Ayurveda and Philology: Gangadhar Ray Kaviraj and His Legacy

Over the past decades, the practice of Ayurveda and other traditional medical systems of South Asia spread to such a degree that in 2014 the Government of India formed the Ministry of AYUSH (an acronym for Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy) to ensure the optimal development and propagation of AYUSH systems of health care. It is the wide spreading and popularization of Ayurveda that makes it more urgent to gain a deeper understanding of the formative stages that led to the present configuration of this medical tradition. The project addresses a most significant stage in the history of Ayurveda by exploring the interplay between Ayurveda and the Sanskritic culture during the colonial period. Its main focus is the editorial and interpretative activity of Gangadhar Ray Kaviraj (17981885), who was editor and commentator of a foundational work of Ayurveda, the Carakasamhita, composed in Sanskrit around the beginning of the 1st millennium CE. The project will edit and study Sanskrit texts composed by or related to Gangadhar. Moreover, the project will explore the cultural background of Ayurveda in 19th century South As ia and Gangadhars legacy in the making of modern Ayurveda, with special regard to issues of canon formation and professional identity. The methodological assumption is that, even if historical documents are scarce (as it is typically the case in South Asia), nevertheless ideas, practices, and dynamics concerning or surrounding texts can in fact be reconstructed by analysing the texts themselves and the context of their production. The project will show challenges and possibilities offered by this kind of analysis also by carefully considering the interplay between different actors of the texts transmission and circulation. Its achievements will form a vantage point for the study of forms and uses of philology in 19th and early 20th century South Asia.