Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The Avesta. No longer in scholarly use.
  • noun Avestan. No longer in scholarly use.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The name commonly given to the language of the Avesta: an ancient form of Iranian or Persian.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun Properly, the translation and exposition in the Huzvâresh, or literary Pehlevi, language, of the Avesta, the Zoroastrian sacred writings; as commonly used, the language (an ancient Persian dialect) in which the Avesta is written.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun an ancient Iranian language

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Short for Zend-Avesta. Sense 2, from a misunderstanding of Zend in Zend-Avesta, as a language designation.]

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