The Daurani and the Ghilztio clans, from their numerical strength, have exercised greater power than other of the Afghan tribes. The Daurani are known also as the Sulimani, from the moun tains whence they came, having dwelt iu the Tobeh Maruf district.
The Kufelzai, more generally known as the Popalzai, numbering 20,000 families, are an off shoot of the Abdali, one of the branches of which, the Saddozai, gave sovereigns to the Afghans in the 17th and 18th centuries.
Their name Daurani is titular. Alnnad Khan, of the Saddozai branch of the Abdali, about the close of 1747 was crowned at Kandahar under the title of Ahmnd Shah, Daurani, which Elphinstone says means pearl of pearls, but is commonly understood to refer to the dominion of the world (Daumn). From his time up to 1820, his descendants have ruled ; but since the last-mentioned date the Barakzai, a great clan of the Zirak branch of the Abdali, have been furnishing the ruling family in Kabul. Their numbers are about 30,000 families. The great bulk are pastoral, a few engage iu tillage in the country S. of Kandahar, in Arghesan, and on the banks of the Helmand.
The Tariu are a tribe in Afghanistan who have two divisions, viz. the independent Safed or Spin Tarin, and the Tor Tarin in the valley of Peshin, who are subject to the Kandahar Government. The Safed Tarin (White Tarin) could muster 6000 fighting men, and the Tor Tarin (Black Tarin) about 3000.
Peshin is the middle portion of the valley of the Lora river, Barshor being the upper and Shora wak the lower part. Peshin is inhabited by the Tor Tarin, by families of Syuds, and a few Kakar.
The Spin or White Tarin tribe reside in the valley of Zawura, and in the open plains of Tull and Chutialli. They stretch into Cacti Gandava and nearly touch the British frontier. The Tor and Spin form two factions on the Banu frontier in which all the neighbouring tribes became in volved, seventeen of them being for the Tor and sixteen for the Spin faction.
Writing of the Tarin, Lieutenant-Colonel Mac Gregor says : I have given them credit for the character of general peacefulness which they hold among their neighbours. There are comparisons among thieves, and in a country like Afghanistan, where an honest man is seldom or ever met with, one can only speak comparatively ; for the best of them would in a civilised country be considered as scoundrels of the blackest dye, and consigned to the common hangman.'
The Ghilji or Ghilzae is next in importance to tho Daurani tribe. The names and numbers of the several clans are variously enumerated by Mountstuart Elphiustone, Lumsden, Leech, Masson, Broadfoot, N. Campbell, Gerard, and MacGregor, and the estimates of the strength range from 35,000 to 100,000 families, with about 30,000 good fighting men. The names of the clans usually recognised are Ohtak, Thoki, Suli man Khel, All Khel, Sabrak, Tereki, and Kharoti. Of these the Suliman Khel is the most important, their numbers being 30,000 or 35,000. The Ghilzae inhabit the country bounded on the south by Kalat-i-Ghilzao, on the west by the Gulokh range, on the east by the Suliman range, and on the north by the Kabul river, but in many places extending beyond these boundaries.
The Ghilzae tribe occupy the principal portion of the country between Kandahar and Ghazni, and are the most numerous of the Afghan tribes. These people are also found between Farrah and Herat, and again between Kabul and Jalalabad, but in either position, being under due control, they are little heard of. The Ghilzae between Kandahar and Ghazni comprise the great families of the Ohtak, the Thoki, the Tereki, and the Andari, with their subdivisions. The Ohtak are acknowledged the principal of the Ghilzae families, and furnished the chief in the period of their supremacy.
Between A.D. 1715 and 1724, the Ghilzae were dominant under Mir Wais, his son Mir Mahmud, and relative Mir Ashraf, who was finally put down by Nadir Shah ; but in that interval Isfahan had been twice taken by the Ghilzae, and Persia had lost a third of its population. When Nadir Shah overran Herat and Kandahar, he is said to have deported to Teheran 18,000 Ghilzae with their families, and to have given the Kandahar lands to his Persian followers. But in Ahmad Shah's time there was a fresh distribution, and at power.