Pashto
पश्तो
7 matras · 3 vibhags · 3 claps
Madhya, Drut · tabla
Sourcing
The structure and theka on this page come from the sources this project works from. A note with no source number is still being checked.
Demo sound: manjira samples recorded by Tejus and Geetha for Tabla Focus.
Theka
Clap
Keeping it
Clap on 1, 4 and 6. Nothing structural falls on the other matras.
Structure
A 7-matra tal in 3-2-2 with all three vibhaags stressed (no khali). Same length as Rupak and Tivra but a different stress design again — three claps, no wave.
Origins
The Afghan attribution in the name is original, not folk etymology: the treatise Asl ul-Usul (c. 1813) lists the cycle as belonging to the Afghans. Lindsey (2020) reads it alongside living Pashtun practice — the dohol-driven attan and Kabuli tabla playing — and notes it enters the written record decades before Rupak, its khali-sam sibling, is first notated.
1
- 1813 · Pashto tal · 7 matras · Named in the Asl ul-Usul (c. 1813), which assigns the cycle to the Afghans — reported in Lindsey (2020).1