Asanas of the Yogacintamani : The Largest Premodern Compilation on Postural Practice

Writing in Varanasi in the sixteenth century, when the Mughal empire was at the height of its power, the monk Sivanandasarasvati composed an extensive Sanskrit compendium on yoga entitled "The Wish-fulfilling Gem of Yoga" (Yogacintamani). Sivananda was an initiate of a sannyasin lineage descending from the great philosopher Sankaracarya (fl. ca. 800). Sivananda was among the first to combine Patanjalayoga with Hatha and Rajayoga. In the seventeenth century, an anonymous redactor used Sivananda's work to create a unique compilation of yoga postures (asana), many of which are not found in other yoga texts. Arguably the largest surviving pre-modern compilation of its kind, it includes six postures that the redactor attributed to Mohan of Mewar, who was a disciple of Dadu and a practitioner of Hathayoga and breath prognostication (svarodaya). These postures were part of a collection that was appropriated and repurposed by Sufis, translated into Persian and illustrated for a royal treatise commissioned by Prince Salim, the future Mughal emperor Jahangir (r. 1605-1627 ce). This book presents this unique compilation,transmitted to us in a manuscript written in the redactor's own handwriting.