Why Are There So Many Kinds of Massage?
The manipulation of the body’s soft tissues like muscle groups is known commonly as massage, and a massage is also commonly known as an art form. In today’s modern world, there are dozens if not hundreds of different types of massage.
People give massages with their fingers, elbows, and even their knees. You have things like a hot stone massage, which implements different heated rocks to soothe tense muscles. You also have various devices used for modern massages, like entire massage beds and chairs and handheld devices. What started as an ancient practice in Japan has become a cash cow for many modern clinics offering their spin on the massage.
In all likelihood, we wouldn’t be able to list all the many massage types that you can find. It seems like every other day, something new is popping up, like a couples massage or a sports massage. But why are there so many different types out there? What is it about the massage that has caused so much parity over the many years?
Table of Contents
The Evolution of Massage
While it is thought that the first massages originated in Japan, that’s just the working hypothesis(1) based on the available evidence. The truth is that we have evidence of all sorts of ancient cultures practicing this as a form of medicine, exercise, and even as sexual foreplay. We have evidence of massages in Egypt, Ancient Greece, Rome, India, Korea, and Mesopotamia.
However, the oldest evidence seems to point to Japan as its point of origin. Though experts also believe that massages arose in places like Greece and Rome independent of Japanese influences, as it is not believed that the Japanese and Grecian peoples had much contact before massages became prevalent in each culture.
Over the years, of course, massage would pop up in many different places and feature a wide range of techniques.
Read: Day and Medical Spas
Asiatic Influence
The primary and sub-continent of Asia are where massage became such a global powerhouse. In India’s nation, many centuries ago, massage became something of a staple in that culture, using tantric and other sorts of methods to implement massage into people’s sex lives.
