Khattaknamah Akorkhel Khattak
He was the eldest son of Ashraf Khan HIjri اشرف خان ھجری(1044-1105/1635 to 1693–94). In 1083/1672-73 Ashraf succeeded his father Khushal Khan in the chieftaincy of the Khattak tribe, but in 1092/1681 he was betrayed into the hands of the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb by his brother Bahram and died in captivity.
Afzal Khan was arrested by the Mughals in 1098/1686-87 and taken to Kabul. He returned two years after the death of Khushal Khan Khattak (1100/1689) to assume the chieftainship of the Khattak tribe, which he held for sixty-one years. Based on a reading of a tarikh in the divan of Afzal’s son Kazem Khan Sayda, Sidiqullah Rishtin and A. Habibi gave the date of Afzal’s death as 1183/1769-70, however the date of his death is uncertain.
Henry George Raverty ھنری جارج ریورٹی stated in his work Selections from the Poetry of the Afghans (London, 1867) that Afzal, upon the assumption of the chieftainship, put his uncle (and rival) Abdul Qader to death does not bear examination; the latter translated the Gulistan of Sheikh Saadi گلستان شیخ سعدی in 1124/1712. Another uncle of Afzal, Gohar Khan, in 1120/1708, gave testimony to Afzal’s good chieftainship and to his consuming literary interests, which were aimed at collecting his grandfather’s works and having them copied to save them from oblivion, and inspiring Gohar Khan and other members of the family to use their talents in translating into Pashto some of the great works in Persian and Arabic. Afzal Khan Khattak himself made chiefly historical translations when he had ruled for twenty-five years and was fifty-three years old; the Tarikh of A`tam Kufi, the Siar of Mullah Mo’in, and a tafsir of the Koran. He began a translation of Lar-e Danes; Abu’l-Fazl’s simplified Persian version of the Anwar-e Sohayly – انوار سہیلی by Hosayn Wa`ez Kashefi – حسین واعظ کاشفی that was completed in 1128/1716 under the name ‘Flmkana da Danes.
Afzal Khan Khattak began writing his main work, the Târikh-e murassa’ – تاریخ مرسع , in 1120/1708. It is an uneven history of the Afghans in Pashto. The first and last parts are translations from the Persian work Makhzan-e Afghani – مخزن آفغانی (or Tarikh-e-Khan Jahani) written by Nimat Allah al-Harawi in 1020/1611. The second part, about half the volume, contains an account of the Yusafzai’s and kindred tribes, based mainly upon the Tazkirat-ul Abrar – تذکرۃالابرار by Akhund Darweza – آخوند درویزہ, the Tabaqat-i-Akbari طبقات آکبری , the Jahangir-nama – جھانگیر نامہ, and other Persian sources, and an extensive account of the history of the Khattaks, particularly of the author’s grandfather.
The Tareekh-e-Murassa is an ancient text of Pashto that was authored by Afzal Khan Khattak (5701 H to 5538 H), the grandson of Khushal Khan Khatak. It is the first voluminous book written in the domain of history in Pashto which carries information regarding political and social situations of that era. Furthermore, this book not only elucidates the conditions of prophets and saints but also tells the history of the Pakhtun nation, the history of the Khattak tribe, and the history of the Mughals. With reference to literature, it has paramount importance. It is considered one of the best prosaic representations of that period. This text has been edited by well-known Pashto‟s researcher, Dost Muhammad Khan Kamil Momand. Till now, its two editions have been published. In this paper, both editions of this ancient text have critically been studied in the light of prevalent principles of textual criticism. This work would be fruitful for the future research scholars and editors of Pashto.
It includes long extracts from the Bayaz بیاض (notebook) of his grandfather Khushal Khan and relates events up to the year 1136/1723-24. This part of the book was used by H.G. Raverty as source material for his Notes on Afghanistan. Afzal Khan Khattak is buried in Nowshera district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province – Pakistan.
