Kamasutra: How to Embrace

Embrace, being the first subject, will now be considered. Embrace indicates the mutual love of a man and woman who have come together is of four kinds: Touching Rubbing Piercing Pressing. The action in each case is denoted by the meaning of the word which stands for it.

When a man under some pretext or other goes in front or alongside of a woman and touches her body with his own, it is called the ‘touching embrace’.

When a woman in a lonely place bends down, as if to pick up something, and pierces, as it were, a man sitting or standing, with her breasts, and the man in return takes hold of them, it is called a ‘piercing embrace’. The above two kinds of embrace take place only between persons who do not, as yet, speak freely with each other.

When two lovers are walking slowly together, either in the dark, or in a place of public resort, or in a lonely place, and rub their bodies against each other, it is called a ‘rubbing embrace’.

When on the above occasion one of them presses the other’s body forcibly against a wall or pillar, it is called a ‘pressing embrace’.

When a woman, clinging to a man as a creeper twines round a tree, bends his head down to hers with the desire of kissing him and slightly makes the sound of sut sut, embraces him, and looks lovingly towards him, it is called an embrace like the ‘twining of a creeper’.

When a woman, having placed one of her feet on the foot of her lover, and the other on one of his thighs, passes one of her arms round his back, and the other on his shoulders, makes slightly the sounds of singing and cooing, and wishes, as it were, to climb up him in order to have a kiss, it is called an embrace like the ‘climbing of a tree’.

When lovers lie on a bed, and embrace each other so closely that the arms and thighs of the one are encircled by the arms and thighs of the other, and are, as it were, rubbing up against them, this is called an embrace like ‘the mixture of sesamum seed with rice’.

When a man and a woman are very much in love with each other, and, not thinking of any pain or hurt, embrace each other as if they were entering into each other’s bodies either while the woman is sitting on the lap of the man, or in front of him, or on a bed, then it is called an embrace like a ‘mixture of milk and water’.

When one of two lovers presses forcibly one or both of the thighs of the other between his or her own, it is called the ‘embrace of thighs’.

When a man presses the jaghana(thigh) or middle part of the woman’s body against his own, and mounts upon her to practice, either scratching with the nail or finger, or biting, or striking, or kissing, the hair of the woman being loose and flowing, it is called the ‘embrace of the jaghana’.

When a man places his breast between the breasts of a of Vatsyayana woman and presses her with it, it is called the ‘embrace of the breasts’. When either of the lovers touches the mouth, the eyes and the forehead of the other with his or her own, it is called the ‘embrace of the forehead’.