Material aspects of some early modern Sri Lankan medical manuscripts
Dr. Anna Elizabeth Winterbottom (McGill University)
At McGill University, there is a collection of around 125 olas (palm leaf manuscripts), several of which are concerned with medicine, astrology, or veterinary medicine. These manuscripts were collected in the 1920s and 1930s by Casey Wood, an ophthalmological surgeon and keen collector of historical manuscripts. Most date from the Kandyan period (1595-1815). While several of the manuscripts are copies of well-known texts, like the Sinhalese Yogāratnākara, others are compilations of excerpts, prescriptions, and recipes made by physicians for personal use. In this talk, I will consider the material aspects of the texts, including the length of the leaves used for the text, the decoration of their covers, the buttons used to secure the cords, and the illustrations and decorations that many of these texts contain. I will argue that rather than acting solely as vehicles for medical knowledge, the texts were also considered to play an active role in healing through these material elements.