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食療本草

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Text ID
KR3ec008
Date
713–741
Dynasty
唐

Shíliáo Běncǎo 食療本草

Materia Medica for Dietary Therapy by 孟詵 (Mèng Shēn, c. 621–713, 唐); revised and expanded by 張鼎 (Zhāng Dǐng, fl. 8th c., 唐)

About the work

The Shíliáo běncǎo is the canonical Táng work on 食療 — the use of common foods as medicines — and the foundational source of every later Chinese dietetic pharmacopoeia. Mèng Shēn, a disciple of the great medical scholar Sūn Sīmiǎo 孫思邈, originally compiled the work as Bǔ yǎng fāng 補養方 (“Prescriptions for Nourishing the Body”) in the late seventh century. Zhāng Dǐng, working roughly two generations later in the Kāiyuán era (713–741), revised, expanded, and retitled it Shíliáo běncǎo. The book’s principal innovation is methodological: it abandons the Běnjīng three-grade hierarchy and instead arranges over 200 entries by the practical category of food (鹽, 黃精, 甘菊, 天門冬, 地黃, 山藥, 白蒿, 決明子, 生薑, 蒼耳, 葛根, 栝蔞, 通草, 百合, 艾葉, etc.), giving for each the medical effect, contraindications, processing notes, and cooking method.

Prefaces

The 漢學文典 transmitted text has no preface; it opens with the first substance entry (鹽). The reconstructive method is signalled by editorial brackets at the end of each note: 〔證〕 indicates that the passage is reconstructed from a Zhènglèi běncǎo (KR3ec009) citation; 〔嘉〕 from the Jiāyòu běncǎo; 〔心〕 from the Yīxīn fāng 醫心方 (the great Heian Japanese medical compendium of 982 by Tanba Yasuyori 丹波康賴 (DILA A005XXX), which preserves a Táng manuscript of the Shíliáo); 〔卷〕 from later anthology citations. The 〔心〕 source is particularly important: the Renpō / Imperial Household Library Heian manuscript of the Yīxīn fāng preserves substantial Shíliáo citations otherwise lost.

The text is also represented in the Dūnhuáng manuscript Pelliot S.0076 (a partial roll, mid- to late-Táng copy), discovered by Aurel Stein and Paul Pelliot in 1907–1908 and published in Dūnhuáng tǔLǔfān wénxiàn 敦煌吐魯番文獻 (1984). The Dūnhuáng witness allows scholars to verify substance entries against an independent ninth-century manuscript line.

Abstract

Mèng Shēn (孟詵), native of Rǔzhōu 汝州 Liángxiàn 梁縣 (modern Hénán), was a member of the early Táng literary establishment, a jìnshì of the Wǔ Zétiān era, and a Shàngshū sīlǎng 尚書司郎. After serving as Zhèngzhōu cìshǐ 鄭州刺史, he retired to a long old age in his native county, devoting himself to herbal pharmacology and longevity research. Mèng was a personal disciple of Sūn Sīmiǎo, from whom he received the foundational tradition of Táng medicine. CBDB has Mèng Shēn id 189488 with deathyear 749 (slightly higher than the conventional 713); CBDB also has id 258142 without dates. The conventional lifedates are c. 621–713 from biographies in 《舊唐書》 j.191 (方伎傳) and 《新唐書》 j.196.

Zhāng Dǐng’s identity is harder to fix. CBDB has multiple Zhāng Dǐng entries; the relevant one is likely id 93535 (fl. 741–742), placing his redaction in the high Kāiyuán era. He was probably a court physician of the early eighth century who refurbished Mèng’s earlier work for contemporary use. The work’s terminus ante quem is the Dūnhuáng manuscript and its citation in the Yīxīn fāng (982); its terminus post quem is Mèng’s death (c. 713).

The book’s significance is twofold. Pharmacologically, it founds the shíliáo tradition that dominates later Chinese dietetic medicine — through the Yǐnshàn zhèngyào 飲膳正要 (Hū​sīhuì 1330), through Lǐ Shízhēn’s 李時珍 inclusion of foodstuffs in the Běncǎo gāngmù (KR3ec025), to the contemporary yàoshàn 藥膳 movement. Culturally, it is an unparalleled witness to Táng cooking practice: entries on 麵 (wheat noodle) preparation, 餺飥 (broad noodles), 餛飩 (wonton), 鮓 (fish-paste), specific spice and condiment usage, and so on, are otherwise irrecoverable.

Translations and research

  • Shang Zhijun 尚志鈞 (coll.). 1992. Shíliáo běncǎo (jí jiào běn) 食療本草 (輯校本). Beijing kexue jishu.
  • Xiè Hǎizhōu 謝海洲. 2007. Shíliáo běncǎo yìzhù 食療本草譯註. Renmin weisheng.
  • Despeux, Catherine. 1998. “L’idéal d’inertie dans la médecine traditionnelle chinoise: la tradition de Sun Simiao et les diététiques.” In Médecines et sociétés en Asie orientale. — discusses Mèng Shēn’s place in the Sūn Sīmiǎo tradition.
  • Engelhardt, Ute. 2000. “Dietetics in Tang China and the First Extant Works of Materia Dietetica.” In Hsu (ed.), Innovation in Chinese Medicine (CUP), 173–192.
  • Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual, §41.3.4 — places Shíliáo in the dietetic literature.
  • Dūnhuáng manuscript P.0076 transcribed in Cóng Chūnyǔ 叢春雨 (ed.) 1994, Dūnhuáng zhōngyīyào quánshū 敦煌中醫藥全書.

Other points of interest

Mèng Shēn’s authorship makes the Shíliáo běncǎo a sister-text to Sūn Sīmiǎo’s Qiānjīn shíliáo 千金食治 — the chapter of Qiānjīn yàofāng devoted to dietetics — and the two should be read together. Where Sūn Sīmiǎo’s chapter is theoretical and recipe-oriented, Mèng’s free-standing book is practical and substance-by-substance.

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