There are reasonable grounds for thinking the highlands of Central Asia the historical cradle of the Japhetic race ; whether, with some writers, we conceive this mountainous region to be the Alpine plateau of Little Bokhara, or, with others, the great chain south and south-west of the Caspian Sea: the first theory suits best for a descent into India; the second for a migration into Europe. The former view, taken broadly, is confirmed by the early Persian traditions preserved in the two first chapters of the Vendidad, (though this compilation as we now have it, is very modern), an outline, in the judgment of Heeren, so evidently historical, as to requ're nothing but sufficient geographical knowledge for the identification of the places therein mentioned. Whether any of these traditional legends are really due to Zoroaster (Zaratrusthra), [indeed whether a Zoroaster ever lived], is of little importance: but this much, however, is certain that they enshrine fragments of the most ancient belief of the Persians. Thus, they describe as the original seat of the Persian race, a delicious country named Eriene - Veedjo, the first creation of Ormuzd, the Spirit of Good, with a climate of seven months of summer and five of winter. But Ahriman, the Spirit of Evil, smote this land with the plague of ever-increasing cold, till at last it had only two months of summer to ten of winter. Hence, the people quitted their ancient homes, Ahriman having, for fifteen successive times, thwarted the good works of Ormuzd, and having, by one device or another, rendered each new abode uninhabitable. The names of these abodes are given and some of thevn may be even now identified ; and there can be little doubt, that they indicate a migration from the north-east towards the south and south-west, that is, from the Hindu-Rush westward to Media and Persia. The original situation of Eriene, a name of the same origin as the modern Iran (and possibly of Erin or Ireland), would, on this supposition, be to the north of the western chains of the Himalaya, a country enjoying a short summer, and great extremes of heat and cold (Source: W. C. Vaux, 1893).
