Talk:Pachisi

Board image

Generating an original image to replace the current image here. The board currently shown is not pachisi. - PilotPrecise 00:37, 10 March 2004 (UTC)

It is, the image came from an old academic paper about the game (by Stewart Cullin IIRC). --Imran 03:17, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Indeed, you are correct! I had believed that classic Pachisi had the forts in the locations as indicated in the image I made, but in reviewing this to make sure, I have found at four configurations ascribed to "Pachisi" (one described as a Chaupar board; silly to claim as Chaupar has no safe houses) and it is difficult to prove wich (if any) is the classic layout. Most examples are like the image I created, but the layout you provide by Cullin and the layout in Partlett's Oxford History... differ (each in the opposite extremes) and my image is more common and between the two. May be worth a mention in the article that the safe house positions vary. PilotPrecise 05:09, 10 March 2004 (UTC)

Origins

Some Ludo instructions I've seen say that Pachisi dates back as far as 500BC. I can't find a reliable source for this - can anyone else find something and add this fact to the article?

There is not a reliable source for this "fact."Phil wink (talk) 06:40, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

How does this fit in?:

Pachisi originated in India during the sixth century or perhaps even earlier. Traces of a cross-shaped pachisi board carved in stone can be seen today in one of the ancient cave temples of Ellora in the Deccan region of India.

Grunfeld, Frederic V. (1975). "Pachisi". Games of the World. Holt, Rinehart and Winston. p. 26–31. ISBN 0-03-015261-5.

Ihardlythinkso (talk) 04:28, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

These, in fact, are the representations debunked by Parlett (1999, p 43) as noted in the article. (You wouldn't be able to tell from my brief reference there, but Parlett does indeed specify cave 21 at Ellora, so we're certainly talking about the same thing.) I don't know how these depictions, of which Parlett says, "...only the dice can be seen — there is no sign of a suitable board" also got described as having "traces of a cross-shaped pachisi board", but I trust Parlett in 1999 (and even more so Finkel in 2004) more than Grunfeld in 1975. Phil wink (talk) 00:15, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Ok, thank u for putting that in perspective for me. Ihardlythinkso (talk) 02:29, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Derivation from Ashte kashte

This "fact" was removed as unreferenced on 2010-10-11 [1], after being added on 2006-02-09 [2]. But it looks like this fact originally came from myself, when I created the initial Ashte kashte article on 2004-03-29 [3]! Back then of course I didn't put any references. The main reference I would have used (The way to play book) doesn't actually mention this fact either. So does anyone have a good reference? Most of the references coming up in Google seems to be derived from Wikipedia which is no good. Vadmium (talk) 04:09, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

If (as I believe is the case) Pachisi is NOT derived from Ashte kashte, it will presumably be very difficult to find any good source that states this directly; no one lists all the games a game is NOT derived from. And it seems that Pachisi's history (if any) before about 1600 is poorly documented and speculative. So in this specific case, we'll likely have to accept lack of evidence as reason enough not to include this "fact". However, I'll look through Murray (1951), Parlett (1999), and Finkel (2004) which will be among our best resources, to see if I can't find some useful references that describe what is really known about the history as explicitly as possible. Phil wink (talk) 17:28, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

Well, I've done my damage for the day. See new history section. Just my opinion, but it seems likely that the idea that Pachisi is derived from "Ashta-kashte" must be a mistake for "Ashtapada", which itself is a speculative history. Falkener in fact (1892, p 265) states that Ashta-kashte is a "modification of Pachisi" but he has no historical evidence, and I think he only means that playing Ashta-kashte is like playing Pachisi with modifications. I don't think anyone takes E.B. Tylor's hypothesis, that Pachisi is derived from Tâb, seriously; so I haven't even mentioned it in the article itself. Phil wink (talk) 00:27, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Suggested merge of current chaupar article with Pachisi. Also chopat seems very similar... Diggers2004 (talk) 01:31, 2 September 2013 (UTC)