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Concept
Afridi
Summary
The Afrīdī (اپريدی Aprīdai, plur. اپريدي Aprīdī; آفریدی) are a Pashtun tribe present in Pakistan.
The Afridis are most dominant in the Spin Ghar range west of Peshawar in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, covering most of the Khyber Pass and Maidan in Tirah. Afridi migrants are also found in India, mostly in the states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and in the Kupwara district of Jammu and Kashmir.
Herodotus, in his Histories, mentions a tribe named Aparytai (Ἀπαρύται) inhabiting the Achaemenid satrapy of Arachosia. Thomas Holdich and Olaf Caroe have linked them with the Afridi tribe:
The Sattagydae, Gandarii, Dadicae, and Aparytae (Ἀπαρύται) paid together a hundred and seventy talents; this was the seventh province
Aurel Stein described Afridis with lighter and fair features, similar to their Dardic neighbours, in contrast to the Afghans living on the other side of the Khyber Pass, whom he described as darker and swarthier. This supports the Dardic origins of Afridis.
The Afridis and their allies Khalils were first mentioned in the memoirs of Mughal Emperor Babar as violent tribes in need of subduing. The Afridi tribes controlled the Khyber Pass, which has served as a corridor connecting the Indian subcontinent with Afghanistan and Central Asia. Its strategic value was not lost on the Mughals to whom the Afridis were implacably hostile.
Over the course of Mughal rule, Emperors Akbar and Jahangir both dispatched punitive expeditions to suppress the Afridis, to little success.
Under the leadership of Darya Khan Afridi, they engaged in protracted warfare against the Mughal army in the 1670s. The Afridis once destroyed two large Mughal armies of Emperor Aurangzeb: in 1672, in a surprise attack between Peshawar and Kabul, and in the winter of 1673, in an ambush in the mountain passes. The emperor sent his Rajpoot general Rai Tulsidas with reinforcements into the mountains to suffocate the revolt and liberate the mountain. Allegedly, only five Mughal soldiers made it out of the battle alive the rest of the Mughals were brutally slaughtered.
Official source
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