Page:A Short History of Aryan Medical Science.djvu/223

XI.] There is nothing in the Egyptian medicine which is not in the Indian system, and there is much in the elaborate Indian system that is wanting in the medical science of Egypt.

It has been shown already that the Arab merchants took many medicinal drugs from India in the early part of the Christian era. It requires no great effort to prove that India has contributed greatly to the Arabic system of medicine. The Arabian physician Serapion (Ibn Serabi), in his well-known treatise upon Medicine, often quotes Charaka, who is named "Sharaka Indianus" in the Latin translation. Avicenna, better known by the name of Aflatoon in India — the name has become synonymous with a "learned man" among the Hindoos — flourished in the ninth century, and was the most celebrated physician of Bokhara. While describing the Indian preparation of Trifala (the three Myrobalans) in his work, he quotes the opinion of Charaka and other writers with great respect. Another Arabian physician, Rhazes (Al Rasi), who is said to have lived long before the two preceding physicians, in treating of the properties of dry ginger and other drugs, transcribes passages from the work of an Indian writer whom he calls "Sindhi- Chara," This Sindhi - Chara