Raktachandana.

Vern. Rahtachandan, Beng. Lalchandan. Hind.

The Pterocarpus Santalinus is indigenous to the Indian Peninsula and is chiefly of importance from its yielding the red dye-wood known as red saunders, large quantities of which are annually exported from India. Sanskrit writers describe several varieties of sandal or chandana. Of these srikhanda or white, pitachandana or yellow, and raktachandana or red, sandal wood are best known. The first two varieties are founded on the difference in the shades of the colour of the wood of Santalum album. It has been a question however how the wood of Pterocarpus santalinus, which is nearly inodorous, came to be called by the name of raktachandana in Sanskrit and the vernaculars of India. I am inclined to think that the name is owing to the similarity in the uses to which the Hindus put both these articles. Both sandal wood and red sandal wood are rubbed on a piece of stone with water, and the emulsions are used for painting the body after bathing and in religious services. Red sandal wood is described as an astringent tonic. It enters into the composition of numerous prescriptions of an astringent character and of cooling external applications for inflammation, headache, etc.,1 but is seldom used alone. It is also much used as a coloring agent in the preparation of medicated oils.

The Pterocarpus marsupium or Indian kino tree is translated into "peet sάl," Beng. by Roxburgh. The Sanskrit term Pita-sdla is however a synonym of Asana ( Terminalia tomentosa). I have not found any notice of the Indian kino tree in Sanskrit works. It was probably unknown to the ancients.