Among the thousands of artefacts discovered on the sites of the 7 Rivers civilization, the steatite seals are the most numerous and the most revealing. They carry the still-undeciphered script, representations of animals with remarkable precision, and — what concerns us here — human figures seated in postures that leave no doubt to anyone who looks at them with a practitioner’s eye.
This is yoga. Yoga five thousand years ago.
Baddha Koṇāsana: a posture that does not lie
In The Civilization of the 7 Rivers, I note this with precision: among the supports for the Indus script, there are representations of yogis in the Baddha Koṇāsana posture. This posture is particularly difficult to hold. You have to be an experienced yogi to be capable of achieving it.
Baddha Koṇāsana — the “bound angle posture” — is a seated posture in which the soles of both feet are pressed together in front of the pelvis, while the knees open to the sides and tend toward the ground. The spine remains straight. The hands may hold the feet or rest on the knees.
This posture is not a position of comfort. It requires considerable hip flexibility, developed abdominal strength, and above all a regular, sustained practice over years. A beginner cannot simply sit in Baddha Koṇāsana and hold the posture — still less hold it with a straight back, knees on the ground, and a serene expression.
What the figures on the seals of Mohenjo-Daro and other sites show is precisely this: figures holding this posture — soles pressed together, knees open, spine straight. These are confirmed practitioners.
The so-called “Pashupati” seal
The most famous of these seals is the one called the “Pashupati seal” — discovered at Mohenjo-Daro, now housed in the National Museum of New Delhi. It depicts a figure seated on a throne, surrounded by animals (an elephant, a rhinoceros, a buffalo, a tiger), wearing an elaborate headdress with what appear to be horns or a tiara.
This figure is seated in Baddha Koṇāsana — or in a very close posture, sometimes described as Mulabandhasana. Both soles of the feet are visible pressed together. Both arms rest on the knees. The torso is straight.
Indian researchers see in it a prehistoric representation of Shiva — the “master of animals,” Pashupati. Other researchers prefer to remain more cautious about the divine identification. But on one point all agree: this is a figure in a meditation posture, surrounded by animals under its protection or control. A figure of mastery — mastery of the body, mastery of nature.
Yoga in the introduction to the Rig Veda
In the introduction to my translation of the Rig Veda, I affirm it: at the time of the composition of the Vedic hymns, yoga already existed — even if the word does not appear to designate a specific discipline in the Rig Veda. Renouncing ascetics already existed. The seals prove it.
And in The Civilization of the 7 Rivers, I specify: the figures seated in the ruins, during the excavations, show characters sitting in a yoga position, the two soles of the feet pressed together, while keeping the body straight. It is very difficult to achieve. This type of posture is practiced during austerities that the yogi inflicts on himself to elevate his spirit.
This precision is important. Baddha Koṇāsana is not a posture of relaxation. It is practised in the context of austerities — of intentional ascetic practices aimed at transforming consciousness. In the Indian tradition, tapas — the inner heat generated by ascetic effort — is one of the paths to Enlightenment.
The figures on the seals do not represent people resting. They represent practitioners working.
The continuity: from seal to yoga studio
What the Baddha Koṇāsana posture on the seals of Mohenjo-Daro demonstrates is a remarkable continuity between the civilization of the 7 Rivers and the yoga tradition as it is practised today.
In The Civilization of the 7 Rivers, I note that the cultural continuity between Vedism and Hinduism is evident on many points — the swastikas, the sacred fig leaves on artefacts, the weights and measures, the craft techniques, the symbolism. Yoga is part of this list.
The same gesture. The same posture. The same soles pressed together, the same open knees, the same straight spine. Reproduced five thousand years ago on a two-centimetre steatite seal, and reproduced today in millions of studios around the world.
This is not a cultural coincidence. It is a transmission — across five millennia, without total interruption, even during periods of decline and transformation. Knowledge of the body, of breath, of the correct posture as a path toward expanded consciousness is one of the most enduring legacies of this civilization.
What yoga says about the civilization
The fact that yoga existed in the civilization of the 7 Rivers — and that it was sufficiently developed for experienced practitioners to be depicted on seals destined to travel throughout the civilization’s commercial network — says something precise about the values of this society.
A civilization that depicts its spiritual practitioners on its commercial seals — where other civilizations depicted their kings, their warriors, their conquering gods — has different priorities. It valorizes inner mastery at least as much as external domination. It recognizes in the meditative posture something worth showing, transmitting, identifying.
This was not a civilization that practised yoga on the margins of social life. It was a civilization whose yoga was part of its heart.
And this Baddha Koṇāsana posture on the seals is perhaps the most silent and most eloquent proof of this fact: five thousand years before mobile meditation apps and yoga retreats in Bali, there were men and women who sat thus — soles pressed together, knees toward the ground, spine straight — working at something essential.
