In the high union, where the male organ is larger in proportion to the female, a doe woman couples with a man by stretching out her pelvic area at the time of passion. In the low union, where she is larger, an elephant woman contracts herself. In an equal coupling the woman keeps her back straight. What has been said of the other two cases also applies to the mare woman.
(1–4)
The woman receives a man within her pelvic opening. Artificial means can also be used, particularly in the low union.
(5–6)
The doe woman generally has three possibilities: the ‘dilation’, the ‘yawn’ and that named ‘Indrani’. In the first, her head is kept low and the pelvis raised, though there must be room for the man to move back. The second requires her thighs to be lifted and spread wide apart to receive the man. In the third she puts her thighs around the man’s sides and draws her knees back towards her own sides. This method needs practice but can be used even in the highest union.
(7–12)
In the low union, where the woman is larger than the man, she receives him by cupping him inside her. This can be done even in the lowest union by an elephant woman. There are four methods: the ‘box’, the ‘squeeze’, the ‘encirclement’ and ‘like a mare’. In the first, both man and woman stretch out their legs straight and keep them together. Depending on how they proceed, there are two variants: ‘box’ lying on the side and ‘box’ lying supine. While lying on their sides, the man should have the woman lie on his left, which is the general practice.
(13–18)
For the man to press the woman’s two thighs together tightly while cupped inside her is the ‘squeeze’ method, and if she then crosses her thighs, it is the ‘encirclement’. To grasp him inside her as hard as a mare does a stallion is called ‘like a mare’. It requires practice and is generally used by the women of Andhra. Such are the methods of intercourse described by the followers of Babhravya.
(19–22)
According to Suvarnanabha, when the woman raises both her thighs to let the man enter, it is the ‘bending’ method, and when the man holds her legs up for this, it is the ‘yawning’. When she draws up her legs beneath him, it is the ‘pressing hard’ and when only one of her legs is thus drawn up, it is the ‘half-pressing’. When she stretches out one foot, placing it on the man’s shoulder, and alternates this position with the other foot as they do this repeatedly, it is called ‘splitting the bamboo’.
(23–28)
When the woman raises one leg above her head while the other is stretched out, it is the ‘impalement on a spear’. This method requires practice. In the ‘crab’, she draws up both her feet towards the region of her navel, and in the ‘pressing’ method she raises and crosses her thighs. To separate her knees and cross her legs is the ‘lotus position’. In the ‘rotation’ the man turns around after entering her while she embraces his back. This too needs practice.
(29–33)
Suvarnanabha says that various methods can also be practised while standing, sitting or lying down in water, as it makes them easier. This may be so, according to Vatsyayana, but it is not proper as learned people have proscribed it.
(34–35)
Now some unusual methods of intercourse. Young couples do it standing up, leaning against each other’s bodies, against a wall or a pillar. This is the ‘stand-up’ union.
(36–37)
He leans against a wall. She sits astride the net made by his clasped hands, her arms around his neck and her thighs encircling his hips, moving herself back and forth with her feet shifting on the wall. This is the ‘suspended’ union.
(38)
She goes down on the ground on all fours and he mounts her like a bull. This is the ‘cow’ union. In it he does on her back all that he would have done on her chest. This union is also like those of the dog, the stag and the billy-goat; the donkey’s assault and the tom-cat’s frolic; the tiger’s spring and the elephant’s crush; the pounding of the boar and the mounting of the stallion. In each of these he can consider doing whatever is special and peculiar to these animals.
(39–41)
Intercourse with two women who have good feelings for each other is known as the ‘combination’. The same with many women is called the ‘herd of cows’. It can be a dalliance in water or like those of goats and deer, whose actions can be imitated.
(42–44)
In the kingdom of women, in regions with villages of women and in Bahlika, many young men have sex with one woman, as if they form her seraglio. They please her one by one or together, depending on her wish and what is doable. One holds and another services her: one between the legs, another in the mouth and yet another around the middle. They do this by turns and also in unison. Such group sex is also known among courtesans and the women of royal harems.
(45–48)
The people of the south also have what is called nether sex, even in the anus. These are the unusual methods of sex. We will speak about the male approach in the chapter on reversing roles. There are two verses explaining the foregoing:
(49–50)
A man who knows the minds of women
may amplify love’s methods by
the modes and by the manners of
animals, wild beasts and birds.
(51)
For, when her feelings are excited
in keeping with her temperament
and the practice of her land,
it inspires in a woman
love, passion and great respect.
(52)