Note 455 — Chapter I · (continued 2)

The account of Ardai Viraf’s vision of the other world can but remind us of what Plato relates (Respubl., t. x) of Hero, the son of Armenius, a Pamphilian by origin: viz., when this man had been killed in battle, and when, on the tenth day, the dead bodies were in a state of decomposition, he alone was preserved and carried home to be buried, and on the twelfth day, being placed upon the funeral pyre, he gave signs of life, and, resuscitated, he related what he had seen in the other world. Upon this we may reflect, that the name of Arda, which occurs as a part of many Persian names, may be referred to the Sanskrit ऊर्ध ûrdha, “elevated;” Ardashir is perhaps ऊर्ध शिरः úrdhaśiras, “elevated head;” ऊर्द्दर úrddara, signifies “a hero, a champion; from ऊर्ज úrja, to be strong: which would give nearly the sense of Plato’s αλκιμου του ανδρος, “of the strong man,” as he characterises Hero. This observation gains perhaps some relief, by connecting it with a passage of St. Clement of Alexandria (Strom. I. V. sect. xiv.), in which he interprets by Zoroaster the name of Hero, and quotes a passage from a work in which this supposed Zoroaster relates of himself what Plato states of Hero. The work mentioned by St. Clement, much known in the first centuries of our era, might have been composed by a Neo-platonic who transposed the fable from Hero to Zoroaster. Hero, certainly not Zoroaster, may with more probability be assimilated to one of his zealous followers, Ardai Viraf, who lived in the second century of our era.—A. T.