Pahlavi Texts

Volume 4 of Pahlavi Texts was published in 1892 and comprises West's collation and analysis of the fragmentary evidence for and remnants of the Nasks, the twenty-one treatises compiling theological texts of the Sassanid empire. These were largely lost after the fall of the empire in the mid-seventh century CE.

Published between 1880 and 1897 as part of Max Müller''s Sacred Books of the East series, this five-volume translation of Pahlavi texts was the work of Edward William West (1824?1905). Largely self-taught, West developed his knowledge of ancient oriental languages in India, where he worked as a civil engineer. After returning to Europe, West focused on the study of sacred Zoroastrian texts and prepared these translations of Pahlavi manuscripts. His writings and editions are still referenced today in Indo-Iranian studies. The Nasks are the focus of Volume 4, wherein West collects, translates and analyses fragments such as names, summaries, digests and stray quotes from other books in order to present all that is known of the twenty-one original treatises containing Sassanid Zoroastrian literature. The treatises were themselves records of what was legendarily lost after Alexander the Great''s conquest of Persia in the fourth century BCE.