Pandit Ballala describes an interesting surgical operation which was performed on King Bhoja at that period. The patient was suffering from severe pain in the head, and, his condition becoming critical, two brother-physicians happened to arrive in Dhar, who, after carefully considering the case, came to the conclusion that a surgical operation was necessary to give relief. They are said to have administered to him a drug called sammohini to render him insensible, and while he was completely under its influence they trepanned his skull and removed the real cause of the complaint. They closed the opening, stitched up the wound, and applied a healing balm.
After the operation, they are said to have administered to the King a drug called sanjivini, to accelerate the return of consciousness and to minimise the chances of death.
An antient Chinese anæsthetic
It is recorded that “a Chinese physician named Hoa-Tho, who lived about A.D. 220 or 230, was accustomed to administer to his patients on whom he wished to perform painful operations, a preparation called ‘Ma-yo’ (Indian hemp, probably), the effect of which was that, after a few moments, they became insensible as if they were deprived of life.”
Miss Isabella Bird, when visiting the Tung-wah Hospital, in Hong-Kong, states: “The native surgeons do not use chloroform in operations, but they possess drugs which throw their patients into a profound sleep, during which the most severe operations can be performed. One of them showed me a bottle containing a dark brown powder, which, he said, produced this result; but he would not divulge the name of one of its constituents, saying it was a secret taught him by his tutor.”
From very early times the fumes of burning lycoperdon (Lycoperdon gygantum) have been used for stupefying bees before taking honey from the hive.
Thus it will be seen from the many allusions we have quoted from writers in the early ages, it is evident that mandragora and Indian hemp were the two drugs which were more or less in general use as anæsthetics in antient times.
Anæsthetics in the Middle Ages
An early Irish anæsthetic
In a Celtic manuscript of the twelfth century on materia medica, a preparation called “potu oblivionis” is mentioned, of which mandragora was probably an ingredient. A draught of this preparation was used by the early Irish to induce sleep.