INDIA xxxiii. INDO-MUSLIM PHYSICIANS

Medicine (ṭebb, pezeški) constitutes the scientific field on which the largest corpus of works has been composed in Muslim India. Most of these works were written in Persian, and to a lesser extent in Arabic, and later in Urdu from the Colonial period. Main scholars and authors were often attached to the courts of Indian sultans and many composed medical works for Muslim nobles. Several medical scholars occupied also important functions in the administration of Indo-Muslim states. For centuries since the medieval period, many physicians (ḥakim, pl. ḥokamāʾ) migrated to India from Persia and Central Asia and played, until the 17th century, a prominent role among the medical elite attached to the Indian courts. The hegemonic presence of Persian physicians characterized important courts, such as those of the Mughal Jalāl-al-Din Akbar (r. 1556-1605) and the Qoṭbšāh of Golconda. Muslim monarchs established hospitals in several cities, such as Delhi, Mandu, Bidar, Hyderabad, Agra, Fāteḥpur Sikri, Ahmadabad, and in those of Bidar and Etawah Indian physicians were also employed. The medical literature authored by Indo-Muslim physicians is mostly composed as new works and for the most part consists of manuals and monographic treatises