70 
A History of the GaJcFhars. 
[No. 1, 
of the Hindu confederacy, bringing into the field 30,000 of the 
choicest troops. Again we read of the Gakk’hars as being con¬ 
verted to Muhammadanism during the reign of Shihabuddin (Mu¬ 
hammad) Ghori, or 200 years after they themselves declare Gak- 
k’liar Shah to have been placed in possession of this country by a 
Muhammadan invader. Firishtah relates that so early as A. H. 
63, or A. D. 682, the Gakk’hars formed a treaty of alliance with the 
Afghans, who compelled the Bajah of Lahor to submit to terms from 
the Gakk’hars, and that this treaty included the cession of certain 
territories in perpetuity to the Gakk’hars. The same author states 
that before embracing Muhammadanism, they were a race of wild 
barbarians without either religion or morality. He adds that they had 
strange customs. When a daughter was born, the child was carried 
to the door of the house. It was there proclaimed aloud, the child 
being held in one hand and a knife in the other, that any person 
who wanted a wife might now take her, otherwise she was imme¬ 
diately put to death. By this means, they had more men than 
women. Polyandry was common among them, and in their inter¬ 
course with their wives the same want of delicacy was observed by 
them* as is attributed by Herodotus to the Massagetee in Central 
Asia and the Nasamones in Africa.f 
Their own traditions and tales concerning their ancestors in 
remote times are for the most part puerile and altogether uninter¬ 
esting. In compiling the annexed list of the Gakk’har chiefs from 
the time of Zain Khan or Kabul Shah up to the present date, 
with notices of the principal events in their lives, I have been 
obliged for the most part, where History is silent, to adopt con¬ 
jectural dates, as the people of the country and the Gakk’hars them- 
✓ 
selves have no idea of them; for they very commonly, even as 
regards modern times, mix up the events and transactions of one 
century with those of another. 
The descendants of these ancient chiefs have been in de¬ 
pressed circumstances for years. The Sikhs deprived them of 
their patrimony, and imprisoned many of them. In 1847, Major 
Abbott succeeded in getting them released from captivity and 
# Firishtali, vol. I., page 104, Bombay Edition. 
f Clio, para. 216 ; Melp., para. 172, 
