Durrani Empire

The Durrani Empire (known as the Afghan Empire^[1][2]) was established in 1747 by Ahmad Shah Durrani at Kandahar, Afghanistan.^[3] It included the land that is now called Afghanistan, Pakistan, eastern Iran and western India.^[1][4] The Durrani Empire is considered the foundation of the modern state of Afghanistan,^[5] with Ahmad Shah Durrani (Ahmad Shah Baba) being the "Father of the nation".^[4][6]

The Durrani dynasty diminished in the early 19th century when Afghanistan was fighting defensive wars with Persia on one side and British India on the other side.^[4] The Barakzai dynasty took over control of the kingdom but lost many of Afghanistan's territories by the end of the 19th century. It became to what is now Afghanistan after the Anglo-Afghan Treaty of 1919 when the state became officially recognized by all the major countries in the world. At first its capital was in Kandahar as that is where the empire started however the capital then shifted to Kabul after its conquest. The empire had two capitals, the main capital Kabul and the winter capital, Peshawar.^[7][8]

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1} "Last Afghan empire". Louis Dupree, Nancy Hatch Dupree and others. Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 2012-07-01.
2. ↑ "Afghanistan (Archived)". John Ford Shroder. University of Nebraska. 2010. Archived from the original on 2009-10-31. Retrieved 2012-07-01.
3. ↑ "Aḥmad Shah Durrānī". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 2012-07-01.
4. ↑ ^{4.0 4.1 4.2} "Ahmad Shah and the Durrani Empire". Library of Congress Country Studies on Afghanistan. 1997. Retrieved 2012-07-01.
5. ↑ "Afghanistan". CIA. The World Factbook. Archived from the original on 2017-09-20. Retrieved 2010-08-25.
6. ↑ Ganḍā, Singh (1959). Ahmad Shah Durrani: Father of Modern Afghanistan. Asia Pub. House. p. 457. ISBN 1-4021-7278-8. 9781402172786. Retrieved 2010-08-25.
7. ↑ Adamec, Ludwig W. (2011). Historical Dictionary of Afghanistan. Scarecrow Press. p. 49. ISBN 978-0-8108-7957-7. Retrieved 2012-07-01.
8. ↑ N. A. Khalfin, "Anglo-Afghan Treaties and Agreements of the 19th and 20th Centuries" Retrieved 01 July 2012.