Indian Medicine (Medicin), translated by C. G. Kashikar c8.85

c8.85

5. Greece:— The Indian elements in the materia medica of Dioskorides and earlier authors can be easily ascertained: e. g. πέπερι-pippali πεπερίριζα-pippalimūla, Costus-Kuṣṭha, ζιγγίβερις-Śṛṅgavera, καρδάμωμοs-Kardama (elā), ινάμωμοs-tvacā, ἄκοροs-vacā, βδέλλιον-guggulu, κύπειρος-mustāka, σάκχαροι-Śarkarā, σήσαμον-tila, etc.¹¹ Still more difficult it is to explore the origin of many further analogies between Indian and Greek medicine¹². To quote for example:— the accomplished humoral pathology (Cf. § 33), the raw, ripening and the ripe stages of fever (Cf. § 51), ἀπεψία,πέψις and some corresponding to the tumour (Cf. § 69) and other ailments, the division of healing remedies into hot and cold (Cf. § 23), also in dry (rākṣa) and oily i. e. moist (Snigdha, picchila), the healing of diseases by remedies of opposite character, the purely Hippocratic emphasis on prognosis (Cf. § 21), the characterization of the physicians and the directions given to them reminding us of the oath of the Asclepiads, the influence of seasons in dietetics, the recommendation of spirituous drink contrary to the religious view of the Indians, the quotidian, tertian and quartan fever, Kṣaya-phthisis (Cf. § 61) etc. in individual diseases, keeping in check the heart-troubles in negative bearing (cf. § 63), the often occurring sensation of creeping round of ants on the body in respect of symptoms, the eating of earth in chlorosis (cf. § 59), the simultaneous formation of all parts of body in the doctrine of development and midwifery, the birth of twins by the division of quantity of semen, the relation of the right part of body to the male sex of the foetus, the vitality of foetus in the 7th month and the contrary in the 8th (cf. § 41), the dismembering of the dead foetus and its extraction with a hook fixed in the eye-sockets (cf. § 48), the movements for the advancement of placenta (cf. § 42), the method of lithotomy in surgery (cf. § 57), the paracentesis in dropsy (cf. § 54), branding, cauterizing and cutting of hemorrhoidal tumours (cf. § 76), bleeding, leeches (among them those coming from Greece, Yavana, Su. 1. 13. 13) and cauteries (cf. § 29 ff.), many surgical instruments (cf. § 28) the operation of the right eye with the left hand and of the left eye with the right hand and other details of the operation of the cataract (§83) in opthalmology. A fragmentary MS (in the 1st cen. A.D.?) ¹³ having the form reminding us of the papyrus-roll is preserved besides the manifold Greek coins minted in India. That in the period when Greek influence was predominant in India as indicated above, certain medical writings of the Greeks might have found admission in India is indeed as easily possible as the Greek astronomy and astrology were, as is well known, received in India ¹⁴. Yet we must not overestimate the Greek elements. The humoral pathology which in its developed form reminds us of the Greek one, can also be connected with the harmony of the three Gunas of the Sāmkhya philosophy and can be proved as early as the origin of the conception of the Gunas (Cf. § 33). The Greek influence must have been the most strongest in the field of surgery. It is also to be noted that the Bower MS and Caraka contain nothing of surgery. In later works also surgery completely receded to the background.