Page:Sacred Books of the East - Volume 4.djvu/56

l Tâgîk. Now the oldest period known when the Arabs settled along the Euphrates and Tigris is the second half of the Arsacide period. We know that at that time Holwân was on the frontier between the Iranians and Arabs. The region east of Holwân 'was in the hands of the Provincial kings (Mulûk ut-tavâif = dau-paitis) who were all Persians, and did not recognise the authority of the Arabs. Irâq and Savâd remained in the hands of the Arabs, who were waging a perpetual war with one another, as they are used to do. ' Therefore the texts in which the Arab Asi Dahâka appears as reigning in Babylon belong to a time when Arabs were already settled in Mesopotamia.

A certain Zaini-gâus or Zâînîgâv is mentioned once in the Avesta as being conquered and killed by Frangrasyan who on that one occasion was invested with the royal Hvarenô and who, accordingly, in the Shâhnâma, is credited with having delivered Iran from an Arab invasion: in the absence of Kaî-Kâûs, it says, invaders flowed over Iran from every side, both Turanians and Arabs: 'the Arabs were conquered by the Turanians.' Perhaps the key to the Afrâsyâb enigma is here. One can hardly understand how the Turanians beyond the Oxus, whom Afrâsyâb is supposed to represent, could repel the Arabs coming from over the Euphrates. But one must bear in mind that Afrâsyâb's career ends on the banks of the Kaêkasta lake, in Âdarbaigân north of Mesopotamia. On another side, the legendary history of Yemen tells of the Tubba'h Abû Kurrub's invasions into Mesopotamia and his struggles with