This article examines the usage and sense of hātąm ‘of beings’ and the adjective haiθiia- ‘true’, both from the present participle haṇt- ‘being’, in the Old Avestan texts. It argues that the first is a rhetorical figure that enhances the stature of its complement and does not denote any particular kind of being whether divine or mortal. haiθiia- consistently appears in contexts that may be legitimately described as eschatological. Most often it qualifies a certain type of activity that leads to or constitutes a ‘splendid’ state of existence. What truly is, the article concludes, refers to existence beyond mortal life.

In this book review published in the October 2015 print issue of the JRAS, and online, Viktor M. Stoll has been incorrectly listed as an Honorary Fellow of the University of Cambridge, he is currently a doctoral candidate at that university. The publisher apologises for this error.

The authors gratefully acknowledge the UK's Arts and Humanities Research Council for funding this research as part of the project ‘Tibetan in Digital Communication’.