Sushruta Samhita, Volume 6: Uttara-tantra
by Kaviraj Kunja Lal Bhishagratna | 1916 | 113,078 words
This current book, the Uttara-tantra (english translation) is the supplementary part of the Sushrutasamhita and deals various subjects such as diseases of the eye, treatment of fever, diarrhea, diseases resulting from superhuman influences, insanity, rules of health etc. The Sushruta Samhita is the most representative work of the Hindu system of m...
Chapter XXIX - Therapeutics of an attack by Skandapasmara
Now we shall discourse on the chapter which deals with the Therapeutics of an attack by Skandapasmara (Skandapasmara-Pratishedha). 1.
A decoction of Vilva, Shiris ha, Golomi (Duralabha), and the drugs of the Surasadi group should be employed in sprinkling the body of the possessed child in a case of the present disease. Medicated oil duly cooked with the drugs of the Sarvagandha group should be used in anointing its body. Clarified butter duly cooked with milk and the decoction of the barks of the Kshiri trees together with the drugs of the Kakolyadi group as Kalka[1] should be prescribed for internal use. 2A.
The body of the affected child should be rubbed (Utsadana) with the paste of Vaca and Hingu taken together. The dungs of an owl and a vulture, human hairs, the nails of an elephant, clarified butter, and the hairs of a bull should be mixed together and used for fumigating the child’s body. Ananta, Vimbi, Markati, and Kukkuti should be strung together and fastened (as a charm) to the body of the child. 2B.
The physician (or the votary officiating for him) should worship the presiding deity of the disease in a ditch (dug out for the purpose) with the offerings of both cooked and uncooked meat, fresh blood (of a goat), milk, and edibles prepared with the Masha pulse for the ghosts, and the possessed child should be bathed at the crossing of roads by physician observing the necessary fast, etc. with the recital of the following Mantra:—
“O thou, the trusted and beloved friend of the god Skanda, O Skandapasmara, O thou ugly-faced one whom the world knows by the epithet of Visakha, may good befall this child in distress.” 2.
Thus ends the twenty-ninth chapter of the Uttara-Tantra in the Sushruta Samhita which deals with the Therapeutics of an attack by Skandapasmara.
Footnotes and references:
[1]:
Although Dallana prescribes the drugs oi the Kākolyādi group to be used as Kalka, we are inclined to take the sentence to mean that the decoction of those drugs should be used.