M A G I A N S
A Magian, worshipping at
a fire altar, Sasanian period
(British Museum, London)
Magians (Old Persian Maguš): experts in Iranian religious -probably: oral- traditions, perhaps belonging to a Median tribe. They are to be distinguished from the priests.
Greek sources
When discussing the Magians of ancient Persia, one thing should be clear from the very start: Magians have nothing to do with magic or wizardry. The confusion, however, is understandable or -in any case- very old. In the sixth century BCE, the Greek philosopher Heraclitus of Ephesus directed his prophecies
against the wanderers of the night: the Magians, the Bacchantes, the Maenads and initiates. Heraclitus threatens them with tortures after death, he threatens them with fire, for what they believe to be initiations in the mysteries are in fact impious rites.
[Clement of Alexandria, Protrepticus 12]
Heraclitus' threats are well chosen, because, as we will see below, the Magians venerated fire and believed in rewards and punishments after death, which was a common religious idea in Iran.
This was the first time that the word 'Magians' was used negatively. Later authors lumped the expression together with words like 'charlatan' and 'wizard' and gave the word the usual meaning. The famous Macedonian philosopher Aristotle of Stagira (384-322), who had not spent a part of his life in Persia's western territories for nothing, felt himself forced to state explicitly 'that the Magians neither know nor practice sorcery' (The Magian, fr.36 Rose).
An older contemporary of the Macedonian philosopher, the Athenian author Xenophon (c.430-c.355), who visited the Achaemenid empire in 401, calls the Magians experts 'in everything religious' (Cyropaedia 8.3.11). He also knows that the Magians sing hymns to the rising sun and all known gods (8.1.23).
But our most important Greek source is Herodotus of Halicarnassus (c.480-c.425). In his Histories, he mentions the Magians several times, usually in connection with sacrifices.
As for ceremonial, when the Persians offer sacrifice to the deities [...], they erect no altar and kindle no fire. The libation, the flute music, the garlands, the sprinkled meal - all these things, familiar to us, they have no use for. But before a ceremony, a man sticks a spray of leaves, usually myrtle leaves, into his headdress, takes his victim to some open place and invokes the deity to whom he wishes to sacrifice.
The actual worshipper is not permitted to pray for any personal or private blessing, but only for the king and for the general good of the community. (The actual worshipper is not permitted to pray for any personal or private blessing, but only for the king and for the general good of the community, of which he is himself a part.) When he has cut up the animal and cooked it, he makes a little heap of the softest green-stuff he can find, preferably clover, and lays all the meat upon it. This done, a Magian -a member of this caste is always present at sacrifices- utters an incantation over it in a form of words which is supposed to recount the birth of the gods. Then after a short interval the worshipper removes the flesh and does what he pleases with it.
[Herodotus, Histories 1.132;
tr. Aubrey de Selincourt]