Which is older Avestan or Sanskrit?

It seems that Avestan is much older than Old Persian and ancient Eastern Iranian languages and hence shares both characteristics. Sanskrit is older than Avestan.

Which is older Rig Veda or Avesta?

Vedic literature is considered older than Avestan literature by 500 – 1000 years though the dating of both is speculative. The Mittani Indo-Aryan language is considered older than Vedic or Avestan because it has aika instead of eka. Vedic is supposed to to have merged ai to e and hence is considered younger.

Is Avestan similar to Sanskrit?

However, Vedic Sanskrit and Avestan are much more similar than it was initially thought – there are cognates between the two and migration from Iran to northern India enabled contact between the two. Both languages underwent certain phonological changes, but their vocabulary is very similar.

Is the Avestan language similar to Sanskrit?

Avestan Old Iranian & Rig Vedic Sanskrit Similarities. The oldest language or dialect in the Avesta, the language of the Gathas and the Yasna Haptanghaiti, is close to the language used in the Rig Veda, the older Hindu scriptures, which for convenience we call Vedic Sanskrit.

What is the oldest Indo-Aryan language?

As such, Old Avestan is quite close in grammar and lexicon to Vedic Sanskrit, the oldest preserved Indo-Aryan language . The Avestan text corpus was composed in ancient Arachosia, Aria, Bactria, and Margiana, corresponding to the entirety of present-day Afghanistan, and parts of Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.

What is the difference between Vedic Sanskrit and Rigvedic Sanskrit?

The Vedic Sanskrit found in the Rigveda is distinctly more archaic than other Vedic texts, and in many respects, the Rigvedic language is notably more similar to those found in the archaic texts of Old Avestan Zoroastrian Gathas and Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey.

What languages were spoken in the Avesta?

Old Iranian Languages of the Avesta. An Avestan Language is any one of the Indo-Iranian languages used to compose the Zoroastrian scripture, the Avesta. The Avestan languages range from the ancient language of the hymns of Zarathushtra, the Gathas, to Sogdian and the relatively modern language of the commentaries, the Zand.