The 10th Century BCE of the Avestan political landscape demarcates a land called Airyana Vaejah, which means the land of Aryans. This covers present-day Central Asia and Russia, which was supposed to be an Aryan land during migration across different parts of Europe and Asia.
This region is icy. The number of references indicates that it was a mysterious region.
Ohrmazd Yasht (21): ‘Hail to the Glory of the Kavis! Hail to the Airyanem Vaejah! Hail to the Saoka, made by Mazda! Hail to the waters of the Daitya! Hail to Ardvi, the undefiled well! Hail to the whole world of the Holy Spirit! ‘Yatha ahu vairyo: The will of the Lord… ‘Ashem Vohu: Holiness is the best of all good….
At the beginning of the Vendidad from Zend Avesta, it says in Chapter 1, FARGARD I
2. I have made every land dear to its dwellers, even though it had no charms whatever in it: had I not made every land dear to its dwellers, even though it had no charms whatever in it, then the whole living world would have invaded the Airyana Vaêgô.
3. The first of the good lands and countries which I, Ahura Mazda, created, was the Airyana Vaêgô, by the good river Dâitya. Thereupon came to Angra Mainyu, who is all death, and he counter-created by his witchcraft the serpent in the river and winter, a work of the Daêvas.
4. There are ten winter months there, two summer months, and those are cold for the waters, cold for the earth, cold for the trees. Winter falls there, with the worst of its plagues.
Again, in Chapter 2, the conversation follows how Ahur Mazda called for a meeting between celestial bodies and mortals in Airyana Vaego. Airyana Vaêgô was localized in the country north of Azerbaijan; the river in it must become identified with the Araxes (Aras), but, at the same time, it continued to surround the world eastward under the name of Veh (Vanguhi), which was the Sassanian name of the Oxus — Indus. It seems that in the time of Herodotus, the Araxes and the Oxus were considered one and the same river, as the Oxus and the Indus were later on; this would account for his strange statement that the Araxes, which is confessedly with him the Oxus or Yaxartes, springs from the land of the Matianians, like the Gyndes, and flows eastwards; and, at the same time, this would account both for how the Airyana Vaêgô could be localized in the basin of the Araxes and how the Oxus could flow eastwards to fall into the Arabian sea. (copied from Vendidad Introduction).
There is a debate about who the original Aryans are—the ones who further migrated eastwards and came near the Indus or those who moved southwards towards Persia. Maybe both are the same people, where two tribes moved in different directions.
Very little research has been conducted to understand Airyana Vaejah. You can see Hapta Hindu (Sapta Sindhu) towards the right, which is mentioned in RigVeda. Haraxwati is also mentioned as Saraswati. The mystery will continue to deepen as we dive deep into it.
