Bull. Ind. Inst. Hist. Med. Vol. XX pp. 1 to 6

AVURVEDASARA OR VIRABHATIlvAOF REVANASIDDHA

B. RAMA RAO*

ABSTRACT

Ayurvedasara or Virabhattiya is a work on salient features of Ayurvedaand is written by Revanasiddha. Copies are available in Madras, Mysore.Hyderabad and Delhi. No details of the author are available. Revanasiddhawas one of the Pranacharyas of Virashaiva cult and was known to be an expertin mantra, yantra and rasayana. Revanasiddha kalpa. Rasadarpana and Rasa-rajalakshmi are also attributed to Revanasiddha. There are no evidences toestablish the identity.

The work is in five chapters and the copy in Adyar Library. Madrashas one more chapter. The work deals with desha (region) desha (hurnour)rasa (taste) classification of diseases, karrnavipaka, desavayunirnaya, effects ofvitiated humours. and signs anrl symptoms of certain ai Iments. The workmentions the names of some authoritative texts and authors. They includeRasarnava, Bahata. Nagarjuna, Yamala, Rasadarpana etc.

Since the copies in Mysore are on palmleat. it may not be later than17-18 c. Though the work mentions some tantra works. it does not containany tantric material except nadivijnana. The author may belong to 16-17 c.

The manuscript under descriptionis with Vaidya Vedantam Ananta-charva of Nujividu in Krishna districtof Andhra Pradesh. The work is in asmall bound note book of ruled pagesand written on both sides. The sizeof the note book is 10.2 X 16 ems.Each page contains 18 Jinesexcludingthe page title and each line has about12 letters. The hand-writing is good

and legible. The work is in 44 pagesand the remaining several pages areblank.

Name of the book and author:The Colophons at the end of the

chapters mention that the work isVirabhattiya (hereafter VB) or Avur-vedasara (AS) by Revanasiddha (RS).The colophon runs as below:

• Assistant birector, Dr. A. L. Research Centre for Ayurveda, Madras.

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"Iti Revanasiddha Viracitayam Avur-vedasara Virabhat ttva nama .. " Thisalso suggests that Vlrabhat t lvamay be a part of a bigger work calledAyurvedasara.

Other Manuscripts:

The Aufrecht's Catalogus Catalo-rJorum does not have any entry of thetwo titles or of the author. The newCatalogus Catalogorum of Universityof Madras does not mention AS orRS. Avurvedasara by Acyuta, isentered, as mentioned by Niscalakara.AS is also mentioned as anothername of Vaidyakapaddhati by Ka~ina-tha. The volumes of letters 'ra' and'va' are not yet published for referringRS and VB. But on approaching per-sonally the Editor and Staff*'" werekind enough to furnish informationfrom the material of New CatalogusCatalogorum. VB and RS have onlyone entry of the copy in Adyar library.The Adyar Library, Madras has onemanuscript with the title Virabhat tlva.The Oriental Institute, Mysore hastwo works of Revanasiddha but theycould not be perused. The informationavailable in the Descriptive Catalogueof manuscripts of that Institutesuggests that one copy with the titleVirabhatt iva may be identical to thecopy under study. Another work,though by Revanasiddha, is listedwith the title Sarvalokahita. Thecolophon runs "lti Revanasiddhavira-citayam Vlrabhat t ivanamankitam

Bull. Ind. Inst. Hist. Med. Vol. XX

Sarvalokahltarn." The colophon andthe beginning and ending versessuggest that the work may be different.This manuscript in Devanaqari scriptis incomplete and contains only onechapter, that too incomplete. Anothercopy of the manuscript is said to bepreserved in the Documentation andPublication Division of CCRAS, NewDelhi,

The manuscript in Adyar library,Madras has been perused. The manus-cript which was traced and given forstudy was not the original manuscriptlisted in the catalogue. It is a copyof the original manuscript. This wascopied by N. Ramachandra Bhatt in1940 in Devans qari script from theoriginal manuscript bearing No.8 J 57.The last few peges contain Teluguand Tamil notes on the preparation ofcertain medicines. This material isalso copied in Devanaqiri script. Theoriginal manuscript was not madeavailable for comparison which wouldhave helped checking certain wordsand clarifying some doubts. Thiscopy has one additional chapter-chapter 6 - which is absent in theNujividu copy. The contents of otherchapters in both these copies aresame. except few variations here andthere and some additional verses.The Nujividu manuscript was copiedby Vedantarn Kutumbaramacharvutuof Balliparru (Village) Post: Pamarru, .Gudivada Taluk, and Krishna district

**Grateful acknowledgements are due to the Editor and staff of New Cat. Cat. University of Madrasfor their cooperation.

Avurvedesere of Revanasiddha-Rama Rao

(Camp at Tadikonda of Guntur taluk).The copying was completed on17.9.41. The dates of completion ofthe copying of Chapter I and ChapterIV are given as 31.8.41 & 39.41respectively. This shows that thescribe had very leisurely copied this,since the whole manuscript couldhave been copied in a single day.

The scribe of the copy in AdyarLibrary, Madras appears to be Vais-nava. since at two places in this copythe word 'vlsnu' is substituted inplace of "deva",

Revanasiddha and his identity:Prof. P.V. Sharma has mentioned

the works on Rasag<'istra calledRasadarpana and Rasarajasfrornanlattributed to Revanasiddha. Thisinformation is based on the listsupplied by A. Siddhinandan Mishraof Varanasi. * There are no evidencesto identify all these Revanas and fixtheir time. Prof. K.R. Srikanta Murthyhas kindly passed on the followinginformation on Revanasiddha. Reva-nasiddha or Hevanacarva was oneamong the Pral)acaryas of Virasalvasect. He is said to be of divinedescent and to have lived about1082-1167 AD. He was an eruditescholar and an adopt in mantra,ventra, and rasavana and is said tohave written books on these subjects.

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Revanasiddhakalpa is available inOriental Research Institute, Mysore.This is incomplete and treats yantras,mantras and rasavanas, Anothermanuscript with the same title by aJain author is also available in thesame Library. Another book ascribedto Revanasiddha is also said to beavailable in Sarangamatha at KapadiSanqam. There are no evidences toestablish that the RS, author of Ayur-vedic work is same as the author ofthe other Ayurvedic and saiva works.

Authors and works quoted:After making obeisance to Lord

Dhanvantari, the God of medicine,the book gives the 'form' of physician.The form of physician has three heads,three eyes, six arms, four faces andeight legs. These are described asfollows:- Kalvana (7) Bhevajakaloaand Dravvasuddhi are the three heads.Sutrasthana. Nidana and Sarira arethe three eyes. Cudarnani, Ka~ali,Candraja, Karmaka, Nagarjuna, Kri-sheya are the six arms. Caraka,Sakhara, Sakta. Yamala are four faces.Rasarnava. Bahat a. Vasisrha, Virabha-t taka, Rasaputra, lndtasara. Sutraja,Yusrna are eight legs. In the abovesome words are not clear and someappear to be works and some othersto be authors.

After describing this, seme moreauthorities are listed under the head-

*This however. appears to be not only based on his list; works from some other lists are alsoincluded in it. Rasapradipika of Mangalagirisurin finds place in it. while this was brought to thenotice of Ayurvedic world by this author based on the manuscript available in APOM Library,Hyderabad.

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ing matabhedas i, e. differing authe n-tic views. The following are included.Hasamava. Bahata. Parijata, Karmukhi,Nagarjuna, Kapali, Darnodara. Rasa-putra, Indrasata, Sutataja, Yusmini,Kalvana. Bhesajakalpa, Sutrasthana.Sanqr aha, Somaparita, Vibhra (7)Sarira, Virabhat t aka, Sadyadi (7)S,ii.kteya,~akhara, Sornanatha, Maha-astra, Nandinatha, Rasendra, Asyi-neya, Ciic.lamal).i,Candrajnana, Krsne-yam Vasistha. Kalvanakaraka, Caraka,Yamala and Hasadarpana.

All these appear to be the name's'of either authors or works which werepopular and authentic during the timeof the author. The list appears to beone prepared at random. It is doubtfulwhether the author Revanasiddha hadseen all the works listed above. It fsalso significant that Susruta, Kasyapaare not mentioned. The inclusionofYarnala. Sakteya which are tantraworks indicates the relationship oftantra branch to Ayurveda duri'ngmedieval period.

Inclusion of Virabhattak~ 'is int~-resting. No other work with thename Vlrabhatt iva than the one underdescription is known. Why the authornamed his work as Virabhat tivaknowing that a work was alreadyexisting by the same name. is unex-plainable. The name Avurvedasaracan be justified with its meaning andsuits the work; but the name Virabha-t t iva. suqqestinq that it is composedby Virabhatta is also difficult toexplain. ..

Bu/!. Ind. tnst. Hist. Med. Vol. XX

Some names of the above listare common in South India and arereferred to in many works, manuscriptsand inscriptions. Sutrasthana, ~arira,Nagarjuna, Bbesajakalpa and Sanqrabahave been very popular.

Date:There are no evidences available

to decide the date. Even the manus-cripts are also recently copied. Thetwo manuscripts in Mysore are Palm-leaf manuscripts and hence may beconsiderably earlier than the two

'presented now. Even if the conditionof the manuscripts is good, they maynot be later than 17th and 18th Cen-tury and the author may not be laterthan 17th C. The identity of Revana-siddha, author of other works men-tioned, can be made only afterstudying and comparing them. Thoughthe work includes some tantric worksunder the authoritative texts men-tioned, it does not contain anymaterial of tantra nature except thenadivijfia na. A work attributed to aSiddha without much tantric practices,suggests that the author or the com-pilation may belong to 16th, 17thcenturies. The study of aII the othermanuscripts may throw further lighton the identity and date of Revana-siddha.

Contents: The work is divided intofive chapters and it contains a totalnumber of 244 verses. The sixthchapter of Adyar manuscript contains120 verses. The topics dealt with aregiven below:

Ayurvedasara of Revanasiddha-Rama Rao

Chapter I : Bhisaklaksanam, Mata-bhedah, persons who are not to betreated and are to be treated; threetypes of desa (region) dosas andr asas and their relationship, sariranirnava,

Chapter II: Classification of diffe-rent diseases; Karrnavidni (Karma-vipaka).

Chapter III : Dasavavunlrnava, effectsof the vitiated vavu and otherhumours.

Chapter IV : Niidisiistra.

Chapter V: Miscellaneous - A'ita-

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dasas. Pindavardhanavidhi, purusa-sm. vuqalajfianalaksanam, The ma-nuscript in Adyar Library has anadditional chapter.

Chapter VI : This is comparatively abig chapter with 120 verses. Thisdeals with the following:

Sonitavata laks ana ; dhanurvatalak ..sana, ast arasanam narnani, jvaropa-dravah, suddhalanqhana gUl)iiJ:!.atilanqhitalaksana: langhanavarja-laksana, apathvani, santatajvaralak-sana. jvaralaksananirnavakrama.aqniprarnana, jirnalaksana. prasnti-vatalaksana, dehalaksana. and nadi-nidanarn.

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