The Newsletter | No.61 | Autumn 2012 50 | The Network IIAS Outreach

Hortus Malabaricus in the year 2012

Introduced and compiled by Sandra Dehue, IIAS editor

n the context of the IIAS outreach programme, intended to promote greater public understanding of Asia, a lecture on Hortus Malabaricus [The Garden of Malabar] was organised on 27 June 2012, in the Hortus botanicus Leiden [botanical gardens]. Three distinguished speakers discussed the present-day value of this stunning and insightful 12-volume work, printed in between 1678-1693, containing approximately 700 illustrations of medicinal plants and the explanations of their workings.

The book was the product of a remarkable collaboration The former director of the Dutch National Herbarium, commercialisation, professionalisation and scientific Illustrations above between the former governor of Malabar, Hendrik van Prof. Pieter Baas, started the afternoon with an inspiring approach of traditional Indian medicine, such as Ayurveda. and below: Coconuts – Rheede, and a large number of Ayurvedic doctors, botanists, bio-historical lecture about the context and history of Prints from the Hortus translators and artisans from India and the Netherlands. Hortus Malabaricus. Renée Ridgway, a visual artist based The afternoon was held at the Hortus botanicus Leiden. Malabaricus. The entire This unique testimony of India’s immaterial cultural in Amsterdam, took over to speak about her interest in the The Hortus works closely with the National Herbarium publication, including illustrations, can be heritage remains significant today as an authentic and subject on the basis of two exhibitions in the Netherlands of the Netherlands (NHN), which houses original Latin and accessed through important source of traditional Indian knowledge of and India, and also introduced a new online community Dutch editions of, respectively, Hortus Malabaricus and www.botanicus.org. indigenous plants and their medicinal workings. 325 years platform (hortusmalabaricus.net). Lastly, Dr. Maarten De Malabaarse Kruidhof. The NHN recently merged with the after its first edition, Hortus Malabaricus has become Bode, medical anthropologist at the University of Naturalis Biodiversity Center in Leiden (www.naturalis.nl/en); topical once again, on account of its recent translation Amsterdam and the Institute for Ayurveda and Integrative with 5.5 million dried plant specimens, Naturalis BC houses into English and , by Prof. K.S. Manilal. Medicine in Bangalore, India, spoke about the practice, one of the largest herbarium collections in the world. The Newsletter | No.61 | Autumn 2012 The Network | 51

A bio-historical lecture VOC physician put together an enormous herbarium of plants from Ceylon. Hermann would later also Professor Pieter Baas advise Van Rheede on the compilation of Hortus Malabaricus.

Hendrik Adriaan van Rheede GIVING THANKS TO HANS HENIGER1 for his excellent thesis In 1656, at age twenty, Hendrik Adriaan Van Rheede joined as the source of information on the hero of the story, Hendrik the VOC and assisted Admiral Rijcklof van Goens in his cam- Adriaan van Rheede, Pieter Baas shared with us the exciting paigns against the Portuguese, mostly in Ceylon. In 1670, history of Hortus Malabaricus. Van Rheede was appointed Governor of Malabar on India’s west coast. Here, he became fascinated by the enormous During the 16th century, the quality of the serious study plant biodiversity, by what people knew about the plants of plants in Europe was given a huge impetus by Lucca Ghini’s and how they used them. Against the wishes of his patrons invention of the ‘herbarium method’: the pressing of plants in Ceylon, Van Rheede set up a laboratory in Cochin for the between two sheets of paper so that they could be preserved extraction of plants and the running of tests. Then he met in dry form. This signifi ed a huge breakthrough, as it enabled the ‘Discalced Carmelite’, Mattheus of St. Joseph, who had easy comparison of plants found in diff erent locations. It also already produced a large collection of drawings and water- led to the creation of ‘herbaria’ – collections, in book form, colours of medicinal plants. Together they agreed to compile of dried plants and drawings – some of the earliest of which an inventory of the most important plants of Malabar. found their way into the collections of the National Herbarium of the Netherlands. When, in 1677, the High Council of the VOC declared Malabar independent from Ceylon, Rijcklof van Goens became a The VOC and botanical inventory jealous rival. Faced with constant opposition, Van Rheede In 1602, the (VOC) was established fi nally resigned and returned to Amsterdam where he in Amsterdam, and was the world’s fi rst joint-stock limited continued to work on the Hortus Malabaricus. The fi rst liability company and commercial multinational. Carolus volume was printed in 1678, in Amsterdam, and Van Goens Clusius, renowned botanist and prefect of the Leiden Hortus was furious; surely the VOC realised that, as demonstrated botanicus, immediately recognised this as an important oppor- by Hermann, the best medicines came from Ceylon! The tunity to expand the plant collection of the Hortus and of the Lords XVII, however, were extremely pleased, and with their existing knowledge of the plant world. Through his infl uential support and the help from botanists from Amsterdam and contacts he was able to persuade the central administration of Utrecht, the fi nal volume was completed in 1693. the VOC, the Lords XVII, to send surgeons and pharmacists on its ships to Southeast Asia, to collect “laid between pieces of Without doubt, Van Rheede was the driving force behind Above: Henricus Translation into English and Malayalam paper, twigs with their leaves and fl owers”. With an enormous Hortus Malabaricus, but the creation of the book was the result Adrianus Van Rheede: 325 years later, and the work has fi nally become available shopping list of plants he wanted to be collected, along with of true teamwork. He was assisted by an advisory board of Hendrik Adriaan van in English and Malayalam, the language spoken by over records of their usages by the local population, Clusius factually Brahmins, his own staff and soldiers, a board of local physicians, Rheede tot Draken- 30 million people in the state of Kerala, thanks to 30 years dictated the botanical research agenda of the VOC. his assistant Itthy Achuden (who came from a family of stein (1636-1691). of arduous work by Prof. K.S. Manilal from Calicut University. Ayurvedic doctors), local coconut tree climbers, the already Manilal saw the huge importance of Hortus Malabaricus as Inset: Manilal’s The VOC also had a direct interest, namely the health of its mentioned Carmelite, two translators, and in Holland by pro- an authentic source of traditional Indian knowledge, of which English translation of employees in the East. The medicines that were sent from fessional botanists from Amsterdam and Utrecht, and various Hortus Malabaricus. all other sources had been lost to time. As a well-deserved Amsterdam, mostly consisting of exotic and expensive artists and Latin translators. The result was a 12-volume treatise tribute to his scholarship, on 1 May 2012, Queen Beatrix products from Arabia, were highly susceptible to mould, and with detailed copper plate engravings and descriptions of 690 of the Netherlands presented Manilal with the highest Dutch moreover, ineff ective against the tropical diseases encountered plant species, named in four languages (Latin, Malayalam, civilian award, ‘Offi cer of the Order of Orange Nassau’. in Asia. In 1671, VOC chief physician Cleyer, having learned Arabic and Kolkani). It was recently established that 689 of from his colleague Padbrugge about the successful treatment these 690 species are still found in the contemporary fl ora of Notes of tropical diseases with indigenous medicinal plants in Ceylon, Malabar, and that they are accurately described in the book 1 Heniger, J. 1986. Hendrik Adriaan van Reede tot Drakenstein urged the VOC to give more attention to indigenous plants for (one turned out to be a fantasy plant, probably based on a (1636-1691) and Hortus Malabaricus. A contribution to the the treatment of its own sick employees. In 1672, the German drawing of mixed fl owers, fruits and leaves). history of Dutch colonial botany.

Flower Power magnifi cently detailed. Besides that, what makes this 17th The third video A study into (un)becoming Dutch part I century compendium so special is that it is perhaps one of exposes various aspects of Dutch bureaucracy faced Renée Ridgway the fi rst documents archiving East-West collaboration,1 along by my Ayurvedic doctor and his decision to return to with its manifold functions: an illustrated botanical garden, the country of origin. Part II addresses the treatment of taxonomy of named plants, a medicinal bible, a translator’s my migration trauma, the cure being obtained through IN MY WORK AS A VISUAL ARTIST I use the VOC and WIC dictionary, or to some, such as myself, an object d’art. Ayurveda massage, which uses many of the herbs and (Dutch East and West India Companies) as a conceptual plants from Hortus Malabaricus. Also on display were paradigm in which to map and address specifi c traces of The Wanted Land: investigating motive and meaning approximately 150 indigenous plants contributed by colonial encounters still visible today. I decided to explore Hendrik van Rheede’s motivation that the local community, which are also found within drove him to produce such a book. Together with documentary Hortus Malabaricus. A copy of the original Latin edition I arrived in Fort Cochin on the , in 2007, to fi lmmaker Rick van Amersfoort I interviewed experts and and the recent (2008) Malayalam version were available investigate the remnants of Dutch colonial history, but also local people about their opinions, anecdotes and documents. for visitors to peruse the beautiful engravings and to for my own wellbeing; to obtain a cure and to investigate The more I fi lmed the more confl icting stories surfaced about view the fi rst printing of the Malayalam language. more about herbal plants. The curative properties of the content of the book. Whose knowledge was it? Were these plants were fi rst introduced to me in Amsterdam the medicinal workings still valid in 2012? Were the botanical HortusMalabaricus.net by my Ayurvedic doctor from Kerala, Thomas Punnen. drawings accurate? What would be the contemporary use, All research and interviews not While residing at Kashi Art Gallery in Mattancherry I met or value, of such a 17th century book of spices? only culminated in the two exhib- with owner, Anoop Scaria, and it was he who fi rst told me itions, but also led to the creation about Hortus Malabaricus. The outcome of these questions were the exhibitions of the online community platform ‘The Unwanted Land’, a group show at Museum Beelden aan ‘hortusmalabaricus.net’. This inter- Hortus Malabaricus Zee in the Netherlands (22 October 2011-14 February 2012) and active website explores the creation This extraordinary book, Hortus Malabaricus, is the earliest my solo exhibition ‘The Wanted Land’ (15-22 February 2012) of Hortus Malabaricus and extends comprehensive work on the fl ora of Malabar, illustrating at David Hall, in Fort Cochin, India – the exact location where its historical (oral/archival), artistic, around 740 indigenous plants that explain their medicinal historians believe Hortus Malabaricus was originally produced. medicinal, botanical, linguistic and properties, with captions in 4 languages (Latin, Malayalam, The exhibition consisted of 3 videos, each addressing diff erent political importance. It attempts Arabic, Kolkani). The former governor of Dutch Malabar, aspects of Hortus Malabaricus. to collate all information about Hendrik van Rheede, collaborated with local physicians, Above: website Hortus Malabaricus, enabling diverse perspectives, visions, botanists, translators, illustrators, engravers and clergymen The video The Wanted Land examines the VOC’s taking, homepage. histories, personal research, etc., to be shared in one to produce the publication. Yet, unlike many 17th century undertakings and un-doings that still form a part of virtual space. documents, the local contributors of this knowledge – the Fort Cochin’s contemporary landscape. It gathers family vaidyas Itty Achudan, RangaBhat, AppuBhat, Vinayaka Pandit genealogies, storytelling, and exchange of information Project participants, and anyone else who would like – do not remain unnamed, but instead have contributed as a re-viewing of history that favors oral traditions, to share their knowledge, are invited to upload personal sworn and signed statements of their collaboration. participation and vox populi perspectives over the texts, archives, images, videos and remarks to the site offi cial written narrative of historians, social scientists, and comment on the texts and contributions of others. Upon returning to the Netherlands I went to visit the anthropologists and sociologists. The multi-channel video Herbarium in Leiden, which housed an original Latin installation Commodore Odatha a.k.a. Hendrik van Reede Notes version of Hortus Malabaricus. I became enchanted tot Drakenstein raises questions about the legacy of Hortus 1 Manilal K.S., D.H. Nicolson, & C.R. Suresh. 1988. by its spectacular, detailed renderings of Malabar plants Malabaricus in 2012: what is the contemporary value of An Interpretation of Van Rheede’s Hortus Malabaricus. made from copper engravings based on original water- the knowledge contained in this book, how and why was Konigstein: Koeltz Scientifi c Books colors. Flowers, fruits, petals, seeds and even roots were it produced, and what were the incentives for this nobleman? The Newsletter | No.61 | Autumn 2012 52 | The Network

IIAS Outreach continued

Ayurveda in contemporary India1

Dr. Maarten Bode

IN THE THIRD LECTURE OF THE DAY, Maarten Bode discussed Pharmaceuticalisation and scientisation ayurveda’s contemporary face. He began with the remark Nowadays there is a focus on Evidence Based Medicine (EBM). that middleclass urban Indians use ayurveda as a back-up Bode feels that, in general, we must conclude that there is not when modern (bio)medicine fails to provide a solution to much modern pharmacological proof for the effi cacy of ayurvedic their ailments. For 30-40% of Indians, who live on one Euro medicines and treatments. On the other hand there is also no per day, however, ayurveda is often the fi rst option when research that shows that ayurvedic treatments do not work and one falls ill. Research suggests that the cultivation and use most western biomedical medicines and treatments are still not of just ten medical plants can reduce the health costs of this evidence-based either. There are three reasons for this lack of section of Indian society by 60%.2 This is signifi cant because scientifi c proof: heavy underinvestment in research on effi cacy, disease is the second largest cause of debt among India’s the lack of organised scepticism in the form of an ayurvedic fi nancially poor. research community, and the absence of treatment and research protocols that do justice to ayurvedic logic. Modern research According to Bode, contemporary ayurveda is shaped by models do not accommodate ayurveda’s therapeutic aims, such a large ayurvedic manufacturing industry, the struggle as building strong bodily tissues, cleaning channels, taking away for scientifi c respectability, and a diverse range of clinical blockages, ‘cooking’ food and expelling ‘poison’ (ama). Modern practices. Even though ayurveda originally provided people pharmacology does provide some evidence, though meagre, Malabar with a regimen for the perfection of body, psyche and soul, that supports the medical worth of amalaki, chyawanprash’s main in modern times the emphasis is on ayurvedic medicines. ingredient. Chyawanprash and amalaki have both been in use in Renee Ridgway And where the ayurvedic industry puts forth medical curative India for centuries and their biological and physiological eff ects claims for its products, learned ayurvedic practitioners favour have been empirically tested by many patients. food and behavioural regimens to medication. According DURING THE 17TH CENTURY, the Above: 1602 map to them, food is medicine and medicine is food; medicine is Practitioners Dutch captured many Portuguese-held by Petrus Bertius no use without food and lifestyle prescriptions, and medicine There are practitioners belonging to an ayurvedic oral command posts along the eastern showing south India is not needed when people adhere to the prescribed course tradition and those who are very scholarly and base their (Coromandel) and western (Malabar) with Malabar region of therapy. treatments upon a corpus of Sanskrit medical texts. There coasts of India, including Fort Cochin in the far south-east (delineated by are those who practise at the margins of legitimacy and those where they set up their own trading dotted line). Health products who hold a college or university degree. At the moment India post within the territory that became To show the contemporary has approximately 600,000 college and university educated known as Dutch Malabar, extending relevance of the Hortus ayurvedic practitioners. Most of them, roughly 70%, use their along the southwestern coast of Malbaricus, Bode focussed ayurvedic degree as a backdoor into biomedical practice. modern day Kerala. on amla or amalaki A second large group of ayurvedic graduates are in govern- (Emblica offi cinalis, Phylantis ment service – approximately 120,000 practitioners. The third This is still one of the most bio-diverse emblica). In part I of the category of ayurvedic practitioners consists of about 60,000 regions in the world, with a tropical Hortus Malbaricus this Indian graduates; even though they sell ayurvedic medicines to their climate that supports an extensive gooseberry is portrayed patients, they do not accompany these with strict regimens variety of spice, medicinal herbs and and described on pp. 69-70. regulating food and lifestyle. Their patients usually expect other valuable plants. It was this The berry is also the main their ayurvedic medicines to do the same job as biomedical bio-diversity that made the area so ingredient of chyawanprash, pharmaceuticals, but without the harmful side-eff ects ascribed desirable to traders since ancient times. India’s best-selling ayurvedic to the latter. Only a small majority of ayurvedic degree holders In particular the Dutch attempted to health product. In 2002 the – probably no more than 10,000 – practise in an authentic way. impose a monopoly on the black pepper sales were estimated at $70 million, almost one tenth of the These authentic ayurvedic practitioners have been trained from the region, still known today as total sales of ayurvedic health and beauty products at that in colleges and universities, but have importantly also taken ‘Malabar Gold’. Although ‘spices’ lured time. Dabur India Ltd. is its largest producer and holds 60% an apprenticeship with a practitioner (often) belonging to European merchants to the Malabar, of the market share of chyawanprash. Dabur has popularised a prestigious family line of traditional healers.3 in these so-called colonies they encoun- the formula’s indications of use and converted the tonic into tered unfamiliar diseases and sicknesses a daily necessity as an important source of vitamin C and as In addition to those holding a degree, there are approximately all the while remarking in their travel an ‘immunity booster’ for fi ghting ‘the stress and strain of one million part-time ayurvedic practitioners, including half notes how healthy and thriving the local modern city life’. Health products like chyawanprash promise a million Traditional Birth Attendants (TBAs), who, besides population lived and prospered. Thus to make users eff ectively modern, e.g., successful in India’s delivering babies, mainly treat the health problems of women the impetus for well-being and survival competitive job market and as a spouse and parent. Another and children. Then there are hundred-thousands of herbal healers in a strange environment inspired their example of such a product is the liver booster Livotrit from who treat a range of common ailments and chronic conditions. determination to procure knowledge the based manufacturer Zandu – like Dabur one of There are also many specialists who treat ailments of the eyes, of medicinal plants. the largest ayurvedic manufacturers. These modern rasayanas ears, skin, as well as muscular and nervous disorders. Others (‘promotive treatments’; as one of the ayurvedic eight sub attend to emergencies such as snakebites and other cases disciplines, increasing the self-healing potential of the human of poisoning. Some manage broken bones and deformities of body is an important objective of ayurveda) are marketed as the legs, ankles and feet. And there are those knowledgeable products that fi ght the toxins of modernisation such as stress, housewives, who practise folk medicine for the benefi t of family a westernised lifestyle marked by the consumption of modern members and neighbours. They are often the fi rst line of medicines and alcohol, and environmental degradation. defence in the treatment of common and chronic ailments.

A recent initiative by the Department of Ayurveda, Above left: Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy Bone setting clinic (AYUSH) and the Indira Gandhi National Open University in South India (IGNOU) promotes a unique programme for assessing (folk healers). and accrediting the knowledge and skills of these folk Left: Advert for an practitioners. This accreditation project also off ers clinical ayurvedic liver tonic: training. It is expected that training and accreditation will ‘taking away the eventually boost the skills, the prestige and the morale toxins of modernity’. of local healers. Further professionalisation is much needed to sift the wheat from the chaff . Near left: Ayurvedic degree holder (BAMS) in his clinic. Notes 1 The full article on which this lecture was based, can be downloaded from the IIAS website: www.iias.nl/event/hortus-malabaricus-anno-2012 2 Bodeker, Gerry & Gemma Burford (eds.). 2007. Traditional, Complementary and Alternative Medicine: Policy and Public Health Perspectives. London: Imperial College Press. 3 Bode, Maarten. 2012. ‘Ayurveda in the 21st Century: Logic, Practice, and Ethics’, in Leena Abraham & V. Sujatha (eds) Medical Pluralism in Contemporary India, New Delhi: Orient Blackswan, pp. 59-76.