Avestan language
E123645
Eastern Iranian language
Indo-European language
Indo-Iranian language
ancient language
liturgical language
The Avestan language is an ancient Eastern Iranian language known primarily as the liturgical language of Zoroastrianism and the sacred texts of the Avesta.
All labels observed (6)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Avestan | 41 |
| Avestan language canonical | 5 |
| Old Avestan | 3 |
| Avestan Aeshma daeva | 1 |
| Avestan: Aredvi Sura Anahita | 1 |
| Younger Avestan | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T1023235 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Avestan language Context triple: [Iranian languages, hasMajorLanguage, Avestan language]
-
A.
Old Persian
Old Persian is an ancient Iranian language used in the Achaemenid Empire, primarily known from royal inscriptions such as those of Darius the Great.
-
B.
Iranian languages
Iranian languages are a branch of the Indo-Iranian family of Indo-European languages, historically spoken across Iran, Central Asia, and surrounding regions, including major languages such as Persian (Farsi), Pashto, and Kurdish.
-
C.
Judeo-Iranian languages
Judeo-Iranian languages are a group of Iranian languages traditionally spoken and written by Jewish communities in Iran and surrounding regions, often featuring Hebrew and Aramaic influences.
-
D.
Persian language
Persian language is a major modern Iranian language spoken primarily in Iran, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan, known for its rich literary tradition and historical influence across the Middle East and Central Asia.
-
E.
Elamite
Elamite is an ancient language of southwestern Iran, historically used in the kingdom of Elam and later as an administrative language under the Achaemenid Empire.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Avestan language Target entity description: The Avestan language is an ancient Eastern Iranian language known primarily as the liturgical language of Zoroastrianism and the sacred texts of the Avesta.
-
A.
Old Persian
Old Persian is an ancient Iranian language used in the Achaemenid Empire, primarily known from royal inscriptions such as those of Darius the Great.
-
B.
Iranian languages
Iranian languages are a branch of the Indo-Iranian family of Indo-European languages, historically spoken across Iran, Central Asia, and surrounding regions, including major languages such as Persian (Farsi), Pashto, and Kurdish.
-
C.
Judeo-Iranian languages
Judeo-Iranian languages are a group of Iranian languages traditionally spoken and written by Jewish communities in Iran and surrounding regions, often featuring Hebrew and Aramaic influences.
-
D.
Persian language
Persian language is a major modern Iranian language spoken primarily in Iran, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan, known for its rich literary tradition and historical influence across the Middle East and Central Asia.
-
E.
Elamite
Elamite is an ancient language of southwestern Iran, historically used in the kingdom of Elam and later as an administrative language under the Achaemenid Empire.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (52)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
Eastern Iranian language
ⓘ
Indo-European language ⓘ Indo-Iranian language ⓘ ancient language ⓘ liturgical language ⓘ |
| closelyRelatedTo | Old Persian ⓘ |
| grammaticalFeature |
inflected for case
ⓘ
inflected for gender ⓘ inflected for mood ⓘ inflected for number ⓘ inflected for person ⓘ inflected for tense ⓘ |
| hasCanonicalCorpus | Avesta ⓘ |
| historicalPeriod |
1st millennium BCE
ⓘ
2nd millennium BCE ⓘ |
| ISO639-2Code | ave ⓘ |
| ISO639-3Code | ave ⓘ |
| languageBranch | Indo-Iranian languages ⓘ |
| languageFamily |
Indo-European languages
ⓘ
linked to:
Indo-European language family
|
| languageGroup | Eastern Iranian languages ⓘ |
| languageSubbranch | Iranian languages ⓘ |
| phonologicalFeature |
distinction between long and short vowels
ⓘ
rich consonant system ⓘ |
| primaryWritingSystem |
Avestan alphabet
ⓘ
linked to:
Avestan script
|
| region |
Eastern Iranian plateau
ⓘ
Greater Iran ⓘ |
| relatedTo |
Bactrian language
ⓘ
Pashto ⓘ
linked to:
Pashto language
Sogdian language ⓘ |
| religion | Zoroastrianism ⓘ |
| sacredText |
Avesta
ⓘ
Gathas ⓘ
linked to:
Avesta
Vendidad ⓘ Visperad ⓘ Yashts ⓘ
linked to:
Avesta
Yasna ⓘ |
| scriptDerivedFrom | Aramaic-derived scripts ⓘ |
| scriptDirection | right-to-left ⓘ |
| status |
extinct as a spoken language
ⓘ
used liturgically ⓘ |
| subdivision |
Old Avestan
ⓘ
linked to:
Avestan language
Younger Avestan ⓘ
linked to:
Avestan language
|
| usedAs | liturgical language of Zoroastrianism ⓘ |
| usedBy | Zoroastrian priesthood ⓘ |
| usedFor |
hymns
ⓘ
prayers ⓘ religious law texts ⓘ |
| usedIn | Zoroastrian rituals ⓘ |
| writingStandardizedIn |
Sasanian period
ⓘ
linked to:
Sasanian Empire
|
| writingSystem |
Avestan script
ⓘ
Manichaean script ⓘ Pahlavi script ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Avestan language Description of subject: The Avestan language is an ancient Eastern Iranian language known primarily as the liturgical language of Zoroastrianism and the sacred texts of the Avesta.
Referenced by (52)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
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linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
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linked to: Avestan language
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linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language
linked to: Avestan language