Studies in the Medicine of Ancient India, Part I: Osteology, or the Bones of the Human Body c7.s2.t1.3

c7.s2.t1.3

2. The first-named term, akṣaka, is the strictly technical denotation of the collar-bone. It is uniformly explained by the commentators to have that meaning. Thus Daḷḷana, in his commentary on the thirty-fourth and forty-eighth verses of the third chapter of the Therapeutical Section (Cikitsita Sthāna) of the Compendium of Suśruta, explains it by saying: ‘The akṣaka is located above the shoulder-joint,’ and again, ‘The akṣaka is the part above the shoulder-joint' (Original Texts in § 97, cl. 2). Similarly Gaṅgādhar, in his commentary on Charaka's skeletal statement, says: 'The two akṣaka are the two shoulder-bones (aṃsaka) which lie below the throat' (Original Text in § 97, cl. 2). But the matter is clinched by Chakrapāṇidatta, who (§ 11, p. 36) very aptly likens the two akṣaka to two kīlaka or 'pegs that run athwart the anterior part of the trunk'. Referring to Figures 4 and 12, it will be seen that the external end of the