Editing Airyanem Vaejah (section)

==Modern scholarship==
[[File:Avestan geography vendidad.png|thumb|Approximate location of Airyanem Vaejah according to a number of scholars.{{refn|group=note|Sources for the different localizations are provided in the description of the image.}}
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When investigating the historical reality behind Airyanem Vaejah, modern scholarship is faced with the fact that many references appear in a clearly mythical context, while others may point to a specific historical location.{{Sfn|Boyce|1996|loc=p. 144: "Another local name which is evidently traditional, and is also used at times with mythical connections, is Airyanem Vaejah, in Pahlavi Eranvej."}}{{Sfn|Vogelsang|2000|loc=p. 50: "An additional problem is the question whether all the lands that are mentioned in the list refer to an actual geographical location, or whether in at least some cases we are dealing with mythical names that bear no direct relationship to a specific area. Such a point has often been brought forward as regards the first and the last names in the list: Airyanem Vaejah (No. 1) and Upa Aodaeshu Rahnghaya (No. 16)."}} Airyanem Vaejah has, therefore, been compared to [[Hara Berezaiti|Mount Hara]], a mountain that both appears in Zoroastrian mythology and has been variously identified with [[Alborz|real geographical]] locations.{{Sfn|Boyce|1996|loc=p. 144: "But just as the name Hara is used both of a mythical mountain (home of Mithra and Aredvi Sura and supporter of the Cinvat Bridge) and also of various local ranges, so the name Airyanem Vaejah appears to have been used both of a mythical land at the centre of the world, and also of wherever the "Airyas" or Avestan people found themselves living."}} Modern scholarship is thus trying to distinguish between these mythical and historical elements in the Zoroastrian sources and to find out how the early Iranians conceived of their world in each respective context.{{Sfn|Vogelsang|2000|loc=p. 50}}{{Sfn|Witzel|2000|loc=pp. 47–48}}

Since the [[Bundahishn]] (29.12) specifically places Airyanem Vaejah near [[Azerbaijan (Iran)|Adarbaygan]], it is clear that during [[Sassanian empire|Sassanian times]] Iranians believed it to be located in Western Iran.{{Sfn|MacKenzie|1998}} Some early modern scholars tended to accept this localisation, assuming that it also reflected the understanding of Iranians at the much earlier [[Avestan period|time of the Avesta]], i.e., the time when the earliest sources were produced.{{Sfn|Darmesteter|1880|loc=p. 3}} However, this notion has been criticised due to the observation that all place names in the Avesta that can be reliably identified with modern places are found in the eastern and northeastern part of [[Greater Iran]].{{Sfn|Grenet|2005|loc=p. 31: "As can be seen, almost all identified countries are situated beyond the present borders of Iran, to the east and northeast."}} As a result, more recent scholarship mostly favours an eastern localisation of Airyanem Vaejah.{{Sfn|Witzel|2000|loc=p. 10: "Since the evidence of Young Avestan place names so clearly points to a more eastern location, the Avesta is again understood, nowadays, as an East Iranian text, whose area of composition comprised -- at least – Sīstån/Arachosia, Herat, Merw and Bactria."}}

One hypothesis that has attracted considerable interest identifies Airyanem Vaejah with [[Khwarezm]].{{Sfn|Vogelsang|2000|loc=p. 58: "The land of Airyanem Vaejah, which is described in the text as a land of extreme cold, has often been identified with ancient Choresmia."}} It was proposed early on by [[Wilhelm Geiger]]{{Sfn|Geiger|1884}} and [[Josef Markwart]]{{Sfn|Markwart|1901}} and a number of arguments have been voiced in its favor over the years. First, Airyanem Vaejah is described as having long and cold winters and Khwarezm is among the coldest regions of [[Greater Iran]].{{Sfn|Benveniste|1934|loc=p. 271}} Next, Airyanem Vaejah is described as the original homeland of the Iranians and Khwarezm has been proposed as an early center of [[Khwarezmian language|Iranian civilization]].{{Sfn|Vogelsang|2000|loc=p. 58: "The concept of Choresmia as the original 'homestead of the Aryans' is connected to the so-called Choresmian hypothesis by Henning."}} This point has been widely discussed within the search for "the traditional homeland" or "the ancient homeland" of the [[ancient Iranians|Iranians]], perpetuating interpretations of the Airyanem Vaejah as {{lang|de|Urheimat des Awestavolkes}}, {{lang|de|Urland}} of the Indo-Iranians{{Sfn|Spiegel|1887|loc=p. 123}} or the {{lang|de|Wiege aller iranischen Arier}}.{{Sfn|von Prášek|1906|loc=p. 29}} Another argument builds on a comparison between the list of Iranian countries in the [[Vendidad]] (Vd. 1.1.–1.19) and the [[Mithra|Mihr]] [[Yasht]] (Yt. 10.13–14). As [[Arthur Christensen|Christensen]] has argued, the place occupied by Khwarezm in the Mihr Yasht seems to be occupied by Airyanem Vaejah in the Vendidad.{{Sfn|Christensen|1943|loc=pp. 66–67}} Taken together, these reasons have made the Khwarezm hypothesis very popular and scholars like [[Mary Boyce]],{{Sfn|Boyce|1996}} [[Nasser Takmil Homayoun]], {{Sfn|Homayoun|2004}} and [[Elton L. Daniel]]{{Sfn|Daniel|2012}} have endorsed it more recently.

However, this hypothesis has also seen a number of criticisms and counter proposals. For instance, [[Willem Vogelsang|Vogelsang]] has noted that the notion of Khwarezm as an important center of early Iranian civilization is not substantiated by recent evidence and places Airyanem Vaejah in the general region of [[Transoxiania]].{{Sfn|Vogelsang|2000|loc=p. 60}} Frantz Grenet has interpreted the cold of  Airyanem Vaejah as referring to a mountainious rather than a northern region and places it in the upper course of the [[Amu Darya|Oxus]] river at the pre-[[Pamir Mountains|Pamirian]] highlands.{{Sfn|Grenet|2005|loc=pp. 35–36}} According to [[Michael Witzel]], however, Airyanem Vaejah lies at the center of the 16 lands mentioned in the [[Vendidad]] – an area now in the central Afghan highlands (around [[Bamyan Province]]).{{Sfn|Witzel|2000|loc=p. 48: "The Vīdēvdað list obviously was composed or redacted by someone who regarded Afghanistan and the lands surrounding it as the home of all Aryans (''airiia''), that is of all (eastern) Iranians, with Airiianem Vaẽjah as their center."}} He also concludes that the idea of finding the "Aryan homeland" in the Avesta should be abandoned and one should rather focus on how both the earlier (Yasht 32.2) and later Avestan texts themselves regarded their own territory.{{Sfn|Witzel|2000|loc=pp. 47–48}} Finally, some scholars like [[Prods Oktor Skjaervo|Skjaervo]] have concluded that the localization of Airyanem Vaejah is insolveable.{{Sfn|Skjaervø |1995|loc=p. 166: "I regard the question of the identity of ''airiianam vaëjô'' "the Aryan expanse" as insoluble"}}