Sudreh and kusti
The sudreh is the white undershirt and the kusti the woollen cord tied three times round it at the waist. Zoroastrians put them on at their initiation and wear them for life, untying and retying the cord with prayers each day.
Meaning
Every initiated Zoroastrian, man or woman, wears the pair: in India the initiation is called the navjote, in Iran sedreh-pushun, “putting on the sacred shirt”, Jamsheed Choksy writes in Encyclopaedia Iranica. J. J. Modi, the Parsi scholar-priest, called them “the symbol and badge” of the religion: a Zoroastrian may wear any dress he likes, but must wear the sacred shirt and thread. The kusti is wrapped three times round the waist, which is believed to stand for good thoughts, good words and good deeds, and tied with a square knot in front and another behind. Most Parsis, even in Western countries, wear it every day; Choksy notes that Iranian Zoroastrians often wear it only for religious services, so as not to be singled out for maltreatment.
Origin and history
The rite of the girdle is probably older than Zoroastrianism, Choksy writes, and he compares the Vedic rite in which Hindu men of the upper three castes are invested with a holy cord. The Zoroastrian texts tell different stories of its beginning: the Yasna credits a sage, Haoma, while a Pahlavi text gives it to the legendary king Jamshid, centuries before Zarathushtra. Traditionally the cords are woven by women of priestly families in Iran and India.
What the threads stand for
The kusti is one cord of 72 white threads of lamb’s wool, in six strands of twelve, ending in tassels. Choksy and Modi agree that the 72 threads stand for the 72 chapters of the Yasna, the twelve threads of a strand for the twelve months, and the tassels’ 24 threads for the sections of the Visperad. They differ on the six strands: Choksy gives the six gahambars, the seasonal feasts, while Modi gives the six religious duties and assigns the gahambars to the six tassels instead. Modi adds that all of this rests on later books, not on the Avesta.
The sudreh, Modi writes, is made of white cambric, white being the colour of purity, in two pieces: the front stands for the past and the back for the future. At the neck is a small pocket, the gireh-ban, the “purse of righteousness”, a reminder to fill one’s life with good deeds.
Retying the cord
The kusti is untied and retied with prayers after washing, on waking, at the start of each watch of the day, and before worship at a fire temple. Choksy writes that the wearer faces east until midday and west until sunset, toward the sun, or at night a lamp, the moon or the stars.
Read next
- Next in Zoroastrian symbolsFaravaharThe winged figure of a man rising from a ring, the best known symbol of Zoroastrianism. Zoroastrians today read it as a fravashi, a guardian spirit, and teach its parts as good thoughts, good words and good deeds; scholars have also seen in it the god Ahura Mazda or the king’s xvarenah. It is also an emblem of Iranian identity.
- The same shape in Andean and Inca symbolsTumi (ceremonial knife)A ceremonial knife with a half-moon blade from the north coast of ancient Peru. The gold tumis of the Sicán (Lambayeque) culture carry a god on the handle, often identified as Naylamp, the dynasty’s mythical founder. The Tumi de Oro was declared a pre-Columbian symbol of Peru in 1981.
See also
Sources
- Kustīg, by Jamsheed K. Choksy, Encyclopaedia Iranica (Internet Archive copy, November 2014), Encyclopaedia Iranica, text
- The Naojote Ceremony of the Parsees, by Jivanji Jamshedji Modi, J. J. Modi, Bombay, 1914 (Internet Archive full text), J. J. Modi (Internet Archive), pp. 1–15
- A Catechism of the Zoroastrian Religion, by Jivanji Jamshedji Modi, J. J. Modi, Bombay, 1911 (Internet Archive full text), J. J. Modi (Internet Archive), chapter on the name of the religion
The same shape elsewhere
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Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 9, 2026. How we research
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