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1. This also is said, that when the primeval ox 1 passed away it fell to the right hand, and Gâyômard afterwards, when he passed away, to the left hand. 2. Gôsûrvan 2, as the soul of the primeval ox came out from the body of the ox, stood up before the ox and cried to Aûharmazd, as much as a thousand men when they sustain a cry at one time, thus: 'With whom is the guardianship of the creatures left by thee, when ruin has broken into the earth, and vegetation is withered, and water is troubled? Where is the man 3 of whom it was said by thee thus: I will produce him, so that he may preach carefulness?'

3. And Aûharmazd spoke thus: 'You are made ill 4, O Gôsûrvan! you, have the illness which the evil spirit brought on if it were proper to produce that man in this earth at this time, the. evil spirit would not have been oppressive in it.'

p. 21

4. Forth Gôsûrvan walked to the star station (pâyak) and cried in the same manner, and forth to the moon station and cried in the same manner, and forth to the sun station, and then the guardian spirit of Zaratûst was exhibited to her, and Aûharmazd said thus 1: 'I will produce for the world him who will preach carefulness.' 5. Contented became the spirit Gôsûrvan, and assented thus: 'I will nourish the creatures;' that is, she became again consenting to a worldly creation in the world.


20:1 Literally, 'the sole-created ox' from whom all the animals and some plants are supposed to have proceeded (see Chaps. X and XIV), as mankind proceeded from Gâyômard. It is the ox of the primitive creation, mentioned in Chap. III, 14, 18.

20:2 The spiritual representative of the primeval ox, called Geus-urvâ, 'soul of the bull,' in the Avesta, of which name Gôsûrvan is a corruption. The complaint of Gôsûrvan is recorded in the Gâthas, the oldest part of the Avesta (see Yas, XXIX).

20:3 Referring to Zaratûst.

20:4 In K20, 'You are ill.'

21:1 As the text stands in the MSS. it means, 'and then the guardian spirit of Zaratûst demonstrated to her thus;' but whether it be intended to represent the fravâhar as producing the creature is doubtful. The angel Gôs, who is identified with Gôsûrvan, is usually considered a female, but this is hardly consistent with being the soul of a bull (see Chap. X, 1, 2), though applicable enough to a representative of the earth. In the Selections of Zâd-sparam, II, 6, however, this mythological animal is said to have been a female (see Appendix to Bundahis).

Next: Chapter V