Chronicling the Afghanistan Tragedy – II In Search of an Independent Kingdom

16 Oct, 2001    ·   610

Suba Chandran traces the establishment of the first independent kingdom in Afghanistan


The ancient history of Afghanistan can be traced from the Achaemenid Empire of Darius the Great (500 BC). Herat (earlier known as Aria), Balkh ( Bactria ), Kandahar (Arachosia) were regional provinces, or satrapies under the rule of Darius I.  

 

 

Alexander the Great overthrew the Achaemenians rule in 329 BC and conquered most of the Afghan provinces. After his death, the eastern provinces came under the control of the Seleucid dynasty that ruled from Babylon . By the beginning of 300 BC, the territories south of the Hindu Kush became part of the Maurya dynasty ruling northern India . After Ashoka, the greatest Maurya ruler, the Greeco-Bactrian rulers conquered parts of Afghanistan and established their rule in Kabul around 180 BC. The Parthians of eastern Iran , during the same period, established their rule in Kandahar .  At about 135 BC, the Yue-Chi tribes of Central Asia, under the leadership of Kadphises I, crossed the Hindu Kush and occupied the Kabul River valley and Gandhara from the Bactrian Greeks. 

 

 

Later, Kanishka (78-144 AD), the most famous Kushana ruler, established control over Bactria and under him the Kushana Empire stretched from Mathura in India to Bactria . During the rule of the Kushanas, the
Silk Route
was established to carry to Rome from China and India and Bactria became as major transit point.  Indian pilgrims also traveled in the
Silk Route
and introduced Buddhism in China . The Buddhist Gandhara art flourished during this period and the famous Bamian Buddha figures (the world’s tallest  at 175 and 120 feet tall and recently destroyed by the Taliban) were carved during the 3rd and 4th centuries AD. 

 

 

After Kanishka, though the Kushana rulers ruled the various provinces of Afghanistan , the Sasanians of Persia established control over parts of it in 241 AD. Afghanistan was ruled by Hepthalites (nomadic tribes from Central Asia ) and Sasanians till the 6th century. Parts of Afghanistan , especially Kabul and Ghazni, were under the control of the Hindu Shahi kings. 

 

 

Arab invasion started in 642 AD and Islam, for the first time, was introduced in Afghanistan with these invasions. During the ninth and tenth centuries a number of local Muslim dynasties were established and the Tahirids of Khorasan, with their capital at Nishapur, were one of the earliest. Their kingdom included Bactria and Herat and were the first to establish complete independence from the Abbasid Caliphate in 820AD. The native Saffarids, with their capital at Nimroz, and the Samanids, with their capital at Bukhra, succeeded the Tahirids in 867 AD, but soon became feudatories of the the Samanids who ruled from Bukhara

 

 

The Ghaznavids replaced the Samanids rule in the 10th century. The Ghurids replaced the Ghaznavids in 1150. Muhammad of Ghur, the most famous Ghurid ruler, invaded India in 1175 and after his death the Khwarezm-Shah conquered Afghanistan

 

 

In 1219, Genghis Khan invaded Afghanistan and overthrew the Khwarezm-Shah dynasty. After his death in 1227, local rulers established independent principalities, while acknowledging Mongol princes as suzerains. By the end of the 14th century, Timur-i-Lang, a Mongol ruler from Samarqand, conquered most of Afghanistan and established his rule with Heart as capital.

 

 

In 1504, Babur, a descendant of Genghis Khan and Timur, made Kabul the capital of an independent principality; captured Kandahar in 1522; invaded and established the Mughal Empire in India. The Mughal Empire lasted till the British conquered India and included all areas of eastern Afghanistan south of the Hindu Kush .

 

 

The western parts of Afghanistan were under the control of Safavids of Persia and both the Persian and Mughal empires had been fighting each other to control Afghanistan . In between, local tribes attempted to overthrow the foreign rule. The Ghilzay tribe under Mir Wais Khan revolted against the Persian rule and established independent rule in 1709 in Kandahar . However, this was short lived as Nadir Shah ran over the Afghan provinces and conquered Herat in 1732 and Kandahar in 1738. After his assassination in 1747, Ahmad Shah Abdali, (who later became Ahmad Shah Durrani) was elected as the King of Afghanistan by a tribal council and the first independent Afghan kingdom was formed.

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