ABSTRACT
The greatest success of Hindu surgery was certainly in the plastic operations on the nose, and even at the present time the Indian technique is not infrequently resorted to. However, it is probable that the great majority belonged to the middle Hindu caste—the Vaisyas—comprising farmers and merchants; at a later date physicians were permitted to have as students members of almost any caste, excepting a Sudra. The medicine of the Medes and Persians somewhat resembled the Chaldean, but had a still closer analogy to that of their near relatives, the Hindus, with the important-difference that it produced no Susruta or Charaka. The medicine of the Medes and Persians seems to have been as conservative as their laws. The physician, the patient, the drugs, and the nurse represent the four pillars of medicine upon which recovery depends. Mention is there found of a special class of physicians.
