Physical postures (asanas)are the most important and often the only constituent of modern Yoga. Many practitioners believe that the postures derive from an ancient original set of eighty-four asanas. This book, for the first time, traces traditions of eighty-four postures by examining original materials, including drawings, descriptions in older Indic texts and modern publications which reflect contemporary traditions. It also takes up a number of broad issues related to the topic of Yoga postures so as to provide the reader with a larger context.