# upadhātu (उपधातु) > Canonical version of this page: https://nighantu.ageayurveda.com/lexicon/upadhatu/ An Ayurvedic technical term, rendered into English in 5 different ways across 6 sources. The renderings do not agree, and the difference between them changes what the term is taken to mean. ## Identification | Field | Value | | --- | --- | | Transliteration | upadhātu | | Devanagari | उपधातु | | Also written | upadhatu, upa-dhatu, upadhātuḥ, secondary tissue (rendering, not alternate) | | Category, as gathered | dhatu | | Grouped under | Body: tissues, wastes and channels | | Classical citations | 7 | | Citations checked | 2026-10-08 | ## How it is translated, and whether the translation holds Each rendering is given with the source that uses it. The assessment is ours. ### Supportive structural component WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda · ITA-2.3.1 (section 2.3 Supportive structural components) · standard WHO's headword, and its description carries the defining criterion: 'formed from the fundamental structural components; they do not undergo further transformation'. That non-transformation clause is the whole distinction from dhātu and it deserves to be the centre of the entry. 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. ### Breast milk (stanyam, ITA-2.3.2); Menstrual blood (ārtavam, ITA-2.3.3); Tendon (kaṇḍarā, ITA-2.3.4); Intramuscular fat (vasā, ITA-2.3.5) WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda · ITA-2.3.2 to ITA-2.3.5 · standard WHO gives only four members their own entries but names seven in the ITA-2.3.1 description: 'breast milk, menstrual blood, tendons, tubular structures of the body, muscle fat, skin and sinews'. The three without entries are siras, tvak and snāyu. 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. ### (no term; the word is absent) Charaka Samhita, tr. Avinash Chandra Kaviratna (1896-1913) · full-text search of the complete volume · translation · our paraphrase of the source, not its words The string 'upadhatu' occurs ZERO times in Kaviratna's Charaka. The content is present at Chikitsasthana 15 but the category is not named. This is a substantive finding, not a gap. ### (no term; the word is absent) Sushruta Samhita, tr. Kunja Lal Bhishagratna (1907-1916) · full-text search of both volumes · translation · our paraphrase of the source, not its words Also zero occurrences across both volumes. The only 'upadh' strings are the proper name Aupadhenava. Neither public-domain English translation of the Brihat Trayi uses the word. ### secondary tissue Common modern Ayurvedic teaching · textbook · our paraphrase of the source, not its words The dominant modern rendering. 'Secondary' suggests lesser importance, which is not what upa- carries here; the classification is about transformational dead-end, not rank. ### by-product / sub-tissue Occasional textbook usage · textbook · our paraphrase of the source, not its words 'By-product' collides badly with mala, which is the actual waste fraction. Recorded because it circulates. ## The classical passages ### Charaka Samhita Chikitsasthana 15:16 in Kaviratna's marginal numbering; carakasamhitaonline cites this content as Cha. Sa. Chikitsa Sthana 15/17, checked against the source > As regards women, from 'Rasa' are both milk and blood ; from blood are ducts large and small ; from flesh is fat or adeps and six varieties of skin ; and from adeps is the origin of the tendons and muscles. tr. Avinash Chandra Kaviratna (1896-1913) · https://archive.org/stream/BIUSante_47357/BIUSante_47357_djvu.txt The locus classicus for the upadhātu list, WITHOUT the word upadhātu. Milk and menstrual blood from rasa; vessels from rakta; vasā and the six skin layers from māṃsa; tendons from medas. Kaviratna frames it as something 'especial' that happens in women, which the standard modern presentation does not. ### Charaka Samhita Chikitsasthana 15:16, translator's footnote, checked against the source > The growth of the 'dhatus', as explained in 15, is true in the case of both males and females. In the case of the latter, something especial happens ; that is stated in 16. Thus from blood, besides flesh, are the ducts tr. Avinash Chandra Kaviratna (1896-1913), translator's footnote · https://archive.org/stream/BIUSante_47357/BIUSante_47357_djvu.txt Kaviratna's own reading, that the whole upadhātu passage is about what is additional in women. Whether the mula supports that restriction is an open question and it matters, because modern tables present the upadhātus as universal. OCR renders 'flesh' as 'jlesh'; corrected here only in that the intended word is obvious. ### Charaka Samhita Chikitsasthana 15:18, checked against the source > The above are the transformations of 'Prasada.' That which Is called the 'Kitta' (refuse) of the food taken, consists of stools and urine ; the 'Kitta' of 'Rasa is phlegm ; that of blood is bile ; that of flesh are the filths of the body, including the secretions (from the nose, the ears, &c.) ; while sweet forms the 'Kitta' of adeps, tr. Avinash Chandra Kaviratna (1896-1913) · https://archive.org/stream/BIUSante_47357/BIUSante_47357_djvu.txt That the text explicitly separates the prasāda transformations (the upadhātu list) from the kiṭṭa list (the malas). The sentence 'The above are the transformations of Prasada' is the textual boundary between the two categories, and it is the strongest evidence in this record set that upadhātu and mala are distinct in the mula even though the mula names neither. ### Sushruta Samhita Sutrasthana 15:prose section, corresponds to the mula verses on bodily principles, checked against the source > The Artavam (menstrual blood) is endued with the same properties as its arterial namesake, and is one of the essential factors in a woman which makes impregnation possible. ... The breast-milk in its turn tends to bring about an expansion of the mammae (of a woman), and maintains the life of her child (by supplying it with the necessary and nutritive element of food). These Vayu, etc. should be duly preserved in their normal condition. tr. Kunja Lal Bhishagratna (1907-1916) · https://archive.org/stream/b24758619_0001/b24758619_0001_djvu.txt That Sushruta treats ārtava and stanya alongside the doṣas, dhātus and malas as things whose increase and decrease must be assessed - i.e. as bodily principles in their own right - without assigning them to a named intermediate category. ### Sushruta Samhita Sutrasthana 15:kshaya prose sections, checked against the source > In the case of loss or waste of the catamenial flow, the menses do not appear at the appointed time or are scanty. The vagina seems stuffed and painful. ... The loss or waste of breast-milk is characterised by a shrunken condition of the mammas, and suppression or scanty secretion of the fluid. tr. Kunja Lal Bhishagratna (1907-1916) · https://archive.org/stream/b24758619_0001/b24758619_0001_djvu.txt Full kṣaya descriptions for ārtava and stanya, parallel in form to those given for the seven dhātus. Structurally they are treated as members of the same list. ### Sushruta Samhita Sutrasthana 15:prose section on vasa, checked against the source > This fatty matter (Vasa) predominates in the female organism and produces its peculiar softness, beauty and pleasing shape, causes the growth of scanty but soft hair on its surface. tr. Kunja Lal Bhishagratna (1907-1916) · https://archive.org/stream/b24758619_0001/b24758619_0001_djvu.txt Sushruta's treatment of vasā, which WHO classes as the upadhātu of māṃsa (ITA-2.3.5), but which Sushruta discusses within the medas section. ### Sharngadhara Samhita Purvakhanda 5:not asserted, address only, nothing quoted to check Cited by carakasamhitaonline as carrying an alternative view on stanya. Recorded as a located reference only: Sharngadhara has no public-domain English translation, so it may be cited and paraphrased with a page reference but never quoted. I did not retrieve the passage itself and assert no verse. ## Not to be confused with - **dhātu.** The defining difference, per WHO ITA-2.3.1, is that upadhātus 'do not undergo further transformation'. They are formed from a dhātu but do not feed the next one. Nothing else in the definition distinguishes them. - **mala.** The waste fraction (kiṭṭa). Charaka Chikitsasthana 15 lists the two separately and marks the boundary with the sentence 'The above are the transformations of Prasada.' Calling upadhātus 'by-products' collapses exactly this distinction. - **kiṭṭa.** The technical term for the waste fraction produced at each stage. Upadhātus come from the prasāda fraction, malas from the kiṭṭa fraction. - **dhātu-prasāda.** Charaka Sutrasthana 28 names 'the essence of the Dhatus' as what supplies the sense organs. Whether that is the same category as upadhātu is not established anywhere retrieved. - **ārtava.** Classed by WHO as an upadhātu of rasa (ITA-2.3.3), but Sushruta 14.14 makes ārtava the female terminus of the whole chain, parallel to śukra. The two placements are not compatible and both are in retrievable sources. - **ojas.** Also derived from the dhātus without being one of them, but classed as their sāra rather than as an upadhātu. WHO places ojas at ITA-2.2.25, inside the fundamental-components section, not in the supportive-components section. ## Renderings that do not hold - secondary tissue. 'Secondary' imports a ranking the category does not assert. The criterion is that these products do not transform further, not that they matter less. Breast milk and menstrual blood are hardly secondary in the tradition's own reckoning. - by-product. That is mala. The mula distinguishes prasāda transformations from kiṭṭa explicitly, and this rendering erases the distinction. - sub-tissue / minor tissue. Same ranking problem, compounded by 'tissue'. - citing upadhātu to a samhita verse. The most damaging error available here. The word occurs zero times in Kaviratna's Charaka and zero times in both Bhishagratna Sushruta volumes. The CONTENT is at Charaka Chikitsasthana 15.16-17; the TERM is later. Any citation of the form 'upadhātu, Ca.Ci.15.16' asserts something the retrieved sources do not support. ## Open questions Recorded rather than resolved. - When and where upadhātu becomes a fixed technical term is not established. It is absent from both public-domain samhita translations and present as a headword in WHO ISTA 2022. The commentaries (Chakrapanidatta, Dalhana) and the Laghu Trayi are where to look, and none of them is quotable in English. - Whether the Charaka Chikitsasthana 15.16 list is universal or, as Kaviratna's footnote reads it, specific to women, is a real interpretive fork with consequences for every modern upadhātu table. It cannot be settled without the Sanskrit and a commentary. - The membership of the list is unstable across sources: WHO names seven in a prose description but gives entries to only four. Charaka's Ci.15.16 yields milk, menstrual blood, vessels, skin (six layers), vasā and tendons. Whether tvak and snāyu belong, and to which parent dhātu, differs between WHO and Charaka. - Whether ārtava is an upadhātu of rasa (WHO) or the female terminus of the chain (Su.Su.14.14) is directly contradictory between two retrievable sources and is not reconciled by either. - Whether Charaka's dhātu-prasāda (the essence of the dhātus supplying the senses, Ca.Su.28) is the same category as upadhātu is undetermined. ## Citation Age Ayurveda Nighantu, "upadhātu", https://nighantu.ageayurveda.com/lexicon/upadhatu/, 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.