Pashtun tribal structure

The Pashtun tribes are divided into four confederacies: Sarbani, Bettani, Ghurghakhti, and Karlani. The oral tradition of the Pashtuns holds that these are descended from three own sons (Sarbaṇ, Beṭ, and Ghurghax̌t) and one adopted son (Orməṛ), respectively, of Qais Abdur Rashid, the folkloric ancestor of the Pashtun people.

There are several levels of organisation of Pashtun tribes: the ṭabar ("tribe") is subdivided into kinship groups, each of which is a khel. A khel is further divided into plārina or plārganəi, each of which consists of several extended families or kahol.^[1]

"A large tribe often has dozens of sub-tribes whose members may see themselves as belonging to each, some, or all of the sub-tribes" in their family tree depending upon the social situation: co-operative, competitive, or confrontational.^[2]

Etymologies

• Ṭabar refers to a "tribe" split into two or more clans. The tribes are then divided into subtribes, also called khel or zai. Zai in Pashto means "descendant". In Avestan it is similar to zoi ("offspring"), and it is also related to the English word "son". In addition, zai is also similar to the Old Turkic word soy ("ancestry, descent, kin, tribe, progeny").^[3]
• William Crooke said that khel is from an Arabic word meaning "association" or "company".^[4] However, it is suggested that khel comes from the Avestan word khuail, meaning "uncountable" or "over-populated", such as the counting of stars or counting grains of rice. The word is a cognate of the Persian word kheleh, meaning "lots" or "too much". In usage, the word khel is placed after the name of the common ancestor or leader; thus, Mūsākhel would be the "followers or descendants of Mūsā". Similarly, subtribes also commonly give their names to settlements; thus, "Musakhel" is not only the name of a subtribe, but also of a settlement. A khel is often based in a single village,^[5] but it may also be based on a larger area including several villages, or part of a town.^[6]
• Plārina is related to the Bactrian term plār, which derives from Old Iranian piðar (in Bactrian and Pashto, Old Iranian /ð/ usually yields /l/), and is related to Sanskrit pidar and English "father". The plural form of plār is plārina. A plārina is considered only when the 7th generation is born, meaning the father of multiple families (kahol). Usually, the 7th forefather is assumed to take from one-and-a-half century to two centuries.
• Kūl (plural kahol) is the smallest unit in Pashtun tribal system, named after an ancestor of 1. zāmən ("children"), 2. lmasī/nmasī ("grandchildren"), 3. kaṛwasī ("great-grandchildren"), and 4. kawdī ("great-great-grandchildren"). Once the fourth generation is born, it would be labelled a "family" or kūl.

Notes

1. ↑ Wardak, A. (2003) "Jirga – A Traditional Mechanism of Conflict Resolution in Afghanistan" p. 7, online at UNPAN (the United Nations Online Network in Public Administration and Finance), accessed 10 January 2009
2. ↑ Wardak, A. (2003) "Jirga – A Traditional Mechanism of Conflict Resolution in Afghanistan" p. 10, online at UNPAN (the United Nations Online Network in Public Administration and Finance), accessed 10 January 2009
3. ↑ "soy" in Nisanyan Turkish Etymological Dictionary
4. ↑ Crooke, William (1896) The Tribes and Castes of the North-western Provinces and Oudh Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, Calcutta, p. 158, OCLC 4770515
5. ↑ Wardak, A. (2003) "Jirga – A Traditional Mechanism of Conflict Resolution in Afghanistan" p. 6, online at UNPAN (the United Nations Online Network in Public Administration and Finance), accessed 10 January 2009
6. ↑ Albrecht, Hans-Jörg (2006) Conflicts and Conflict Resolution in Middle Eastern Societies: Between Tradition and Modernity Duncker & Humblot, Berlin, p. 358, ISBN 3-428-12220-8

References

• Wardak, A. (2004) "The Tribal and Ethnic Composition of Afghan Society" in Girardet, Edward and Walter, Jonathan (2004) Afghanistan: Essential Field Guides to Humanitarian and Conflict Zones (2nd ed.) Crosslines Ltd., Geneva, ISBN 2-9700176-1-X

External links

• Pashtun Tribe, Clan, & Ethnic Genealogies, US Naval Postgraduate School