Indian Medicine (Medicin), translated by C. G. Kashikar c12.5

c12.5

Children's diseases are, however, particularly attributed to demoniac influences, perhaps because the innocent childhood is held especially accessible to such influences, and because the suddenness with which the severe illness appears and disappears in children cannot be explained otherwise. The demon jambha, who attacks the children, is Vedic and for his aversion the children are taken to mother's breast (AV 7.10. cf. Kauśika sūtra 32.1). Naigameya, Naigameṣa, partly a deity imparting birth of sons and the exchange of children in the womb, partly a demon making the children ill, is also Vedic. It also appears in ancient sculptures and has the head of a goat (later a ram's head) and is considered as the symbol of lewdness suited to the God of creation'. In the child attacked by Naigameṣa there appear flatulence, convulsions of the hands, feet and the mouth, froth in the mouth, thirst, tightening of fists, diarrhoea, hoarseness, discoloration, pains in the body, rattling in the throat, vomiting, cough, hiccup, sleeplessness, biting the lips, crookedness, looking upwards, violent delirium, unconsciousness, smelling of the flesh or fat, fever, tumour in one eye and other symptoms (AHr 6.3.12-14; AS 6.3.188; Su 6.27.16; MN 429). General signs of demoniac possession are the following: The child suddenly shrinks, becomes frightful and cries, it bites itself with teeth and also bites its nurse,