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CHAPTER VI]
BOWER MANUSCRIPT
Ixi
of Vangasena (chap. VIII, vv. 93-9, pp. 226-7), where the formula, with its final attribution, is also quoted, the lengthy introductory verse 418 is omitted. And that this omission is not due to any accidental cause is shown by the fact that the formula, in the colophon, is called chandanadya-ghrita. For as the medical prescription begins, in v. 419, with chandana, and as the rule is to name a formula by its initial drug (see note 29, on p. 82), it is apparent that the introductory verse 418 is not an essential part of the formula, and was not present in the source whence Vangasena gathered the formula for his compilation, but that its addition is due to the author of the Návanitaka himself, and (in view of the final verse) is really a piece of supererrogation:
The sanie may be the case with the attributive remarks in the other formulæ, Thus the two formulæ, Nos. 11 and 12 (vv. 575 and 579), which are quoted by Madhava and Vangasêna (see notes 281 and 284 on pp. 134, 135) are cited by them without the attributive remark of the Naranitaka. Again the formula, No. 8, which consists of five verses, is found, in another version, identical in substance, but compressed into two verses, in Vangasêna's compilation (Chap. XXX, w. 106-7). In the same, or a similar short version, according to Dr. Cordier (Récentes Découvertes, p. 21), the formula is ascribed to Krishnâtrêya by Niśchalakara. in his Ratnaprabha, and by Chandrata in his Yogaratna-samuchchaya. From this it is clear that the formula occurred in different versions, in different treatises, by different authors, but that the author of the Navanitaka preferred the longer and more archaic version ascribed by tradition to the Aśvin pair.
The case of No. 14 is similar. This is a long formula of 22) verses, describing a curiously complicated treatment with daily increasing and subsequently decreasing doses of aments of long pepper. The whole course of treatment (see note 329 on p. 144) occupies a period of 100 plus 99 plus 21, or 220 days. It also involves the consumption, within that period, of not less than 10,000 aments of long pepper. By the side of this complicated formnla, the Navanitaka has another, in verses 749-52, which is much more simple. It is modeled on the longer one, but it greatly reduces the length of the period, as well as the total of the consumed peppers. It also admits several options: while in every case the period is twenty days, the ratio of peppers may vary between 10, 6, 5, or 3, ard consequently the total of peppers consumed is, 1.000 or 600, or 500, or 300. From the largest option, this shorter formula is, in verse 750, distinguished as the pippali-sahasra or "the one thousand pepper formula.” It seems reasonable to conclude that it was the unwieldiness of the original formula, both with respect to the length of the period and the enormous total of the consumed peppers, which led to the simplification. As a matter of fact, even the simplified formula survives, at the present day, only in its mildest form, which prescribes the consumption of 300 peppers in a period of twenty days at the rate of three peppers a day (see note 343 on p. 147). While the longer formula is, in verse 736, expressly ascribed to the Asvins, the author of the shorter is not mentioned. We know him, however, from the fact that it occurs in the Charaka-Sasihita
sect, 'VI, chap. 1, v. 136-40, ante, No. 24, p. lix). As that sarhità is based on the tantra of Agnivesa, and the latter embodies the teachings of Atrêya, it follows that the simplified formula goes back to Atrêya. It also follows that the longer formula, on which Atrêya's simplification was modeled, and which certainly impresses one as more archaic, goes back to the mythic, or semi-mythic, time antecedent to Atrêya. That explains its attribution
