The evidence for hospitals in early indi 21

DOMINIK WUJASTYK

19

Figure 1: Sealing found at Kumrahār showing probably the tree of enlightenment (bodhivṛkṣa)
flanked by conch shells (Altekar and Mishra 1959: frontispiece, 103).

of the monastic community” (Skt. śrī ārogyavihāre bhikṣusaṅghasya). Other potsherds from the same debris also bear similar inscriptions: “in the health house”
(Skt. [ā]rogyavihāre), and “of Dhanvantari” (Skt. [dha]nvantareḥ). The latter is
the name of the god of medicine and promulgator of the medical Compendium of
Suśruta, (whose textual history is somewhat parallel to that of Caraka), and is
a name associated with an ancient school of surgeons.70 The name Dhanvantari
is also mentioned in the Milindapañha (approximately second century BCE) as a
medical authority, and in many later sources.71 It is beyond reasonable doubt
that the Kumrahār site included a medical building. It was possibly part of a
Buddhist monastery, perhaps offering treatment for the monks similar to that
described by Faxian in about CE 410.

X

7

XUANZANG

UANZANG was born in China in CE 602 and became famous for his seventeenyear Buddhist pilgrimage through India, during which he studied with

70 See HIML: IA, 358–61.
Note, however, that recent research on the ninthcentury Nepalese version of the Suśrutasaṃhitā shows that the figure of Dhanvantari
was not at that time strongly associated with

the text (Birch et al. 2021) and may have

been a person associated more with teachings on food and drink than on surgery.
71 HIML: IA, 358–361.

HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 10 (2022) 1–43