Asana
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An āsana is a body posture, originally and still a general term for a sitting meditation pose, and later extended in hatha yoga and modern yoga as exercise, to any type of position, adding reclining,
Asanas in varied contexts. Left to right, top to bottom: Eka Pada Chakrasana; Ardha Matsyendrasana; Padmasana; Navasana; Pincha Mayurasana; Dhanurasana; Natarajasana; Vrkshasana
Mould of Pashupati seal from the Indus Valley Civilization, c. 2500 BC, its central figure in a pose resembling Mulabandhasana.
Relief statue in Achyutaraya temple, Hampi, Karnataka showing an unidentified hand-balancing asana, 16th century
Postures in Niels Bukh's 1924 Primary Gymnastics resembling Parighasana, Parsvottanasana, and Navasana, supporting the suggestion that Krishnamacharya derived some of his asanas from the gymnastics culture of his time
Ashtanga yoga is Pātañjali's classification of classical yoga, as set out in his Yoga Sūtras. He defined the eight limbs as yama, niyama, āsana, prāṇāyāma, pratyāhāra, dhāraṇā, dhyāna, and samādhi.
Asana
…of Patanjali define "asana" as "[a position that] is steady and comfortable". Patanjali mentions the ability to sit for extended periods as one of the eight limbs of his system. Asanas are also called yoga poses or yoga postures in English. The 10th or 11th century Goraksha Sataka and the 15th century Hatha Yoga Pradipika…
Modern statue of Pātañjali, the compiler of the Yoga Sūtras, practicing dhyāna (meditation), one of the eight limbs of yoga that he defines.
Lahiri Mahasaya in Padmasana, one of the ancient seated meditation asanas
Alternate nostril breathing, one form of Pranayama
A woman meditating beside the sacred river Ganges in Varanasi