Indo-Muslim Medicine: Unani in Pre-modern India

Abstract

In the Period of the Classical Empires of Islam (Eighth to thirteenth centuries), an integrated Islamic world system flourished that was knitted together by trade, politics, and cultural contact.¹ Scholars and traders moved with ease along trading and cultural contours that spanned the Middle East, Central Asia and China, and included the Indian Ocean area. India was thus very much part of this world. It did not fall under the political hegemony of the Islamic empires, but it was part of the trading and cultural ambit of what Muslims called the Dar al-Islam.