Vatsyayana’s Kamasutra describes intimacy of various forms, including those between lovers before and during sex. XXX For example, the text discusses eight forms of alingana (embrace) in verses 2.2.7–23: sphrishtaka, viddhaka, udghrishtaka, piditaka, lataveshtitaka, vrikshadhirudha, tilatandula and kshiranira. When a person presses the chin, the breasts, the lower lip, or the jaghana of another so softly that no scratch or mark is left, but only the hair on the body becomes erect from the touch of the nails, and the nails themselves make a sound, it is called a ‘sounding or pressing with the nails’. If there be no marks of nails to remind a person of the passages of love, then love is lessened in the same way as when no union takes place for a long time.’
Even when a
