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INTRODUCTION.

certainty that Subhūti was one of the personal disciples of Śākya Siṅha Buddha, and that it was customary among contemporary Buddhists to append the title of their (1) lord (Gautama or Bodhisattva) to the name of a convert to emphasize his wisdom and sanctity in the world. A certain group of scholars never tires of using this line as conclusive evidence that the Samhitā was, at best, a contemporary production of early Buddhism. But they ignore the opinions of Shaunaka and others on the subject, quoted in the exact same part of the book, which places the date of its composition at least several centuries earlier. Shaunaka, who was sixth in the direct line of discipleship from the immortal Vyāsa, was the author of the renowned Shaunaka Samhitā of the Atharvan. These facts lend a very plausible weight to our hypothesis that the original Sushruta Samhitā, which was first composed perhaps at the same time as the later portions of the Atharvan, naturally discussed the opinions of Shaunaka and other Vedic embryologists, while Nāgārjuna, at the time of revising that book, quoted the opinion of his contemporary Subhūti for the purpose of giving him an equal status with the Vedic Rishis, if for nothing else.

Greek Influence:—Regarding Hellenic influence on the Hindu system of medicine and on the Sushruta Samhitā in particular, we must rid our minds of all sentiments of racial vanity and proceed to investigate the case in a scientific and unprejudiced spirit before giving a more detailed account of the contents of the Sushruta Samhitā.

(1) Nāgārjuna Bodhisattva was well practiced in the art of compounding medicine. Nāgārjuna Bodhisattva, by moistening all the great stones with a divine and superior decoction, changed them into gold. — Beal's Buddhistic Records of the Western World, Vol. II.

प्रजापतिश्चाश्विना प्रथममृचस्तं वीथ्याय च ।
तं तं वघ्नाम्यायुषे वर्चसे ओजसे च बलाय चास्माभिरचक्षत ॥