A History of Indian Medical Literature v1.c25.599

v1.c25.599

Chapter one (putrakāmīya), which corresponds to part of the first chapter of the Śārīrasthāna of the Hṛdaya, deals with the following subjects: the features making a girl eligible as a bride for a man;¹ the girl should be twelve, the man twenty-one years of age (1.2); the age for begetting a first child: sixteen years for the female, twenty-five years for the male partner;² the problems that may arise when the partners are younger;³ the same problems are likely to occur when conception takes place during the first three nights of the first fertile period (1.3);⁴ the physiology of the production of male and female seed (śukra), its ejaculation, its properties⁵ (1.4); the female procreational fluid (rakta) accumulates every month in the uterus (garbhakoṣṭha), whence it flows out as the menstrual discharge for three days; when the amount of this discharge is too large or when it flows out during a longer time, or when it appears during another part of the cycle, the disorder is called asṛgdara, pradara or raktayoni; its treatment may be looked up in the chapters on the therapy of raktapitta and guhyaroga (1.5);⁶ amenorrhoea appears when vāta and kapha cover the pathways of the procreational fluid; pitta-producing measures are then required;⁷ when this disorder progresses and the procreational fluid remains inside,⁸ whether combined with śukra or not, it may develop into gulma and bring about signs of pregnancy, in particular when the woman indulges in vāta-promoting articles of diet and behaviour; its treatment is described in the chapter on gulma (1.6); vātodara, which resembles pregnancy, sometimes develops; it is alleviated by measures counteracting vāta (1.7);⁹ this disorder sometimes progresses, thus simulating an established pregnancy and becoming a trap to foolish physicians; when, later, due to contrary factors or accidentally (yadṛcchayā), blood begins to appear, without any sign of a child to be born, these fools say that the foetus has been taken away by a bhūta; however, the beings called rakṣas¹⁰ deprive a pregnant woman and her child of their ojas only, but do not take away the child's body, because they are not keen on this or unable to do so; anyhow, the taking away of a body by non-human beings has never been observed (1.8); the author objects to those who nevertheless assert that this happens sometimes by declaring that it is hard to explain why these very powerful beings carry off the unborn child only and desist from attacking the mother's body (1.9);¹¹ the characteristics of a pure menstrual discharge (ārtava) (1.10);¹² the reproductive age ranges from sixteen to seventy in males, from twelve to fifty in females (1.11);¹³ the preparation of a couple for sexual intercourse (1.12);¹⁴ the disorders of the male seed are those caused by vāta, pitta, and kapha, and those called kuṇapagandhi-, granthi-, pūya-, kṣīṇa-, mūtra-, and purīṣaretas;¹⁵ these disorders result in infertility;¹⁶ the characteristics of seed corrupted by vāta, pitta, or kapha;¹⁷ the relationships between the other disorders and the doṣas, respectively blood¹⁸ (1.13); the disorders of the ārtava are the same as those of the male seed, their relationships with the doṣas and blood are identical, and they also lead to infertility;¹⁹ the degrees of curability of the disorders of śukra and ārtava ²⁰ (1.14); the treatment of the disorders of the male seed caused by vāta, pitta, or kapha (1.15);²¹ the treatment of the same types of disorders of the ārtava, which are called puṣpadoṣa here (1.16);²² the treatment of the other types of disorders of semen and ārtava (1.17);²³ general treatments for all types of disorders of semen and ārtava (1.18); four different opinions on the duration of the fertile part of the menstrual cycle (1.19).²⁴