Abdali (Durrani)

In the Makhzan-i Afghani (1609–11) Abdal is one of three sons of Tarin, with Tor and Spin, and himself has three sons: Barik, Popal and Ali. The Loralai gazetteer of 1907 records that Abdal replaced the older name Bor Tarin. Encyclopaedia Iranica reports a tradition that Abdal took his name from serving one of the abdal, a high rank of Sufi saints, and says it cannot be known whether this is more than popular etymology.

The later Khulasat al-Ansab gives Abdal two sons. Firak was the father of Popal, Barek and Alekko, and Isa was the father of the Alizai, Turzai (Nurzai), Ishaqzai, Maku and Khogani, the five clans called Panjpai. Elphinstone, Bellew and Iranica use the two leagues that grew from this: the Zirak (Popalzai, Alikozai, Barakzai, Achakzai) and the Panjpai (Nurzai, Alizai, Ishaqzai, Khugiani, Maku). Elphinstone wrote in 1815 that the two leagues no longer had any use except to show descent, and that the Zirak were held the more honourable.^1,8,4,2,3

Elphinstone heard some accounts that made the mountains of Toba the oldest home of the Abdali, and more that brought them down from Ghor. In his summary, drawn from Hanway, they paid tribute to Persia from the early seventeenth century for protection against the Uzbeks, and by 1708 most were settled in the mountains near Herat. Iranica's article on the Barakzai adds that the Ghilzai had taken the Kandahar country in the Safavid period and pushed the Abdali west towards Herat.

In 1716 the Abdali under Abdullah Khan Sadozai defeated the Persian governor and took Herat. Zaman Khan, father of Ahmad Shah, displaced Abdullah Khan, and by 1722 the Abdali were besieging Mashhad. Allahyar Khan was elected leader in 1725–26 and was governor of Herat when Nadir advanced in 1729. After two Abdali risings Herat surrendered: Elphinstone dates the fall to 1731 after a ten-month siege, Iranica to 27 February 1732. Nadir exiled Allahyar and the leading Sadozai to Multan and, by Iranica's account, moved 60,000 Abdali to Mashhad, Nishapur and Damghan. Abdali troops then served in his army, and after taking Kandahar in 1738 he gave them lands around the city, moving them from west of Herat.^3,5,10,7

After Nadir Shah's murder in June 1747, Ahmad Khan, a young Sadozai Popalzai who had commanded Nadir's Afghan contingent of 4,000 men, was chosen king by a jirga of Pashtun chiefs and crowned near Kandahar in October 1747. He took the title Durr-i Durran, "pearl of pearls", and the Abdali took the name Durrani from it. Elphinstone was told the change followed a dream of the saint of Chamkani.

Ahmad Shah confirmed the Durrani in the lands Nadir had given them, on the condition Nadir had set: one horseman for every plough. The Durrani paid no revenue, and their clan heads held the military title of sardar. Ahmad Shah's empire reached from the Amu Darya to the Arabian Sea and took Delhi in 1757, and his army defeated the Marathas at Panipat in 1761. His Sadozai descendants held the throne until 1818. From 1826 to 1973 Afghanistan's rulers came from the Muhammadzai section of the Barakzai, another Zirak clan.^6,3,9,4

Elphinstone put the whole population of the Durrani country at 800,000 or perhaps a million, of whom the Durrani made up considerably more than half. He reported that Nadir Shah had counted 60,000 Durrani families, and judged that 100,000 families was "within bounds" in his own time. He noted that the clans lived mixed together around Kandahar and in the Garmsir on the Helmand. Iranica places the Zirak mainly around Kandahar and the Panjpai mostly in the west, in Helmand, Farah, Sistan and Herat. A Sadozai colony lived at Multan, where Nadir had exiled the leading families.^9,4,3