2004
S Jain, PN Tandon
AYURVEDA
The chief source of ancient Indian Aryan culture and medicine are the four Vedas that are traditionally believed to be revealed to the sages by Brahma (the creator) some 6,000 years before Christian era.
Most western scholars believe that the oldest of the four Vedas was compiled during the second millennium BC. The word Ayurveda (in Sanskrit Ayu means life, and Veda means to know) means the knowledge of life by which the nature of life is understood and thus life is prolonged.
Unfortunately Ayurveda is not available in its original form, but most of its contents are revealed to us by the Samhitas (the encyclopedic works) of Caraka and Sushruta.
These texts originally written about 1,000 BC are considered to be the most authentic and renowned representatives of the original Ayurveda.
Caraka Samhita (around 1,000-800 BC), a treatise on the ancient Indian system of medicine was composed by Agnivesa, redacted by Caraka and reconstructed by Drdhabala. The Sushruta Samhita has been acknowledged as one of the greatest of its kind in Sanskrit literature and is important from the surgical point of view.
