ashtanga

eight limbs (ash + anga ) meaning the eight parts or stages into which the sage Patanjali divided Yoga when he traveled throughout India about 200 B.C.E., studying everything that he could find that went by the name of Yoga. He then wrote a treatise presenting a structural and functional analysis of the techniques he had studied. This treatise is called the " Yoga Sutras," which remains to this day the single most revered work on yoga, and the definitive treatise on raja yoga.