At its peak, it ruled over present-day Afghanistan, much of Pakistan, parts of northeastern and southeastern Iran, eastern Turkmenistan, and northwestern India.

[12] Ahmad was the son of Muhammad Zaman Khan (an Afghan chieftain of the Abdali tribe) and the commander of Nader Shah Afshar.

Following Afshar's death in June 1747, Ahmad secured Afghanistan by taking Kandahar, Ghazni, Kabul, and Peshawar.

[13] Subsequently, Ahmad sent an army to subdue the areas north of the Hindu Kush down to the Amu Darya, and in short order, all of the different Afghan tribes began to join his cause.

The Durrani Empire is considered to be the foundational polity of the modern nation-state of Afghanistan, with Ahmad being credited as its Father of the Nation.

However, the Hotak dynasty came to a complete end in 1738 after being toppled and banished by the Afsharids who were led by Nader Shah Afshar of Persia.

He placed some wheat or barley sheaves in Ahmad Khan's turban, and crowned him Badshah, Durr-i-Dauran (Shah, Pearl of the Age).

He belonged to a respectable family of political background, especially since his father had served as Governor of Herat who died in a battle defending the Afghans.

In short order, the powerful army brought under its control the Tajik, Hazara, Uzbek, Turkmen, and other tribes of northern Afghanistan.

Ahmad Shah invaded the remnants of the Mughal Empire a third time, and then a fourth, consolidating control over the Kashmir and Punjab regions, with Lahore being governed by Afghans.

He sacked Delhi in 1757 but permitted the Mughal dynasty to remain in nominal control of the city as long as the ruler acknowledged Ahmad Shah's suzerainty over Punjab, Sindh, and Kashmir.

[21] However, with his campaigns in India exhausting the state treasury, and with his troops stretched thin throughout Central Asia, Ahmad Shah lacked sufficient resources to do anything except to send envoys to Beijing for unsuccessful talks.

He defeated the Rohillas and Afghan garrisons in Punjab and succeeded in ousting Timur Shah and his court from India and brought Lahore, Multan, Kashmir and other subahs on the Indian side of Attock under Maratha rule.

[25] The defeat at Panipat resulted in heavy losses for the Marathas, and was a huge setback for Peshwa Balaji Rao.

[19]: 71 He assaulted Lahore and, after taking their holy city of Amritsar, massacred thousands of Sikh inhabitants, destroyed their revered Golden Temple.

[28]: 144–45 [29][30][28]: 154  Ahmad Shah also faced other rebellions in the north, and eventually he and the Uzbek Emir of Bukhara agreed that the Amu Darya would mark the division of their lands.

[2] Ahmad Shah's successors governed so ineptly during a period of profound unrest that within fifty years of his death, the Durrani empire per se was at an end, and Afghanistan was embroiled in civil war.

The court had attempted to urge Ahmad Shah to reconsider his decision, coinciding with the fact that the eldest son should ascend to the throne.

However, choosing Timur Shah as a successor was likely to restrict power of the Senior Generals and the Durrani Tribal Council, which he deemed as a threat to his dynasty in the future.

Timur Shah's plans were stalled, however, as a rebellion by Darwish Ali Khan under the Sunni Hazaras, likely instigated by the Sulaiman faction had risen up.

Shah Wali Khan had also announced to everyone that the king was ill and had given orders to not disturb him except his trusted officials.

To make the deception more believable, Ahmad Shah's chief eunuch, Yaqut Khan had brought food for the "Sick" Ruler.

However, many of the Amirs including Mahadad Khan had disliked Shah Wali's ambitions, and thus had fled to Timur's side, also notifying him of the ongoing situation at Kandahar.

Timur Shah, having secured Punjab, also faced recurring rebellions against him, including an assassination attempt early in his reign at Peshawar.

Painda Khan's son fled to Iran and pledged the substantial support of his Barakzai followers to a rival claimant to the throne, Zaman's younger brother, Mahmud Shah.

On June 7, 1809, Shuja Shah signed a treaty with the British, which included a clause stating that he would oppose the passage of foreign troops through his territories.

The "Army of the Indus", full of both British and Indian infantrymen and cavalrymen, was intent on restoring Shah Shuja Durrani, the deposed monarch to the throne of Afghanistan.

The Durrani military was based on cavalry armed with flintlocks who performed hit-and-run attacks, combining new technology in firearms with Turco-Mongol tactics.

[42] The core of the Durrani army were the 10,000 sher-bacha (blunderbuss)-carrying mounted ghulams (slave-soldiers) of which a third were previously Shia soldiers (Qizilbash) of Nader Shah.

Infantry played a very small role in the Durrani army and, with the exception of light swivel guns mounted on camels, the Zamburak, so did artillery.