Among them were conserved and propagated Persian ethical ideals, which
found expression in literary forms, in ethico-didactic tracts, like
those which we notice just in the same circles in later times. To the
same end were preserved national traditions and ritual, some of which
had nothing to do with Mazdaism. The ethical ideals of the church found
strong support in the feudalistic circles comprising the larger and the
smaller landholders, the _dehkans_ who, with particular zeal, preserved
ancient heroic traditions.

Alongside of these national currents in the Sasanian empire there
operated in full force those factors of cultural exchange of which we
spoke above. Of those factors the most important that deserve our
attention are questions regarding education and instruction. In this
connection, Sasanian Persia found itself under powerful influences from
the West. There are sufficient reminiscences of neo-Platonic exiles from
Greece at the Sasanian Court and of the school of medicine in which the
leading part belonged to Hellenic physicians. At the same time in the
same field we have to examine other influences. For Sasanian Persia did
not remain stranger to the sciences of India. We have information
regarding the renascence of the activity of the translators of
scientific works into the Persian language and the tradition of this
activity survived down to the Moslem times. In connection with this
theoretical scientific activity stood high perfection in exterior
culture issuing to a considerable degree from exchange of materials. And
even here the Sasanian tradition has survived the dynasties; in the
study of the commerce and industry as well as the art of the Moslem
epoch we have necessarily to refer back to the preceding times of the
Persian history.

In pre-Moslem Arabia the high development of the civilisation of
Sasanian Persia was well known. Among the subjects of the great Persian
sovereigns in the western provinces of their empire there were a large
number of Arabs who in commercial intercourse carried, to tribes of the
Syrian desert and further south to the Arabian peninsula, reports
regarding the great _Iran Shahar_. Not only legends of the heroic
figures of the Iranian epic--Rustam and Isfandiar--but religious views
and persuasions of the Persians found a place and were spread among the
Arab clans. Thus we know that "fire-worshippers" were settled among the
Arab tribe of the Temim.[1]

[Footnote 1: _See_ f