| ABOUT THE BOOK : | Cikitsātilaka written by Srinivasa son of Raghunatharya, grandson of Aijanagarya, a comprehensive textbook of medicine, based on Vāgbhata's Astāngahrdayasamhita. The work consists of 130 chapters, arranged in five sections: sutra (40 chapters), Sārira- (10 chapters), nidāna- (16 chapters), cikitsita- (24 chapters), and uttarasthana (40 chapters). The subjects of all the chapters are enumerated in a table of contents at the beginning of the work (1.27-43ab). This table shows that the author modelled his work on the Astāngahrdayasamhitā. The sutrasthāna, which will be discussed below, has ten chapters more than the parallel section of Vāgbhata's work. The Sarirasthana has four chapters more; three of these have been added: sambhogasadhana (chapter one), garbhanipidana (chapter three), and vandhyāvijñāna (chapter four), while Vāgbhata's chapter six was divided into two, one on dreams (chapter nine), the other on messengers (chapter ten). The order of the chapters of the nidānasthana agrees exactly with that of Vāgbhata's work. and the same applies to the uttarasthana. The cikitsitasthāna has two extra chapters at its beginning: (1) runnivṛtti. (2) pathyakrama. More details are available only on the sutrasthana, since the remaining sections have not been preserved. This sutrasthana is a re-arrangement of the matter contained in the same section of Vāgbhata's work, with a number of additions. The order of Vāgbhata's chapters one to fourteen was changed, and four chapters (four to six and nine) were added, although their contents are not new, being borrowed from the Astāngahrdaya. The sequence of the remaining chapters is basically the same in both sutrasthānas. The Cikitsātilaka, however, has six chapters more (twenty-three to twenty-five and twenty-seven to twenty-nine), the contents of which, as well as their titles, are closely related to the six chapters of Vāgbhata's kalpasthana. The advantage of the incorporation of the kalpasthana at an appropriate place in the sutrasthana is that all the aspects of pañcakarman are dealt with together, and not scattered over two sthānas. Although Śrinivasa does not mention Vāgbhata as his main source, by far the greater part of the sutrasthana of the Cikitsātilaka is a slightly shortened and re-arranged version of that of Vāgbhata's work. New material is sparsely represented. It is found in an appendix (parisista) of 187 verses, added to chapters twelve and thirteen on dinacarya- and ṛtucarya, and concerned with betel chewing, fragrant substances. articles of clothing, etc., making it thus resemble Bhoja's Carucarya. Some new verses occur in chapter fifteen (on liquids); chapter sixteen (on articles of food and drugs) has an udyānavarga of forty verses on horticulture inserted. |
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