The Vedic priesthood is the collective term for the priests of the Vedic religion. Known as purohita, the priests are divided into several types:

• The Hotar is the chief priest, presiding the sacrifice. He is associated with the Rigveda.
• The Udgatar intones the hymns for the Hotar. He is associated with the Samaveda.
• The Adhvaryu carries out the actual sacrifice. He is associated with the Yajurveda. In mythology, he is presented as a newcomer, probably corresponding to a historical secondary development. The rising importance of the Adhvaryu probably coincided with the codification of the Yajurveda, linguistically corresponding to the samhita prose phase of Vedic Sanskrit of roughly 1000 BC.
• The Atharvan was a special kind of priest involved with Soma and fire rituals. The word is from Indo-Iranian *athar not attested in Sanskrit but ātar is Avestan for fire. Later, the Atharvaveda was associated with a legendary rishi called Atharvan.

The division of the Agnihotra among the Hotar, the Udgatar and the Adhvaryu is directly comparable to the Celtic priesthood as reported by Strabo, with the Druids as high priests, the Bards doing the chanting and the Vates performing the actual sacrifice.

In Ancient Persia Athravans were the highest, sacerdotal class similar to the Brahmanic caste. The Zoroastrian Avesta mentions three levels of Athravans (Avestan āϑravaŋ). Parsis have corresponding levels in this tradition known