Vanaspati: Plants and Plant-Life as in Indian Treatises and Traditions c11.5

c11.5

The author has explored a vast field of Sanskrit literature (including English reviews and commentaries on early Sanskrit works) and collected a mine of information replete with gems of botanical facts and aphorisms. The essay embodies not merely a collection of fragments of early speculation on plant-life but a critical survey of the botanical knowledge of the Hindus and its application to Medicine and Agriculture, in the searchlight of modern Science. The author has, with the grasp of a trained botanist, succeeded in marshalling evidence to show clear indications of possession by the ancient Hindus of such knowledge of plant-life as prognosticate the dawn of science.