Kama Sutra
Kama Sutra is a classic treatise on the science of sex. It was written by a famous Indian sage, Maharshi Vatsyayana, fifteen hundred years ago during the golden period of the Gupta dynasty. It is based on ancient Indian scriptures and treatises such as the Vedas—perhaps the world's oldest sacred text. The Vedas describe a fourfold purpose of human life— dharma (duty), artha (wealth), kama (pleasure), and moksha (liberation of the soul). Of them, kama, or sex, is considered indispensable for complete human self-fulfillment and happiness.
What makes Vatsyayana's Kama Sutra a unique work is its universal appeal and the value it places on the systematic treatment of sex both as a science and an art. It lays down scientific principles of various forms of lovemaking while fully taking the human anatomy and psychology into account. Kama Sutra lays out sixty-four lovemaking practices. Vatsyayana recommends maintaining absolute privacy while studying the art and practice of sex. His erotic arts are known as Panchali. A woman well versed in its sixty-four practices is known as a ganika (courtesan). A ganika is a woman much sought after by kings, the rich, and other men highly placed in society. She is compensated by generous offerings of money and precious gifts.
In Kama Sutra, male and female are each divided into three categories: man as rabbit, bull, and horse; woman as dove, mare, and she-elephant. The rabbit is handsome, tender, and soft-spoken. The bull is stout and well shaped, emitting semen with a salty odor; the horse is sturdy, long-faced, and sexually passionate. Similarly, the woman characterized by the dove is exceptionally beautiful, engaging, and soft-spoken; her discharges are as fragrant as the blossoming lotus. A mare woman is slim, tall, and easily seduced. She emits a fishy aroma. The she-elephant woman is fat, gluttonous, awkward in demeanor, and highly sexed. The size of the animal is related to the size of the genitalia. Thus, a happy and harmonious sexual relationship between a man and woman depends on having compatible qualities. Otherwise, Kama Sutra maintains, their sexual and married life will prove disastrous.
Vatsyayana describes eight steps to achieving sexual gratification. These include embracing, kissing, scratching with fingernails, biting, caressing, reversed coitus, and oral sex. He outlines three kinds of kissing by women: limited kiss, throbbing kiss, and probing kiss; five kinds of kissing by men: straight kiss, oblique kiss, evolving kiss, pressed kiss, and hard-pressed kiss. He also recommends the use of various Ayurvedic (India's traditional science of medicine) recipes for those men and women who cannot perform sexual intercourse successfully because of physical or psychological impediments. The text is remarkable, not only for providing detailed sexology, but also for being one of the very few ancient treatises referring to the geography of India. Vatsyayana imposes a kind of geographic determinism by maintaining that women have varying sexual proclivities relative to the climate of different regions of India they are native to.
Further Reading
Archer, W. G. (1963) The Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana. London: George Allen and Unwin.
Sinha, Indra. (1980) The Love Teachings of Kama Sutra, with Extracts from Koka Shastra, Anamga Ronga and Other Famous Indian Works on Love. New York: Crescent Books.
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