Chaupai (poetry)

A chaupai (चौपाई) is a quatrain verse of Indian poetry, especially medieval Hindi poetry, that uses a metre of four syllables.

Famous chaupais include those of poet-saint Tulsidas (used in his classical text Ramcharitamanas and poem Hanuman Chalisa) and the Sikh prayer Chaupai.

Chaupai is identified by a syllable count 16/16, counted with a value of 1 in case of Hrasva (short sounding letter) and 2 in case of Dhirga (long sounding letter).