GENEALOGIES AND HISTORY OF DARDISTAN.
I do not propose to do more in this place than give the roughest outline of this subject, as sketched in 1866 and 1872, and now rapidly brought up to date. My reason is to prevent those falsifications of History which are inevitable when a conqueror annexes a new country and the vilest in it naturally becomes his first friends, and fabricate their family tree. Therefore, with all its errors, which subsequent enquiries have corrected, there is an element of actuality in the following accounts gathered from Dards in 1866, the value of which will become apparent when I write the history of the events that are drawing Dardistan into the devastating range of European influences and politics:
GENEALOGY OF THE GILGIT, YASIN, CHITRAL, NAGYR, HUNZA, AND OTHER DYNASTIES SINCE 1800.
Transcriber’s Note: These genealogies are designed to be viewed using a fixed width font. They’re also provided as linked illustrations.
I.—GILGIT
Gurtam Khan (1800), hereditary ruler of
| Gilgit, whose dynasty can be traced
| to the daughter of Shiribadatt, the
| last, almost mythical, pre-Muhammadan
| Raja of Gilgit. Killed in
| 1810 by Suleyman Shah of Yasin.
+-----------------------+------------------------------+
| | |
Raja Khan (?) died Muhammad Khan reigns till Abbas Ali, killed
| 1814. 1826 and is killed by in 1815 by Suleiman
| Suleyman Shah of Yasin. Shah.
+--------------------------+
|
Asghar Ali killed on his flight to Nagyr by Suleyman Shah.
|
Mansur Ali Khan,
(the rightful Raja of Gilgit, probably still a prisoner in Srinagar).
1827.—Azad Shah, Raja of Gakutsh, appointed ruler of Gilgit by Suleyman
Shah whom he kills in 1829.
Tahir Shah of Nagyr conquers Gilgit in 1834
| and kills Azad.
+--------------------------+---------------------------+
| | |
Sakandar Khan, killed Kerîm Khan, (Raja of Gôr), Suleyman Khan.
by Gauhar Aman of (calls in Kashmir troops
Yasin, in 1844. under Nathe Shah in 1844)
was killed in 1848 in Hunza.
|
+--------------------------+--------------+-------------+
| | | |
Muhammad Khan died Suleyman Khan. Sultan Muhammad. Rustam
in 1859 when on a Khan.
visit to Srinagar. |
| |
Alidád Khan (son of Muhammad Ghulam Hayder.
Khan’s sister).
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II.—YASIN DYNASTY.
It is said that both the Yasin and the Chitral dynasties are descended from a common ancestor “Kathôr.” The Gilgitis call the Yasînis “Poryalé” and the Chitralis “Katoré.”
Khushwakt(?) died 1800(?) from whom the present dynasty derives the name of “Khushwaktia.” [A Raja of that name and dignity often met me at Srinagar in 1886.]
He had two sons Suleyman Shah and Malik Amán Shah. The former died about 1829 and left four sons and a daughter whom he married to Ghazanfar, the Rajah of Hunza. The names of the sons are Azmat Shah the eldest, Ahmad Shah, Rahîm Khan and Zarmast Khan.
Malik Amán Shah was the father of seven or, as some say, of ten sons, the most famous of whom was Gauhar Aman, surnamed “Adam farosh” (the man-seller) the third son. The names of the sons are: Khuda Amán Duda Amán, Gauhar Amán, Khalîl Amán, Akhar Amán (who was killed by his nephew Malik Amán, eldest son of his brother Gauhar Amán): Isa Bahadur (son of Malik Amán Shah by a concubine), Gulsher, Mahter Sakhi, Bahadur Khan (who was murdered) and Mir Amán(?) of Mistuch(?)
Gauhar Amán left seven sons: Malik Amán (also called Mîr Kammu? now in Tangîr?) Bahadur Amán, murdered by Lochan Singh, Mir Vali (who killed Hayward), Mir Gházi, Pahlwan (who killed Mir Vali), Khan Daurán and Shajáyat Khan. [The Khushwaktia Dynasty has since been dispossessed by the kindred dynasty of Chitrál in 1884.]
III.—CHITRAL OR “SHAH KATHORIA” DYNASTY.
Shah Kathor, the son of Shah Afzal, (who died about 1800) was a soldier of fortune who dispossessed the former ruler, whose grandson Vigne saw in the service of Ahmad Shah, the independent ruler of Little Tibet in 1835. Cunningham considers that the name of Kathôr is a title that has been borne by the rulers of Chitrál for 2,000 years.
Shah Kathor had a brother, Sarbaland Khan, whose descendants do not concern us, and four sons and a daughter married to Gauhar Amán of Yasin. The names of the sons were: Shah Afzal (who died in 1858), Tajammul Shah who was killed in 1865 by his nephew Adam-khor—or man-eater—(so called from his murderous disposition; his real name was Muhtarim Shah), Ghazab Shah (who died a natural death) and Afrasiab (who was killed). The murdered Tajammul Shah left two sons namely Malik Shah (who revenged his father’s death by killing Adam Khôr), and Sayad Ali Shah.
Shah Afzal left Amán-ul-Mulk, his eldest son, the present ruler of Chitrál [1872] Adam-khôr (who usurped the rule for a time); Kohkán Beg, ruler of Drus; a daughter whom he married to Rahmat-ulla-Khan, chief of Dîr; Muhammad Ali Beg; Yadgar Beg; Bahadur Khan; and another daughter whom Gauhar-Amán married as well as Shah Afzal’s sister and had Pahlwan by her.
Amán-ul-Mulk married a daughter of the late Ghazan Khan, chief of Dîr, by whom he had Sardar (his eldest son), also called Nizam-ul-Mulk. Amán-ul-Mulk’s other sons are Murad and others whose names will be found elsewhere. One of his daughters is married to Jehandar Shah, the former ruler of Badakhshán and the other to the son of the present Chief, Mîr Mahmud Shah. [Full details are given elsewhere of the Yasin-Chitrál house.]
IV.—The names of the principal chiefs of the Chilâsis and of the Yaghistanis (the independent Hill tribes of Darêl, Hôdûr, Tangìr, etc.) have already been given in my “history” of their “Wars with Kashmir.” Just as in Chilâs and Kandiá, the administration is in the hands of a Board of Elders. The Maharaja of Kashmir only obtains tribute from three villages in Chilaz, viz., the villages of Chilás, Takk and Bundar.
V.—Nagyr,[82]
[is tributary to Ahmad Shah of Little Tibet about the beginning of this century, but soon throws off this allegiance to Ahmad Shah under Alif Khan.](?)
[[See “Historical Legend of the Origin of Gilgit,” pages 9 to 16.] The Nagyr-Hunza Rajas or Thams similarly claim a divine origin and account for it through the two fairy-brothers who disappeared at Gilgit. [See note on page 111.]]
[“Nagyr,” which Col. Biddulph very properly writes “Nager” (like “Pamèr”) is now spelt “Nagar,” so as to confound it with the Indian “Nagar” for “town,” from which it is quite different.]
Alif Khan. 1800(?)
|
Raja Za’far Khan Záhid (the present Raja of Nagyr).
|
|
Son (a hostage for his father’s adhesion to Kashmîr, whom I saw
at Gilgit in 1866). The names of his maternal uncles are Shah
Iskandar and Raja Kerîm Khan(?) the elder brother. (The full
genealogy of Hunza Nagyr is given elsewhere.)
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VI.—Hunza
Ghazanfar, died 1865.
|
Ghazan Khan, present ruler.[83] (1866)
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VII.—Badakhshan
Sultân Shah. |
+----------------+--------+
| |
Rejeb Shah. Mirza Kalán.
| |
Ahmad Shah. +-----------+--+----+
| | | |
| Nizam-ud-din Yusuf Saad-ulla
| (surnamed Ali Khan.
+------+---------------+ Mir Shah). Khan.
| | | |
Rahmat Shah Mahmud Shah [1872] +---------+-------+---------+----+
Shah. Ibrahim (present ruler of | | | | |
Khan. Badakhshan Shajá-ul Jehandar Suleyman Shahzada |
under Kabul) Mulk. Shah, Shah. Hasan. |
stayed a long the former |
time with his ruler, Abdulla
maternal uncle, independent Khan (by
the ruler of Kunduz, of Kabul a concubine).
whence he (now (1872)
has often been a fugitive;
miscalled “a Sayad infests the
from Kunduz.” Kolab road).
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Yusuf Ali Khan had seven sons: Mirza Kalán, surnamed Mir Jan; Hazrat Ján; Ismail Khan; Akbar Khan; Umr Khan, Sultan Shah; Abdurrahim Khan (by a concubine).
Saad-ulla Khan had two sons: Baba Khan and Mahmud Khan (by a concubine).
VIII.—Dir
Ghazan Khan (a very powerful ruler. Chitrál is said to have once
| been tributary to him).
|
Rahmat-ulla Khan and other eight sons (dispersed or killed in
struggles for the Chiefship).
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The connection of Little Tibet with the Dard countries had ceased before 1800.
ROUGH CHRONOLOGICAL SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF DARDISTAN SINCE 1800.
1800.—Gurtam Khan, hereditary ruler of the now dispossessed Gilgit Dynasty, rules 10 years in peace; is killed in an engagement with Suleyman Khan, Khushwaktia, great uncle of the famous Gauhar Amán (or Gormán) of Yasin.
1811.—Muhammad Khan, the son of Gurtam Khan, defeats Suleyman Khan, rules Gilgit for 15 years in peace and perfect independence whilst—
1814.—(Sirdar Muhammad Azim Khan, Barakzai, is ruler of Kashmir).
1819.—Ranjit Singh annexes Kashmir.
1826.—Suleyman Khan of Yasin again attacks Gilgit and kills Muhammad Khan and his brother, Abbas Ali. Muhammad Khan’s son, Asghar Ali, is also killed on his flight to Nagyr.
1827.—Suleyman Shah appoints Azad Khan(?), petty Raja of Gakutsh, over Gilgit as far as Bunji; Azad Khan ingratiates himself with the people and rebels against Suleyman Shah whom he kills(?) in 1829.
1829.—Suleyman Shah, head of the Khushwaktia family of Yasin, dies.
1833.—Gauhar Amán turns his uncle, Azmat Shah, out of Yasin.
1834.—Azad Khan is attacked by Tahir Shah of Nagyr and killed. Tahir Shah, a Shiah, treats his subjects well. Dies 1839. Vigne visits Astór in 1835, but Tahir Shah will not allow him to cross over to Gilgit. At that time the Sikhs had not conquered any Dard country. Ahmad Shah was independent ruler of Little Tibet (Baltistan) and under him was Jabar Khan, chief of Astór (whose descendants,[84] like those of Ahmad Shah himself and of the Ladak rulers are now petty pensioners under Kashmir surveillance). (The Little Tibet dynasty had once, under Shah Murad, about 1660, conquered Hunza, Nagyr, Gilgit and Chitrál, where that ruler built a bridge near the fort.) Zorawar Singh conquers Little Tibet in 1840, but no interference in Dard affairs takes place till 1841 when the Sikhs are called in as temporary allies by the Gilgit ruler against Gauhar Amán of Yasin.
1840.—Sakandar Khan, son of Tahir Shah, succeeds to the throne of Gilgit and rules the country—with his brothers, Kerim Khan and Suleyman Khan.
1841.—Gauhar Amán of Yasin conquers Gilgit. Its ruler, Sikandar Khan, asks Sheikh Ghulam Muhi-ud-din, Governor of Kashmir on behalf of the Sikhs, for help.
1842.—1,000 Kashmir troops sent under Nathe Shah, a Panjabi.
1843.—Sikandar Khan is murdered at Bakrôt at the instigation of Gauhar Amán.
1844.—Gauhar Amán of Yasin re-conquers the whole country, selling many of its inhabitants into slavery.
Nathe Shah, joined by Kerim Khan, younger brother of Sikandar Khan and 4,000 reinforcements, takes Numal Fort, but his subordinate Mathra Das is met at Sher Kila (20 miles from Gilgit) by Gauhar Amán and defeated.
1845.—Karim Khan succeeds his brother as ruler (called “Raja,” although a Muhammadan) of Gilgit and pays a small sum for the retention of some Kashmir troops in the Gilgit Fort under Nathe Shah. The Rajas of Hunza, Nagyr and Yasin [Gauhar Amán sending his brother Khalil Amán to Sheikh Iman-ud-din] now seek to be on good terms with Kashmir, especially as its representatives, the tyrannical Nathe Shah and his equally unpopular successor, Atar Singh, are removed by its Muhammadan Governor.
1846.—Karim Khan, Raja of Gor, another son of Tahir Shah, calls in Nathe Shah and defeats Gauhar Amán at Basin, close to Gilgit. A succession of officers of Ghulab Singh then administer the country in connexion with the Raja of Gilgit (Wazir Singh, Ranjit Rai, Bakhshu, Ali Bakhsh and Ahmad Ali Shah, brother or cousin of Nathe Shah). By Treaty ([see page 110]):
“Kashmir and its dependencies eastward of the Indus” are made over by the British to the Hindu Ghulab Singh. Gilgit, which lies to the westward of the Indus, is thus excluded from the dominions of that Maharaja. Gilgit was also, strictly speaking, not a dependency of Kashmir, nor was Chilás.
1847.—The Maharaja restores Nathe Shah, whilst confirming his cousin Nazar Ali Shah as Military Commandant of Gilgit. Raja Kerim Khan sends his brother Suleyman Khan on a friendly mission to Srinagar, where he dies. Vans Agnew arrives at Chalt on the Gilgit frontier towards Nagyr and makes friends with the people, who at first thought that he came accompanied by troops.
1848.—Isa Bahadur, the half-brother of Gauhar Amán by a concubine of Malik Amán Shah, is expelled from Sher Kila, a Fort belonging to Punyal, a dependency of Yasin, and finds refuge with the Maharaja, who refuses to give him up. Gauhar Amán accordingly sends troops under his brother Akbar Amán and captures the Bargu and Shukayôt Forts in Gilgit territory. The Rajas of Hunza and Nagyr combine with Gauhar Amán and assisted by the Gilgit people, with whom Kerim Khan was unpopular because of his friendship for Kashmir, defeat and kill Nathe Shah and Kerim Khan. Gauhar Amán captures the Gilgit and Chaprôt Forts. The Kashmir troops re-invade the country and at the beginning of
1849.—Wrest all the forts in Gilgit territory from Gauhar Amán, and make over the rule of that country to Raja Muhammad Khan, son of Kerim Khan, assisted by the Kashmir representative, Aman Ali Shah as Thanadar, soon removed for oppression.
1850.—The raids of the Chilâsis on Astór is made the occasion for invading the country of Chilâs, which, not being a dependency of Kashmir, is not included in the Treaty of 1846. ([See page 110.]) The Maharaja gives out that he is acting under orders of the British Government. Great consternation among petty chiefs about Muzaffarabad, regarding ulterior plans of the Maharaja. The Sikhs send a large army, which is defeated before the Fort of Chilâs.
1851.—Bakhshi Hari Singh and Dewan Hari Chand are sent with 10,000 men against Chilâs and succeed in destroying the fort and scattering the hostile hill tribes which assisted the Chilâsis.
1852.—The Maharaja’s head officers, Santu Singh and Ramdhan, are murdered by the people of Gilgit whom they oppressed. The people again assist Gauhar Amán, who defeats and kills Bhup Singh and Ruknuddin (for details [vide Appendix]), and drives the Kashmir troops across the Indus to Astór.
1853.—The Maharaja now confines himself to the frontier, assigned to him by nature as well as the treaty, at Bunji, on the east of the Indus, but sends agents to sow discord in the family of Gauhar Amán. In addition to Isa Bahadur, he gained over two other brothers, Khalil Amán and Akbar Amán, but failed with Mahtar Sakhi, although an exile. He also attracted to his side Azmat Shah, Gauhar Amán’s uncle.
1854.—The Maharaja instigated Shah Afzal of Chitrál to attack Gauhar Amán, and accordingly in
1855.—Adam Khor, son of Shah Afzal of Chitrál, drove Gauhar Amán from the possession of Mistuch and Yasin and restricted him to Punyal and Gilgit.
1856.—The Maharaja sends a force across the Indus under Wazir Zoraweru and Atar Singh assisted by Raja Zahid Jafar of Nagyr,[85] and Gauhar Amán thus attacked in front and flank, retreats from Gilgit and dispossesses Adam Khor from Yasin and Mistuch.
1857.—Gauhar Amán again conquers Gilgit and drives out Isa Bahadur, officiating Thanadar of that place. Gauhar Amán and the Maharaja intrigue against each other in Chitrál, Nagyr, Hunza, etc.
1858.—Shah Afzal of the Shah Kathor branch, ruler of Chitrál, dies.
Intrigues in Gilgit against Gauhar Amán, by Muhammad Khan, son of Raja Karim Khan, assisted by Kashmir. Muhammad Khan is conciliated by marrying the daughter of Gauhar Amán. The Sai District of Gilgit beyond the Niludar range is still held by the Sikhs.
1859.—Mir Shah of Badakhshan and Raja Ghazanfar of Hunza assist Gauhar Amán in attacking Nagyr, which is under the friendly Raja Zahid Jafar, and in trying to turn out the Sikhs from Sai and even Bunji. Azmat Shah, uncle of Gauhar Amán, is expelled from Chitrál where he had sought refuge.
Aman-ul-Mulk, King of Chitrál, dispossesses his younger brother, Adam Khor, who had usurped the throne, from the rule of Chitrál and joins Gauhar Amán against Kashmir.
1860.—The Maharaja instigates Adam Khor and Azmat Shah, who were in the country of Dir with Ghazan Khan, a friendly chief to Kashmir, to fight Gauhar Amán—Adam Khor was to have Yasin, Asmat Shah was to take Mistuch and Sher Kila (Payal) was to be given to Isa Bahadur, the Maharaja to have Gilgit. Intrigues of the Maharaja with the Chiefs of Dir, Badakhshan, etc.
Gauhar Amán dies, which is the signal for an attack by the Maharaja co-operating with the sons of Raja Kerim Khan of Gilgit. Gilgit falls easily to Lochan Singh, who murders Bahadur Khan, brother of Gauhar Amán, who was sent with presents from Malik Amán, also called Mulk Amán, son of Gauhar Amán. The Sikhs, under Colonels Devi Singh and Hushiara and Radha Kishen, march to Yasin expelling Mulk Amán from that country (which is made over to Azmat Shah) as also from Mistuch. Isa Bahadur is reinstated as ruler of Payal, but Mulk Amán returns and drives him and Azmat Shah out. The Kashmir troops fail in their counter-attacks on Yasin, but capture some prisoners, including Mulk Amán’s wife.
1861.—Malik Amán murders his uncle, Akbar Amán, a partisan of Kashmir. Badakhshan, Chitrál and Dir ask the Maharaja to assist them against the dreaded invasion of the Kabul Amirs, Afzal Khan and Azim Khan. Amán-ul-Mulk tries to get up a religious war (Jehád) among all the Muhammadan Chiefs. Hunza and Nagyr make friends. Both Adam Khor and Amán-ul-Mulk, who have again become reconciled, send conciliatory messages to the Maharaja, who frustrates their designs, as they are secretly conspiring against him.
Even Mulk Amán makes overtures, but unsuccessfully.
1862.—Kashmir troops take the Fort of Roshan. A combination is made against Mulk Amán, whose uncle Gulsher and brother Mir Ghazi go over to the Maharaja.
1863.—Mulk Amán advancing on Gilgit is defeated in a very bloody battle at the Yasin Fort of Shamir. Massacre of women and children by the Kashmir troops at Yasin.
1864.—Mir Vali and his Vazir Rahmat become partisans of the Maharaja.
1865.—Ghazanfar, the Raja of Hunza and father-in-law of Mulk Amán, dies, which causes Mirza Bahadur of the rival Nagyr to combine for an attack on Hunza with Kashmir. Adam Khor murders his uncle, Tajammul Shah, whose son, Malik Shah, murders
1866.—Adam Khor (some say at the instigation of his elder brother, Amán-ul-Mulk). Malik Shah seeks refuge with the Maharaja who will not give him up to Amán-ul-Mulk. Amán-ul-Mulk then sprung the mine he had long prepared, and when the long contemplated campaign against Hunza took place in 1866, all the Mussulman Chiefs who had been adherents of the Maharaja, including Mir Vali, fell away. The Kashmir troops which had advanced on Nummal were betrayed, and defeated by the Hunza people (now ruled by Ghazan Khan, son of Ghazanfar).
All the hill tribes combine against Kashmir and reduce the Dogras to the bare possession of Gilgit, which however held out successfully against more than 20,000 of the allied Dards, headed by Amán-ul-Mulk, Ghazan Khan and Mir Vali. Very large reinforcements were sent by Kashmir,[86] at whose approach the besiegers retreated, leaving, however, skirmishers all over the country.
Wazir Zoraweru followed up the advantage gained by invading Dareyl. Whilst the place was yet partially invested, Dr. Leitner made his way to the Gilgit Fort and frustrated two attempts made against him by the employés of the Maharaja, who ostensibly were friends.
1867.—Jehandár Shah of Badakhshan is expelled from his country by the Governor of Balkh and seeks refuge in Kabul, where he is restored a year afterwards to his ancestral throne by the influence of Abdurrahman Khan, son of the Amir Afzal Khan and by his popularity. His rival, Mahmud Shah, leaves without a struggle. Mir Vali, joining Mulk Amán, made an unsuccessful attack on Isa Bahadur and Azmat Shah, who beat them off with the help of Kashmir troops from Gilgit. The consequence was general disappointment among the Muhammadan Chiefs and the Hill tribe of Dareyl (which had been subdued in the meantime) and all opened friendly relations with Kashmir, especially.
1868.—Mir Vali rules Yasin with Pahlwan.[87] Mulk Amán flees to Chitrál.
1869.—Mulk Amán takes service with Kashmir and is appointed on salary, but under surveillance, at Gilgit.
1870.—Mr. Hayward visits Yasin in March; is well received by the Chief, Mir Vali, but returns, as he finds the passes on to the Pamir closed by snow—visits the country a second time in July, after exposing the conduct and breach of treaty of the Kashmir authorities, and is murdered, apparently without any object, at Darkôt in Yasin, one stage on to Wakhan, by some men in the service of his former friend, Mir Vali, who, however, soon flies the country in the direction of Badakhshan, then seeks refuge with the Akhund of Swat, and finally returns to Yasin, where he is reported to have been well received by Pahlwan. Whilst in Chitrál, he was seen by Major Montgomerie’s Havildar and was on good terms with Amán-ul-Mulk, who is supposed, chiefly on the authority of a doubtful seal, to be the instigator of a murder which was not, apparently, to his interests and which did not enrich him or Mir Vali with any booty, excepting a gun and a few other trifles. Much of the property of Mr. Hayward was recovered by the Kashmir authorities, and a monument was erected by them to his memory at Gilgit, where there is already a shrine, which is referred to on pages [47] and [51].
1871.—Jehandár Shah, son of Mir Shah, who had again been turned out of the rule of Badakhshan in October 1869 by Mir Mahmud Shah with the help of the Afghan troops of Amir Sher Ali, finds an asylum in Chitrál with Amán-ul-Mulk (whose daughter had been married to his son) after having for some time shared the fortunes of his friend, the fugitive Abdurrahman Khan of Kabul. (Chitrál pays an annual tribute to the Chief of Badakhshan in slaves, which it raises either by kidnapping travellers or independent Kafirs or by enslaving some of its own Shiah and Kafir subjects—the ruler being of the Sunni persuasion.)
1872.—Late accounts are confused, but the influence of Amir Sher Ali seems to be pressing through Badakhshán on Chitrál and through Bajaur on Swat on the one hand and on the Kafir races on the other. The Maharaja of Kashmir on the one side and the Amir of Kabul on the other seem to endeavour to approach their frontiers at the expense of the intervening Dard and other tribes. Jehandár Shah infests the Kolab road and would be hailed by the people of Badakhshan as a deliverer from the oppressive rule of Mahmud Shah, as soon as the Kabul troops were to withdraw.
So far my “Dardistan,” in which a detailed “History of the Wars with Kashmir” will be found. The events since 1872 need only to be indicated here in rough outline, and, unfortunately, confirm my worst anticipations as to the destruction of the independence of the Dardu tribes, of their legendary lore, and, above all, of the purity of their languages, including the prehistoric Khajuná or “Burishki” spoken in Hunza-Nagyr, and a part of Yasin. What are the admitted encroachments of our Ally, the Maharaja of Kashmir, have been utilized in our supposed interests, and we have stepped in to profit, as we foolishly think, by his sins, whilst he is tricked out of their reward. Falsely alleging that Hunza-Nagyr were rebellious vassals of Kashmir, when Hunza at all events was under Chinese protectorate, we have reduced their patriotic defenders to practical servitude, and, by to-day’s Times (21st November, 1892), are starting, along with 250 rifles and two guns, some 100 men of a Hunza levy to Chitrál to put down a trouble which our ill-judged interference has created in another independent principality, where we have put aside the rightful heir, Nizám-ul-Mulk, for his younger brother, Afzul-ul-Mulk, on the pretext that the former was intriguing with the Russians. I believe this allegation to be absolutely false, for I know him to be most friendly to British interests. In 1886 he offered to send a thousand men from Warshigum over the passes to the relief of Colonel (now General Sir) W. Lockhart, then a temporary prisoner at Panjah Fort in Affghan hands. As Padishah of Turikoh, Nizám-ul-Mulk was, in his father’s life-time, the acknowledged heir to the Chitrál throne, and he was made by his father Raja of Yasin in succession to Afzul, who had taken it in 1884 from Mir Amán, the maternal uncle of Pehliwán, who was ruler of Yasin in 1880, when Colonel Biddulph wrote his “Tribes of the Hindukush,” and with whom the Khushwaqtia dynasty, as such, came to an end. This Pehliwan killed Mir Wali, the murderer of Hayward, but Pehliwan made the mistake of attacking Biddulph in 1880, and was ousted by Mir Amán. With Nizám-ul-Mulk, therefore, begins the rule over Yasin by the Kathoria Dynasty of Chitrál. He is now a fugitive at Gilgit; had he been intriguing with Russia he would certainly not have sought refuge from his brother in the British lion’s mouth at Gilgit. All I can say is that in 1886 he did not even know the name of Russia, and that when he wrote to me in 1887 he referred to the advent of the French explorers Capus, Pepin and Bonvalot, as follows: “they call themselves sometimes French, and at other times Russians.” In the “Asiatic Quarterly Review” of January, 1891, there is a paper from Raja Nizám-ul-Mulk on “the Legends of Chitrál.” He is thus the first Central Asian prince whose literary effusion has appeared in the pages of a British, or indeed of any other, Review. His first letters, sent in the hollow of a twig, like his latter ones sent through British officers, all breathe a spirit of what might be called the sincerest loyalty to the Queen-Empress, were he not an absolutely independent ruler. There will be an evil day of reckoning when the “meddling and muddling,” which has created the Russian Frankenstein, will be followed by the exasperation of princes and people, within and beyond our legitimate frontier. To revert to Hunza and Nagyr, Mr. F. Drew, an Assistant Master of Eton College, who was in the service of the Maharaja of Kashmir, wrote in 1877 in his “Northern Barrier of India”—which, alas! our practical annexation of Kashmir, and our interference with the Hindukush tribes are breaking down—as follows: “Hunza and Nagyr are two small independent rajaships. Nagyr has generally shown a desire to be on friendly terms with the Dogras at Gilgit, while Hunza has been a thorn in their side.” There is not a word here of these States being tributaries of Kashmir, whilst Colonel Biddulph, who was our Resident at Gilgit, shows that the last Hunza raid was committed in 1867, and that slavery and kidnapping were unknown in inoffensive, if not “timid,” Nagyr. My article in the “Asiatic Quarterly Review” of January, 1892, shows that raiding and slavery had been recently revived in consequence of alike Russian and English advances, and that the fussiness and ambition of our officials have alone indicated and paved “the nearest way to India.”
Woking, 21st November, 1892.
P.S.—In correcting this proof of a paper on the Fairy-land that adjoins “the Roof of the World,” which our imprudence has drawn within the range of practical politics, I never anticipated that I should have to refer to my “rough sketch of the History of Dardistan” brought down to 1872 as a refutation of the history written to order by some of our leading journals which, to suit the policy of the moment, would make the Amir of Affghanistan responsible for Badakhshan, and yet blame him for interfering with Chitrál, as is hinted in a telegram in to-day’s Times. I shall deal with this matter elsewhere. ([See also Appendix II.])
Woking, 29th November, 1892.
Our Manufactured Foes
| A student from Tangir. | A Nagyri Peasant. |
| A Dareyli Herdsman. [notice fine head and ample forehead] | (Already published) A well-known Hunza Fighter, Brought to England by Dr. Leitner in 1887. |
| KASHMIR SOLDIER (HIGHLANDER), (Wearing a Great Lama’s Hat). | A BALTI COOLIE (LITTLE TIBET). (The Baltis are used as Coolies by the Kashmir invaders.) |
HISTORY OF THE DARD WARS WITH KASHMIR
In 5 Chapters—(Chapter I. Chilás)
(Committed to writing from the statements of a Sazíni Dard who took part in many of the engagements.)