Studies in the Medicine of Ancient India, Part I: Osteology, or the Bones of the Human Body c6.s2.t2.2

c6.s2.t2.2

2. As regards the form, there are two points which deserve consideration. In the first place, with reference to the bones of the trunk, the Traditional Recension states that they are distributed over ‘the pelvic cavity, sides, back, abdomen, and breast’ (§ 27). That this is the true reading of the Traditional Recension is proved by the fact that the two medical works, Śārīra Padminī and Bhāva Prakāśa, which adopt the statement of Suśruta, giving it, however, in a versified form of their own (§§ 26, 36), also name the abdomen (udara) in this connexion. The mention of the abdomen as a seat of bones may well cause surprise, and a suspicion that there must be some error in the text. The suspicion is confirmed when we find that in the subsequent enumeration of the bones in their several seats, the collar-bones (akṣaka) take the place of the abdomen (udara). As the collar-bones form a part of the shoulder-girdle, it suggests itself that the Sanskrit text of the statement of Suśruta, in its original and genuine form, must have read amsa, shoulder, instead of udara, abdomen. A very probable explanation of the origin of the error in the Traditional Recension may be given. In the classification of the bones according to their shape (§ 30), the text of the Traditional Recension has the compound word pṛṣṭh-odara (i. e. pṛṣṭha, back, and udara, abdomen). In this connexion the introduction of the term udara, abdomen, has a good reason. It is to indicate the position of the pubic arch (§ 60, cl. 2) as located in the anterior (or ventral) part of the pelvis. The latter organ comprises five bones (§ 27), viz. the two hip-blades (nitamba), the sacrum (trika), the coccyx (guda), and the pubic arch (bhaga). These five bones belong to two different classes: the hip-blades and the sacrum (incl. coccyx) belong to the pan-shaped (kapāla), while the pubic arch belongs to the ornament-like (valaya). Hence, in classifying them according to their shape, the term śroṇi, pelvis, indicative of their common locality, could not be used; but each bone had to be indicated by its peculiar locality. Hence the sacrum and coccyx are indicated by the back (pṛṣṭha), and the pubic arch by the ventral part (udara) of the pelvis. The compiler of the Traditional Recension, failing to understand this, introduced the term pṛṣṭh-odara also into the enumeration of the bones according to their position in the body. But here the term is quite out of place. For the common locality of the five bones is already defined by the term śroṇi, pelvic cavity, while the locality of the bones of the shoulder-girdle (aṃsa) is entirely ignored. It can, therefore, hardly be doubted that the reading pṛṣṭh-odara, back and abdomen, of the Traditional Recension is an erroneous substitute for the true reading pṛṣṭh-āṃsa, back and shoulder.