Studies in the Medicine of Ancient India, Part I: Osteology, or the Bones of the Human Body c7.s1.t3.2

c7.s1.t3.2

2. Ātreya, whose system is reported by Charaka and Bheḍa, appears to have held the opinion that the long bones (metacarpals and metatarsals) were fixed in one bone as their common base. He may have known that this base (the carpus, or tarsus) was really composed of a cluster of small bones, but the term adhiṣṭhāna (or sthāna) which he chose as its name, rather suggests that he thought it to be a single undivided bone. Actual examination of a prepared skeleton, such as Suśruta certainly practised (§ 45), would, of course, have set him right; but it may be doubted whether he ever went beyond a superficial examination of a dead body.