Mahjong CompendiumNepalese

Proto-mahjong › Chinese classical › Babcock rules › Western / British Empire style › Nepalese

Nepalese

11-tile winning hand

Sources

Sources

The documents this entry rests on, as published. Each can be opened and checked; nothing in this part is anybody’s reading of them.

  1. Guide Sloper, Tom. "FAQ 2b: Identifying a Mah-Jongg Variant." Sloperama. canonical checked 2026-09-18

    https://www.sloperama.com/mjfaq/mjfaq02b.html

    chart’s note Tile counts, hand sizes, flower handling and scoring for roughly 50 named variants. Primary source for most leaf nodes in this chart.

    for this variant The chart's canonical source. Its Nepalese entry was written on 2 February 2003 from one correspondent's email, which survives on Sloper's bulletin board, so it is a summary of a single informant, not an independent witness

    Also cited on: Chinese archaic, Late Qing style, Chinese pre-classical, Chinese classical, Shanghai / Hong Kong new style, Hong Kong old style and 45 more · bibliography #1

  2. Forum Singh, Sushila, and Tom Sloper. Posts of 1-3 February 2003 on "The Mah-Jongg Q & A Bulletin Board." Maj Exchange, Sloperama. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://web.archive.org/web/20030212055238/http://www.sloperama.com/majexchange/bulletinbd.htm

    AI summary Sloper's reply to a correspondent whose family in Nepal had played with ten tiles in hand, going out on the eleventh. It quotes her email and proposes the name "Nepalese mah-jongg", which she accepts the next day. This is the source of FAQ 2b's Nepalese entry. Read in the Wayback capture of 12 February 2003, because the live board's archives begin in 2007.

    for this variant The origin of FAQ 2b's entry and of the variant's name: one informant's memory of her family's play, emailed to Sloper. It is not independent of the chart's source. It shows that the node rests on a single informant and that "Nepalese" is Sloper's name for the game, not one found used in Nepal

    Only cited here · bibliography #348

  3. Guide Sloper, Tom. "Mah-Jongg FAQ Update Log." Sloperama. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://www.sloperama.com/mjfaq/log.html

    AI summary Sloper's dated log of changes to his FAQs from July 2002 on. It dates each variant's addition to FAQ 2b, including Nepalese on 2 February 2003 as the 24th type.

    for this variant Dates the entry to the February 2003 correspondence and shows that nothing earlier lies behind it. Same author as the chart's source

    Also cited on: Bashi-Bashi, Siamese Mah Jongg · bibliography #349

  4. Journalism Shakya, Sujeev. "Sinophobia revisited." The Kathmandu Post, 12 April 2016. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://kathmandupost.com/opinion/2016/04/12/sinophobia-revisited

    AI summary An opinion column on Nepal's relations with China that recalls the Kathmandu Valley's old ties with Tibet through Newar traders. It says mahjong was more popular than cards there before the Tibet routes closed after 1962.

    for this variant Independent of Sloper. Confirms that mahjong was played in the Kathmandu Valley, reaching it through the Tibet trade, which fits the informant's "years ago". Says nothing on hand size or scoring

    Only cited here · bibliography #350

  5. Journalism Taylor, Marissa. "Finding familiarity in Ghiling." The Kathmandu Post, 23 September 2022. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://kathmandupost.com/travel/2022/09/23/finding-familiarity-in-ghiling

    AI summary A travel feature on the Yarthung festival in Ghiling, Upper Mustang. During the festival the village's young people spend their days playing cards or mahjong.

    for this variant An independent witness that mahjong is played today in a Tibetan-culture community in Nepal. It is silent on hand size, so it neither confirms nor contradicts the 11-tile hand

    Only cited here · bibliography #351

  6. Encyclopedia Wikipedia. "Lhasa Newar." cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lhasa_Newar

    AI summary The English article on the Newar traders and artisans who worked between the Kathmandu Valley and Lhasa. It says, without a citation, that the older generation in Sankhu regularly play mahjong brought from Tibet. Read on 2026-10-08; the article was last edited on 29 November 2025.

    for this variant Independent of Sloper but unsourced. Supports a Tibetan route for mahjong in Nepal rather than the British one the chart's placement implies, and says nothing of an 11-tile hand

    Only cited here · bibliography #352

AI-generated

Analysis

Written by an AI model from the sources above. It is a reading of them, not a source in its own right: every figure in it points back to a numbered source, and where the two disagree, the source is right.

Assessment

Confidence
catalogued listed in a variant catalogue with tile counts and hand sizes, but no rules text verified
Evidence
partial sources agree on some points but disagree or say nothing on others

Cross-comparison

What each source was read to say, set side by side. The numbers are the sources above.

SourceTilesHandFlowersScoringPayout
[1]14410, out on 118 flowers/seasons20 for Out, then points for pongs/kongs/pairs, then double—
[1]14410 in hand, out on 118 flowers/seasons20 points for Out, then points for pongs, kongs and pairs, then doublesAll players earn points, not only the winner
[2]144Ten in hand, the eleventh tile to go Mah JonggFlowers and seasons, 1 double20 for Mah Jongg, 1 double for flowers and seasons, three doubles for a clean hand, 16 for a concealed kong of major tiles and 8 for an exposed one—
  • [1] similar to Western but with fewer tiles in the hand; this is what the chart means by an 11-tile winning hand
  • [1] Re-read 2026-10-08. The wording is the same as in the first capture to carry the entry (27 February 2003). The entry names no source and gives "Books: none", and the variant list numbers Nepalese 24th with "11 tiles in the complete hand". The only other 11-tile hand on the page is a Sichuan game reported by Dragon Chang, where some players hold 10 and go out on 11
  • [2] The correspondent's family in Nepal played this "years ago". She revived it from their memories and their old sets. Sloper had never heard of an 11-tile game. On 2 February 2003 he proposed the name "Nepalese mah-jongg", and on 3 February she accepted "Nepalese Maha Jung". Her own post of 1 February is cut off after two words
  • [3] Nepalese was added to FAQ 2b on 2 February 2003 as the 24th type, the same day Sloper answered the correspondent on his bulletin board. The log names no informant. In the Wayback captures the entry is absent on 27 December 2002 and present on 27 February 2003
  • [4] Recalling the Kathmandu Valley's ties with Tibet through the Newar traders of Patan, says mahjong was more popular than cards there before the Tibet routes closed after the 1962 war. Gives no rules
  • [5] At the Yarthung festival in Ghiling, Upper Mustang, the village's young people spend the festival days playing cards or mahjong. Gives no rules
  • [6] Says, without a citation, that the older generation in Sankhu, a Newar town of the Lhasa trade, regularly play mahjong brought from Tibet

Reading it

Everything the chart says about Nepalese rests on one person. FAQ 2b's entry, a 144-tile game with ten tiles in hand going out on the eleventh and scoring 20 for going out, then pung, kong and pair points, then doubles, was added on 2 February 2003. That was the day Sloper answered a correspondent on his bulletin board. Her family in Nepal had played the game "years ago", and she revived it from their memories and their old sets. Sloper had never heard of an 11-tile hand, and he coined the name himself. His update log and bulletin board are not independent of the FAQ. Three independent sources show that mahjong was played in Nepal: Shakya (2016) among the Kathmandu Valley's Tibet-trading Newars before 1962, Wikipedia's uncited Lhasa Newar article in Sankhu ("brought from Tibet"), and Taylor (2022) at a festival in Upper Mustang. None of them mentions hand size or scoring. Their Tibetan route also sits awkwardly with the node's place under Western / British Empire style, which rests only on Sloper's "Similar to Western". Still wanted: a second account of an 11-tile game in Nepal, Tibet or Darjeeling, and Harrer's description of Lhasa mahjong. The Nepalese correspondent is very likely the Mumbai teacher Sushila Rana Singh: she signed her 2003 messages to Sloper [email protected], and the 2013 site of The Mumbai Style Mahjongg, by Sushila Rana Singh, gives [email protected], carries galleries of Nepal and calls her the main driving force behind mahjong in Mumbai. If so, Sloper's Nepalese and India/Mumbai entries share an informant.

Looked for, not found

  • Official rules No governing body exists for a Nepalese game, and web and newspaper searches found no club or association in Nepal.
  • Tournament rules No tournament in Nepal was found. The variant is one family's house game, remembered rather than published.
  • Law No law on mahjong in Nepal was found. The legal news found concerns casinos, one of them named Casino Mahjong, which do not appear to offer the tile game.
  • Rulebook No published rules were found. FAQ 2b says "Books: none", and Open Library and Internet Archive searches found no book on mahjong in Nepal.
  • Scholarship No scholarship on mahjong in Nepal was found in web or Internet Archive searches. Ethnographies of Sankhu and the Lhasa Newars are second-round leads.
  • Commercial No app or seller offers a Nepalese game. The commercial hits are casinos, including Casino Mahjong at the Soaltee hotel, which is named after the game.
  • Organisation No club or body for mahjong in Nepal was found in web or newspaper searches.
  • Collection No museum record of a tile set from Nepal was found. The correspondent's family sets were 144-tile sets of unknown origin.

Known, not yet read

Sources that look worth having but could not be read for this entry. If you can reach one, it can be read and added. Every variant’s list is gathered on Missing sources.

  • Historical Harrer, Heinrich. Return to Tibet. 1984 (English editions 1985 and 1986 on the Internet Archive) — An eyewitness account of mahjong played passionately for high stakes in old Lhasa and nearly gone by the 1980s. This is the Tibetan game that Wikipedia's Lhasa Newar article and Shakya say reached Nepal. Whether Harrer gives its hand size is unknown
    Where: https://archive.org/details/returntotibet0000harr. Tried: Found by Internet Archive full-text search on 2026-10-08. The item is lending-only, and its text file redirects to a login (302): the site's own restriction

Where it was searched

Every place the search checklist names for this variant’s languages, and what each gave, including nothing. The last full pass was on 2026-10-08.

Names searched: English Nepalese, Nepalese mah-jongg, Nepalese Maha Jung.

16 places searched
  • General web search — Standard-mode searches on 2026-10-08: Nepalese mahjong rules and an 11-tile hand; mahjong clubs in Kathmandu; Tibetan and Sherpa players; the Rana period; Kalimpong, Darjeeling and Sikkim; and a site-restricted search of kathmandupost.com, nepalitimes.com, thehimalayantimes.com, myrepublica, recordnepal.com, risingnepaldaily.com and onlinekhabar. One Chinese query looked for a ten-tile game (十张麻将), and one extended-mode query covered Newar mahjong in Sankhu and Patan. These found the two Kathmandu Post pieces and Wikipedia's Lhasa Newar article, but nothing on rules or an 11-tile hand. Most hits for mahjong in Nepal are Casino Mahjong at the Soaltee hotel, a casino named after the game whose listings do not show the tile game (unread). The registry has no Nepali, Newar or Tibetan, so no search was run in Devanagari. A pass in Nepali would need ne added to the registry first.
  • Wikidata — No item for the variant. Wikidata's search page found nothing for "mahjong Nepal" (2026-10-08), and its API answered 429.
  • Wikipedia, in every declared language — English Wikipedia's search for mahjong Nepal led to Lhasa Newar, which was read: an uncited line on mahjong brought from Tibet to Sankhu. The English Mahjong article does not mention Nepal or Tibet. The API answered 429 for most of the session, so pages were read through action=raw.
  • The sources' own references, and who cites them — FAQ 2b names no source. Its update log dates the entry to 2 February 2003, and the Wayback capture of Sloper's bulletin board holds the correspondent's email that the entry rests on (read). The email cites nothing further. The Lhasa Newar sentence is uncited, and Shakya and Taylor cite nothing. Leads for a second round, unread: Harrer, Return to Tibet (1984), on Lhasa mahjong (wanted); Andrew Powell, Heirs to Tibet (1992), on a mah-jong house among Tibetan exiles in India; and Bal Gopal Shrestha, The Sacred Town of Sankhu (2012), the ethnography of the town the Lhasa Newar article names.
  • Internet Archive full-text search — Full-text search for "mah jong" Nepal on 2026-10-08 (the page_production endpoint, which refused an empty page_target until that parameter was dropped). The hits concern Tibet, not Nepal: Harrer, Return to Tibet (1984-86 editions), on mahjong in old Lhasa, and Powell, Heirs to Tibet (1992), on an exile mah-jong house. Both are lending-only, and Harrer is listed as wanted. An advanced search for mah jong with Nepal, Kathmandu or Lhasa returned nothing. No book or pamphlet on mahjong in Nepal was found.
  • Wayback Machine — The CDX listing of FAQ 2b has 83 distinct captures. The Nepalese entry is absent on 27 December 2002 and present on 27 February 2003, worded as today. The capture of Sloper's bulletin board of 12 February 2003 holds the correspondence (read). On 2026-10-08 web.archive.org reset connections several times and the CDX API once answered 503 "Temporarily Offline"; retries worked.
  • Google Books — The Books API answered 429 for mahjong Nepal (2026-10-08). Not searched by hand.
  • HathiTrust full-text search — Not searched: full-text search is behind a Cloudflare challenge, and nothing found elsewhere points to a printed source on mahjong in Nepal.
  • WorldCat — Not searched: WorldCat needs a browser. Open Library stood in, and its searches for mahjong nepal, mah jong nepal and mahjong tibet returned no records (2026-10-08).
  • Scholarly indexes — Not searched: OpenAlex wants a key and Google Scholar refuses automated readers. No source read cites scholarship on mahjong in Nepal.
  • YouTube — One web search for videos of mahjong being played in Nepal found none (2026-10-08). YouTube itself was not searched.
  • English-language forums — Reddit and BoardGameGeek not searched: both refuse automated readers. The forum that matters, Sloper's own Q&A bulletin board, was read through the Wayback Machine. Its live archives (bulletinbd-archive1 to 5, 2007-08) have no post on Nepal.
  • Mahjong reference sites — Sloperama: FAQ 2b re-read and its update log read. The family-tree page (tree.htm) has no Nepalese entry. All of these are Sloper's and none is independent. The Mahjong Wiki's index lists no Nepalese overview page.
  • App and platform listings — Not searched: no source read names an app that offers a Nepalese or 11-tile game.
  • English-language newspaper archives — Nepal's English papers are not in this channel's archives, so they were searched with the web-search tool restricted to their sites. Two Kathmandu Post pieces were read (Shakya 2016, Taylor 2022). Nepali Times, The Himalayan Times, Republica and Record Nepal gave no piece on the tile game: Republica's Mahjong hits are about Casino Mahjong. Chronicling America, Trove, Papers Past, NewspaperSG and the BNA were not searched, because nothing ties the game to their countries.
  • Statutes published in English — Not searched: the channel's statute databases do not cover Nepal, and no source read mentions a law on mahjong there.

In the tree

Descends from Western / British Empire style, as the source chart draws it.

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