Atar in the context of "Vatër"

Ancient Iranian religions were a set of ancient beliefs and practices of the Iranian peoples before the rise of Zoroastrianism. The religion closest to it was the historical Vedic religion that was practiced during the Vedic period. The major deities worshipped were Ahura Mazda and Mithra from Iran to Rome, but Atar was also worshipped, as names of kings and common public showing devotion to these three exist in most cases. But some sects, the precursors of the Magi, also worshipped Ahura Mazda, the chief of the Ahuras. With the rise of Zoroaster and his new, reformatory religion, Ahura Mazda became the principal deity, while the Daevas were relegated to the background. Many of the attributes and commandments of Varuna, called Fahrana in Median times, were later attributed to Ahura Mazda by Zoroaster.

The Iranian peoples emerged as a separate branch of the Indo-Iranians in the 2nd millennium BC, during which they came to dominate the Eurasian Steppe and the Persian Plateau. Their religion is derived from Iranian religions, and therefore shares many similarities with the Vedic religion of India. Although the Persian peoples left little written or material evidence of their religious practices, their religion is possible to reconstruct from scant Iranian, Babylonian and Greek accounts, similarities with Vedic and other Indo-European religions, and material evidence.

A fire temple (Persian: آتشکده, romanized: ātashkade; Gujarati: અગિયારી, romanized: agiyārī) is a place of worship for Zoroastrians. In Zoroastrian doctrine, atar and aban (fire and water) are agents of ritual purity.

Clean, white "ash for the purification ceremonies [is] regarded as the basis of ritual life", which "are essentially the rites proper to the tending of a domestic fire, for the temple [fire] is that of the hearth fire raised to a new solemnity". For, one "who sacrifices unto fire with fuel in his hand ..., is given happiness".

The Khalaj (Bactrian: χαλασσ, romanized: Xalass; Persian: خلج‌ها, romanized: Xalajhâ) are a Turkic ethnic group who mainly reside in Iran. In Iran they still speak the Khalaj language, although most of them are Persianized.

Historically, the Khalaj who lived among Pashtuns were slowly Pashtunized. Due to this, the Khaljis of Delhi, originating from Khalaj migrants from Afghanistan into India, were often considered to be Pashtuns by other Turkic nobles. The Ghiljis, one of the largest Pashtun tribes, also derive their name from the Khalaj, and it is likely that the Khalaj initially formed the core of this tribe.