Theriac Recipes (Dar ya kan) as Ultimate Cure Against Epidemics in Tibetan Medical and

Alchemical Literature of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries.

Carmen Simioli
(L’Orientale, University of Napoli)

1. Abstract

This essay traces a preliminary history of complex medical compounds known as theriaca (dar yak
an) in selected Tibetan medical and Buddhist tantric writings of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries
devoted to the cure of epidemics and poisons. The fortune of these recipes during this period can be
related to historical factors and to the multicultural nature of medical knowledge circulating across
the Mongol empire. This paper evaluates the role of Buddhist sources and lineages in legitimizing,
conveying and preserving medical and alchemical knowledge. It explores the meanings of these
recipes in these two contexts and demonstrates how they overlapped into the wider category of elixirs
of immortality (bdud rtsi), which play a pivotal role in alchemical and ritual writings. Starting with
an historical and literary overview, this paper analyses in detail the theriac recipes from the Great
Vase of the Amṛta of Immortality (’Chi med bdud rtsi bum chen, thirteenth century) and the Great
Golden Measure, Pith Instructions of the Brang ti Medical Lineage (Brang ti lha rje’i rim brgyud kyi
man ngag gser bre chen mo, fourteenth century). The descriptions of the speculative models on
epidemics and pharmacological formulae are examined to discuss the long-standing concepts of
recipes and epidemics within the broader historical framework of the global process of transfer and
transformation of medical and pharmacological knowledge in Eurasia.

Keywords: theriac, elixir of immortality, epidemics, poisons, global history.