Observations on the Transmission Routes of the Egyptian Solar Model to the Ancient Iranian World

The Mazdean calendar followed in its structure the main lines of the civil Egyptian calendar, although with a modification in the position of the epact. This ancient Iranian calendar is usually considered to be a witness of an Egyptian cultural influence in Iran, which occurred after Cambyses’ annexation of Egypt. This probably occurred during the last part of Xerxes’ reign. While the general historical framework would have allowed for such an intellectual transfer, the present article tries to focus on the practical conditions and the textual sources that transmitted the rules of the solar calendrical system of Egypt to Persian intermediaries with simultaneous reference to the historical background of this development. Of foundational importance surely were the Aramaic papyri of Persian Egypt, where many double dates were offered according to the Egyptian and the Babylonian calendars. This practice, based upon bureaucratic conventions, would suggest the plausible existence of simple tables of timing conversions (or something akin to this) that opened the key rules of the Egyptian civil calendar also to Aramean and Persian functionaries, thus making the Iranian intelligencija acquainted with the advantages of a calendrical system quite suited to the profane and religious needs of the “Mazdean” communities.