Medieval History

[Hauma Hamiddha]

Right from the vedic period Afghanistan was a border zone between Indo-Aryan and Iranian. These languages were both seen interacting in that region as supported by Iranian influences on the vedic dialect there and vice versa on Avestan. Thus we had a continuous speech of Vedic Sanskrit then Classical Sanskrit closely juxtaposed with Old Iranian and then Middle Iranian dialects. Some people have even claimed that the vedic ethnonym paktha is related to the modern ethonym pakhtu of the dominant tribe in the region. In the post-Sanskrit development we have a well known Prakrit known as Gandhari that was quite comparable to the literary Prakrits of inner India. This seems to have further evolved into different vulgar offshoots that might find representation in the surviving Indo-Aryan tongues of the region. A variant of Gandhari spread through central Asia and is called Niye Prakrit. Even after invasion of Mah'd Ghaznavi Sanskrit did not die off entirely because we notice that he minted Sanskrit coins imitating the Hindus he had just overrun. But with the subsequent Jihads of various Mohammedans the Indo-Aryan languages gradually shrunk and attained their present status.

The post Prakrit IA languages from gandhAra that still survive of which we have a record are:
lahndI - close to kashmiri
khetrAnI - North of Baloch
poThohArI - Ravalpindi and further north
Hindko- Peshavar and North
Shina -upper Indus Swat Gilgit
BashkarIk/gAwrI -Kohistan
maiyA
kanyawAlI -- all further north TSP-Afg border zone
gawar-bAtI -- south Afghan near Bashgal river.
ningalAmI, gR^ingalI, shumAshtI kaTArqala, sAvI, tirAhI all extinct or nearly extinct distributed throughout Afghan and remnant of the old Gandhari
pashaI- gAndhArI descendant in Lamghan region
kalaSha- the language of the Kalasha who were denuded by the jihads of Timur, Akbar, Jahangir and finally by Abdur-Rahman Khan the 1800s precursor of the modern Talibs.

There are additionally the Nuristani family of languages for which look up:
http://users.sedona.net/~strand/Nuristan...anis1.html

Evils of Islam continue to destroy whatever remains of Indo-Aryan presence in those regions.