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. Objecting to this, he had asked Narayanaswami to writea book highlighting the special features of the Siddha system. 48 Narayanaswami,a practiced ayurvedic specialist with knowledge of both systems, begins his bookwith a history of siddha medicine. The recorded history of the Tamils is millionsof years old.A civilized society must naturally have had a system of medicinewhich catered to the health needs of its people.This was the Siddha system. Heattributes authorship of this ancient system to eighteen siddhars, who he describesas historical rather than mythological figures.Although he insists that he does notwant to enter into the debate on the primacy of siddha or ayurveda, he ascribesgreater antiquity to siddha medicine. It is well established that before the Aryansoccupied the Sind region and the Gangetic plain, there existed in the south, on thebanks of the rivers Cauvery, Vaigai, and Tamiraparani, a civilization which washighly organized.This civilization had a system of medicine to deal with the prob-lems of sanitation and treatment of diseases.This is the Siddha system. Althoughsiddha and ayurveda later came into contact and enriched each other.from thebeginning the Siddha system has maintained its identity. 49N.Subramaniam, a licensed Indian medical practitioner and graduate ofthe Government Indian Medical School of Madras, wrote a short booklet on thedevelopment of siddha medicine, published in 1940.He begins by thanking hiskraakuru , his selfless spiritual guru, none other than A.Chidambaranar, whoencouraged his entry into medicine.He begins his account in language reminiscentof that of his teacher. Experts do not doubt the ancientness and greatness of theTamil people.Tamils were cultured people 12,000 years ago. 50 Subramaniamlocates the beginnings of siddha medicine at that early date, which coincides withthe beginning of the first Tamil sangam.These ancient Tamils enjoyed men-tal and bodily health, respecting nature and living hygienically.51 Subramaniamcorruption of siddha medicine by ayurveda 93emphasizes that these ancient Tamils lived in ways appropriate to the Tamil soil,employing the language of autochthony common to formulations of siddha medi-cine.He follows Chidambaranar in giving precedence to Agastya, who receivedmedical knowledge from the god Murugan, which he then taught to other Tamilsiddhars, as well as to the Chinese.Agastya and other siddhars attained youth and52health for themselves, and they selflessly cared for others.N.Kandaswamy Pillaidraws on the Lemuria narrative for his history, locating the origins of Tamil civili-zation and siddha medicine on a vast continent several millions of years ago.Thepresent Tamil Nadu is only a tiny corner of the extensive continent which oncecovered the large expanse of the Indian Ocean and beyond.The fragmentation andsubmersion of that vast landmass, though a fact of millions of years old, still lingersin the racial memory of Tamilians. 53 Dr.Circapai writes from Kanchipuram thatsiddha is the oldest medicine in the world, and that it never borrowed from anyother system. Before Aryans, Mongolians, and other foreign peoples entered intomedical research, the Tamil peoples siddha medicine had attained full fruition,like other arts such as astronomy.This eminent art is unique to the Tamil land. 54Siddha vaidyas consistently highlight the ethnic purity of Tamil cultural traditionsas a response to histories that locate the achievements of Indian civilization inSanskritic culture.The Lemurian narrative is not the only myth of origins that vaidyas invoke.In1983, the Siddha Medical Textual Research Center gave first prize in an essay contestto Lakshmi Renganathan.Her essay begins, Tamil medicine, known as siddhamedicine, appeared on this earth on the third day as the waters dried and the landspread.When humans and other species were established on the earth, Shiva taughtUma the art of medicine in order to remove disease, increase health, and extendlives
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