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Kabul Shahi   by jekky

Lineage of Kabul Shahis Asia in 565 AD showing the Shahi kingdoms and their neighbors History of Afghanistan Timeline Pre Islamic Period Achaemenids 550 330 BC Seleucids 330 150 BC Greco Bactrians 256 125 BC Sakas 145 BC Kushans 30 CE 248 CE Indo Sassanid 248 410 Kidarites 320 465 Hephthalites 410 557 Sassanids 224 579 Kabul Shahi 565 670 Islamic Conquest Umayyads 661 750 Abbasids 750 821 Tahirids 821 873 Saffarids 863 900 Samanids 875 999 Ghaznavids 963 1187 Seljukids 1037 1194 Khwarezmids 1077 1231 Ghurids 1149 1212 Ilkhanate 1258 1353 Timurids 1370 1506 Mughals 1501 1738 Safavids 1510 1709 Hotaki dynasty 1709 1738 Afsharids 1738 1747 Durrani Empire 1747 1823 Emirate 1823 1926 Kingdom 1926 1973 Republic 1973 1978 Democratic Republic 1978 1992 Islamic State 1992 1996 Islamic Emirate 1996 2001 Islamic Republic 2001 Afghan Civil War 19791989 19891992 19921996 19962001 2001resent Afghanistan Portal v d e The affinities of the earlier Shahi rulers of Kapisa Kabul who are believed to have probably ruled from early 5th century till 870 AD are still not clear The confused accounts of 11th century Persian Muslim scholar Alberuni which bear the impress of folklore for the early history of the Kabul Shahi rulers state that Hindu kings residing in Kabul were Turks they were said to be of Tibetan origin first of them was a Barahatakin founder of the dynasty who came from Tibet into the country Kabul entered a cave and after few days started to creep out of it in the presence of people who looked upon him as a new born baby clothed in Turkish dress People honored him as a being of miraculous birth destined to be a king And he brought those countries under his sway and ruled under the title of Shahiya of Kabul the rule remained among his descendants the number of which is said to be about sixty generations till it was supplanted by a Brahmana minister and in this series of his descendant rulers one was Kanik Kanishaka who is said to have built Vihara in Purushapura which is called Kanika Caitya The folklore accounts recorded by Alberuni connect the earlier Shahis of Kabul Kapisa to Turkish extraction and also claim their descent from Kanik or Kanishaka of Kushana lineage At the same time it is also claimed that their first king Barahatigin Vrahitigin had originally came from Tibet and concealed in a narrow cave in Kabul area and here is given a strange legend which we omit One can easily see the above account of Shahi origin as totally fanciful and fairy like tale These statements taken together are very confusing inconsistent and bear the express marks of a folklore and vulgar tradition hence unworthy of inspiring any confidence in the early history of Shahis The accounts recorded by Alberuni is not confused rather confirmed narration of ancient history as we should have a look into broader perspective of ancient history keeping in mind the diaspora of Kambojas worldwide as Kamakura people of Japan Kamarupa Tibat China Chumo India Cambodia and Canbra people of Australia as well as Comanche of USA Barhatigin is said to be the founder of the dynasty which is said to have ruled for 60 generations until 870 AD This if true would take Barahatigin the founder of the early Shahi dynasty to about 20X60 1200 years i e to about fourth century BCE if we take the average generation of 20 years and to seventh century BCE if average generation is taken as 25 years It is well neigh impossible that a single dynasty could have ruled for 1200 or 1500 years at a stretch Moreover king Kanik if Kanishaka who ruled 78 AD to 101 AD not over Kabul but over Purushapura Gandhara and his descendants could not have ruled for almost 900 years as a single dynasty over Kapisa Kabul especially in a frontier region called the gateway of India Pre Islamic Hindu and Buddhist heritage of Afghanistan is well established in the Shahi coinage from Kabul of this period Based on fragmentary evidence of coins there seems to be one king named Vrahitigin Barhatigin who belonged to Sixth or Seventh century AD rather than pre Christian times as Alberuni s accounts would tend to establish If Kanik is same as Kanishaka of Kushana race as is often claimed then the second claim that the ancestors of the early Shahis came from Tibet which incidentally is the Kamboja desa of the Nepali Traditions becomes incompatible to known facts of history It is very interesting that Alberuni calls the early Shahi rulers as Turks which however should be interpreted as Turkised rather than Turkic Based on Alberuni s accounts V A Smith speculates that the earlier Shahis were a cadet branch of the Kushanas who ruled both over Kabul and Gandhara until the rise of Saffarids H M Elliot relates the early Kabul Shahis to the Kators and further connects the Kators with the Kushanas Charles Fredrick Oldham also traces the Kabul Shahi lineage to the Katorshom he identifies with the Kathas or Takkhasaga worshipping collective tribal groups of solar Sun worshiping lineage He further speaks of the Urasas Abhisaras Daradas Gandharas and Kambojas etc as allied tribal groups of the Takkhas belonging to the Naga worshipping and Sun worshiping race of the north west frontiers D B Pandey traces the affinities of the early Kabul Shahis to the Hunas E Vesey Westmacott Bishan Singh K S Dardi etc connect the Kabul Shahis to the ancient Ksatriya clans of the Kambojas Gandharas George Scott Robertson writes that the Kators Katirs of Kafiristan belong to the well known Siyaposh tribal group of the Kams Kamoz and Kamtoz tribes But numerous scholars now also agree that the Siyaposh tribes of Hindukush are the modern representatives of the ancient Kambojas According to Olaf Caroe the earlier Kabul Shahis in some sense were the inheritors of the Kushana Hephthalite chancery tradition and had brought in more hinduised form with time There does not yet exist in the upper Kabul valley any documentary evidence or any identifiable coinage which can establish the exact affinities of these early Shahis who ruled there during the first two Islamic centuries The affinities of the early Shahis of Kapisa Kabul are still speculative and the inheritance of the Kushan Hephthalite chancery tradition and political institutions by Kabul Shahis do not necessarily connect them to the preceding dynasty i e the Kushanas or Hephthalites It appears that from start of 5th century till 793 94 AD the capital of the Kabul Shahis was Kapisa In the wake of Muslim invasions of Kabul and Kapisa in second half of seventh century 664 AD the Kapisa Kabul ruler called by Muslim writers as Kabul Shah Shahi of Kabul made an appeal to the Ksatriyas of the Hind who had gathered there in large numbers for his assistance and drove out the Muslim invaders as far as Bost This king of Kapisa Kabul who faced the Muslim invasion was undoubtedly a Ksatriya In subsequent years the Muslim armies returned with large reinforcements and Kabul was swept when the Shahi ruler agreed to pay tribute to the conquerors For strategical reasons the Shahis who continued to offer stubborn resistance to Muslim on slaughts finally moved their capital from Kapisa to Kabul in about 794 AD The fact that Chinese pilgrim Hieun Tsang 644 AD specifically addresses the ruler of Kapisa as Ksatriya and that of Zabul at this time being known as Shahi casts serious doubt about the speculated connections of the first Shahis of Kabul Kapisa to the Kushanas or the Hephthalites Neither the Kushanas nor the Hunas Hephthalites nor the Turks or Turushakas have ever been designated or classified as Ksatriyas in any ancient Indian tradition Therefore the identification of the first line of Shahi kings of Kapisa Kabul with the Kushanas Hunas or Turks obviously seems to be in gross error Once the political clout of the invaders like the Kushanas or the Hephthalites had declined some native chieftain from the original dominant clans of this region seeems to have attained ascendancy in political power and established an independent kingdom on the ruins of the Kushanas and or the Hephthalites empire The powerful evidence from Hiuen Tsang 644 AD attesting that the ruler of Kabul Kapisa was a devout Buddhist and belonged to Ksatriya caste would rather connect this ruling dynasty either to the erstwhile Gandharas or more probably to Ashvaka clan of the Kambojas the eminent Ksatriya clan of the Mauryan times from this very region Even as early as 424 AD the prince of Kapisa Ki pin of the Chinese was known as Guna Varman The name ending Varman is used after the name of a Ksahriya only Thus the line of rulers whom Hiuen Tsang refers to in his chronicles appears to be an extension of the Ksatriya dynasty whom this Guna Varman of Ki pin or Kapisa 424 AD belonged Thus this Ksatriya dynasty was already established prior to 424 AD and it was neither a Kushana nor a Hephthalite dynasty by any means Song Yun the Chinese Ambassador to the Huna kingdom of Gandhara in 520 AD writes that the Yethas Hephthalites had invaded Gandhara two generations prior to him and had completely destroyed this country The then Yetha ruler was extremely cruel vindictive and Anti Buddhist and had engaged in a three years border war with the king of Ki pin Cophene or Kapisa disputing the boundaries of that country The Yetha king referred to by Song Yun may have been Mihirakula 515 540 547AD or his governor This evidence also proves that the Kapisa kingdom was well established prior to the Huna Hephthalite invasion of Gandhara 477 AD and that it did not submit to the Yethas but had survived and continued to maintain its independence It is also a known fact of history that from second century BCE onwards much prior to the Huna ascendancy the Tukharas had settled in considerable numbers in the ancient Kamboja land and thus the culture of the Kambojas undoubtedly underwent some changes and due to the interaction of two cultures the Kambojas of Kapisa were also substantially influenced by Tukharas who remained quite for a time the ruling power in this region This fact is also verified by Hiuen Tsang who records that the literature customary rules and currency of Bamiyan were same as those of Tukhara the spoken language is little different and in personal appearance the people closely resembled those of the Tukhara country On the other hand the literature and written language of Kapisa Kamboja was like that of Tukharas but the social customs colloquial ideom rules of behavior and their pesonal resemblance differed somewhat from those of Tukhara country which means that the original and dominant community of Kapisa had imbibed the Tukharan culture and customs but to a limited extent and the penetration of the Tukharas in the Kapisa territory appears to have therefore been also limited The Kambojas and the Tukharas Turks are mentioned as immediate neighbors in north west as late as 8th century AD as Rajatarangini of Kalhana demonstrates Evidence also exists that some medieval age Muslim writers have confused the Kamboja clans of Pamirs Hindukush with the Turks and invested the former with Turkic ethnicity For example 10th century Arab geographer Al Muqaddasi refers to the Kumiji Kamoji Kamboja tribesmen of Buttaman mountains Tajikstan on upper Oxus and calls them of Turkic race According to the confused accounts recorded by Alberuni which are chiefly based on folklore the last king of the first Shahi dynasty Lagaturman Katorman was overthrown and imprisoned by his Brahmin vizier Kallar thus resulting in the change over of dynasty The name Katorman or Lagaturman of the last king of the so called first Shahi line of Kabul Kapisa simply reveals a trace of Tukhara cultural influence in the Kamboja Kapisa region as hinted in above discussion Thus the first ruling dynasty of Kapisa and Kabul designated as Ksatriya dynasty by Hiuen Tsang may indeed have been a Kamboja dynasty It is also very remarkable that Kalhana c 12th century the author of Rajatarangini written in 1147 49 AD also refers to the Shahis and does not maintain any any difference or distinction between the earlier Shahis RT IV 143 and the later Shahis or does not refer to any supplanting of the dynasty at any stage as Alberuni does in his Tarikh al Hind Furthermore Kalhana takes the dynasty of the ancestors of the Hindu Shahi rulers Lallya Kallar Kamala Toramana Bhimadeva Jaipala Anandapala Trilochanpala Bhimapala etc unbroken to as far as or earlier than 730 AD It is also remarkable that Rajatrangini and all other sources refer to the Shahi rulers of Udabhandapura Waihind as belonging to the Kshatriya lineage in contrast to Alberuni who designates the earlier Shahi rulers as Turks and the later as Brahmins The system of naming the kings of the so called Turki Shahi dynasty and the Hindu Shahi dynasty is also similar for which reason it is very likely that the caste of the two might also have been same i e Ksatriya Thus if we follow Kalhana then the ancestors of Shahi kings Lallya Toramana Kamalu Bhimadeva Jaipala Anandapala Trilochanapala etc may be traced back to the Ksatriya ruler of Kapisa Kabul 644 45 AD mentioned by Hiuen Tsang and also probably to prince Guna Varman 424 AD a princely scion of the Ksatriya rulers ruling at the start of 5th century in Kapisa Ki pin as mentioned in the Chinese Buddhist records In addition one ancient inscription and several ancient Buddhist manuscripts found from Gilgit area between upper Indus and river Kabul shed some light on three kings who ruled in Gilgit region in 6 7th c AD They also wore Shahi titles and their names are mentioned as Patoladeva alias Navasurendradiyta Nandin Srideva alias Surendra Vikrmadiyta Nandin and Patoladeva alias Vajraditya Nandin It is very relevant to mention here that each of the Shahi rulers mentioned in the above list of Gilgit rulers has Nandin as his surname or last name It is more than likely that the surname Nandin refers to their clan name It is also very remarkable that the modern Kamboj tribe of northern Punjab still has Nandan Nandi

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