Fwd: [INDOLOGY] Mangala- title for brahmin physicians

Sat May 12 23:54:53 UTC 2012

Dominik,

As regards D.S. Sircar's conclusions, his statement in footnote 5 that "The village Vaidyas in South India are barbers," gives us the underlying reason for his conclusions. Similar belief in barbers alone being the Tamil Vaidyas seems to have influenced E. Hultzsch more than a century ago and Y. Subbarayalu recently. In his book "South India Under the Cholas", p. 52, Subbarayalu says: 

"Another piece of somewhat tantalizing evidence comes from a Tanjavur inscription of Rājarāja I, which refers to an almost similar title, Pañchavan-maṅgala-pēraraiyan . It is interesting to note that E. Hultzsch has translated this title as ' the great lord of the barbers of the Pāṇḍya king'. Araiyan Bavaruddiran, who held this title is said to have been assigned the duty of kōlinamai. Unfortunately, there is no known lexical authority to interpret the significance of the term kōlinamai. Perhaps this is related to kōl or kattari-kōl meaning scissors. In any case it may have something to do with medical practice as the immediately preceding functionary is an ambaṭṭa  (that is, ambashṭa) with the title Rājarāja-prayōgada-araiyan. Prayōga in Sanskrit means, among other things, application of medicine and ambashṭa in Sanskrit is a Vaidya too."

Unfortunately, barbers are not the only Tamil Vaidyas. (Our own family Vaidya was a Vaishnava Brahmin.) Moreover, Hultszch and Subbarayalu have neglected to discuss an important piece of information in the Tanjavur inscription that Subbarayalu mentions above. See South Indian Inscriptions, vol.2, no.66 at http://tinyurl.com/6w82txp
. If you scroll down, the relevant lines to be noted are 497 and 498. Line 497 does not have any word to indicate that the person was a barber. Hultzsch has made that assumption based on the 'mangala' title. (The person Subbarayalu calls 'the immediately preceding functionary' is actually mentioned in the following line, no. 498.) As for line 498, the word 'Ambaṭṭaṉ' is there. But so is the word 'Śaḍaṅgavi' ('Caṭaṅkavi' according to Tamil Lexicon system of transliteration) meaning 'Shaḍaṅgavid'.  Hultzsch had ascribed the meaning 'barber' to the word 'Ambaṭṭaṉ' based on its usage in modern times not realizing that it could have referred to a different person in the 11th century. But in doing so, he has discounted the significance of the word 'Śaḍaṅgavi' which refers to 'one well-versed in the six Vedāṅgas' and usually refers to Brahmins. If Hultzsch was reluctant to consider the person as a Brahmin because his gotra was not mentioned, it should be noted that in inscriptions there are many instances when a Brahmin's gotra is not mentioned as in (SII vol.2, no.31). If 'Śaḍaṅgavi' is taken to refer to the person's expertise in Vedāṅgas, then we have an one part-name, Kōṉ, as the proper name of the person instead of the often-expected father's name followed by the person's given name. But if we look at many 'Shaḍaṅgavid' names in SII vol.2, no. 99, we find many Shaḍaṅgavids with an one-part given name. For instance, see donee number 7 in the table in http://tinyurl.com/788vq9d . 

As for Hultzsch's assumption (which is followed by Subbarayalu) that the maṅgala/maṅkala title refers to barbers, we should note that in 1016-17 CE, a person by the name, Kṣatriyaśikhāmaṇi Vaḷanāṭtu Brahmadeya Marucalnāṭṭu Pūtannūr Vaṇṇak Kaṇṇuvan Araiyan Pācuran-ampalavan Maṅkalaperaraiyan, was given some land and house-site so that he and his descendants could provide Vaidya services. Here Kaṇṇuvan refers to Kāṇva gotra. It is absolutely clear that the donee was a Brahmin with a 'maṅgala'/'maṅkala' title, who provided medical services  

In summary, any conclusion that Tamil/South Indian barbers went to Bengal and became Vaidyas is untenable if it is only based on the presence of 'Ambaṭṭan' or 'mangala'/'maṅkala' in the names of such persons.

Regards,
Palaniappan

>> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Dominik Wujastyk <wujastyk at GMAIL.COM>
>> To: INDOLOGY <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
>> Sent: Tue, May 1, 2012 1:37 am
>> Subject: [INDOLOGY] Fwd: [INDOLOGY] Mangala- title for brahmin physicians
>> 
>> In a 1953-54 article in EI, D. C. Sircar noticed a plate that mentions Ambaṣṭhas of Tamil Nadu, and DCS suggested that they were Vaidyas
>> who moved from S. India to Bengal and helped to crystallize the Bengal Vaidya tradition.  There is a long history to the Ambaṣṭhas, going back to the Pāli Canon at least.  I'm not aware of a specific study of this group (and would be grateful for any reference), but they are routinely considered to be barber-surgeons, pretty much in the same mould as the European barber-surgeons.  
>> 
>> @ARTICLE{sirc-raks,
>>   author = {Dinesh Chandra Sircar},
>>   title = {6. {Rākshaskhāli (Sundarban)} Plate; {Śaka} 1118},
>>   journal = {Epigraphia Indica},
>>   year = {1987},
>>   volume = {30},
>>   pages = {42--3},
>>   annote = {(1953--54)},
>> }
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Dr Dominik Wujastyk
>> Department of South Asia, Tibetan and Buddhist Studies,
>> University of Vienna,
>> Spitalgasse 2-4, Courtyard 2, Entrance 2.1
>> 1090 Vienna
>> Austria
>> Project | home page | PGP | Free Dropbox account 
>> 
>> 
> 

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