Mài Jué Rǔ Hǎi 脈訣乳海
The Pulse-Song Ocean of Milk by 王邦傅 (Wáng Bāngfù, fl. Kāngxī, 清); printed in 1891 by 葉霖 (Yè Lín, zì Zǐyǔ 子雨)
About the work
A six-juan early-Qīng pulse-doctrine commentary by Wáng Bāngfù (字念西), a Bǎoyìng 寶應 (Jiāngsū) physician of the Kāngxī period. The book is a zhù shì 註釋 of Wáng Shūhé’s (王叔和) original Mài jīng and of the Mài jué 脈訣 attributed to him — taking the late-Sòng pseudonymous Mài jué as a vehicle on which to elaborate Wáng Shūhé’s authentic doctrine. The book is unusual among early-Qing pulse texts in defending the pseudo-Mài jué as containing genuine fragments of Wáng Shūhé’s teaching against the demolitions of Dài Qǐzōng KR3eb026 and Lǐ Shízhēn KR3eb019: Wáng Bāngfù follows Zhū Xī’s Bá Guō Chángyáng shū 跋郭長陽書 in defending at least the “high-bone-marks-the-guān” 高骨取關 doctrine as genuine. The book uses HéLuò 河洛 cosmology (the twelve pì guà 闢卦, the Shāng Guī cáng 歸藏 Yì) to ground pulse theory in Yìjīng numerology, in the style of the Yìxíng 易醫 movement.
Prefaces
KR3eb016_000.txt carries a 1891 printing preface by Yè Lín 葉霖 (zì Zǐyǔ 子雨), the well-known late-Qīng medical bibliophile of Yánlíng 廣陵 (Yángzhōu) — dated Guāngxù xīnmǎo chū qiū 光緒辛卯初秋 = autumn 1891. Yè recounts that he acquired the book in spring 1890 (庚寅) in a Yángzhōu bookseller’s stall, in worm-eaten condition, and reconstituted the text for printing. The preface contains an extended exposition of the Hé Luò / yìyī 易醫 framework Wáng Bāngfù uses, indicating Yè’s own commitment to it; it also discusses recent Western anatomical findings (微絲血管 micro-vessels, 回血管 venous return) and integrates them into the pre-existing pulse-theoretic framework.
Catalog–text discrepancy: the catalog meta names the author as 王邦博 (Wáng Bāngbó); the text consistently writes the personal name as 王邦傅 (Wáng Bāngfù), which is followed here. Both readings are attested in the bibliographic literature, with 王邦傅 being the more frequently cited.
Abstract
Wáng Bāngfù 王邦傅 (also written 王邦博) was a Kāngxī-period physician of Bǎoyìng 寶應 (江蘇 modern Jiāngsū). He is not in CBDB; Yè Lín’s preface specifically reports that “Wáng Jūn is of unknown date” (王君不知何時人), and the conventional dating to the Kāngxī era is reconstructed from internal citation evidence and from references in other early-18th-century pulse compendia. The book is part of the early-Qing pro-Mài jué counter-current that resisted the Lǐ Shízhēn / Dài Qǐzōng demolition; it is also one of the more interesting Yìxíng 易醫 pulse productions, drawing extensively on Yìjīng numerology and on the pì guà 闢卦 / twelve-month-image scheme to ground pulse theory in cosmological structure. The 1891 Yè Lín printing reintroduces Western anatomical terminology — huí xuè guǎn 回血管 (venous return), wēi sī xuè guǎn 微絲血管 (micro-vessels) — making it a small but interesting witness to the late-Qing reception of Western anatomy through traditional medical commentary.
Translations and research
- No Western-language translation exists.
- The work is discussed briefly in Yú Yǒngmǐn 余瀛鰲, Zhōng yī gǔ jí xué 中醫古籍學 (Beijing: Renmin weisheng, 1986), as a Yìjīng-grounded pulse text.
Links
- Wikidata: not assigned.
- 脈訣乳海 jicheng.tw
- Kanseki DB