5 Ludo Trivia That You Did Not Know

The game Ludo is centuries old and generations of people across the Indian sub-continent and even across the world can remember Ludo fondly as a childhood memory.

The game originated in India, as chausar and then has been carried all around the world by travelers. While chausar was originally a game of kings, played by Shiv & Parvati, the royalty in Mahabharata, even Badshah Akbar, these days the game is enjoyed by everyone alike.

Unique Ludo Trivia Around the World

Since the game has been played all over the world, there are multiple variants of the game that exist along with various unique ludo rules and gameplays.

Here are top 5 trivia that you might not know about the game we all love.

1. There is a variant of Ludo played in Pakistan, where you can actually move your pawns forward and backwards

This variant is played with two dice. Let’s say you rolled 3 and 5, then you can move a single pawn in the following different ways:

1. 3 steps forward and 5 steps back for a single pawn
2. 5 steps forward and 3 steps back
3. 3 and then 5 steps forward
4. 3 and then 5 steps back

Alternatively, you can also move two pawns in the following ways:

1. First pawn 3 steps forward and the second 5 steps forward
2. First pawn 3 steps backward and the second 5 steps backward
3. First pawn 3 steps forward and the second 5 steps backward
4. First pawn 3 steps backward and the second 5 steps forward

This makes the game even more interesting and challenging. Imagine a pawn just turning back and killing your pawn.

There is another common variant of ludo played online Known as Speed Ludo.

2. A game of ludo cannot last more than 90 minutes

We have all been there : a game of ludo that just seems to go on forever. The moment someone gets close to winning, their pawn gets killed and they have to start all over again. Pawns being killed left, right and center and the game seems nowhere close to finishing.

Well, technically, that is not possible. According to the official rules of the ludo game, the game of ludo ends after 90 minutes and it’s a tie. Alfred Collier, who patented the game as “The Royal Ludo” in London has added this rule. You can check for yourself by going through the official papers for the patent which are still available online.

3. Dice is actually a plural word

A game of ludo isn’t completed without a dice, or actually a die. Dice is in fact a plural word and the singular one is called a “die”. But who cares, we all seem to understand the game well enough with one dice or two.

4. The origin of dice is unknown, but it is present everywhere

There are only a few things in history that are present in every civilisation, and dice is one of them. Objects made from bones have been found across all major excavation sites in the world as old as 2500 BC. Some of them are shaped like a cube while some are cuboidal, almost like long sticks. But all of them have numerical markings and they seem to be present everywhere.

No one knows who truly invented dice, or why all civilisation needs it in the first place. We can only guess. Looks like dice and board games are a very old favorite of humanity. And with the recent rise of ludo on mobiles, we know that ludo is here to stay.

5. Boards for Pachisi and Chaupar were made of cloth and the pawns were cowries

While now we are very used to seeing boards made out of plastic or cardboard, these materials weren’t available as easily in the older times. Makes us wonder about the history of ludo game and what did our ancestors use? They used cloth, or even just drew with chalk on the ground. Of course, the boards drawn on the ground did not have separate colors, which would make it very hard to identify where your home was. Imagine playing in that chaos.

But the board, made using cloth, had different colors. The pawns also weren’t made of plastic. Commoners used cowries as pawns to play the game of pachisi. Even the dice wasn’t made of plastic. To make dice, animal bones were used. These dice have been excavated from the sites of Harappan Civilisation among many others.

If you found these trivia interesting and you learned something new today, make sure that you share with your friends.

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• Share your unique referral link with a code with your friends. You will be able to find this under the Refer Friends tab.
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