Swarasa, Kalka, Kwatha, Hima, Phanta: the Five Kashaya Kalpanas of the Charaka Samhita — How a Herb Becomes a Medicine

Quick Summary Somewhere between your kitchen and the Charaka Samhita stands a pot of simmering kadha — and this article...

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Visarga, Adana, Vikshepa: How Soma, Surya and Anila Uphold the Body — the Dosha Prakarana of the Bhavaprakasha

Quick Summary Deep in the Purva Khanda of the Bhavaprakasha, the great sixteenth-century encyclopedia of Ayurveda, the text finishes counting...

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Netra Abhighata: Eye Injury in the Sushruta Samhita and the Three-Patala Prognosis (Uttara Tantra, Chapter 19)

Quick Summary In the Uttara Tantra of the Sushruta Samhita — Ayurveda’s great classic of surgery and of Shalakya Tantra,...

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Vidradhi in the Sushruta Samhita: The Classical Ayurvedic Science of the Abscess (Nidana Sthana, Chapter 9)

Quick Summary The ninth chapter of the Nidana Sthana of the Sushruta Samhita — Ayurveda’s great classic of surgery —...

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Annasvarupa Vijnaniya: How the Ashtanga Hridaya Classifies Every Food (The Seven Food Groups of Ayurveda — Grains, Pulses and the Four Gruels)

Quick Summary The sixth chapter of the Ashtanga Hridaya, the Annasvarupa Vijnaniya (“knowledge of the nature of food”), is Vagbhata’s...

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Dravya and Dravyaguna: How the Charaka Samhita Classifies Every Ayurvedic Medicine (Rasa, Guna, Virya, Vipaka, Prabhava)

Quick Summary Walk into any Ayurvedic shop and you meet a wall of jars, oils, powders and pastes, each one...

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