Page:A History of Hindu Chemistry Vol 1.djvu/46

 at the same time the laws and usages of the age at which it was remodelled.

It would equally be a great mistake to suppose that the knowledge—chemical and therapeutical—which our Susruta embodies is only representative of the time of its final redaction. As a matter of fact it is a repository of the informations on the subject accumulated from the Vedic age to the date of its ﬁnal recasting.

The remarks of M. Berthelot regarding a Greek technical treatise, which, from palæographic evidence, seems to have been written about the 11th century A. D., apply with still greater force to the Susruta.

"En effet la date de rédaction originelle n'est certainement pas le même pour les divers articles que le traité renferme: les uns étant plus anciens et remontant parfois jusqu'à l’antiquité gréco Egyptienne; tandis que les autres reproduisent des recettes postérieures et des additions peut-être contemporaines du dernier copiste. En tous cas, ce traité continue la vieille tradition de l'orfèvrerie