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Minerals and Metals in Ancient India v2.c44.s3: Patañjali’s Successor : Nāgārjuna

Minerals and Metals in Ancient India v2.c44.s3

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Patañjali’s Successor : Nāgārjuna

v2.c44.s3.1

Nāgārjuna, the alchemist, is widely regarded as the inventor of distillation and calcination. According to Vṛnda and Cakrapāṇi, Nāgārjuna was the inventor of the use of *kajjali* or Cinnabar (mercuric sulphide HgS) to produce mercury. The later day *Rasaśāstra* texts eulogize him as the pioneer in metallurgy (*dhātuvāda*) and the use of metallic salts in medicine. Dallaṇa makes him the redacter of the *Suśruta Saṃhitā*:

v2.c44.s3.2

प्रति-संस्कर्तापीह नागार्जुन एव
*prati-saṃskartāpīha nāgārjuna eva*
(*Nibandha-Saṃgraha* I)

v2.c44.s3.3

Nāgārjuna compiled several medical texts related to metals and metallic salts: Lauhaśāstra, Kakṣapuṭatantra, Rasaratnākara (on which we would comment later), etc. Several medical recipes, based on haridrā (turmeric), abhra (mica), etc. and formulated by Nāgārjuna, used to be written on stone slabs in Pāṭaliputra for the public. (Mukhopadhyaya, 1923)

v2.c44.s3.4

Rasāyana has been defined by Caraka (1.2.6) as the science or medicine which promotes longevity, retentive memory, health, virility, etc. Few experts in Rasāyana who might have preceded Nāgārjuna were Vyāḍi or Vyālācārya and Māndavya of whom we do not know very much.

v2.c44.s3.5

We would now comment on the date of Nāgārjuna and his precise identity. Al-Beruni mentioned the popularity of the Indian Science Rasāyana, and that the Indians were ‘inclined towards the mineralogical method of alchemy’. In that connection, he wrote that ‘a famous representative of this art was Nāgārjuna, a native of the fort Daihak near Somnāth. . . . His book is very rare . . . He lived nearly a hundred years before our time’. (Sachau, 1910, 1983: 189) Quoting Al-Beruni, many authors have put Nāgārjuna in the ninth/eighth century AD. (Ray, 1956:116-18) However as Filliozat (1951) has pointed out, Hiuen-Tsang attested in AD 630 that the alchemist Nāgārjuna had lived much before his time: ‘Nāgārjuna in Sangharama not far to the south of the city Kosala or Berar; he was well-practised in the art of compounding medicines which provided long life; Sadvaha-rāja had partaken of this mysterious medicine’. (Beal, 1884, 1969: 212)

v2.c44.s3.6

It is quite likely that the original Indian source from which Kumārajiva wrote Nāgārjuna’s biography in Chinese (AD 405), had mixed up the famous alchemist-cum-tāntric teacher, the contemporary of Yajñaśrī Gautamīputra Sātavāhana or Sātakarṇi (AD 166-96 or 174-203), with the (Mādhyamika) philosopher Nāgārjuna who was probably a contemporary of King Kaniṣka (AD 78-102) (Nalinākṣa Dutt’s view in Majumdar, Volume 2, 1980: 388). We are concerned with the alchemist (vide Sylvain Lévi). The suggestion that the alchemist and the philosopher were the same person is difficult to accept.

v2.c44.s3.7

The alchemist Nāgārjuna lived in the monastery of Kosala or Berar, modern Chāndā (near Nāgpur or Amrāvati), and was a friend of the Sātavāhana King addressed to whom he wrote a book: Suhrillekha (Letters to a Friend). Hiuen-Tsang wrote that when the king had fallen short of gold, Nāgārjuna used a ‘divine decoction and converted some stone into gold with which four statues of Buddha were made’. (Beal, 1884, 1969: 216). The allusion was most probably to the yellow or gold-coloured brass, widely publicised by Nāgārjuna.

v2.c44.s3.8

We quote two very relevant passages from Nāgārjuna’s Rasa-Ratnākara (RR):

v2.c44.s3.9

किमत्र चित्रं रसको रसेन . . . . . . क्रमेण कृत्वाम्बुधरेण रंजितः करोति शुल्वं त्रिपुटेन कांचनम् kimatra citraṃ rasako rasena . . . . . . krameṇa kṛtvāmbudhareṇa rañjitaḥ karoti śulvaṃ tripuṭena kāñcanam (RR, 3)

v2.c44.s3.10

What wonder is that calamine (rasaka or zinc ore calamine) roasted thrice with copper (śulva) convert the latter into gold (actually gold-coloured brass).

v2.c44.s3.11

क्षारस्नेहैश्च धान्याम्लै रसकं भावितं बहु। ऊर्णा लाक्षा तथा पथ्या भूलता धूमसंयुतम्।। मुकमुषागतं ध्मातं टंकणेन समन्वितम्। सत्वं कुटिलसंकाशम् पतते नात्र संशयः।। kṣārasnehaiśca dhānyāmlai rasakaṃ bhāvitaṃ bahu । ūrṇā lakṣā tathā pathyā bhūlatā dhūmasaṃyutam ।। mukamuṣāgataṃ dhmātaṃ ṭaṅkanena samanvitam ।। satvaṃ kuṭilasaṃkāśaṃ patate nātra saṃśayaḥ ।। (RR, 31-32)

v2.c44.s3.12

Rasaka (Calamine) digested repeatedly with fermented paddy-water, natron and clarified butter, and mixed with wool, lac, Terminalia Chebula and borax and roasted in a covered crucible, yields an essence of the appearance of tin; of this there is no doubt.

v2.c44.s3.13

The above passages from Nāgārjuna are the earliest literary references to the ancient art of making brass and zinc. The latter passage quoted (RR, 31-32) vividly recalls the distillation of zinc, ‘the falling of the tin-like metal’. The ore was named rasaka because it yielded a distillation product like rasa or mercury. Much later, the metal zinc was named yaśada, yaśadāyaka, yaśatva (later colloquially yastā or dastā), ‘that which gives fame’, a reference to the gold-like colour of its alloy.

v2.c44.s3.14

Brass has been widely used in India since the pre-Christian era of Taxila. We may also mention the first century BC brass coins of Dhanadeva and Āryavarmā of Ayodhyā, second century AD cast brass casket at Mānikyālaya, numerous fifth/sixth century brass statues of Buddha, seventh century AD unfinished brass vihāra or convent at Nālandā etc. Hiuen-Tsang mentioned widespread use of teou-shih or brass in India.

v2.c44.s3.15

Alchemists like Nāgārjuna were interested in the therapeutic use of metallic salts of mercury (*rasa*), zinc (*rasaka*), etc. Minerals or metal salts were stated to provide hardness to metal as well as to body :

v2.c44.s3.16

वलीपलितनाशश्च तथा कालस्य ध्वंसनम्।
यथा लोहे तथा देहे क्षमते नात्र संशयः।।
*valipalitanāśaśca tathā kālasya dhvaṃsanam* |
*yathā lohe tathā dehe kṣamate nātra saṃśayaḥ* ||

v2.c44.s3.17

In his *Rasa-Ratnākara* (*RR*), Nāgārjuna dwelt on several other topics related to minerals and metals: purification of *rājāvarta* or lapis lazuli (*RR*, 1), extraction of metals from chalcopyrite (*mākṣika*), lead ore (*capala*), purification of crude molten copper by poling (*RR*, 14), extraction of metal from *vaikrānta* (*RR*, 23-25), extraction of metal from *vimala*, *darada* (cinnabar), etc.

v2.c44.s3.18

The distillation of mercury from cinnabar was described:

v2.c44.s3.19

दरदं पातनायन्त्रे पातितश्च जलाशये।
*daradaṃ pātanāyantre pātit aśca jalāśaye* |
(*RR*, 37)

v2.c44.s3.20

Pearl was stated to be soluble in vegetable acids:

v2.c44.s3.21

एक एव महाद्रावौ अम्लकांजिकैः।
मुक्ताफलानि सप्ताहं वेतसाम्लेन भावयेत्।
*eka eva mahādrāvau amlakāñjikaiḥ* |
*muktāphalāni saptāhaṃ vetasāmlena bhāvayet* |
(*RR*, 50-51)

v2.c44.s3.22

Nāgārjuna described the use of *navasāra* or salt ammoniac (*RR*, 2.1), vegetable recipes in metal making, various tools and so on.

v2.c44.s3.23

There is no doubt that the alchemist Nāgārjuna belonged to the latter half of the second century AD (Bose, Sen and Subbarayappa, 1971:41) although it is not clear whether he was also the celebrated philosopher, and whether the present form of *Rasa-Ratnākara* was edited in the eighth century. (Ray, 1956:118)

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