The Tishtar festival is one of the Zoroastrian jashnas, or small holidays, dedicated to the patron saint of rain, the Avestan version of whose name sounds like Tishtriya, or Tishtrya. In the ritual calendar of the adherents of traditional Zoroastrianism, this holiday falls on July 1.
Zoroastrian Tishtrya is the deity personifying the star Sirius, and the leader of all the constellations of the night sky. Information about this character is contained in Yashty, the fourth part of the Avesta, a collection of Zoroastrian sacred texts. The main function of this deity is the return of rain to the earth dried up by the heat. Tishtrya was worshiped as a shooter capable of assuming the form of a white horse, a golden-horned bull and a youth.
The Yashty tells how for three days, in the guise of a white horse, Tishtrya fought at Lake Vorukasha with the drought demon Apaosha. When the forces leave the hero, he appeals to the supreme deity and Ahura Mazda gives him the power to exorcise the demon. After Apaosha was defeated, it began to rain. The Zoroastrian Tishtrya corresponds to the divine archer Tishya from Vedic mythology.
In the ritual solar calendar of the adherents of Zoroastrianism, seasons, months and days have their own names. The days and months of this calendar are named after the Yazats, in other words, the beings to be worshiped, one of which is Tishtrya. His name is on the thirteenth day of each month and the fourth of the twelve months. A day on which both names coincide is a holiday dedicated to Yazat.
In the ritual Zoroastrian calendar, later Persian forms of names are used, therefore the day and month in it are called Tire, and the holiday itself, which falls on July 1 of the Gregorian calendar, is called Jashn-e Tirgan. On this day, you should sweep the floor in and around the house, put on clean clothes and have fun splashing water on each other. P. Globa, emphasizing his adherence to the non-traditional Zervanian concept of Zoroastrianism, uses the name "Feast of Tishtar" in his calendar and transfers it to the fourth of July.
