Ancient schemes and modern syntheses

The entries are careful about age and origin. The chakra and nadi systems come from tantric Hindu and Buddhist sources, though the familiar seven-centre, rainbow-coloured scheme owes much to twentieth-century Western synthesis. The koshas are set out in the Upanishads; the aura layers are largely Theosophical; the mounts and lines of the palm belong to chiromancy, attested independently in several traditions.

Where a system is medical, the zang-fu organs, the zodiacal man of medical astrology, the atlas describes it as a historical framework, not as current clinical guidance.