Denkard

The Dēnkard or Dēnkart (Middle Persian: "Acts of Religion") is a 10th-century compendium of the Mazdaen Zoroastrian beliefs and customs. The Denkard is to a great extent an "Encyclopedia of Mazdaism" and is a most valuable source of information on the religion. The Denkard is not itself considered scripture.

The name traditionally given to the compendium reflects a phrase from the colophons, which speaks of the kart/kard, from Avestan karda meaning "acts" (also in the sense of "chapters"), and dēn, from Avestan daena, literally "insight" or "revelation," but more commonly translated as "religion." Accordingly, dēn-kart means "religious acts" or "acts of religion." The ambiguity of -kart or -kard in the title reflects the orthography of Pahlavi writing, in which the letter <t> may sometimes denote /d/.

The individual chapters vary in age, style and authorship. Authorship of the first three books is attributed in the colophones to Adurfarnbag-i Farrokhzadan, as identified in the last chapter of book 3, and who de Menasce believes lived in the early 9th century. Of these three books, only a larger portion of the third has survived, which de Menasce proposes is the result of a transmission through other persons. The first three books were subsequently edited by a certain Ādurbād (son) of Ēmēdān of Baghdad, who is also the author of the remaining six books and whose work is dated 1020. The manuscript 'B' (ms. 'B 55', B for Bombay) that is the basis for most surviving copies and translations is dated 1659 and which its editor reconstructed from a partially destroyed work. Of other copies only fragments survive.

The Denkard is roughly contemporary with the main texts of the Bundahishn, and like much of the other Pahlavi literature of the period, reflects a movement initiated by the Samanids to revive Greater Iranian culture.

The Denkard originally contained nine books or volumes, called nasks. The first two and part of the third have not survived. However, the Denkard itself contains summaries of nasks from other compilations, such as Chihrdad from the Avesta, which are otherwise lost.

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