A History of Sanskrit Literature c9.65

c9.65

The chief social recreation of men when they met together was gambling with dice. The irresistible fascination exercised, and the ruin often entailed by this amusement, we have already found described in the Gambler’s Lament. Some haunted the gaming-hall to such an extent that we find them jocularly described in the *Yajurveda* as “pillars of the playhouse” (*sabhāsthāṇu*). No certain information can be gathered from the *Rigveda* as to how the game was played. We know, however, from one passage that four dice were used. The *Yajurveda* mentions a game played with five, each of which has a name. Cheating at play appears in the *Rigveda* as one of the most frequent of crimes; and one poet speaks of dice as one of the chief sources of sinning against the ordinances of Varuṇa. Hence the word used in the *Rigveda* for "gamester" (*kitava*) in classical Sanskrit came to mean "cheat," and a later word for "rogue" (*dhūrta*) is used as a synonym of "gamester."