Zoroaster - Etymology

Etymology

Zoroaster's name in his native language, Avestan, was probably Zaraϑuštra. His English name, "Zoroaster", and the derivatives from a later (5th-century BCE) Greek transcription, Zōroastrēs (Ζωροάστρης), as used in Xanthus's Lydiaca (Fragment 32) and in Plato's First Alcibiades (122a1). This form appears subsequently in the Latin Zōroastrēs and, in later Greek orthographies, as Zōroastris. The Greek form of the name appears to be based on a phonetic transliteration or semantic substitution of the Avestan zaraϑ- with the Greek zōros (literally "undiluted") and the Avestan -uštra with astron ("star").

In Avestan, Zaraϑuštra is generally accepted to derive from an Old Iranian *Zaratuštra-. While zarat- is strongly referenced to mean "golden" (from the old Eastern-Iranian zar-, meaning "gold") it does not itself appear in Avestan. The second half of the name (-uštra-) is universally accepted to mean "camel". These factors combined open the door for reconstructing the name's meaning, though there have been other alternative etymologies proposed.

Reconstructions from later Iranian languages—particularly from the Middle Persian (300 BCE) Zardusht, which is the form that the name took in the 9th- to 12th-century Zoroastrian texts—suggest that *Zaratuštra- might be a zero-grade form of *Zarantuštra-. Subject then to whether Zaraϑuštra derives from *Zarantuštra- or from *Zaratuštra-, several interpretations have been proposed.

Following *Zarantuštra- are:

• "with old/aging camels": related to Avestic zarant-. (cf. Pashto zōṛ and Ossetic zœrond, "old"; Old Persian zāl, "old")
• "with angry/furious camels": from Avestan *zarant-, "angry, furious".

Following *Zaratuštra- are:

• " golden camel": this is derived from old Eastern Iranian word *zar- for gold and ushtra for camel, further corresponding to an Eastern Iranian origin (the Old Persian word dar as a Western-Iranian dialect would be the equal term of Eastern Iranian zar; Modern Persian uses the Eastern Iranian word for gold).
• "who is driving camels" or "who is fostering/cherishing camels": related to Avestan zarš-, "to drag".
• Mayrhofer (1977) proposed an etymology of "who is desiring camels" or "longing for camels" and related to Vedic har-, "to like", and perhaps (though ambiguous) also to Avestan zara-.
• "with yellow camels": parallel to younger Avestan zairi-.

A folk etymology of the name is from zaraϑa, "golden", and the *uštra, "light" (from the root uš, "to shine"). In yet another etymological variation, Zaraϑuštra is split into two words: zara, "gold", and ϑuštra, "friend". Several more etymologies have been proposed, some quite fanciful, but none is factually based.

The interpretation of the -ϑ- (/θ/) in Avestan zaraϑuštra was for a time itself subjected to heated debate because the -ϑ- is an irregular development: As a rule, *zarat- (a first element that ends in a dental consonant) should have Avestan zarat- or zarat̰- as a development from it. Why this is not so for zaraϑuštra has not yet been determined. Notwithstanding the phonetic irregularity, that Avestan zaraϑuštra with its -ϑ- was linguistically an actual form is shown by later attestations reflecting the same basis. All present-day, Iranian-language variants of his name derive from the Middle Iranian variants of Zarϑošt, which, in turn, all reflect Avestan's fricative -ϑ-.