Kalash valley

Kalash valley

One of the main attractions of Chitral are the Kalash valleys the house of the Kafir Kalash or (Wearers of the Black Robes) a primitive pagan tribe.Their ancestry is enveloped in mystery and is that the subject of controversy.A legend says that 5 troopers of the legions of Alexander of Macedonia settled in Chitral and are the progenitors of the Kafir Kalash.

Kalash Peoples

Kalash girl

The kalasha language is that the closest trendy language to ancient sanskrit(old indo aryan) closely followed by western dardic khowa.They are associated with the Nuristani folks of the adjacent Nuristan (historically referred to as Kafiristan) province of Afghanistan.An autochthonous and polytheistic cluster just like the Kalasha of Chitral, the Nuristani were forcibly converted to Islam by the 'Iron Amir' Abdur Rahman Khan within the late nineteenth century, whereas the Kalasha of Chitral maintain their own separate cultural traditions.

Festivals

 

The 3 main festivals of the Kalash are the Joshi festival in late might, the Uchau in autumn,and also the Caumus in midwinter

Chitral  district

Chitral is a district within the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan that contains the city of Chitral.It is the most important district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa covering a neighborhood of 14,850 km² and a population of 318,689 at the 1998 Census, that had subsequently risen to concerning 378,000 individuals by 2004.It has one amongst the very best mountains of the planet Tirich Mir.

Kalash girls dance