A History of Indian Medical Literature v3.c42.s2.71

v3.c42.s2.71

The well-known rasāyana procedure, called pippalīvardhamāna, differs in the Bower MS (II.716–737) from the related prescription found in a large number of Sanskrit treatises,¹¹³ in being more complicated and taking a much longer time for its completion. The patient is advised to take one long pepper (pippalī) on the first day, and to increase the dose for ninety-nine consecutive days by one pepper daily, resulting in an intake of one hundred long peppers on the hundredth day. Thereupon, the dose is to be reduced by one pepper each day. At the end of this course a particular diet is to be observed for twenty-one days. An alternative shortened version of the procedure is also described in the Bower MS (II.749–752: pippalīsahasra).¹¹⁴