Came across this awesome graphic this morning that shows the development of yoga over time. Bravo to Alison Hinks for creating it!

If you’ve ever wondered about the many different types of yoga and where they came from, this chart shows them very nicely.

Almost all my yoga experience has been in the Krishnamacharya lineage through Iyengar, although I have taken a class in Sivananda yoga in the Bahamas and took classes for a couple of years from a teacher whose background was in Integral yoga.

One omission I see is Shiva Rea. I understand she has studied with Krishnamacharya’s son and associates Desikachar, Mohan, and Ramaswami. (Maybe it was too difficult to show that!)

I’m unfamiliar with Babu Bhagwan Das, who is shown to have influenced Krishnamacharya. I haven’t encountered that name in my readings. When I googled it, I got links to the follower of Baba Neem Karoli who met up with Richard Alpert in India and took him to his guru. (And of course, Richard Alpert became Ram Dass.)

But Babu Bhagwan Das preceded Krishnamacharya, so obviously they are two different people in two different eras with similar names.

Just FYI, from Wikipedia, shramana refers to the belief that salvation is possible for anyone (in contrast to the Vedic caste system) and to monastic, ascetic traditions. It underlies Buddhism and Jainism. Buddha later shed shramanic practices, but Buddhism has a strong monastic tradition in Asia.