Ben Cao Gang Mu, Volume III Mountain Herbs, Fragrant

Herbs, 1st Edition

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 CONTENTS

1. Prolegomena / 7
1.1 History of Chinese materia medica literature / 7
1.2 Structure and contents of the Ben cao gang mu / 11
1.3 Biographical sketch of Li Shizhen (1518 – 1593) / 21
2. Notes on the Translation / 23
3. Wang Shizhen’s preface of 1590 / 27
4. Translation of the Ben Cao Gang Mu 本草綱目
Chapters 12 - 14 / 31
Herbs I, Mountain Herbs, Chapter 12 / 31
Contents / 34
Entries / 36
Herbs II, Mountain Herbs, Chapter 13 / 272
Contents / 272
Entries / 274
Herbs III, Fragrant Herbs, Chapter 14 / 455
Contents / 455
Entries / 458

Appendix / 720
5. Weights and measures / 720
5.1 Measures of capacity / 720
5.2 Measures of weight / 720
5.3 Measures of length / 721
5.4 Measures of the size of pills / 721
6. Lists of Substances / 722
6.1 Identification of pharmaceutical substances of plant origin mentioned
6 The Ben Cao Gang Mu

in BCGM ch. 12 - 14 in passing. Herbs with an entry of their own are

marked with their entry number / 722
6.2 Substances discussed in chapters 12 – 14 in a separate entry. Listed in
alphabetical order of their proper pin yin names with their popular
English names and references to their entry / 743
6.3 Currently accepted scientific identification of substances discussed in
BCGM ch. 12 – 14 in a separate entry. Listed in alphabetical order, with
reference to their entry / 748
 1. Prolegomena

This book offers, together with the original Chinese text, the first complete philo-
logical and annotated English translation of chapters 12 through 14 of the Ben cao
gang mu 本草綱目, the 16th century Chinese Encyclopedia of Materia Medica and
Natural History by Li Shizhen 李時珍 (1518 – 1593), devoted to the natural history
and pharmaceutical application of what were considered at the time “mountain
herbs” and “fragrant herbs.” It opens up an almost two-millennia-long panorama
of wide-ranging observations and sophisticated interpretations, ingenious manip-
ulations and practical applications of natural substances for the benefit of human
health. As Prof. Zheng Jinsheng 郑金生, the pre-eminent Ben cao gang mu expert
of present day China, has characterized it:
“Some of the pharmaceutical substances gathered in this book have already left
the platform of their clinical application. However, the data associated with
them offer abundant material to study the customs of the people and the cul-
ture of the past. While he gathered data related to pharmaceutical substances,
Li Shizhen never hesitated to extend his investigations and collection to all
possible realms. That is, while [the Ben cao gang mu] appears to be a book on
materia medica, it is in fact an encyclopedia of natural science and has become a
treasure house for today’s researchers of many fields of science.” 1

1.1 History of Chinese materia medica literature

The Ben cao gang mu is the culmination of a 1600-year history of Chinese materia
medica literature. This history began at some time during the Han dynasties when,
between the 2nd century BCE and the 2nd century CE, two hitherto in China un-
documented genres of medical-therapeutic works appeared. Stimulated by impulses
whose origin and nature remain enigmatic today, the new therapeutic approach of

1 Zheng Jinsheng 郑金生 and Zhang Zhibin 张志斌, Ben cao gang mu dao du 本草綱目
导读, “Guide to Reading the Ben cao gang mu,” Beijing, Ke xue chu ban she 科學出版社,
2016, 35.
8 The Ben Cao Gang Mu

needling 365 “holes” spread over the human body, on the one hand, and a first de-
tailed description of 365 individual pharmaceutical substances on the other, marked
the onset of two traditions of health care. They conceptually remained separate for
one thousand years. Why the number of days in a solar year, 365 – rather unusual
in the history of Chinese categorization of natural phenomena – was chosen as a
starting point of both traditions is unclear.
Needling therapy, or so-called acupuncture, remained an isolated facet of Chi-
nese medical culture until the 11th/12th century. Its seminal texts, the Yellow Thearch
classics,2 were either lost during the first millennium or survived only through a
rather tenuous tradition, supported by a few members of the social elite.3 Appar-
ently, the Yinyang and Five Phases doctrines of systematic correspondences, which
legitimated and guided needle therapy from its beginning, failed to achieve the sta-
tus of a world view widely acknowledged by broad segments of the population. In
contrast, pharmaceutical therapy, as evidenced by published recipe collections and
works focusing on the description of individual substances, constituted the main-
stay of medical practice from the first millennium to the present day.
Since the early 1970s, recipe manuscripts with data on the therapeutic properties
of combinations of herbal, mineral and animal substances have been recovered from
late Zhou and early Han era tombs.4 The list of therapeutic indications and a highly
developed pharmaceutical technology outlined in these texts evidence a long devel-
opment of pharmaceutical therapy prior to the compilation of works with descrip-
tions of the properties of individual substances. The earliest of these works known is
the Shen nong ben cao 神農本草, “Shen nong’s materia medica.” Historians agree that
it was written at some time between the 1st century BCE and the 1st century CE.5
Even though at that time Chinese civilization recognized and documented in
bibliographies and catalogues individual authorship of literary works, the authors of
the seminal texts of both the needling and the pharmaceutical traditions remained

2 Including the Huang Di nei jing su wen 黄帝內經素問, Huang di nei jing ling shu 黄帝
內經靈樞, and a late sequel, the Nan jing 難經. For philological translations of these
classics, see Paul U. Unschuld and Hermann Tessenow, Huang Di Nei Jing Su Wen. An
Annotated Translation of Huang Di’s Inner Classic, 2 vols. University of California Press,
Berkeley and Los Angeles, 2011. Paul U. Unschuld, Huang Di Nei Jing Ling Shu. The
Ancient Classic on Needle Therapy. University of California Press, Oakland, 2016. Paul U.
Unschuld, Nan jing. The Classic of Difficult Issues. Oakland 2016.
3 Paul U. Unschuld, 2016, 1 – 4.
4 Donald Harper, Early Chinese Medical Literature. The Mawangdui Medical Manuscripts.
Kegan Paul International, London and New York, 1997.
5 For details on the Shen nong ben cao and the subsequent history of Chinese materia medica
literature, see Paul U. Unschuld, Medicine in China. A History of Pharmaceutics. Berkeley,
Los Angeles, London, 1986.
 Prolegomena 9

anonymous. Their origins were traced to legendary culture heros, that is, Huang
Di 黃帝, the Yellow Thearch, and Shen Nong 神農, the divine husbandman. Shen
Nong, also known as Yan Di 炎帝, the Fiery Thearch, was said in the Huai nan zi
淮南子 to have pitied the suffering of mankind. Hence he tasted all kinds of herbs
and “discovered 100 with poison per day.” From the very beginning, for a natural
substance “to have poison” (you du 有毒) or “to be nonpoisonous” (wu du 無毒)
was seen as an important criterion for assessing its acute or long-term therapeutic
potential.
The Shen nong ben cao, closely associated with the tripartite world view of Dong
Zhongshu 董仲舒 (179 – 104) and a political structure antagonistic to the hierarchy
of the young empire, distinguished among three “ranks” (pin 品) of pharmaceutical
substances. The upper rank, associated with heaven, included substances identified
as jun 君, “rulers.” These were considered nonpoisonous and capable of helping ex-
tend life. A lower rank, associated with the earth, was assigned to substances “with
poison.” These were given the status of zuo 佐 and shi 使, that is, “helpers” and
“messengers,” and they helped eliminate the disease. A middle rank of chen 臣, “offi-
cials,” associated with mankind, was positioned between the upper and lower ranks.
Some of these “officials” were considered “nonpoisonous,” while others were known
to “have poison.” They acted as intermediaries between the rulers above and their
helpers and messengers below. The substances described, arranged according to a
preface into groups of 120, 120 and 125 respectively,6 were mostly herbal. This may be
the reason behind the naming of the first materia medica work and henceforth the
entire literature genre ben cao 本草, which possibly meant “based on herbs.”
Tao Hongjing 陶弘景 (452-536), a Daoist naturalist, was the first author to revise
and expand the “original classic,” Ben jing 本經, as he called the Shen nong ben cao.
In a first work, titled Shen nong ben cao jing 神農本草經, “Shen nong’s classic on
materia medica,” he retained the original division into three chapters, but added 365
“additional records [on pharmaceutical substances recorded earlier] by renowned
physicians,” ming yi bie lu 明醫別錄. In a second work shortly thereafter, the Shen
nong ben cao jing ji zhu 神農本草經集注, “Various annotations to Shen nong’s clas-
sic on materia medica,” Tao Hongjing significantly expanded his annotations to the
730 substances listed and divided the text into seven chapters.
Tao Hongjing initiated a “main tradition” of ben cao works, which would be con-
tinued by subsequent authors until the early 13th century. This tradition was charac-
terized by an expansion of the “original classic” with ever more data on the nature,
6 The Shen nong ben cao versions accessible today are based on reconstructions by Chinese
and Japanese researchers since the 17th century. They have identified 141 substances as
“upper rank,” 111 substances as “middle rank,” and 103 substances as “lower rank,” totaling
365.
10 The Ben Cao Gang Mu

origin, therapeutic effects and pharmaceutical processing of natural and man-made

substances. This data was often adopted from an increasing number of materia
medica works published outside of the main tradition whose authors did not feel
committed to the structure and contents of the Ben jing. They focused on regional
knowledge, their own experience, substances used as both medication and food,
substances enabling survival in times of famine, pharmaceutical processing and oth-
er such special aspects of pharmaceutical lore. In the middle of the seventh century,
an official named Su Jing 蘇敬 (fl. 657) suggested that the emperor support a new
edition of the “original classic” to correct older data regarded since as erroneous, and
include more recent knowledge of the therapeutic potential of natural substances.
The result, the Xin xiu ben cao 新修本草, “Newly revised materia medica,” of 659,
combining 850 substance entries in 54 chapters, was the first government-sponsored
and illustrated ben cao work in China.
The main tradition came to a halt in the 13th century for at least two reasons.
The lengthy title of one of the final works of this tradition, published in 1249 and
describing 1746 substances in 30 chapters, offers a clear indication of one of these
reasons: Chong xiu zheng he jing shi zheng lei bei yong ben cao 重修正和經史證類
備用本草, “Newly revised materia medica of the zheng he reign period, based on
data from the classics and historical annals, based on evidence and ordered on the
basis of groups, prepared for clinical application.” The main tradition was stifled by
the abundance of its data and the perpetuation of its claim to be merely extending
the original classic. The last works were extremely unwieldy. More recent data was
added to previous statements, without comments on contradictions or earlier errors.
Readers were left abandoned with ever longer sequences of quotes from a wide
range of sources of varying quality.
We see a second reason for the end of the main tradition in a completely new
genre of materia medica texts initiated by Kou Zongshi’s 寇宗奭 Ben cao yan yi
本草衍意, “Extended ideas on materia medica,” in 1119 and exemplified by Wang
Haogu’s 王好古 Tang ye ben cao 湯液本草, “Materia medica of decoctions” in the
mid 13th century. With the rise of Song Neo-Confucianism, the more than one-mil-
lennium-old schism was bridged between the therapeutic approaches of needling
and pharmaceutical therapy. Needling, i.e. acupuncture, was based on the Yinyang
and Five Phases doctrines of systematic correspondences. Ben cao literature and
recipe collections were based on empirical knowledge and magic correspondences.
The convergence of these two separate approaches resulted in a first pharmacology
of systematic correspondences. Authors committed to this new perspective cate-
gorized each pharmaceutical substance according to its presumed association with
certain kinds of flavor and qi. As these kinds of flavor and qi were associated, in turn,
 Prolegomena 11

with certain yin and yang qualities, as well as with the Five Phases, a link appeared
possible to pathologies also defined in terms of yin and yang and the Five Phases.
The main tradition was unable to integrate the ideas published by the various au-
thors of the so-called Song-Jin-Yuan epoch of ben cao literature. As a result, the pub-
lication of comprehensive materia medica texts ended. Each of these works claimed to
offer all available pharmaceutical knowledge, old and new. It was only three centuries
later, in the 16th century, that two authors introduced a new structure to the contents
of comprehensive materia medica works, leading to a brief revival of the tradition. The
first result was the Yu zhi ben cao pin hui jing yao 御製本草品彙精要, “Materia medi-
ca, written on imperial order, containing essential data arranged in systematic order,”
in 1505. The second and more successful of these newer ben cao works was the Ben cao
gang mu 本草綱目 of 1593 compiled by Li Shizhen 李時珍 (1518-1593).

1.2 Structure and contents of the Ben cao gang mu

It is not known whether Li Shizhen saw the Yu zhi ben cao pin hui jing yao before
he set out to compile the Ben cao gang mu. In his own personal interest, Qiu Jun 邱
濬 (1420 – 1495), a scholar official, had devised a scheme to overcome the unwieldy
nature of the final texts of the main tradition of ben cao literature. By restructuring
the individual substance monographs, he removed the decisive obstacle to practi-
cal use of the ben cao texts. He dismissed the idea that newer ben cao works were
mere emendations of the “original classic,” with whatever new knowledge had be-
come available being added to the substance of earlier works. Qiu Jun divided each
monograph in accordance with 13 characteristics of individual substances that he
extracted from former texts.7
As a result, a reader interested in the origin, the pharmaceutical processing or the
therapeutic indications of a particular substance found relevant data collected under
a respective heading. To find the information they sought, users of the new text
were no longer required to read through all the historical layers that had accrued
among the texts of the main tradition of ben cao works. Qiu Jun died when he had
finished writing only one chapter. After hectic intrigue and conflicts of interest, Liu
Wentai 劉文泰 (fl. 1503), an official in the Imperial Medical Office, and a team of
collaborators were ordered by Emperor Xiao zong 孝宗 (1470 – 1505) in 1503 “to pre-
pare a new ben cao edition, to simplify the consultation of these works.” They took
over the structural proposals of Qiu Jun but expanded the number of subheadings
of each substance monograph from 13 to 24.

7 Paul U. Unschuld, 1986, 140-141.

 Prolegomena 11

with certain yin and yang qualities, as well as with the Five Phases, a link appeared
possible to pathologies also defined in terms of yin and yang and the Five Phases.
The main tradition was unable to integrate the ideas published by the various au-
thors of the so-called Song-Jin-Yuan epoch of ben cao literature. As a result, the pub-
lication of comprehensive materia medica texts ended. Each of these works claimed to
offer all available pharmaceutical knowledge, old and new. It was only three centuries
later, in the 16th century, that two authors introduced a new structure to the contents
of comprehensive materia medica works, leading to a brief revival of the tradition. The
first result was the Yu zhi ben cao pin hui jing yao 御製本草品彙精要, “Materia medi-
ca, written on imperial order, containing essential data arranged in systematic order,”
in 1505. The second and more successful of these newer ben cao works was the Ben cao
gang mu 本草綱目 of 1593 compiled by Li Shizhen 李時珍 (1518-1593).

1.2 Structure and contents of the Ben cao gang mu

It is not known whether Li Shizhen saw the Yu zhi ben cao pin hui jing yao before
he set out to compile the Ben cao gang mu. In his own personal interest, Qiu Jun 邱
濬 (1420 – 1495), a scholar official, had devised a scheme to overcome the unwieldy
nature of the final texts of the main tradition of ben cao literature. By restructuring
the individual substance monographs, he removed the decisive obstacle to practi-
cal use of the ben cao texts. He dismissed the idea that newer ben cao works were
mere emendations of the “original classic,” with whatever new knowledge had be-
come available being added to the substance of earlier works. Qiu Jun divided each
monograph in accordance with 13 characteristics of individual substances that he
extracted from former texts.7
As a result, a reader interested in the origin, the pharmaceutical processing or the
therapeutic indications of a particular substance found relevant data collected under
a respective heading. To find the information they sought, users of the new text
were no longer required to read through all the historical layers that had accrued
among the texts of the main tradition of ben cao works. Qiu Jun died when he had
finished writing only one chapter. After hectic intrigue and conflicts of interest, Liu
Wentai 劉文泰 (fl. 1503), an official in the Imperial Medical Office, and a team of
collaborators were ordered by Emperor Xiao zong 孝宗 (1470 – 1505) in 1503 “to pre-
pare a new ben cao edition, to simplify the consultation of these works.” They took
over the structural proposals of Qiu Jun but expanded the number of subheadings
of each substance monograph from 13 to 24.

7 Paul U. Unschuld, 1986, 140-141.

12 The Ben Cao Gang Mu

The new work was completed only two years later. Pleased, the emperor per-
sonally gave it the title “The Essentials of Materia medica with the Data on Items
Arranged According to their Similar Nature, compiled on Imperial Order.” Soon
afterward, the emperor died. The manuscript was never published, possibly because
of the exquisite color illustrations added to each entry. No technology was available
in the 16th century to print such a work. Several manuscript copies were prepared
and a few have ended up in libraries in Japan, Rome and Berlin. In 1701 a revised
and amended version without the illustrations was prepared, by order of Emperor
Kang xi 康熙. It was published by Shanghai Commercial Press in 1937.8
Li Shizhen chose a structure for his Ben cao gang mu entries similar to that of the
Yu zhi ben cao pin hui jing yao substance monographs. However, rather than separat-
ing the data of each entry into 24 categories, he decided to limit their subheadings,
where required, to the following ten:
1. xiao zheng 校正: Editorial Correction

2. shi ming 釋名: Explanation of Names

3. ji jie 集解: Collected Explanations

4. xiu zhi 脩治: Pharmaceutical Preparation

5. bian yi 辯疑: Discussion of Uncertain Issues

6. zheng wu 正誤: Correction of Errors

7. qi wei 氣味: Qi and Flavor

8. zhu zhi 主治: Therapeutic Control

9. fa ming 發明: Explication

10. fu fang 附方: Added Recipes

Li Shizhen also conceptualized a new order of the entries. The “original classic,”
within the three groups of “upper,” “middle,” and “lower rank,” had listed substances
following their identification as mineral, herbal, and animal-human – i.e. proceed-
ing from dead and immobile to living and immobile, and on to living and mobile
substances. A fourth and final group consisted of victuals. Later works of the main
tradition omitted the “upper,” “middle,” and “lower rank” divisions, but retained the
mineral, herbal, and animal-human classifications.

8 Ibid., 142-143.
 Prolegomena 13

Li Shizhen introduced a different order. Based on the sequence of the Five

Phases, he began, after four introductory chapters, the subsequent 48 chapters with
a list of waters, followed by fires, soils, and metals, which included salts and min-
erals (chapters 5-11) and then herbal substancs (chapters 12 through 37). Separated
by chapter 38, listing “fabrics and utensils,” he then devoted chapters 39 through 50
to animals, ranging from “tiny” to “large,” that is, from worms/bugs through fowl
to four-legged creatures. Again separated by a chapter on “strange items,” he even-
tually reached the pinnacle of his scale, human substances suitable for a medicinal
application. In all, Li Shizhen wrote down ca. 1.6 million characters to describe 1892
pharmaceutical substances.
The entries in the final 48 chapters were divided into 16 sections, for 13 of which
Li Shizhen identified subsections. These serve to point out related items within
broader groups such as waters, herbs and worms/bugs. For example, the section
on worms/bugs is subdivided into those born from eggs, those generated through
transformation, and those originating from moisture. Each section is introduced by
a general statement explicating the special nature of the substances grouped in it.
Each individual substance is given a heading stating its earliest name documented
in pharmaceutical literature and, if this was the “original classic,” the upper, middle
or lower rank it had been assigned to.
Where required, Li Shizhen began an entry by pointing out a formerly erroneous
listing of the substance in question. Whenever he found identical substances listed
in previous ben cao works twice under different names, he justified the combination
of these names in one entry.
The length of documented Chinese pharmaceutical history, the sheer size of the
country with its many regional cultures and languages, and the different kinds of
sources quoted by Li Shizhen led him to list and discuss the names of the substanc-
es he described. Not infrequently, Li Shizhen saw a need to explain different names
in the North and South of China assigned to an identical substance. For example, in
chapter 09, he went into an extensive discussion to end an apparently millennia-old
confusion concerning the substance gypsum. It was known as shi gao 石膏, “stone
fat,” xi li shi 細理石, “finely structured stone/mineral,” and han shui shi 寒水石,
“cold water stone/mineral.” Some authors identified it as fang jie shi 方解石, “stone/
mineral that splits into rectangular pieces,” and as chang shi 長石, “lengthy stone/
mineral.” But these names had also been applied to other minerals. Li Shizhen
brought all relevant quotes together and eventually offered his conclusion.
Li Shizhen titled the relevant subheading shi ming 釋名, “Explanation of Names,”
because he went beyond simply enumerating alternative names. Wherever possible
he added philological explanations taking into account, for example, local dialects
14 The Ben Cao Gang Mu

and the composition of characters. Substances imported from foreign countries of-
ten were given names in China transcribing the pronunciation of their original
foreign pronunciation. Wherever feasible, Li Shizhen included information on the
origin of such names, for example, reflecting a Sanskrit term. Furthermore, many
names were written with characters possibly unfamiliar to the Ben cao gang mu’s
readers. Hence Li Shizhen explained their pronunciation by either adducing homo-
phones or resorting to the split-reading approach. And when he felt at his wits’ end,
he freely acknowledged his inability to explain a certain name.
While this explanation of names suggests an awareness of certain limits of under-
standing among future readers and users of the Ben cao gang mu, Li Shizhen rarely
explained a central feature of each substance described: its therapeutic indications.
The quotes on the ability of substances to “control” disease are taken from sources
spanning more than 1500 years. The Ben cao gang mu lists more than 4500 key dis-
ease terms; by the time of Li Shizhen, perhaps most of them were still self-explan-
atory or could be understood by experts from their context.
In today’s China, many of the disease names referred to in these quotes are no
longer easily understood. Similarly, for readers of the Ben cao gang mu outside Chi-
na, the therapeutic indications are often given with rather enigmatic disease names
written in single, unfamiliar characters or using metaphors that are no longer easily
grasped. The first volume of the Dictionary of the Ben cao gang mu traces each of the
4500 disease terms to its earliest appearance. It identifies its meaning in that early
context and, where applicable, at the time of Li Shizhen. 9
Another central feature of descriptions of pharmaceutical substances is their
place of origin. From early on it was known among Chinese experts that one and
the same herb was endowed with different therapeutic powers depending on where
it grew in the country. The climate and the nature of the soil varied from North to
South and from East to West, and so did the “qi” a plant was exposed to. Hence
where considered necessary, substance entries of the Ben cao gang mu include related
information. This is mostly comparative, that is, Li Shizhen provided a ranking of
the substances from different regions in accordance with the presumed strength
of their therapeutic effects. All the dynasties that followed each other during the
imperial age regularly rearranged administrative structures. As a consequence, place
names and the names of administrative structures were assigned new names. Hardly
any location kept one and the same name throughout history. Li Shizhen regularly
explained the location in his time of places mentioned in an ancient quote under a

9 See Zhang Zhibin and Paul U. Unschuld, Dictionary of the Ben cao gang mu. Vol. I: Chi-
nese Historical Illness Terminology. University of California Press, Oakland, 2015.
 Prolegomena 15

name no longer in use. Today, the current location of even more places can no longer
be easily identified by their ancient names.
The second volume of the Dictionary of the Ben cao gang mu traces each of the
place names and those of administrative structures mentioned in the Ben cao gang
mu to their current location. More importantly, the Dictionary offers the history of
each name and each administrative structure so that a quote from a specific time
period may be compared to the existence of a name and administrative structure at
that time. This is of particular relevance if one identical name was given to different
locations in the course of history, or if the borders of an administrative structure
were moved to a degree that may have had a significant impact on the climate or
nature of soil suggested by its name.10
No materia medica text prior to the Ben cao gang mu was based on a comparable
range of literary and non-literary material. It should come as no surprise that Li
Shizhen exploited the Zheng he ben cao 正和本草 of 1249, the final work of the
former main tradition of ben cao works, as his major source. Apparently, Li Shizhen
intended to continue this tradition, but he went far beyond it. In a bibliography at
the very beginning of the Ben cao gang mu, he listed more than 868 titles he had
consulted. The number of titles quoted or mentioned in passing in the main text
by far exceeds these 868 texts. Li Shizhen may not have held all of them in original
editions in his hands. Many texts were quoted second- or third-hand from quotes
in later encyclopedias.
In addition to drawing his data from all kinds of literary genres, Li Shizhen
personally travelled to places all over the country where he expected to access data
available nowhere else. This way, he also was able to record valuable data on sub-
stances not mentioned in ben cao literature or publicly documented elsewhere be-
fore. For example, san qi 三七, identified today as Gynura segetum (Lour.) Merr., is
one of the most common herbs in Chinese medicine. Li Shizhen was the first to
learn of its therapeutic potential from “locals,” and introduced it with the following
lines:
“This medication was discovered for the first time only recently. The people
in the South use it in their military as an important medication for wounds
caused by metal objects/weapons. It is said to have an extraordinary [therapeu-
tic] potential. It is also said: For all injuries resulting from flogging and blows,
when stagnating blood is set free, it should be chewed until it is pulpy. Once
this is applied [to the affected region, the bleeding] ends. Greenish swelling is
dissolved. If one is to be flogged, let him ingest beforehand one or two qian and
10 See Hua Linfu, Paul D. Buell and Paul U. Unschuld, Dictionary of the Ben cao gang mu.
Vol. II: Geographical and Administrative Designations. University of California Press,
Oakland, 2017.
16 The Ben Cao Gang Mu

his blood will not rush to his heart. After a flogging it is even more advisable to
ingest it. To ingest it after a birth is good, too. Generally speaking, this medica-
tion has warm qi and a sweet and slightly bitter flavor. Hence it is a medication
for the blood section of the yang brilliance and ceasing yin [conduits] and can
serve to cure all kinds of blood diseases, similar to qi lin jie (Daemonorops draco
Bl.) and shellac.”11
In this manner the Ben cao gang mu refers to hundreds of texts and their authors, in
addition to individuals (including Li Shizhen’s own extended family) unassociated
with any literary genre.
Many of the persons quoted or referred to as authors, patients, healers or actors
in some anecdote have remained nameless to posterity. In bibliographical and bi-
ographical reference works today’s readers of the Ben cao gang mu may easily find the
more prominent book titles, authors and historical personalities encountered in the
Ben cao gang mu. But an identification of numerous titles and many more persons
requires extensive research. It is here that one wonders how many collaborators Li
Shizhen may have had. Wang Shizhen, the author of a preface to the first edition
of the Ben cao gang mu, quotes Li Shizhen verbatim with a statement that he had
rewritten the entire manuscript three times12. A question arises here whether he
had failed to notice numerous inconsistencies in the references to book titles and
authors quoted. Not infrequently, one book is quoted with either its complete title
or several different abbreviations. Similarly, one identical author is quoted by his full
name, by his first or last name, by his style, or other possible designations. Such di-
versity appears plausible if one imagines a larger team around Li Shizhen supplying
him with data without prior agreement on how to quote a text or refer to a person.
If this diversity makes it difficult enough for readers to immediately identify a text
or author quoted, the hardship is further aggravated by numerous quotes mislead-
ingly ascribed to source texts they were never part of.
Not much later, Zhao Xuemin 趙學敏 (ca. 1730 – 1805), author of the Ben cao
gang mu shi yi 本草綱目拾遺, suggested with the title of his book “to make up for
omissions in the Ben cao gang mu” not only his intention to list pharmaceutically
useful substances Li Shizhen had failed to include. He was also the first to point
out 30 substantial errors in the description of substances recorded. In recent years,
with a steep rise in Ben cao gang mu research, many more such errors and misleading
data have been identified, as for instance in Mei Quanxi’s 梅全喜(1962 - ) Ben cao
gang mu bu zheng 本草綱目補正, “Supplementing omissions and correcting errors

11 Ben cao gang mu, chapter 09, entry 09. See also, Zheng Jinsheng 郑金生 and Zhang
Zhibin 张志斌, Ben cao gang mu dao du 本草綱目导读, 2016, 175 - 177.
12 See below p.27
 Prolegomena 17

of the Ben cao gang mu.”13 A comparison of numerous quotes in the Ben cao gang
mu with their original sources often enough shows significant divergence. It is not
always clear whether these are intentional modifications, perhaps adapting an an-
cient wording to usages preferred at the time of Li Shizhen, or errors due to careless
copying.
The third volume of the Dictionary of the Ben cao gang mu, devoted to “Persons
and Literary Sources,” offers biographical and bibliographical data on all the texts
and persons encountered in Li Shizhen’s encyclopedia, with a few exceptions for
sources and people that appear undocumented elsewhere. This volume of the Dic-
tionary includes the different versions of titles and names assigned by Li Shizhen or
his collaborators to quotes and anecdotes. It also points out where quotes ascribed
in the Ben cao gang mu to a specific text or author originated, in fact, elsewhere. 14
Ever since Tao Hongjing’s Shen nong ben cao jing ji zhu of 500 CE and throughout
the history of the main tradition, authors introduced their materia medica works not
only with at least one preface to inform readers of their motives, aims and (where
relevant) the history of their texts. They also offered more general information as-
sociated with the origin, gathering, pharmaceutical processing, contra-indications,
synergies and applications of pharmaceutical substances. Here, too, Li Shizhen ex-
tended the introductory sections to four voluminous chapters occupying one eighth
of the entire text. In chapter one he enumerated 40 earlier ben cao works with brief
commentaries by other authors and himself. This list is followed by another, already
mentioned above, of all the literary sources he had taken into account, divided into
two groups: 277 older and more recently published medical and pharmaceutical
works, and 591 classics, historical annals and others. Next, Li Shizhen went into
more detail informing readers of all earlier ben cao works he had taken drug de-
scriptions from. Li Shizhen paid homage to the beginning of the main tradition by
quoting the preliminary sections of the “original classic, “ including commentaries
by Tao Hongjing and others.
He eventually switched to the Song-Jin-Yuan understanding of health and phar-
maceutical therapy by first quoting a passage from the Huang Di nei jing su wen 黃
帝內經素問 concerning the influence of climatic factors on drugs. This is followed
by a section on “The seven ways of compiling a recipe,” with commentaries by the
legendary Qi Bo 岐伯, the 8th century commentator of the Su wen Wang Bing 王
冰, and various Song-Jin-Yuan authors. Next is a section on “The effects of the ten
kinds of recipes, “ with commentaries by Xu Zhicai 徐之才 (ca. 510 – 590), several
13 Zheng Jinsheng and Zhang Zhibin, 2016, 70.
14 Zheng Jinsheng, Nalini Kirk, Paul D. Buell and Paul U. Unschuld, Dictionary of the Ben
cao gang mu, Vol. III: Persons and Literary Sources, University of California Press, Oakland,
2018.
18 The Ben Cao Gang Mu

Song-Jin-Yuan authors again and Li Shizhen himself. The first chapter ends with
ten treatises on the medical-theoretical teachings of the Song-Jin-Yuan period.
Chapter 2 begins with an enumeration of pharmaceutical substances known by
up to five alternative names. It continues with an enumeration of pharmaceutical
substances according to their reciprocal, synergistic effects when ingested together,
an enumeration of foods whose consumption is forbidden during an ingestion of
specific pharmaceutical substances, an enumeration of substances that must not be
taken by pregnant women, and an enumeration of beverages and foods that must
not be consumed together. Also in chapter 2, Li Shizhen quoted from Li Gao 李杲
(1180 – 1251), one of the main authors and theoreticians of the Song-Jin-Yuan era,
whose treatise acknowledged that the treatment of certain illnesses escaped theo-
rization. Hence he simply listed certain pathological signs and the pharmaceutical
substances suitable for their treatment – without reference to the Yin-Yang and
Five Phases doctrines of systematic correspondences.
Similarly, the next treatise is an “enumeration of all pharmaceutical substances
that, according to Chen Cangqi 陳藏器 (8th century), are used in the treatment of
depletions.” From another core theoretician of the Song-Jin-Yuan era, Zhang Zihe
張子和 (1156-1228), Li Shizhen took over the treatise “The three processes of sweat-
ing, vomiting and purging.” Chapter 2 ends with a section from a Yao dui 藥對, a
work allegedly predating the “original classic,” and the tables of contents of the Ben
jing and the Jing shi zheng lei bei ji ben cao 經史證類備急本草 by Tang Shenwei 唐
慎微 (fl.1082), one of the final works of the main tradition, written between 1080
and 1107.
Chapters 3 and 4 of the Ben cao gang mu include lists of all diseases, and where
necessary a detailed description of their pathological conditions, with the appropri-
ate pharmaceutical substances and information concerning their pharmacological
function, preparation and administration.
Despite their prominence in chapter 2, the references to the Song-Jin-Yuan doc-
trines of pharmacology appear isolated. Further hints at their relevance for pharma-
ceutical therapy are rarely encountered in the Ben cao gang mu. Li Shizhen may have
felt it suitable to pay lip service to a development that had lost its creative momen-
tum prior to his lifetime. By the end of the Song-Jin-Yuan era, several authors had
suggested combinations of empirical pharmaceutical knowledge with the Yinyang
doctrines of systematic correspondences without reaching an agreement on one
pharmacology accepted by all. Too many contradictions remained between the as-
sessment of the properties in terms of yin and yang qualities on the one hand and
their assumed and observed effects on the human body on the other. Eventually, this
development found no further creative naturalists. By the time of Li Shizhen, carry-
 Prolegomena 19

ing through to the very present, a status quo had emerged within which any author
interested in a theoretical foundation of pharmaceutical treatment was free to pick
from any of the Song-Jin-Yuan authors, whomever he felt or feels appropriate.
Li Shizhen’s attitude toward a theoretical legitimation of pharmaceutical thera-
pies may be called fragmented. Only in very few instances did he feel compelled to
refer to the preference of a specific substance to enter one or more of the yin and
yang conduits. Li Shizhen did not neglect magic argumentation, and he seems to
have had a special inclination toward the number seven. It dominates suggestions
for the length of periods and number of frequencies of ingestions as well as quan-
tities in which pharmaceutical substances are to be taken. Categorizations of items
according to their yin or yang status, or their affiliation with one of the Five Phases,
are rarely seen in the Ben cao gang mu. Occasionally Li Shizhen resorts to a concept
of cong qi lei 從其類, “group correspondence” to explain correspondences between
items and their properties that appear to exist outside the realm of Yinyang and
Five Phases correspondences. For example, in chapter 41, entry 16, “cicadas,” he
writes:
Generally speaking, to cure [diseases affecting] the long-term depots and short-
term repositories, the bodies of cicadas are to be used. To cure dermal sores and
ulcers, wind and heat, the nymph shells of cicadas are to be used. This is always
based on their group correspondences.
Similarly, in chapter 43, entry 19-02, “breficaude pit viper”:
When poisonous items are used to attack poison diseases, then this is always
based on their group correspondences.
Perhaps Li Shizhen’s reluctance to support his therapeutic advice with theoretical
reasoning may be traced back to a perception of himself as primarily being a prac-
titioner not interested in burdening other practitioners with a request to indulge
in the complicated doctrines of systematic correspondences as a precondition of
pharmaceutical therapy. If we are right to assume that a central motivation under-
lying Li Shizhen’s compilation of the Ben cao gang mu was to offer a handy work
to a wide public of healers, we then also grasp two more of his encyclopedia’s great
innovations.
Li Shizhen’s Ben cao gang mu is the first truly inclusive encyclopedia of natural
history and pharmacotherapy in China. Nothing comparable existed in the medical
literature elsewhere. Ben cao literature had hitherto been dedicated to the descrip-
tion of individual substances. Li Shizhen integrated medical case histories. These
are meant to illustrate, more vividly than would have been possible with theoretical
statements, the therapeutic potential of certain substances. Medical case histories
have been published in China ever since Sima Qian 司馬遷 included examples of