Inches Apart and Counted Separately

Muktasana, siddhasana and guptasana are described in the same lesson of the same text and differ only in where the heels rest and which foot lies above the other. A modern taxonomy would treat them as three variants of one seat. The Gheranda Samhita treats them as three postures, and the atlas follows the source.

The decision is not arbitrary. In a practice where a seat is held motionless through extended breath restraint and the application of the inner locks, the exact placement of a heel against the perineum is the point of the posture rather than a detail of it. The compilers recorded the distinctions because the distinctions were the content. Collapsing them into a single entry with a note about variations would discard the only information these entries carry.

It also shows how the traditional counts work. The Gheranda Samhita opens its list by reporting that postures are as numerous as living species, that eighty four are the best, and that thirty two are useful in this world. Figures like these are inherited and formulaic rather than arrived at by counting. What fills the list is a compiler's judgement about which differences deserve a name, and a text that names three near identical seats separately is telling the reader how fine that judgement was. Mallinson and Singleton's Roots of Yoga sets the descriptions side by side and makes the comparison possible in translation.