between the literate and the nonliterate, etc., very little material has been obtained from the zone of interaction between so-called primitive and so-called scientific forms of medical practice as an aspect of the more general interaction between scientific and primitive technology. Some general work has been done in the area of primitive medicine, usually focused on its functional role in a particular cultural context (Ackerknecht 1942a, 1942b, 1946a; Hallowell 1935; Rogers 1948; Field 1937), its logic (Ackerknecht 1946b, 1946c, 1947; Redfield 1941; Tax 1950; Alvarez 1937; Erasmus 1952), or its psychological and psychosomatic implications (Mead 1949; Henry 1949; Ackerknecht 1943). However, the specific character of the interaction between primitive and modern medical practices has received less attention. We know very little, for example, about the way in which these two seemingly divergent approaches to healing operate side by side in the same aboriginal or folk setting. We know even less about the reasons for the persistence of folk medical practices in the most sophisticated urban cultures, or about the structural accommodations which must be made in the primitive environment with the advent of modern medical practices. This paper represents an effort to discuss some of these problems in the light of data obtained in the course of seven months' field work among peasant villagers in North India (Uttar Pradesh). Unfortunately, the data are meagre, as medical practices were not an original concern of the study. Yet they tend to fall into rather clear categories and to be reasonably reliable statistically. It is therefore hoped that the findings presented here will prove useful to fellow researchers.