Essay name: Surgery in ancient India (Study)
Author:
P. P. Prathapan
Affiliation: Sree Sankaracharya University of Sanskrit / Department of Sanskrit Sahitya
This essay studies Surgery in ancient India based on Sanskrit sources such as the Sushruta Samhita. These references indicate evidence of theoretical and practical knowledge of hygiene rivaling contemporary routine practices. Further topics include Ayurveda, a historical study of surgery, surgical schools and instruments used in ancient India.
Chapter 1 - Ayurveda and Sanskrit literature
27 (of 54)
External source: Shodhganga (Repository of Indian theses)
Download the PDF file of the original publication
Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)
27
Patanjali the two eminent grammarians should be mentioned in this
period. P膩峁噄ni has also mentioned about the system of education. The
ceremony of initiation is refered to as 膧c膩rya Kara峁嘺 and Upanayana.
29 28
The pupil is called Ch膩tra because as explained by Patha帽jali, 20 the
preceptor is like an umbrella sheltering the pupil of covering his defects or
pupils are like an umbrella maintaining his preceptor. The pupil must
secure the affection of his teacher for the sake of his own welfare both
here and hereafter". The pupil stays with his teacher (antevasin) but there
is also a reference to day scholars; the common mark of both classes of
pupils being the carrying of the danda or staff and another mark is the
bowl in the hand.
P膩峁噄ni indicates the various types of institutions known as Kula,
30 Gotra, Cara峁嘺 and Parisad. These institutions are primarily concerned
and connected with the social life of the community but they have certain
important cultured and educational aspects which cannot be ignored.
Gotra may be defined as a system of relations based upon
community on ancestors. Thus knowledge of ancestors is handed over
from previous generation to later ones. For eg: Atri, Brgu, Vasistha, Kanva
etc. Members of different gotras united and contributed to their particular
culture and traditions in the cara峁嘺s. There are only one and main
difference between gotras and cara峁嘺s. They are gotra because indicative
