ABSTRACT
Geography is the background of human endeavour. In all the marching and countermarching that ensued, the valleys of the Ghorband and the Upper Kunduz river were prominent. The Ghorband, and its tributary the Panjshir, which flows into it at an acute angle from the north-east, are part of the Indus system; the Kunduz flows into the Oxus. Together they form a trough of about 100 miles in length, broken only by the mature, rounded downs of the Shibar Pass. Southward movements across Hindu Kush included the Bactrian Greeks, the Sakas, who displaced them, and the Kushans, who displaced the Sakas. Ephthalites and Turks followed, and finally Chingiz Khan and his Mongols, and their kinsmen, the Mughals. Alexander preferred the third available route to India, via Kandahar, Ghazni, and the Kabul valley. Kandahar is separated from the Quetta plateau and the Bolan by the Khojak ravine.
