Jahangir's interest in public health and medicine.

ABSTRACT

Jahangir, after his accession on the 24th October, 1605 A.D. passed twelve orders, as we learn from his Memoirs (Tuzuk-e-Jahangiri). According to fifth order manufacturing and sale of Rice-Spirit and any kind of intoxicating drug were forbidded. The tenth order was for the foundation of free hospitals and appointment of physicians in all the great cities of the empire. We learn from Edward Terry who was in India from 1615-18 A.D. that the common diseases of the time included the venereal disease, which was possibly syphilis. In the twelfth year of his reign Jahangir passed orders prohibiting smoking tobacco. In Tuzuk we find that in the third year of his reign a doe was brought to Jahangir, it was milked. Here Jahangir says that the milk of a she-antelope was believed to be a remedy for asthma. In the eighth year of his reign he tried to test the milk of a tigress which was brought to his court. He, however, failed to get the milk of the tigress. Here he says that, it was heard from philosophers that the milk of a tigress was highly useful for brightening eyes. Jahangir's belief in spiritual help in curing diseases is reflected in the fact that in the ninth year of his reign when he fell ill, he took a vow that after recovery he would make holes in his ears to declare that he owed his very existence to Khawaja Muinu-ddin and so he was Khawaja's ear-bored slave. After recovery he did accordingly and wore a pearl in each of his ears. Shaykh Hasan or Hassu whose father and grand father were surgeions of Akbar's times was a surgeon and a childhood friend of Jahangir. Jahangir after his accession made him governor of Gujarat and gave him the title of Mukarrab Khan. Another physician Hakim Ali whome Akbar had once sent as ambassador to Bijapur and was made a commander of 700 on his return, was made commander of 2,000 by Jahangir.