Ocean of Immortality (Bahr al-Hayat)

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Ocean of Immortality (Bahr al-Hayat), by Muhammad Ghwath Gwaliori (d. 1562). This book consists of ten chapters explaining the philosophy of hatha yoga, with paintings showing twenty-one different positions (asanas). Written in Persian, the work was composed in Gujarat c. 1550 by Muhammad Ghwath Gwaliori (d. 1562), a prominent Sufi, drawing from an earlier Arabic version (Pool of life, or Hawd al-hayat), of an original Sanskrit text (Amrita Kunda, now lost). This manuscript was produced in early seventeenth-century Mughal India: it is one of three yoga-related texts commissioned for prince Selim (the future Mughal emperor, Jahangir). The paintings are now detached from the codex, on twelve separately-mounted folios (also in the Chester Beatty collection). Codex, ink, colours and gold on paper, 52 folios, Persian text in nasta`liq script, the Ocean of Immortality (Bahr al-Hayat), by Muhammad Ghwath Gwaliori (d. 1562), unsigned, Allahabad, India, c. 1600-1604.