# sparśana (स्पर्शन)

> Canonical version of this page: https://nighantu.ageayurveda.com/lexicon/sparshana/

An Ayurvedic technical term, rendered into English in 4 different ways.
The renderings do not agree, and the difference between them changes what the term is taken
to mean.

## Identification

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Transliteration | sparśana |
| Devanagari | स्पर्शन |
| Also written | sparshana pariksha, sparsana, sparshanendriya (homonym) |
| Category, as gathered | pariksha |
| Grouped under | Examination and treatment |
| Classical citations | 4 |
| Citations checked | 2026-10-07 |

## How it is translated, and whether the translation holds

Each rendering is given with the source that uses it. The assessment is ours.

### palpation (sparshana)

WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda (2022) · ITA-4.7.2 trividhaparīkṣā (darśana, sparśana, praśna); index lists sparśana under ITA-4.7.2 · comparator-standard

WHO gives sparśana no headword of its own. Separately ITA-3.10.9 'Tactile sense faculty' = tvagindriyam, sparśanendriyam.

Reproduced unaltered and attributed from the WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda, which is what that
licence permits, and deliberately absent from the downloadable dataset, which is CC BY 4.0.

### examined by the (physician's) hand

Kaviratna, Charaka Samhita Vi 4, aphorism 10 (= standard 4/7) · p. 498 · public-domain-translation

Charaka's verb phrase (sparśaṃ ca pāṇinā) rather than the noun sparśana.

### perceptible by the sense of touch

Bhishagratna, Sushruta Samhita Su 10 · wisdomlib doc122899 · public-domain-translation

Sense-based framing.

### touching, percussion, palpation / tactile examination

common textbook renderings (also the WebSearch summary of easyayurveda AH Su 1 glossing 'Sparshana (touching, percussion, palpation)') · n/a · textbook · our paraphrase of the source, not its words

'Percussion' is a biomedical addition not in the Sanskrit.

## The classical passages

### Ashtanga Hridaya Sutrasthana 1:22, checked against the source

> दर्शनस्पर्शनप्रश्नैः परीक्षेत च रोगिणम्| रोगं निदानप्राग्रूपलक्षणोपशयाप्तिभिः||२२||

tr. none (Sanskrit only; no public-domain English) · https://easyayurveda.com/2012/08/31/ashtanga-hrudaya-sutra-sthana-chapter-1-basic-principles-of-ayurveda/

sparśana as the second of the three methods of patient examination; this is the locus of the term as a method-name.

### Charaka Samhita Vimanasthana 4:standard 4/7; Kaviratna 10, checked against the source

> The touch, normal or abnormal (of the patient's body), should be examined by the (physician's) hand. Thus is explained the examination (of patients) by Observation, and by Inference as partially treated.

tr. Avinash Chandra Kaviratna · https://archive.org/stream/BIUSante_47357/BIUSante_47357_djvu.txt

Touch is one of the five sense-channels of pratyakṣa in Charaka, not a separate named method. Sanskrit: 'स्पर्शं च पाणिना प्रकृतिविकृतियुक्तम्। इति प्रत्यक्षतोऽनुमानादुपदेशतश्च परीक्षणमुक्तम् ॥७॥' (siva.sh).

### Sushruta Samhita Sutrasthana 10:Sanskrit verse number not established, checked against the source

> The heat and coldness of the body, or the gloss, roughness, hardness, or softness of the skin of the affected part as in fever, or in an edematous swelling of the body, are perceptible by the sense of touch.

tr. Kaviraj Kunja Lal Bhishagratna · https://www.wisdomlib.org/hinduism/book/sushruta-samhita-volume-1-sutrasthana/d/doc122899.html

Content of tactile examination.

### Sharngadhara Samhita Pūrvakhaṇḍa 3:1, checked against the source

> करस्याङ्गुष्ठमूले या धमनी जीवसाक्षिणी| तच्चेष्टया सुखं दुःखं ज्ञेयं कायस्य पण्डितैः ||१||

tr. none (Sanskrit OCR) · https://archive.org/download/sharngadhara_samhita_madhya_202001/sharngadhara_samhita_purva_djvu.txt

Pulse examination, the most elaborated post-classical application of sparśana.

## Not to be confused with

- **sparśa-parīkṣā (aṣṭasthāna item).** Site/quality examined versus the method; Yogaratnakara's sparśa is one of eight sites, Vagbhata's sparśana is one of three methods.
- **sparśanendriya (WHO ITA-3.10.9).** The tactile sense faculty (= tvagindriya), a homonym of the method.
- **nāḍīparīkṣā.** A specialised sparśana; not present in Charaka/Sushruta.
- **darśana.** Inspection; in AH the two are coordinate methods, but Charaka folds both into pratyakṣa.
- **percussion.** Biomedical technique often added in textbook glosses; the classical descriptions (Charaka, Sushruta) list only felt qualities.

## Renderings that do not hold

- percussion. Not in the Sanskrit; added by analogy with biomedical examination.
- massage / touch therapy. sparśana here is diagnostic, not therapeutic.

## Citation

Age Ayurveda Nighantu, "sparśana", https://nighantu.ageayurveda.com/lexicon/sparshana/, CC BY 4.0.
Whole lexicon: https://nighantu.ageayurveda.com/lexicon.json and https://nighantu.ageayurveda.com/lexicon.csv.

Educational reference only. A term entry explains what a word means and how it has been
translated. Nothing here is advice.