1 494
2 Darwesh Khel Wazirs.
3 Khd-n border, behind the Bitanni country, and as far south as the
4 Gtomal pass, lie the Mahsud clan of the same tribe. The Wazfr are
5 descended irom Snlaina^n, son of Kakai, and are one of the Karl4nri
6 tribes, 'i’he original seat of the tribe was in the Birrail hills, west
7 of the Khost range which separates them from their kinsmen the
8 Bannuchi descendants of Shitak. Sulaimdn had two sons, L^lai and
9 Khizrai. Lalai had to fly by reason of a blood feud, and settled in
10 Ningrahdr on the northern slopes of the western Safed Koh, where
11 his descendants the Lalai Wazir are still settled between Jal6.1db^d
12 and Pdrachindr. Khizrai had three sons, Musa, Mahsfid and Gurbuz.
13 From Mahsud are descended the Mahsud Wazir, divided into the
14 Alizai and ^Bahlolzai while from Musa Darvesh are descended the
15 Utm^,nzaiand Ahmadzai clans, usually joined under the title of Darvesh
16 Khel Waziri.
17 About the close of the 14th century the Wazir began to move east-
18 wards. They first crossed the Khost range and drove the Bannuchi out
19 of Shaw^l, and occupied the hills of the Bannu and Kohdt border
20 north of the Tochi. Then crossing that river, they drove the Urmur
21 Afghans, descendants of Urmur, son of Sharkabun and near kins-
22 men of the Abdali, out of the hills south of the Tochi on the lower
23 Bannu and Tdnk borders to take refuge in the Logar valley near Kd.bul
24 and dislodging the Bitanni from Kdniguram, drove them back beyond
25 Garangi to the low hills on our immediate frontier. They thus obtained
26 possession of all that confnsed system of mountains, which, starting from
27 the Gomal pass which marks the northern extremity of the Sulensdns
28 proper, runs northwards along our border to Thai and the Kurram river,
29 where it joins the lower ranges of the Safed Koh. Their two main
30 sections are the Mahsud and Darvesh Khel, the former holding the
31 hills to the south, and the latter those to the north of the Tochi river
32 and the Kasor pass ; while of the Darvesh Khel country, the Ahmadzai
33 occupy the southern and the Utmanzai the northern parts. The Hasan
34 Khel, an important UtmJlnzai sept, hold the extreme north-western
35 portion of the tract. The two great sections are practically independent
36 tribes, owning no common head, and with but little common feeling.
37 They still rmininally hold the Birmil country, though the Sulim^n Khel
38 and Kharoti Ghilzai winter there with their flocks, and during their
39 stay the Wazm are confined to their walled villages. They were till
40 lately wholly nomad and pastoral ; but they have of late years encroach-
41 ed upon the plain country of the Marwat, Bannuchi, and Khatak, and
42 now hold cultivated lands in Bannu and Koh4t.
43 I. — The Daewesh Khel Wazibs.
44 The tradition about the origin of the Darwesh Khel Wazirsis that one
45 Abdullah, who lived in the country now occupied by the Mahsuds, was
46 chief of the tribe, called Urmur, but had no son. One day he went towards
47 the W4na plain, where a king’s army had been in camp. On the
48 morning after the king’s forces had left, Abdullah found a baby,
49 hidden under a frying-pan — in Pashtu fearerai— and took it home. This
50 boy grew up, rnarried a girl of the Urmur tribe and by her had a
51 son called Sulaiman, who in turn had a son called Wazir, the reputed
52 ancestor of the Wazir tribe.