Page:Sushruta Samhita Vol 1.djvu/18

ii Identity of Sushruta and Divodasa:—It is only safe to assert that Sushruta was of the race of Vishvamitra. The Mahabharatam (i) represents him as a son of that royal sage. This coincides with the description given of him in the present recension of the Samhita. The Garuda Puranam (2) places Divodasa as fourth in descent from Dhanvantari, the first propounder of medical science on earth, whereas the Sushruta Samhita describes the two as identical persons. But this apparent anomaly in the Samhita can be accounted for, if we consider that in some parts of India the custom still prevails of appending, for the purposes of better identification, the name of one's father, or of a glorious ancestor to one's name, and it is therefore not surprising that Divodasa (the preceptor of Sushruta), who was a firm believer in the doctrine of psychic transmigration, should represent himself as an incarnation of Dhanvantari, and assume his name and style in the usual way. Revond this meagre genealogy we possess no trustworthy information regarding the life and personalitv of Sushruta, the father of Indian Surgery.

Age of the Sushruta Samhita:—We have no means of ascertaining what the Samhita was like as originally written by Sushruta, the present being only a recension, or rather a

(1) Mahahhiralam — Anushasan Parva, Ch. W

(2} Garuda PuranAm, Chap. 139, 's. 8- 11,