Before serums lined marble vanities and wellness became algorithmic, there was oil, warmed between palms, scented with herbs, and pressed into skin with unhurried intent. In India’s classical healing canon, this was never indulgence. It was ritual maintenance, an act of embodied intelligence known as abhyanga. Codified within Ayurveda’s foundational texts notably the Charaka Samhita and the Sushruta Samhita, abhyanga was prescribed with the precision of a regimen and the reve