Talk:Nuristanis

Nuristani's of Chitral, Pakistan

The article doesnt mention the vibrant Nuristani communities that inhabit the district of Chitral in neighbooring Pakistan where many Nuristani's have settled especially after the Soviet/Russian invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. The community is a prosperous one that has enourmous economic clout and dominates many aspects of the Bazaar life.

I agree, the Nuristani are integral part of Chitral, Pakistan. Infact, several regions of Nuristan where unlawfully annexed and were part of Pakistan's Chitral district prior to being attacked by the Afghan King and forcibly converted to Islam. These regions of Nuristan used to pay tribute to the Mehtar of Chitral. Chitrali's have also begun protesting that these regions illegally occupied by Afghanistan be given back to Pakistan. Interestingly, Nuristani's are allowed to cross over freely and are welcomed in Chitral district to this day where they are an important community. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.119.48.78 (talk) 16:10, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

The population in Chitral is so small that its almost nonexistent. I studied Anthropology for years and went all over Asia. 216.252.17.164 (talk) 19:18, 23 May 2013 (UTC) i have already been looking at the claims for months and looked at multiple sources, and it appears they are more of gypsies during seasons only for trade, they have already mentioned their neighbors...etc and this conflict in separate pages. This is just the peoples page, all that you guys are mentioning is mentioned on the Nuristan province page, this is specifically the Nursingxmajor (talk) 20:30, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

question

An evil king??----Waxwing slain 15:06, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

At the beginning of the Soviet Occupation of Afghanistan meaning the year 1979 December there was no King in Afghanistan but a President. That President was a Communist himself and the Communists took over the power in April of 1978 from another President in a coup. So whoever wrote something like General Issa Nooristani was second in command after the King must have mentioned another country but not Afghanistan. At the afore mentioned times the Defense Ministers were second in command and General Nooristani was never a defense minister but a general like many other generals in Afghanistan as well. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.111.80.132 (talk) 08:18, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Sources for future article expansion

The Wikipedia readers must note that all the material of this article is based on observations from several noted commentators on Kafirs/Nurestanis such as:

1. The Kafirs of Hindukush, 1896, by George Scott Robertson, Arthur David McCormick, (Oxford in Asia Historical Reprints)

2. Afghanistan: its people, its society, its culture (Survey of world cultures), 1962, by Donald Newton Wilber.

3. Tribes of the Hindoo Koosh by John Biddulph (Paperback - Jan 15, 2004)

4.The gates of India: Being an historical narrative by Thomas Hungerford Holdich (Unknown Binding - 1977)

5. The Indian Borderland, 1880-1900 by Thomas Hungerford Holdich (Paperback - April 12, 2001)

6. An account of the Kingdom of Caubul and its dependencies in Persia, Tartary, and India, (comprising a view of the Afghaun nation, and a history of the ... Entdeckungsgeschichte und Geographie Asiens), 1969 Edition, by Mountstuart Elphinstone

7. Proceedings (1869, 1879, 1881, 1884...)... by Royal Geographical Society (Great Britain), Norton Shaw, Francis Galton, William Spottiswoode...

8. The Religions of the Hindukush: The Religion of the Kafirs : The Pre-Islamic Heritage of Afghan Nuristan (The Religions of the Hindukush) by Karl Jettmar (Paperback - Mar 1986)

9. A History of Kafferistan: Socio-economic and Political Conditions of the Kaffers, 1989, Amar Singh Chohan.

10. etc etc. [Unsigned]

The Bashgeli kafirs & their language By Gottlieb William Leitner

Kafiristan: the Bashgeli Kafirs and their language By Gottlieb William Leitner

The Bashgeli Kafirs & Their Language (1880)

Kafiristan: The Bashgeli Kafirs and Their Language (1880)

Notes on the Bashgalī (Kāfir) Language By John Davidson

Bashgali Dictionary: An Analysis of Colonel J. Davidson's Notes on the Bashgali Language By Sten Konow

The Káfirs of the Hindu-Kush (1900)

Kafiristan (October 24, 1884) —Rajmaan (talk) 22:48, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

See also: "Kafiristan" in the EB, 9th ed., Vol. XIII, and its sources although obviously these old books should be used (carefully) for historical data and not current information. — LlywelynII 01:58, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Edit War

The edit war here is nothing but FANATICISM vs FACTS OF HISTORY. Fanaticism is being let loose here by a guy or two to suppress genuine historical information which is based on the works of notable scholarship, merely for personal and subjective reasons. History contains both sweet and bitter pills for the audience. The balanced article must shed light on strenghths and weaknesses of a historical people ...some facts may not be likable but history is history and one's likes and dislikes have no place in factual and realistic historical accounts. Funny thing is that a guy or two here don't want to digest the weakinesses of the former Kafir society but would welcome only some thing good said about it. This approach would simply amount to misrepresent history of an important ancient people and shall not be tolerated simply to appease bigotry and fanaticism. If the deletion of articles on the Kafirs, the predecessors of the modern Nuristani people, continue to go unchecked, they will definitely be revived. The factual history will not be allowed to be suppressed since the endavour is inspired by mere fanaticism and bigotry.

Sze cavalry01 17:34, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

First off, you're adding information from a deleted article. The article was deleted per the consensus of the community, which means that its content was deemed unfit for inclusion anywhere. Do not add content from deleted articles. I'm sorry, but your understanding of Wikipedia's policy of NPOV seems to be deeply flawed. Even when backed by sources, we do not call ethnic groups "brigands" and the like. Not only is slanderous language like this fundamentally biased, but it sounds completely outdated. A Wikipedia article on Nuristani people or their forebearers isn't out to comment on their character as a group. It's simply unencyclopedic. Another point is that Wikipedia is not a quote farm, and should not rely on so heavily on large passages of direct quotes from primary sources. That's certainly not good history writing, and in fact may violate copyright laws. VanTucky ^Talk 21:15, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Well put. Also, there's nothing wrong with letting the facts speak for themselves -- be they representing "strengths" or "weaknesses." But that is not what you are doing, Sze_cavalry01. How can an entire ethnic group of people be "brigands by instinct"? This is not something that can be supported scientifically because all individuals are different. Perhaps some have "brigand-like" qualities, but all of them do not. Also, no one is a brigand by instinct. One can learn "brigand-like" traits, if you will, but one cannot be a brigand by instinct. We know what traits are instinctual thanks to various scientific disciplines (i.e. biology, sociology). "Hunger," "thirst," "preservation of life," "empathy" -- these are instinctual traits. "Brigand-like," on the other hand, is not a natural born or instinctual trait.

So, basically, just because some 19th century guy says these people are "brigands by instinct" and "love to fight" and are "careless of human life" does not mean these things are true. How can you say that an entire ethnic group is "careless of human life"? How can you say that an entire ethnic group "loves to fight"? How can you believe these broad generalizations? Broad generalizations like these are the foundations of discrimination and have no basis in fact. That's why science has weeded them out and disregards them. If someone epirically proves them true, then surely they would be accepted by the scientific community. But that has not happened (and I doubt it ever will). All people are different -- that is, each individual is different. One can make some generalizations without characterizing a group too broadly, but one must be very careful when doing so. For if one is not careful, one will characterize people that are not one way or another -- in other words, one will have characterized too broadly. For these reasons, one cannot say that all Italians are one way, or all blacks are one way, or all Muslims are one way, or all Jews are one way, or all Catholics are one way or all Chinese are one way, or all Indians are one way, etc. (you get the point). You cannot say these things because they can never be scientifically proven because individuals are different.

Sze_cavalry01, it seems that you will believe anything George Scott Robertson wrote. So if you dug up a book by Robertson saying that your particular ethnic group is comprised of brigands who "love to fight" and are "careless of human life" and are "brigands by instinct," would you believe him? I would really like to know your answer to that question. I would hope, though, that you would not believe him and that you would recognize that Robertson was making broad, sweeping generalizaions that were not scientifically provable. You would know this because you were not a "brigand by instinct," you did not "love to fight" and you were not "careless of human life." ask123 17:47, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Strong agreement with VanTucky and ask123. What is most confusing to me, Sze cavalry01, is that you are not a newbie who doesn't know about Wikipedia but have in fact been here for a long time. I mean, come on! Facts of history? "It is as natural for a Kafir to thieve, as it is for him to eat." "In Kafir opinion, a good man is one who is a successful homicide." Do you seriously want people who look up an article about a group of people to read nonsense like this? Have you ever seen anything so racist on Wikipedia? It is not the nineteenth century anymore, this stuff can't be taken seriously. Robbie098 01:09, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Relationship with non-IE peoples and languages

I recently studied kom lexicon, thanks to Richard Strand's great site about Nuristan [1]. Nuristani people visually resemble neighbouring persians and tajiks but tend to have more european features (such as bright hair, eyes & fair skin). But I'm not gonna discuss genetics. I'm more interested in linguistic borrows from non-iranian and non-indic languages. Here are some of the words borrowed from turkic languages (such as Uzbek and Turkmen languages):

1. Kinship:
2. Vov - Grandfather, derived from old-turkic 'Baba' or 'Papa' - "ancestor", "great grandfather". (today, turkic stone statues in Ukrainian and Central Asian steppes are called "stone babas")
3. Vâ'i - Grandmother, probably derived from turkic 'apa', 'abi', 'ebe', 'eve' - "grandmother", "aunt" (but now also used as polite adress among Central Asian turkic peoples towards elderly and middle-aged women). (I also should note that first 'a' letter is obsolete in nuristani version which is typical for borrowed turkic words in IE-languages)
4. Nâv'o - Grandson, borrowed from turkic word for grandson - 'nəvə' (azeri) and more primitive 'nemere' (kazakh, sounds [v], [b] & [m] are related).
5. Sus - sister, probably derived from turkic 'çaç'; 'süs' (chuv.) - "hair". However I must admit that IE word "sister" can be of common (eurasiatic or nostratic) origin with turkic 'çaç'.
6. Music:
7. l'âalu - song, music; it is said that it's derived from PIE '*lalli' but I doubt that PIE language is reliable enough since IE languages are generally flexive (except few) and very diverse, unlike turkic and finnic languages which are mostly agglutinative and tend to be more 'stable', this why locating more or less primitve version of initial turkic language isn't that problematic than locating common proto-language of slavs or germans. Anyway this word looks like linguistic OOPART since it resembles finnic word "song" - 'laulu', 'laullu', 'lavl', and hungarian "dal" ([l] & [d] are related, probably result of "turkization"). As far as I know, this word is not presented in indo-aryan and germanic languages.
8. Animals:
9. kuř'i - dog, kuchekk in Baloch, probably borrowed from turkic 'göpek' or 'köpek' - "dog" or tibetan 'khʷyi'; 'gui' (kachin).
10. kâcor (or katsor, kajor) - mule, turkic 'qatır' - donkey, mule.
11. ź'uk - yak; azeri - sarlıq, yak, qaytağ; uzbek - qo'tos; kazakh - qodas.
12. pš'âš - cat, derived from turkic 'müş'; 'mǔsıq' (kaz.); 'pişik' (az.);'kuʃak' (chuv.); 'kóška' (east slav.).
13. Speech:
14. vâll'â - speak; probably related to estonian 'valjusti' - "aloud".
15. viri - word; also can be related to estonian 'vali' - "loud" as well as english "word".

These are just examples. We can explain presence of turkic and sino-tibetan loanwords but can't explain presence of words that resemble uralic equivalents. Only reasonable explanation is that ancestors of finnic peoples could migrate to north-eastern Europe through territory of modern Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. Presence of finnic words in iranian language is very unusual. If such migration could be in past then it could happen only in prehistoric times. Iliassh (talk)

Did you consider the fact that the Indo-Iranian Urheimat is located next to where Uralic languages are/were spoken? Azalea pomp (talk) 16:29, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

A Goldmine of Misinformation on Nuristan

I cannot begin to address the amount of fantasy and misinformation that I have found in the Wikipaedia articles on Nuristan. Most of the people who are contributing to these articles have no first-hand experience with Nuristan, its people, or its languages. I will not comment on the misguided remarks posted by amateurs on the origins of the Nuristanis or the etymologies of certain words. But I must warn all that the information on Nuristan posted on the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School website, used as a source for some of the Wikipaedia articles, is egregiously incorrect. In particular, the chart of Nuristani tribes, prepared for the NPS by Courage Associates at great taxpayer expense, borders on fraudulence. Readers of these so-called sources should realize that they are getting false information.—Richard F. Strand, 174.26.188.83 (talk) 09:09, 9 August 2010 (UTC)

Need more details than that. — LlywelynII 01:59, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Unrealistic picture

i think a picture of a little kid is unrealistic, and from my visit there, majority of Nuristan looks like typical southern Asia, dark featured and tanned. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.252.17.164 (talk) 19:19, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

IS anyone going to switch the picture??? Nursingxmajor (talk) 20:19, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

if anyone is interested let me know, because i think it is biased, and i visited the region many times personally, and have available photots Nursingxmajor (talk) 20:25, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

is there any suggestions, contact me Nursingxmajor (talk) 21:25, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

WRONG population number

from my search that population number is the number of all the people living in that region, not of the the natives and specific to Nuristan people descendent — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.252.17.164 (talk) 03:53, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

Genetics

No way Nuristanis should have that high R1a percentages if they are a Dardic group. It maybe because they're population is low which attributes to high amounts but i cannot find any other source on their genetics. The only one we have is from Harber but it is not sourced here instead the source used here is from an outdated link talking about the Y chromosome of pathans which does not mention the Y type of nuristanis. Akmal94 (talk) 11:17, 18 July 2016 (UTC)

Merge from Siah-Posh Kafirs

which may refer to all Nuristanis or to a subgroup but in any case shouldn't be sitting around with its laundry-list of sources under its long-outdated 19th-century name. — LlywelynII 01:58, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

  Y Merger complete. Klbrain (talk) 10:27, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

Merge discussion

Safed-Posh Kaffirs is another outdated classification that should be merged into the main article. PepperBeast (talk) 02:26, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

  Y Merger complete. PepperBeast (talk) 17:37, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

"Kafirism" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Kafirism. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 November 17#Kafirism until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 22:23, 17 November 2021 (UTC)

July 2023

@Editorkamran: Hi, it is regarding this removal. The source talks about Kata-vari dialect speakers, which may be why it was added. Do "Kata-vari" speakers identify as Nuristani? If yes then it can be re-added, with another better source explicitly mentioning the relation. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 10:35, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

Nuristani languages and Nuristani people should not be confused with each other because Nuristanis are ethnic group. That is why source must clearly mention existence of Nuristanis in Chitral, Pakistan. Editorkamran (talk) 10:50, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

@Editorkamran: This source (page 51) explicitly mentions the presence of Nuristanis in Chitral and the language they speak - Kata-vari dialect. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 12:00, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

That's a reliable source. Information added. Editorkamran (talk) 12:18, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

@Editorkamran: Thanks. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 12:35, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

"Race science" terms used uncritically?

In § Origin hypotheses, a sentence reads:

They appear to be a mixture of an extremely ancient element related to oldest known population of central Himalayas (the Presuns), the element with resemblance to the Kurds and a type with Nordic and Dinaric traits (the Siah-Posh/Wai groups) which goes back to the ancient prototype of these races preserved in the midst of Indo-Aryan ascendancy.

I don't have access to the specific books mentioned to ascertain whether they all support this language, and to know whether this is a fringe theory or actually WP:DUE. However, it is troubling that a theory describing the origin of the Nuristanis in "racial science" terms like Dinaric race is presented uncritically as being supported by recent writers. Chaotic Enby (talk · contribs) 23:35, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

@Chaotic Enby: Well, that section is part of a large chunk which was merged here in 2019 from this article. Note that the user who created that article, posted similar stuff in this talk page ([2]), both of which are full of unreliable, dated, undue and obsolete concepts as well as OR/Synth stuff removed by other in the past. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 13:02, 29 January 2025 (UTC)

Well that's certainly concerning. Someone more familiar with the sources/the topic should definitely double-check these additions. Chaotic Enby (talk · contribs) 13:35, 29 January 2025 (UTC)

@Chaotic Enby: Done removing. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 12:30, 8 April 2025 (UTC)