AFGHANISTAN, in all historic times, seems to have been an arena in which powerful races have been striving for dominion,—Scytbian, Mede, Greek, Persian, Moghul, and Turk races, Ghilzae, Saddozai, and Barakzai tribes ; even the British have ruled there, and the limits of the ruler's sway have been continuously on the change.
Little is known of the occurrences up to the invasion by Alexander the Great. After that conqueror's death, his lieutenant Seleucus suc ceeded to the sovereignty of the Asiatic con quests. But under Seleucus' grandson, Afghanistan was taken from the Seleucidm by aboriginal chiefs, and soon after formed, with Bactria, an independent state, which existed through 150 years. Subsequently Scythians made themselves masters of Afghanistan, and appear to have held possession of it up to the death of Manniir, when one of his officers, Sabaktagin, established an independent dominion over all the S. parts of Afghanistan, making Ghazni his capital. His son Mahmud, who died A.D. 1028, enriched Afghanistan with thospoils of India; but in the reign of Ilahram, one of the Tartar's descendants, the Sabaktagin dynasty were deprived of all but the Panjab, and this too, in A.D. 1160, they lost. Afghan rulers at different times have laid claim to the region embraced between lat. 30° and 37° N., and long. 61° and 70° E. ; but the whole of the country of the Yusilfzai clans, of Kafiristan, of Chitral, of the Afridi, of the Waziri, and much of the Hazara country are essentially democracies, and pretend as little to owe allegiance as the .Amir of Kabul cares to claim it ; while Badakhshan, Kunduz, the Char Vilayat, the Aimak country, the Hazara, the Ghilzae, and the Kakar, as also Kuram, Khost, and Dawar, only yield obedience when the demand is backed by force. So little have the tribes amalgamated, that the region which Europeans designate Afghanistan is not even known by that name to the people who inhabit it. The term Afghan is hardly known to any of the Muham madans of Asia, and the original countries of the various tribes is equally unknown. It has, how ever, been satisfactorily ascertained that the lower valleys of the Kabul country were once occupied by Buddhist and Hindu religionists, and that the present Afghan tribes have advanced into the N.E. corner of Afghanistan within comparatively recent historical times ; the peaks of the Safed Koh, between Jalalabad and Kabul, bear such Hindu names as Sita Ram. The Yusufzai and other tribes in the N. are comparatively recent conquerors of the N. hills and valleys, where they
havo mixed with a free Hindu people, and are fairer than the other Afghan tribes.
There is the certainty that within the three last centuries there were people styled Gabar in the Kabul countries, particularly in Lughman and Bajor, also that in the days of Baber there was a dialect called Gabari. We are also told that one of the divisions of Kafiristan was named Gabrak. That in former times fire-worship existed to a certain, if limited, extent in Afghanistan, is evi denced by the 'Dyrethrm, or altars, still crowning the crests of hills at Gard-dez, at Bamian, at Seghan, and at other places. Near Bamian also is a cavern, containing enormous quantities of human bones, apparently a common receptacle of the remains of Gabar corpses. At Murki Khel, in the valley of Jalalabad, and under the Safed Koh, human bones are so abundant in the soil that walls are made of them. There is every reason to suppose it a sepulchral locality of the ancient Gabar ; and coins are found in some number there.
According to Captain Raverty, the people who dwell about Kabul and Kandahar, Shorawak and Pishin, designate themselves B'r-Pushtun or Upper Afghans ; and those occupying the district of Rob, which is near India, are called L'r-Pukhtun or Lower Afghans ; and Major Fosberry suggests (J.E.S.) that the term Pathan, by which the Afghan races are generally known throughout British India, has been derived from Pushtun or Pukhtnn. Although the tribes known by these names speak the Pushtu as a common language, they are not all of the same origin, but are dis tinguished by marked characteristics, moral as well as physical. One tribe repudiates another, and denies its Afghan origin. The names of Pathan, Rohilla, Afghan, which serve at the pre sent time to designate the Indian Afghans, are really those of so many distinct races little blended together. In their own country they make no matrimonial alliances except amongst themselves, indicating their feelings as an original race. Af ghan has been said to be only an Arabic plural of the word feghan,' which was applied to them about the time of Sultan Abu-Seid, of the race of Chengiz Khan, because of their constantly dis united state amongst themselves. The primitive tribe of the Afghans is called taifah,' a word which corresponds with that of nation. The first division of this primitive tribe are called firqa,' a tribe ; and the subdivision of this, tirah ' or branch.