Times (Eng. trans. London, 1885) : Spiegel, Die arische Periode und ihre Zustiinde (Leipzig, 1887): Binder. 4u Kurdistan, en iUsopotamie et en Perse (Paris. 1887) : Houssaye. Les peuples uetuels dc la Perse (Lyon, 18S7): Dieulafoy, La Perse. In Chaldfe et la i^usiane (Paris. 1887): Brunnhofer. Iran und Turan (Leipzig, 1889) ; id.. ro»! Pontus bis zum Indus (1890)'; and the sections on the Persians and Iranians in Ratzel. nistorii of Mankind (Eng. trans., Lon- don. 1808), and Riplev's Races of Europe (New York. 1899). IRANIAN LANGUAGES AND LITERA- TURES. Historically, the linguistic and liter- ary monuments of Iran cover a period of more than two thousand five hundred years, diiting from the early Zoroastrian scriptures
