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Updated: June 15, 2025
There were Magians, astrologers, and magicians by the dozen, who considered this sacred spot the most suitable place in which to offer their services to the Romans, always inquisitive for signs and charms.
"But, my beloved, the Light in which we rejoice, through no merits or deserts of our own, had not yet been shed on the lost children of those days of darkness; and all those noble, and indeed most admirable efforts were polluted by an admixture, even here, of coarse superstition, bloody sacrifices, and foolish adoration of perishable stone idols and beasts without understanding; and in other places by the false and delusive arts of Magians and sorcerers.
He mingled a draught of one of those simple but potent remedies which he carried always in his girdle for the Magians were physicians as well as astrologers and poured it slowly between the colorless lips. Hour after hour he labored as only a skilful healer of disease can do; and, at last, the man's strength returned; he sat up and looked about him.
The companies of the imperial body-guard, who were placed about the amphitheatre, found no great difference, so long as it was daylight, between the crowd round the Circus of Alexandria and that by the Tiber. What chiefly struck them was the larger number of dusky faces, and the fanciful garb of the Magians.
Quoth she, 'Where didst thou leave the owner of these olives? 'O King of the age, answered he, 'we left him in the land of the Magians and he is a gardener there. 'Except thou bring him to me, said she, 'thou knowest not the harm that awaits thee and thy ship. Then she bade seal up the merchants' storehouses and said to them, 'The owner of these olives is my debtor; and an ye bring him not to me, I will without fail put you all to death and confiscate your goods. So they all went to the captain and promised him the hire of the ship, if he would go and return a second time, saying, 'Deliver us from this masterful tyrant. Accordingly, the captain set sail and God decreed him a prosperous voyage, till he came to the city of the Magians, and landing by night, went up to the garden.
Similarly he seems more inclined to believe that the great storm at the beginning of the Persian War ceased from ordinary atmospheric causes, and not in consequence of the incantations of the MAGIANS. He calls Melampos, whom the majority of the Greeks looked on as an inspired prophet, 'a clever man who had acquired for himself the art of prophecy'; and as regards the miracle told of the AEginetan statues of the primeval deities of Damia and Auxesia, that they fell on their knees when the sacrilegious Athenians strove to carry them off, 'any one may believe it, he says, 'who likes, but as for myself, I place no credence in the tale.
Smart, inquisitive girls were pushing their way singly or in groups, and their laughter drowned the deep, tragical voices of the soothsayers and Magians who announced their magic powers to the passersby.
Zoroaster invented this writing which the Magians have called Sin Dabireh, that is to say, the 'sacred writing'. He incised his writing into 12,000 cow skins and filled it with gold. It was in the ancient language of Persia of which no one has any knowledge to-day. Only a few portions of its chapters have been translated into the modern Persian.
A superior smile parted the Magian's lips; he stepped back into the room, followed by Annianus, and replied: "You know how many who call themselves Magians will crowd round Caesar, and the fame of Sosibius, Hananja, and Kaimis, is not much behind mine. Each plies his art by his own formulas, though he may call himself a Pythagorean or what not.
“I have faithful slaves,” said Xerxes, rising and smiling benignantly upon the general and the bow-bearer. “Let us disperse, but first let command be given the Magians to cry all night to Mithra and Tishtrya, and to sacrifice to them a white horse.”
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