Malla-yuddha
मल्लयुद्धAncient Indian wrestling described in the Mahabharata, divided into four kinds from purely points-based to limb-breaking. It merged with the Persian tradition into today's kushti.
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About Malla-yuddha
Malla-yuddha is ancient Indian wrestling and the oldest documented layer of the subcontinent's fighting tradition. It is mentioned in the Mahabharata, where Bhima fights Jarasandha, and the texts divide it into four kinds according to how it is fought and how it ends: hanumanti is purely technical and decided on points, jambuvanti allows locks and pins, jarasandhi permits breaking limbs, and bhimaseni rests on raw strength. That division is itself interesting, because it shows that India distinguished sporting from combative wrestling already in antiquity. Wrestling took place on an earth floor, unclothed apart from a loincloth, and preparation included work with weights and with the club, which survives in Indian training to this day. Malla-yuddha has not survived in its original form; it gradually merged with the Persian tradition of varzesh-e pahlavani, which arrived with the Mughal empire, and from that union came today's pehlwani or kushti. References to malla-yuddha are therefore found in texts and sculpture rather than in living practice. Besides the texts, the wrestling survives in temple reliefs, and its southern form lived on in Tamil tradition; the name itself is now used mostly in a historical sense.
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