The Sir?j al-taw?r?kh is the most important history of Afghanistan ever written. This pinnacle of the rich Afghan historiographic tradition is available in English translation, annotated, fully indexed, including an introduction, eight appendices, Persian-English and English-Persian glossaries, and bibliography.

By the author of Destiny Disrupted: an enlightening, accessible history of modern Afghanistan from the Afghan point of view, showing how Great Power conflicts have interrupted its ongoing, internal struggle to take form as a nation

A Political and Economic History of the Jews of Afghanistan by Sara Koplik describes the situation of Jews in that country during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, particularly 1839-1952. It examines the political, economic and social conditions they faced as religious minorities. The work focuses upon harsh governmental economic policies of the 1930s and 1940s spearheaded by 'Abd al-Majid Khan Zabuli which caused the impoverishment and suffering of both the local community and refugees from Soviet Central Asia. The question of Nazi influence in Afghanistan is addressed, with the author arguing that it was mainly limited to the economic sphere. An examination of the appeal of Zionism and the community's immigration to Israel is included.

This book comprises English translations of Nizhādnāmah-i Afghān (Afghan Genealogy) and Taẕakkur al-Inqilāb (Memoir of the Revolution), the culminating works of Fayż Muḥammad Kātib Hazārah’s monumental history of Afghanistan, Sirāj al-tawārīkh (The History of Afghanistan). Nizhādnāmah-i Afghān, a detailed guide to all the ethnic and religious communities in Afghanistan in the first third of the 20th century, is the first locally-produced ethnography by a modern Afghan scholar. The Taẕakkur al-Inqilāb is Fayz Muhammad’s journalistic record of seven of the nine months of Amīr Ḥabīb Allāh Kalakānī’s reign in 1929. Together with The History of Afghanistan these works offer an incomparable resource for the history of Afghanistan from the mid-18th to the mid-20th centuries.

American and Afghan veterans contribute to this anthology of critical perspectives—“a vital contribution toward understanding the Afghanistan War” (Library Journal). When America went to war with Afghanistan in the wake of 9/11, it did so with the lofty goals of dismantling al Qaeda, removing the Taliban from power, remaking the country into a democracy. But as the mission came unmoored from reality, the United States wasted billions of dollars, and thousands of lives were lost. Our Latest Longest War is a chronicle of how, why, and in what ways the war in Afghanistan failed. Edited by prize-winning historian and Marine lieutenant colonel Aaron B. O’Connell, the essays collected here represent nine different perspectives on the war—all from veterans of the conflict, both American and Afghan. Together, they paint a picture of a war in which problems of culture, including an unbridgeable rural-urban divide, derailed nearly every field of endeavor. The authors also draw troubling parallels to the Vietnam War, arguing that ideological currents in American life explain why the US government has repeatedly used military force in pursuit of democratic nation-building. In Afghanistan, as in Vietnam, this created a dramatic mismatch of means and ends that neither money, technology, nor weapons could overcome.

This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curated for quality. Quality assurance was conducted on each of these books in an attempt to remove books with imperfections introduced by the digitization process. Though we have made best efforts - the books may have occasional errors that do not impede the reading experience. We believe this work is culturally important and have elected to bring the book back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide.

From William Dalrymple—award-winning historian, journalist and travel writer—a masterly retelling of what was perhaps the West’s greatest imperial disaster in the East, and an important parable of neocolonial ambition, folly and hubris that has striking relevance to our own time. With access to newly discovered primary sources from archives in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Russia and India—including a series of previously untranslated Afghan epic poems and biographies—the author gives us the most immediate and comprehensive account yet of the spectacular first battle for Afghanistan: the British invasion of the remote kingdom in 1839. Led by lancers in scarlet cloaks and plumed helmets, and facing little resistance, nearly 20,000 British and East India Company troops poured through the mountain passes from India into Afghanistan in order to reestablish Shah Shuja ul-Mulk on the throne, and as their puppet. But after little more than two years, the Afghans rose in answer to the call for jihad and the country exploded into rebellion. This First Anglo-Afghan War ended with an entire army of what was then the most powerful military nation in the world ambushed and destroyed in snowbound mountain passes by simply equipped Afghan tribesmen. Only one British man made it through. But Dalrymple takes us beyond the bare outline of this infamous battle, and with penetrating, balanced insight illuminates the uncanny similarities between the West’s first disastrous entanglement with Afghanistan and the situation today. He delineates the straightforward facts: Shah Shuja and President Hamid Karzai share the same tribal heritage; the Shah’s principal opponents were the Ghilzai tribe, who today make up the bulk of the Taliban’s foot soldiers; the same cities garrisoned by the British are today garrisoned by foreign troops, attacked from the same rings of hills and high passes from which the British faced attack. Dalryrmple also makes clear the byzantine complexity of Afghanistan’s age-old tribal rivalries, the stranglehold they have on the politics of the nation and the ways in which they ensnared both the British in the nineteenth century and NATO forces in the twenty-first. Informed by the author’s decades-long firsthand knowledge of Afghanistan, and superbly shaped by his hallmark gifts as a narrative historian and his singular eye for the evocation of place and culture, The Return of a King is both the definitive analysis of the First Anglo-Afghan War and a work of stunning topicality.

Vols. for 1871-76, 1913-14 include an extra number, The Christmas bookseller, separately paged and not included in the consecutive numbering of the regular series.

This set includes all four volumes of the critically acclaimed History of Central Asia series. The epic plains and arid deserts of Central Asia have witnessed some of the greatest migrations, as well as many of the most transformative developments, in the history of civilization. Christoph Baumer's ambitious four-volume treatment of the region charts the 3000-year drama of Scythians and Sarmatians; Soviets and transcontinental Silk Roads; trade routes and the transmission of ideas across the steppes; and the breathless and brutal conquests of Alexander the Great and Chinghiz Khan. Masterfully interweaving the stories of individuals and peoples, the author's engaging prose is richly augmented throughout by colour photographs taken on his own travels. This set includes The Age of the Steppe Warriors (Volume 1), The Age of the Silk Roads (Volume 2), The Age of Islam and the Mongols (Volume 3) and The Age of Decline and Revival (Volume 4)