The Classical Doctrine of Indian Medicine: Its Origins and its Greek Parallels c8.94

c8.94

As regards the form *ajñātayaksma*, it does not appear to occur in the classical medical literature, but the idea represented thereby seems to be present in the epithet *durvijñeya*, “difficult to know”, which we have seen being applied in the *Uttaratantra* to cachexy. This epithet, as also undoubtedly the expression *ajñātayaksma*, have quite a natural explanation. Decay is not a determined disease, clear in its origin like the one which provokes a wound; it is a mysterious invasion, a disorder with an uncertain evolution. There is nothing, therefore, to prevent us from admitting that the term *yaksma* has the same sense of “decay” or “consumptive disease” in Vedic as in classical medicine, subject to the reservation that it should not be supposed that the medical notions developed in the Āyurveda around this term were already familiar to the Vedic authors.