Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v1.c6.s2.t4.62

v1.c6.s2.t4.62

*Jīvaka-Pustaka* is the product of Indian medical culture and there are many prescriptions which can be sourced from Veda Literature in early times; it is, at the same time, an example for Khotan to learn from Indian Medicine. When *Jīvaka-Pustaka* was translated into Khotan, they incorporated the original knowledge form their own medical practice as well as the local medical knowledge into the translation, which was equipped with “creative compositions”. *Jīvaka-pustaka* in Khotan is, in fact, not a faithful translation to the original Sanskrit edition. The main changes, as compared to the Sanskrit edition, in Khotan were: There were more functions for a certain kind of prescription and a certain kind of prescription was composed of different medicaments. There were more medicaments for composition of one certain kind of prescription. There were more names for these prescriptions, the medicaments were in different forms, there were specialised explanations for collective noun of medicaments and there were detailed descriptions for the process of pharmacy. The indigenous dose unit was used and typical Buddhist medical terms such as “Si Bai Si Bing” were mentioned. *Jīvaka-Pustaka* is one of the products for exchange and blending of Vedic medicine in India and indigenous medicine in the Kingdom of Khotan.