CHINESE_FOLK_MEDICINE.pdfVIP

Chinese Folk Medicine A Study of the Shan-hai Ching By J o h n W m . S c h iffele r The Shan-hai ching (山海経〉or “The Classic of the Mountains and Seas” is a geographical gazetteer of ancient China and a catalogue of the natural and supernatural fauna and flora allegedly dating back to the Eastern Chou dynasty (東周朝，771-256 B.C.) and spanning a period of perhaps a millennium through the first century of the North-South dynasties (南北朝，A.D. 304-589). It is also a repository of strange spirits, curious folkways, medical beliefs, and other related oral and written traditions of earlier origins, perhaps even beginning with the Shang-Yen dynasty ( 商殷朝，c . 1500-1027 B.C.).1 “ Now when we look at what is said or herbs and minerals in this treatise, we find, rather surprisingly perhaps, that the idea of prevention rather than cure is outstandingly present. The Shan Hai Ching usually recommends particular drugs, not for curing diseases but for preventing their onset. No less than sixty items of this kind are stated to promote health and to prevent illness.”2 In many ways, this classic bears some similarity in content and theme to the Hippocratic treatise Airs, Waters, Places，although it is not commonly associated with being a part of the Chinese medical corpus as the latter is in oreek medicine. For, like this ancient Greek treatise, The Classic of the Mountains and Seas is based upon a philo­ sophical and scientific premise of nature—the Chinese Weltanschauung• The Chinese quest for a harmonious union between themselves and their biophysical and socioanthropological environment gave rise to 1 . Kwang-chih Chang, The Archaeology of Ancient