The Abhiras (today Ahirs) is an Historical tribe mentioned in ancient Indian epics and scriptures. They were a warlike tribe is admitted by all and Probably they were a semi-nomadic people as they are associated with various peoples and provinces. A historical people of the same name are mentioned in the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea. The Mahabharata describes them as living near the seashore and on the bank of the Sarasvati River, near Somnath in Gujarat.

The term Abhira, means cowherd. The Vishnu Purana calls the Abhiras as Gopalas. In the Mahabharata, Arjuna also calls the Abhiras as Gopalas. The Amarakosha mentions Gopa, Gopala, Gosamkhya, Godhuk and Ballava as the synonyms for Abhira and says that the village or place where Abhiras lived is named as Ghosa or Abhirapalli.

The Abhiras appear in ancient India as a famous and numerous tribe already established in Punjab, Rajasthan and Sind at the beginning of the Christian era. In the first century AD south-west Rajasthan and western Sindh were globally called Abhiradesa literally "The Land of the Abhiras". The epic Ramayana does not directly mention the Abhira region, but mentions the marukantara living in the Thar desert of Marvar a place where Rama himself is supposed to have thrown a shaft on the land of the savage Abhiras Probably, by the end of the second century they had spread over the whole of India. The frontier districts of the Abhiradesa were the regions of Parkar and Hyderabad Sind (to the north of the Indus delta) and south-west Rajasthan comprising the districts of Marwar, Ajmer, Mewar, Pushkar, and the whole of southern Rajasthan up to Malwa and Saurashtra.

In the Mahabharata the Abhiras are mentioned by Sanjaya in the enumeration of the people of Bharatavarsha.

The scholars like R.G. Bhandarkar and Jayaswal feel that there is a strong evidence in Harivamsa Purana and Balacarita for the origin of cowherd-God Krishna among the Abhiras.

Along with the Vrishnis, the Satvatas, and the Yadavas, the Abhiras were followers of the Vedas, and worshipped Krishna, the head and preceptor of these tribes. Tradition goes that the Yadavas, Vrishnis, and the Abhiras were cattlerearers by profession. Lord Krishna has been conceived as a leader of the cowherds.

In the Padma-puranas and certain literary works, the Abhiras are referred to as belonging to the race of Krishna.

In archaeological inscriptions, Abhiras are mentioned as belonging to the race of Krishna.

The Narayani Army which the Krishna organised and which made him so powerful that his friendship was eagerly sought by the greatest kings of his time, is described in the Mahabharata as being all of the Abhira caste.

The Mahabharata and other authoritative works use the three terms-Abhira, Yadava and Gopa synonymously.

In the Mahabharata it is mentioned that when the Yadavas (though belonging to the Abhira group) abandoned Dvaraka and Gujarat after the death of Krishna and retreated northwards under Arjuna's leadership, they were attacked and broken up by the rude Abhiras of Rajputana. They were also mentioned as warriors in support of Duryodhana and Kauravas and in the Mahabharata, Abhira, Gopa, Gopal and Yadavas are all synonyms. They defeated the hero of the Kurukshetra War (Arjuna) who had slain the mighty warriors like Karna and Bhishma in the war. However Abhiras spared him when he disclosed the identity of the members of the family of Krishna.

The Yadavas, mentioned in the Mahabharata, were pastoral Kshatriyas among whom Krishna was brought up. The Gopas, whom Krishna had offered to Duryodhana to fight in his support when he himself joined Arjuna's side, were no other than the Yadavas themselves, who were also the Abhiras.

The Yadavas of the Mahabharata period were known to be the followers of Vaisnavism, of which Krishna was the leader. They were the Gopas (cowherd) by profession, but at the same time they held the status of the Kshatriyas, by participating in the battle of Kurukshetra. The present Ahirs are also followers of Vaishnavism. In the epics and the Puranas the association of the Yadavas with the Abhiras was attested by the evidence that the Yadava kingdom was mostly inhabited by the Abhiras.

In the time of the Periplus (C. 80 A.D.) the very area called by Ptolemy Larike was called Abiria or Abhiria. the Abhiras of Gujarat were the Rastrikas of Ashoka and the Yadavas of the Mahabharata. Again and again in that area we find republicans. In the time of the Mahabharata they are Andhaka-Vrisnis and Bhojas (Yadavas); in the time of Asoka we have the Rastrikas and Bhojas; in the time of Kharvela we have the Rathikas and Bhojakas; in the time of Samudragupta we have the Abhiras, while a contemporary Puranic text designates the Saurastras and Avantyas as the Abhiras; in the time of Kumara Gupta I and Skandagupta we have the Pusyamitras there. These were all one and the same people, with different names at different times.