But for the proper study of the subject, a work exclusively devoted to Indian medicinal plants has been a great desideratum in the medical literature of India. Messrs. Hooker and Thompson writing as far back as 1855, said:—
"We have had a considerable experience both in medical and economic botany, and we announce boldly our conviction that so far as India is concerned these departments are at a standstill for want of an accurate scientific guide to the flora of that country."[1]
The flora of British India commenced by Sir Joseph Hooker in 1872 is now completed. The great value of this work as a scientific guide to the plants of this country can hardly be doubted. The foundation of a medical botany of India should be grounded on this work. In this medical botany should be included all the plants that are used medicinally by the natives of this country. A very large number, perhaps the vast majority of these plants, will be found perfectly useless, but in the present state of our knowledge we are not justified in excluding any from the list. The great aim of this work being to collect and identify the medicinal plants of the country, it should, after giving the plants its modern scientific name, insert the synonyms under which it was known in former times.
The value of Sanskrit and vernacular names of plants has been much questioned by botanists for purposes of identification. But, I think, these synonyms help a great deal towards identification.[2]
- ↑ Introductory Essay to the Flora Indica, p. 3, London, 1855.
- ↑ The importance of Sanskrit names of plants was fully understood by Sir William Jones, the President Pounder of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. More than a century ago he suggested that " the first step in compiling a treatise on the plants of India should be to write their true names in Roman letters, according to the most accurate orthography, and in Sanskrit preferably to any vulgar dialect; because a learned language is fixed in books, while popular idioms are in constant fluctuation, and will not perhaps be understood a century hence by the inhabitants of these Indian territories, whom future botanists may consult on the common appellations of trees and flowers." (Sir Wm. Jones' Works, Vol. II, London, 1799, p. 2.)
On another occasion Sir Wm. Jones said:—
"I am very solicitous to give Indian plants their true Indian appellation; because I am fully persuaded, that Linnaeus himself would have adopted them, had he known the learned and ancient language of this country. * * * Far am I from doubting the great importance of perfect botanical descriptions; for languages expire as nations decay, and the true sense of many appellatives in every dead language must be lost in the course of ages; but as long as those
