Thread by @blog_supplement

The Geser Khan epic is one of the most remarkable texts where we can make out the layers of heathen religions piling one on top of the other. When the Mongolian version was finally published by the Manchus in 1716 CE it was part of their trilingual national formula with Manchu,

Mongolian and Chinese. The epic itself has roots in Tibet. The name of the protagonists Geser is believed by some to faint memory of Augustus or Julius but that is about it for any Roman memory. Its chief god outside of the bauddha overlay is named Qormusda Khan Tengri coming

from the Iranic Ahura Mazda. He is part of pantheon of 33 gods coming from the Indo-Iranian world. The Mongols however visualize him more like indra rather than the Iranic Ahura Mazda. The 2nd of Qormusda's sons incarnates as Geser. He is worshiped as an equestrian deity for the

protection of the herds of the Mongols & convergently presents many aspects of the Indian revanta with broader Indo-Iranian roots & later reflexes like Arya & khaNDoba in peninsular India -- a v.persistent Indo-Iranian motif resonating with the Mongols. Then there is a mysterious

white colored goddess: Arya alaMkarI, clearly of originally Indic origin, whose agency is quite independent of any bauddha overlay and she is the protectress of Geser Khan in his adventures. Her roots remain a topic of note for investigation. Then we have Rogmo Goa the first wife

of Geser who takes on elements of the legendary ancestress of the Mongols,Alan Qoa, whom even the tyrant Akbar, upon apostasy, felt a sudden connection to and had painting of her commissioned.Then there is an evil Lama güngü echige whose nature hints some struggle between the old

religion & the nAstika-mata. The mysterious deity Erlik, after whom a therizinosaurian dinosaur was named, has features of yama and is Plutonic deity of the nether world. garuDa has an Indian name but also wraps up features of his Iranic cognate the saena merega. In the Manchu

age, Geser Khan was identified with rAjAdhirAja whom they had acquired from the nAstikamata & identified him throughout the chIna lands with Guandi who was hero who had been made a deity of war in the Mongol Khaganate and subsequent Ming periods. So the Mongols saw Geser in the

temples of Guandi it in China. When the Mongols say Bisman Tengri incarnated as Geser they're accommodating this link to mahAraja. The annihilation of the city of sudarshana in the epic is a likely memory of the Mohammedan ravages in central Asia which the Tibetans witnessed. Yet

why they adopted the Roman emperor as the focus is mysterious. I've been playing with a somewhat outré hypothesis that rather than actually being Julius or Augustus himself the "prakR^iti" was none other than the great short-lived Julian who almost turned back the 2nd Abrahamism

I posit that upon his fall & the take over of the Roman world, some Roman or more likely Indian or Iranian bards carried a narration of this last true roman emperor & his glory eastwards fleeing the advancing evil of ekarAkShasatvam. This story expanded in the zone of northern

Indosphere & neighboring Iranosphere before being taken up by the Tibetan bards of the rising Tibetan empire. At each transfer new elements were added until it reached Mongolia where it was Mongolized but resonating with the old Indo-Iranian elements.This hypothesis would explain

why a war-like Indian chakravartin-like figure or Iranic pAtishah figure carried the name of a Caesar from Rome and landed up in the east. If were purely an Augustan or Juliusian epic would we not find Western "prakR^iti"-s. If were instead Julian as the locus then the only ones

to appreciate his glory would lie in the East after the fall to pretonmAda. Further, if initially composed by an Iranic bard close to the greater Indosphere the subsequent fall of their nation to marUnmAda would have provide a foundation for the motif of the destruction of

the city of sudarshana that was close to the gods by demonic forces. Parking the essence of this hypothesis here for now.