Indian Medicine (Medicin), translated by C. G. Kashikar c9.41

c9.41

Watt⁴ leaves the question open whether the Indians knew the medicinal effects of mercury before or after the Arabs. Since, however, the calcination of mercury is traced only to Mahommedan epoch, it may be believed that it originated from the Arabic alchemy in which mercury plays such a great role. The Indian physicians also received from the Arabians the opium which began to be cultivated in India since the 16th century A. D. and was formerly being imported from Arabia⁵. The designation of opium as *ahiphena* "Serpent-foam" is evidently only a popular etymological transformation of the old *aphena, afim, afin, afuka* and these expressions go back to one of the Arabic transformations (usually *afyun*) of the Greek *ὄπιον* and they come only in later works like Madanavinoda, Rajanighaṇṭu, Śārṅgadhara, Rasendrasārasaṅgraha and Yogaratnākara, while Caraka, Suśruta, AS, AHr do not know them. A constipating and narcotic effect (*grāhin, mohakṛt*) is attributed to it, therefore it is particularly prescribed for diarrhoea⁶ (*Atisāra, Grahaṇī*).