Kalash Siaposh Kafirs History and Customs by Charles Masson

This is one chapter, Chapter XI, of the book Narrative of various journeys in Balochistan, Afghanistan, the Panjab and Kalat 1826-1838 by Charles Masson. This chapter describes the Siaposh Kafirs or Wearers of the Black Robes. The Siaposh Kafirs are now known as the Kalash. They inhabit three valleys in Chitral in NorthWest Pakistan. The valleys are Bumboret, Birir and Rumbur. There are now only three thousand of these Kalash left. The rest have converted to Islam. However, their numbers are increasing, with more babies being born and a decline in the infant mortality rare. There are two kinds of Kafirs: Red and Black. The Red Kafirs are now called the Nuristanis. They inhabit the area of Nuristan in Afghanistan. There are also some Nuristani villages in the far upper parts of Bumboret, Birir and Rumbur. The Black Kafirs are known for wearing Black dress. You will see references to the color Black in the pages here. For example: The males of the infidels, whose souls are said to have been more black than their garments, This book was first published in 1844. In spite of the passage of 127 years, little has changed. The females still wear the same black outfits with a headdress made of corwie shells and they dance in the same way. There are differences of opinion as to whether the Kalash have or had the same religion as the Nuristanis and whether they are the same people. The similarities between them are that they both do not bury their dead but put their dead in wooden boxes above ground, and both sit on small wooden stools and do not sit on the ground.