A literary history of Persia

104 LITERATURES OF ANCIENT PERSIAOf the age of the Pahlawi literature, properly so called, wehave already spoken (pp. 7-8 supra}.It was essentially thePersian literature of the Sasanian period, but wasmature. naturally continued for some time after the fall ofthat dynasty.Thus the Gujastak dbalish ndmak,to which reference has already been made, narrates a discussionheld between an orthodox Zoroastrian priest, Atur-farnbagson of Farrukh-zad, and a heretical dualist (perhaps a Manichaean)in the presence of the 'Abbasid Caliph al-Ma'mun(A.D. 813-833), so that the period to which this literaturebelongs may be considered to extend from the third to theninth or tenth centuries of our era, at which time the naturalat alluse of Pahlawi may be considered to have ceased, thoughtimes, even to the present day,learned Zoroastrians were to befound who could compose in Pahlawi. Such late, spuriousPahlawi, however, commonly betrays its artificial origin, notablytermination -Ik with theby the confusing of the adjectivalnominal or substantival termination -M, both of which are-/represented by in Modern Persian.Of actual written Pahlawi documents, the papyrus-fragmentsto date fromfrom the Fayyum in Egypt, which West supposesthe eighth century of our era, are the most ancient,ma^frTp'ts.and after them there isnothing older than theMS. of the Pahlawi Yasna known as " J. 2," whichwas completed on January 25, A.D. 1323. Pahlawi manuscriptsnaturally continue to be transcribed amongst the Parsis downto the present day, though since the introduction of Pahlawitype, and the gradual publication by printing or lithographyof the more important books, the function of the scribe, here asin the case of other Eastern languages, has in large measurefallen into abeyance.The Pahlawi literature is divided by West, who iscertainlyExtent and*^e g reatest living authority on andit,who is int ^1[he'paMa^i*s P ort n f our i subject our chief guide, intoliterature.three classes,as follows :