 Selves and persons are often used as synonyms in contemporary philosophy, and sometimes also in the history of Western philosophy. This is almost never the case in classical Indian philosophical traditions. The Sanskrit term ‘ātman’ properly translated as self stands for whatever it is that is the essence of individual humans (manuṣya) or the psychophysical complex (pudgala) which includes the mind, body and sense organs. There is disagreement among the philosophical schools about whether the essence is a substantial soul or pure consciousness and whether there is such an essence at all. The Buddhist no-self theorists and the Cārvāka materialists deny that there is any such essence, the psychophysical complex is all there is. Finding an equivalent term across the classical Indian philosophical schools that properly can be translated as person is a bit more challenging. The concept of ‘pudgala’ used to signify the psychophysical complex as whole in Buddhist philosophy is properly translated as person. But ‘pudgala’ is not used with this strict meaning across the philosophical spectrum. The Jaina philosophers use it as an equivalent for matter or material object. There are several terms in Sanskrit, for example, ‘jīva-ātma’, ‘puruṣa’, ‘manuṣya’ which are often used to indicate persons, but these terms have wider meanings and do not apply strictly to persons. The lack of an exact equivalent in Sanskrit does not, however, mean that the concept of personhood was not central to classical Indian philosophies other than Buddhism.