Also called: Shubh Chinha · Symbolic marks

Where on the hand: Read wherever they appear on the palm, but especially on the Fate line, the Sun line, the Mount of Jupiter, and the base of the palm near the wrist.

What it looks like: Small figures formed by chance crossings and loops of fine lines, each resembling a named object — a fish, a conch, a flag, a temple, a tree, a trident, a lotus, a serpent, a barleycorn.

Indian palmistry places far more weight on symbolic marks than Western palmistry does — this is one of the deepest differences between the systems. Each named sign carries a fixed reading, and the auspicious ones are held to multiply the good effects of whatever line or mount they sit on.

Read with care: An honesty note from the research: these signs are described in the popular Indian literature far more often than they actually occur clearly on real hands. Almost all are partial, ambiguous, or created by chance crossings. The universal rule from careful readers of both traditions is that only the clean, well-defined versions are uncommon — partial, vague versions of nearly all of these are common. RECONCILED. Two conflicts stood here. (1) Identification: the yava and the island are the same closed oval; what differs is position, not shape. The claim that 'an island is formed by the parent line splitting and the yava is free-standing' was the error. (2) Valence: 'the barleycorn has no negative reading anywhere' is wrong — the same oval is auspicious on the thumb and inauspicious on a mount or line (Jupiter: career damaged by relatives; Saturn: misfortune, disease; Mercury: job instability; Mars: cowardice; Venus: a missed marriage; Moon: weakened imagination). Position decides. On the thumb, sources also disagree on the phalanx — the second (lower) phalanx, where the two flexure creases bow apart and rejoin, is anatomically the position described.

Only the clean, well-defined versions are uncommon; partial, vague versions of nearly all of these are common.careful readers of both traditions