By: Dr.Naseer Dashti
Koch as Brahui
During the Buyids and Seljuqs periods, some of the Baloch tribes from the Barez Mountains of Kerman were forced to migrate and were identified first as Barezui. Later, with their settlement in Turan, the Barezui tribes became Brahui, and with the formation of a powerful tribal confederacy, they created the Baloch state of Kalat in later medieval times. These Baloch tribes from Barez Mountain in Kerman had been mentioned by Arab historians as Kufici (mountaineers), distinguishing them from other Baloch tribes who were dwelling mostly in the deserts of Kerman and Sistan. Hudud-al-Alam describes Jebel Barez (Kuh-e-Kufij) as a chain of seven mountains running from Jiruft to the sea, with seven tribes, each with its chief and being “professional looters” (Bosworth, 1976). Later, the term Koch o Baloch was used for the Baloch tribes as a whole in historical accounts of some of the Arab writers including Ibn Haukal and Istakhri.
From various historical narrations, it appeared that there was not much difference between the language of Koch and the Baloch at that time; however, the Brahui tribes may have their dialect that is not much different from Balochi. European linguists of the colonial era had investigated the origin of the Brahui group of the Baloch tribes from a particular angle. However, from the investigations of Dr. Gershevitch, it can be deduced that the Brahui were among the tribal confederacy of the Baloch tribes in Kerman. Gershevitch (1962a, b) traced the origin of Baśkarɔi dialects to the Bradazhui tribe of central Persia during the Achaemenid period. Dr. Gershevitch, investigating the Baśkarɔi dialect, observed that apart from having absorbed some Brahui and Arabic, the Baśkarɔi dialects are pure Iranian. According to medieval Arab writers, Baśkarɔ was surrounded by the Balochi-speaking tribes. If we assume the original country of the Brahui tribes in Turan, how can one explain the loan Brahui words in the Baśkarɔi dialects, keeping in mind the distance of Turan and Kerman or Baśkarɔ?
Minorsky (1958) believed that the Brahui are the Koch. There is a possibility that the people of Barez Mountain, who became known as the Koch in the writings of Arab scholars, were from that tribe of Bradazhui who were deported by Cyrus the Great into the hills of Kerman. There is also mention of a people from Barez Mountain along with the Baloch as part of the Xerxes Army when he marched against the Greeks.
Koch o Baloch also entered in the accounts of Arab writers of medieval Iran in respect of their encounters with Buyids. Many authorities on medieval Iranian history, including Bosworth, observed that Koch was a separate ethnic entity that later merged with the Baloch entity; however, they failed to prove this on the authentic ground. Some of the Baloch writers, including Mari (1974) and Dashti (2020) believed that the Koch were the Baloch tribes living in Barez Mountain (the Kuh-e-Kufij of the Arab writers), who were among the early migrating Baloch tribes that finally settled in Turan.
There are references in early Persian cuneiform inscriptions of Akaufaciya, a people who could be identified with Kufich, Kufijor, or Kuj. Kuj or Kufij were also mentioned by Muslim historians including the anonymous author of Hudud al Alam, a geographic treatise from the late 10th century A.D. This may also refer to Koch o Baloch of earlier times living in Kerman. The author maintained that Kufij lived on the eastern fringes of Kerman and were divided into seven tribes, every tribe speaking its variety of languages. Other Muslim chroniclers, prominent among them Istakhri and the author of Burhan-e-Katih, also localize the Koch or Kufij to Kerman and its eastern regions during the early Islamic period.
If we consider Koch or Bradzhui as original inhabitants of Kerman, then it can safely be deduced that it was after the arrival of a great number of the Baloch tribes in Kerman in the later Sassanid period that was responsible for the merging of the Koch into the greater Baloch ethnic entity. Arabic writer Ibn Haukal, writing in the tenth century in his “Belad-al-Islam” quoted by Mari (1974), mentioned the Bradazhui tribe living around the Fars country with Koch o Baloch. Maqaddesi (1906) observed that by the tenth century, the Baloch had spread as far as Turan, and, obviously, these Baloch most probably were from the Bradazhui Baloch tribes of Barez Mountain who, later, became Brahui of modern-day Balochistan.
It is not improbable that some of the Brahui tribes might have been part of the larger Baloch migrating tribes toward the east into their present abode in central Balochistan during the Sassanid era. However, it appeared that Brahuis formed the bulk of Baloch tribes who in the beginning fled en masse from Kerman after the Buyids incursions, taking the eastward routes, traversing the Great desert, and resting in Sistan for a while before settling in present-day central Balochistan in Pakistan. This assumption makes sense as from the time of the Buyids genocide of the Baloch in Kerman, the mention of the Koch along with the Baloch as a significant political factor vanished altogether from the official narratives of Persian chroniclers. From the works of Dr. Gershevitch, it became apparent that the present Brahui language is an admixture of Balochi, Baśkarɔi, and some of the Dravidian languages. This is most plausible as there is evidence of the presence of Jats among the Baloch tribes in Kerman speaking a Dravidian language. At the time of the Baloch migration into Turan, there was a significant presence of Hephthalites Turks in the region. The influence of the Dravidian and Turkic dialects must have influenced the language after the Baloch tribes, who finally settled and intermarried with the indigenous Dravidian and Turkic population of Turan of that time.
Watch Latest Videos
