7.2 KiB
| title | chunk | source | category | tags | date_saved | instance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bower Manuscript | 3/3 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bower_Manuscript | reference | science, encyclopedia | 2026-05-05T16:24:34.791319+00:00 | kb-cron |
=== Medical treatises === Part I has 5 leaves, and the incomplete treatise ends abruptly. It is a fragment of a treatise on garlic, it medicinal properties and recipes, its use for eye diseases. It opens with a flowery description of the Himalayas, where a group of rishis reside, interested in the names and properties of medicinal plants. It mentions Hindu sages such as Ātreya, Hārīta, Parāśara, Bhela, Garga, Śāmbavya, Suśruta, Vasiṣṭha, Karāla, and Kāpya. Suśruta, whose curiosity is aroused by a particular plant, approaches muni Kāśirāja, enquiring about the nature of this plant. Kāśīrāja, granting his request, tells him about the origin of the plant, which proves to be garlic (Sanskrit laśuna), its properties and uses. The section on garlic consists of 43 verses in poetic meter. This section also mentions the ancient Indian tradition of "garlic festival", as well as a mention of sage Sushruta in Benares (Varanasi). This is the part where the initial 43 verses are in eighteen different, uncommon meters (Sanskrit prosody) such as the vasanta tilaka, trishtubh and arya, while the verses thereafter are in the shloka style. The verses credit the knowledge to past sages. Verse 9, for example, attributes the knowledge to Susruta, who received it from the sage king of Kashi. Part II abruptly ends on the 33rd folio of the Bower manuscript. It is voluminous, relative to the other six treatises, and contains medical prescriptions sections on powder, medicated ghee (clarified butter), oil, elixirs, aphrodisiacs, decoctions, dyes and ointments. It opens with a salutation addressed to the Tathāgatas, contains, as stated by the scribe, the Navanītaka text (lit. "cream" text), a standard manual (siddhasaṃkarṣa). Then it states its intention to provide 16 chapters of prescriptions (but the surviving fragment only provides 14, ending abruptly). According to G.J. Meulenbeld, "an important peculiarity of the Bower MS consists of its varying attitude towards the number of the doṣas [humours]. In many instances, it accepts the traditional number of three, vāta, pitta, and kapha, but in a smaller number of passages it also appears to accept blood (rakta) as a doṣa." Part III consists of 4 leaves and also ends abruptly on the obverse side of the folio (Part IV starts on reverse). It starts with the symbol Om as usual with the other treatises, and is a short treatise on 14 prescription formulary in a manner similar to Part II. It consists of 72 shlokas. It is a fragment whose contents correspond to chapters one to three of the Part II.
=== Divination treatises === Parts IV and V contain two short manuals of Pāśaka kevalī, or cubomancy, i.e., the art of foretelling a person's future by means of the cast of dice, a ritualistic practice found in Tibetan manuscripts. Part IV is almost complete, while the manual constituting Part V is markedly more fragmentary and defective. The dice is stated to be a group of three dice, each with four faces (tetrahedron) numbered 1, 2, 3 and 4. When cast, it would yield one of 64 possible casts, of which 60 combinations are listed in Part IV (the missing 4 may be scribal error or lost; but those 4 are mentioned in later verses). Hoernle mentioned that Part V is similar to other Sanskrit manuscripts discovered in Gujarat, and like it, these parts of the Bower manuscript may be one of the several recensions of a more ancient common source on divinatory work. These are traditionally attributed to the ancient sage Garga, but maybe an influence of the Greek oracle tradition during the post-Alexander the Great period.
=== Dharani treatises === Parts VI and VII contain two different portions of the same text, the Mahāmāyurī, Vidyārājñī, a Buddhist dhāraṇī-genre incantations text. The Mayuri text, in later centuries, became a part of the Pancha-raksha magical incantations group – one of the highly popular dharani sets in Buddhist communities in and outside India. Part VI of the Bower manuscript contains charms against cobra bite, while Part VII is for protecting against other evils befalling a person. Both these parts are a small select portion of the actual Mayuri text, and tiny compared to the much larger dharani compilations. Part VI is complete, written on better quality birch and is the most well preserved treatise in the Bower manuscript. According to Watanabe, the verses of these treatises as found in folio 49 to 54 of the Bower manuscript completely correspond to those found in Mahamayurividya-rajni verses of the Chinese Tripitaka, in particular to the 705 CE translation by I-tsing, the 746–771 CE translation by Amoghavajra, and the 516 CE translation by Sanghapala. Their shared source may be Pali verses in the Mora Jataka, with interpolations by Mahayana Buddhists of that era. These parts of the Bower manuscript also contain the name Yashomitra, likely the votary or the influential person for whom the manuscript was prepared. According to Hoernle, Yashomitra may well have been a Buddhist monk of great repute, the one for whom the stupa was built, and in whose memory the manuscript was prepared and buried in the stupa mound.
== Legacy == The discovery of the Bower Manuscript, its antiquity, and its decipherment by Hoernle triggered "enormous excitement" in the 1890s, states Wujastyk. Famous explorers were commissioned by some of the world's major powers of the era – such as Britain, Germany, Japan, France, Russia – to go on a Central Asia and Xinjiang expedition. They were to seek manuscripts and other ancient treasures. These expeditions yielded major discoveries such as the Dunhuang manuscripts, as well as famous forgeries such as those of Islam Akhun, in the decades that followed. The European Union-funded International Dunhuang Project has continued the legacy of the Bower manuscript which in part inspired Rudolf Hornle to seek funds from the then Government of India to finance the first 1900–1901 expedition of Marc Aurel Stein.
== References ==
=== Bibliography ===
=== Editions === A. F. Rudolf Hoernle, The Bower manuscript; facsimile leaves, Nagari transcript, romanised transliteration and English translation with notes (Calcutta: Supt., Govt. Print., India, 1908-1912. reprinted New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan, 1987. Rudolf Hoernle, Bower Manuscript Text and Translations, Part III to VII, 1897. (archive.org) Rudolf Hoernle, 1892 edition, Calcutta (indianculture.gov.in)
=== Further reading ===
Description of the Bower Manuscript, The Indian Antiquary, Vol XLIII, 1914 Dani, Ahmad Hasan. Indian Palaeography. (2nd edition New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1986). Review: The Bower Manuscript, ASI 1893–1912, F.E. Pargiter Peter Hopkirk, Foreign Devils on the Silk Road: The Search for the Lost Cities and Treasures of Chinese Central Asia (Amherst: The University of Massachusetts Press, 1980) ISBN 0-87023-435-8 Sander, Lore, "Origin and date of the Bower Manuscript, a new approach" in M. Yaldiz and W. Lobo (eds.), Investigating the Indian Arts (Berlin: Museum Fuer Indische Kunst, 1987). Sims-Williams, Ursula, Rudolph Hoernle and Sir Aurel Stein.