زندواف

Zandvaf

Zandvaf and its variant forms zandbaf, zandlaf, zandk`"ʹan and zand-dan are defined in Persian dictionaries as a) a nightingale and h) a Zoroastrian or Zoroastrian priest. One can gather from these lexicographic accounts that the original meaning of these words has been "a Zoroastrian" and "a reciter of the Zand" (which is the Middle Persian commentary of the Avesta), and later these same words have also been applied to the nightingale and similar warblers because of the melodious manner in which the Zoroastrian holy texts are recited. The author says the etymology of the first element of the word, zand- is clear: in Middle Persian it means "a commentary or a report", and it is derived from zanti- (knowledge) in Avestan. But he finds the argument for assigning the meaning of "nightingale" to zandvaf etc far-fetched, and sets out to investigate the matter further. This investigation leads him to the domain of the Sogdian language and the views of such well-known scholars as Henning, Bailey, Bartholomae and our own Ms. Badr-oz-Zaman Qarib, and the upshot of the investigation: "From the sum of the above, it is quite clear that the word zandvaf, and its variants zandbaf and zandlaf, meaning "nightingale, cuckoo" have entered the Persian language from Sogdian, and etymologically they are not related to zandk"ʹan or zand-dan meaning "a reciter of Zand or an Avestan scholar". And yet our early poets have confused the Iwo sets of words and have used them synonymously in their works".