In the eyes of Erskine, Zend was a Sanscrit
dialect, imported from India by the founders of Mazdeism, but never
spoken in Persia. His main argument was that Zend is not mentioned among
the seven dialects which were current in ancient Persia according to the
Farhang-i Jehangiri, and that Pahlavi and Persian exhibit no close
relationship with Zend.
In Germany, Meiners had found no followers. The theologians appealed to
the "Avesta," in their polemics, and Rhode sketched the religious
history of Persia after the translations of Anquetil.
Erskine's essay provoked a decisive answer from Emmanuel Rask, one of
the most gifted minds in the new school of philology, who had the honor
of being a precursor of both Grimm and Burnouf. He showed that the list
of the Jehangiri referred to an epoch later than that to which Zend must
have belonged, and to parts of Persia different from those where it must
have been spoken; he showed further that modern Persian is not derived
from Zend, but from a dialect closely connected with it; and, lastly, he
showed what was still more important, that Zend was not derived from
Sanscrit. As to the system of its sounds, Zend approaches Persian rather
than Sanscrit; and as to its grammatical forms, if they often remind one
of Sanscrit, they also often remind one of Greek and Latin, and
frequently have a special character of their own.
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