Output details
33 - Theology and Religious Studies
University of Manchester
The Zoroastrian Myth of Migration from Iran and Settlement in the Indian Diaspora: Text, Translation and Analysis of the 16th Century Qeṣṣe-ye Sanjān 'The Story of Sanjan'
Joint winner of the 2010 International Society for Iranian Studies Ehsan Yarshater Prize, this book offers an extensive theory about the Qesse-ye-Sanjan, a Zoroastrian verse text which for over 400 years was central to Indian Parsi identity, demonstrating that it is religious-mythological not chronological-historical. From the oldest extant manuscript, which Williams discovered and worked on in a Mumbai library, this first complete English translation and micro/macro-exegesis of this ‘story’ of the Zoroastrian emigration from Iran 1300 years ago challenges all previously held notions. The literary-analytical interpretation in this monograph reads it as a priestly composition of late sixteenth century India, which validates and legitimates contemporary vested interests.
