Two volumes bound in one. pp.316, (iv); iii, ix, [5, subscriber list], [1], 203, 81. Bound in contemporary red reverse calf, marbled boards, original label pasted to spine.

According to the preface, the then only known manuscript of this work was purchased in Isfahan “about forty-five years ago, from one Agha Muhammed Taher, a bookseller”, by Molla Kavus, father of the publisher Mulla Firuz bin Kaus.

This, the first printed edition, claimed the support of Sir William Jones, Jonathan Duncan, late Governor of Bombay, and Sir John Malcolm. Publication gave some credibility and influence in Parsee circles to the spurious work, but subsequent research has shown that it has no connection with the authentic ancient literature of Zoroastrianism. The manuscript is thought to have been fabricated during the reign of the Mughal emperor Akbar, whose search for an ecumenical religion encouraged religious religious inventions of this kind. The text is written in an ostensibly secret coded language.

It is not known whether this was published in misguided belief, or whether it represents an early attempt to increase the commercial value of a dubious manuscript.

Provenance: bookplate recording presentation to “St. Augustine’s College Library by the Rev. Thomas Robinson, D. D., Late Archdeacon of Madras”; bookplate pasted on verso of title page of the “Collegii Sti Augustini apud Cantuarienses Liber”.

Encycl. Iranica Vol. III (1989) pp.185-7 and Vol. VII (1994) p.85.