1891.] Dr. Hoernle —An instalment of the Bower Manuscript. 
145 
On the other hand some of the names mentioned in the introduc¬ 
tion to the other well-known Hindu work on medicine, known as the 
‘ Charaka ’, agree with those in our manuscript. In that introduction it 
is said that Atreya taught medicine to his six pupils : Agnivesa, Bhela, 
Jatukarna, Parasara, Harita # , and Ksharapani. Four of these names 
are identical: Atreya, Bhela, Parasara, and Harita, but in every other 
respect the statements of the two authorities differ from one another. 
According to the Charaka, Atreya was the teacher of Bhela, Parasara 
and Harita, while according to our manuscript these four men were fellow- 
students, and were taught by Kasiraja. In the Charaka, Susruta is 
altogether omitted, while according to our manuscript, he was the most 
prominent in the company of fellow-students and their mouthpiece. This, 
of course, is explained by the fact, that the two works of Charaka and 
Susruta, as we now have them, in the main represent two different schools 
or rather departments of medical science—the former, medicine, the latter, 
surgery. Of this assumed division there is no sign in our manuscript; 
nothing in its contents, though coming from Susruta, is connected with 
surgery; and in its introduction both Atreya, the fountain-head of the 
Charaka, and Susruta are mentioned in company. But neither the Susruta 
nor the Charaka, as we now have them, are original works ; they are clearly, 
both of them, recensions (probably much modified) of earlier works. 
The earlier work on which the Charaka Samhita is based was one 
A 
written by Agnivesa (said to have been a pupil of Atreya), and was pro¬ 
bably still exstant, as Dr. Dutt in his Hindu Materia Medica (p. vii) 
shews, at the time of Vasfbhatta. That the work now called Susruta is 
not the composition of Susruta himself, is shown by the opening saluta¬ 
tion in which Susruta himself, along with other divine personages, is 
invoked. Of what sort the two original works were, we have perhaps 
hardly sufficient right to conclude from their modern re-cast representa¬ 
tives. At the time of the composition of our manuscript, however, it is 
clear, the original work of Susruta (the so-called vriddha Susruta ?) 
already existed. 
That neither of the two works, now known as the Charaka and the 
Susruta, can be accepted as ancient and original compositions, has been 
clearly shown by Dr. E. Haas, in his two Essays in the Journal of the 
German Oriental Society (vol. XXX, p. 617, and vol. XXXI, p. 647). 
The Susruta, especially, would seem to be a comparatively modern 
compilation, somewhat loosely and unscientifically put together in the 
manner of the Puranas. But Dr. Haas- goes much too far in his theory 
of the origin of that work, which, though seriously put forward, reads 
* Our MS. spells the name Harita, which is there guaranteed by the metre. I 
may here mention that a Harita Samhita ( Atr&ya-muni-bh&shita ) has been edited by 
Kaviraj Binod Lai Sen. (Calcutta, Ayurveda Press, 146 Lower Chitpore Road). 
T 
