It is polite today to call this area Nuristan since
Islam is the loacl religion but it is newly established
there. Kafiristan is also known as the Land of the Devil
Worshippers. This is the wildest and least stable in
Afghanistan and perhaps in the world to this day. The
Soviet war broke out in 1978 when the locals in the Kunar
valley raided the Armory and seized the weapons. In the
west we like to date the war to the Russian Invasion but
it really started when the Nuristan armory fell.
KAFIRISTAN,
kä'fe-re-stän' (Pers., land of the infidels). A
political dependency, but practically an independent
State in the northeast corner of Afghanistan,
situated on the southern slope of the Hindu Kush
Mountains, and bounded on the south by the Kabul River.
Estimated area, 5000 square miles. Toward the south
the surface consists of undulating and of level
ground, but the north is u region of valleys, glens,
ravines, and mountains. The soil is fertile, and
along the valleys cereals and fruit are cultivated,
especially grapes, from which a wine of great local
repute is manufactured; the chief occupations,
however, are pastoral, and there are large herds of
cattle, sheep, and goats. Since 1895 the region has
been under the nominal control of the Amir of
Afghanistan, who maintains military stations at
various points. The inhabitants, numbering about
200,000, differ from their neighbors in features and
complexion, customs, and creed, and claim to be
descendants of troops of Alexander the Great. They
are divided into three principal and some minor
tribal communities often at internecine variance.
They are independent and warlike, and their simple
patriarchalism may be compared with the earliest
known governmental institutions of the Aryans of
Europe. As the term 'Kafir' (Arabic, infidel)
implies, they have retained more or less of their
primitive religion and resisted the advances of
Islam. They are not nearly so orientalized as the
Hindus, etc., but have preserved many traits of
un-Asiatic Aryan character. Some have seen in the
Kafirs, unnecessarily, a largo Greek admixture, both
in their physical make-up and their arts, customs,
etc. Their language, which has no written literature,
is apparently midway between the Indian and the
Iranian divisions of the Indo-Iranian dialects. Of
the literature about the Kafirs, the following may be
referred to: Biddulph. Tribes of the Hindu Kush (Calcutta,
1880); Leitner, Kafiristan (Lahore, 1881);
Ujfalvy, Aus dem westlichen Himalaya (Leipzig,
1884); Robertson, The Kafirs of the Hindu Kush (London,
1896).
Almost our sole sources of information regarding the
language are articles by Leitner in the Journal of
the United Service Institution of India (Simla,
1881); and by Trumpp in the Journal of the Royal
Asiatic Society, O.S., vol. xix. (London, 1862),
and in the Zeitschrift der deutschen
morgenländischcn Gesellschaft, vol. xx.
(Leipzig. 1800).
From The New International Encyclopaedia
edited by Daniel Coit Gilman, Harry Thurston Peck,
Frank Moore Colby 1911