Health and Hygiene in Vedic Literature

From the time immemorial rather from the very beginning of human existence the health-care system came into existence in some form or other. Suffering of human-beings gave impetus to search the Vedic seers made use of the instinctive understanding of living creatures, medicinal plants and natural resources. An active and disease-free long life find expression in the Veda which gives hint that maintenance of good health was a desideratum in the then society. In the hymns of the Veda the mention of swen basic elements (sapta dhatu), the basic tenets of ‘tridosa’, known as vata, pitta and kapha are found which later developed as the basis of the Ayurvedic science. It is interesting to note that the application, the properties, the classification of medicinal plants which acted as the healing agents of diseases at an early age, have been mentioned in the Vedic hymns. The Vedic people have thorough knowledge of all the parts of the human body, the digestive system, the blood circulation, the process of surgery and effects of poison on body etc. So all these early scientific observations and speculations can be traced in a rudimentary form in the Vedic and post-Vedic literature. In this book the endeavour is to find out a comprehensive idea of medical knowledge and the elementary process, undertaken by the Vedic people to maintain health and hygiene in ancient times. This effort will be fulfilled if the readers and research scholars are benefited with it.