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瑞竹堂經驗方

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Text ID
KR3ed023
Date
1326–1335
Dynasty
元

Ruìzhútáng Jīngyàn Fāng 瑞竹堂經驗方

Tested Recipes of the Auspicious-Bamboo Hall by 沙圖穆蘇 (Shātúmùsū, zì Xièqiān 謝謙, hào Qiānzhāi 謙齋, fl. 1320s–1330s, 元) — Mongol official of Yuán, Censor and Prefect of Jiànchāngfǔ 建昌府

About the work

The Ruìzhútáng jīngyàn fāng in 15 juǎn is a Yuán-dynasty general formulary compiled by the Mongol official Shātúmùsū 沙圖穆蘇 (Chinese alias Xièqiān 謝謙, sobriquet Qiānzhāi 謙齋) during his prefectship of Jiànchāngfǔ 建昌府 (modern Jiānglí 江沥, Jiāngxī) in the mid-1320s and 1330s. The Ruìzhútáng “Auspicious-Bamboo Hall” was Shātúmùsū’s personal study, named for an auspicious-bamboo planting that flourished there.

The work’s contents — drawn from senior-official, hermit, and physician informants and tested by Shātúmùsū over years of practical use — extend well beyond the recipes in the standard Héjì júfāng (KR3ed011), Sānyīn (Chén Yán), and Yìjiǎn (Wáng Shuò 王碩) traditions that the Yuán medical mainstream relied upon. Cataloged in 15 juǎn in the original; a separate Sìkùquánshū abridged recension of 5 juǎn (KR3ed024) also survives, on which see below.

Prefaces

The hxwd transmission preserves two patronage prefaces:

  1. 王都中 序 by Wáng Dōuzhōng 王都中, a senior Yuán official. Frames the work with Fàn Wénzhèng 范文正 (Fàn Zhòngyān)‘s famous saying that “a good chancellor and a good physician share the same heart of rén 仁” (良相良醫之言). Wáng presents Shātúmùsū as embodying both ideals: as a Censor and Prefect his administrative rén protected the people; as a medical compiler his medical rén extends the protection through his book. The preface mentions Shātúmùsū’s recent appointment to Jiànchāngfǔ as preparation for higher offices to come.
  2. 又序 (anonymous second preface). Develops the same rényī / rénzhèng parallelism, and adds the practical observation that “recipes are easy to find, but tested recipes are hard” (病之有方不難，而方之有驗為難). Records Shātúmùsū’s method: he interviewed senior officials, royal-family members, and hidden hermits for their family recipes — recipes that “the Héjì, Sānyīn, and Yìjiǎn books do not record” (率和劑、三因、易簡等書之所未載) — and tested each on his patients before printing. Records that the Ruìzhútáng name comes from Shātúmùsū’s planting of an auspicious bamboo at his official residence.

Abstract

Shātúmùsū 沙圖穆蘇 (the Chinese transcription of his Mongol name) is one of the very few Mongol officials of the Yuán who is documented as having produced an original Chinese medical text. His Chinese alias Xièqiān 謝謙 (literally “Thank-You-Modest”) and Qiānzhāi 謙齋 sobriquet were Confucianised name-translations of his Mongol given name. His career path — Censor (御史) at the central court, then prefect of Jiànchāngfǔ — is typical of the mid-Yuán Mongol official cycling between central appointments and prefectural service. The two patronage prefaces explicitly anticipate further promotion, placing him among the Yuán good government literary-Confucian establishment.

The work’s significance is several-fold:

  1. The Yuán-era kàoshí tested-recipe genre. Yuán medical literature divides between the polemic-physician schools (Lǐ Gǎo, Zhū Zhènhēng) producing theoretical treatises and the more practical jīngyàn “tested-recipe” tradition; the Ruìzhútáng belongs to the second.
  2. Multi-ethnic medical collation. Shātúmùsū’s informant pool included Mongol and Jurchen aristocracy alongside the Han Chinese hermit and physician constituencies; the work’s recipes include Mongol-style preparations (notably wine-based and dairy-product preparations, e.g. xiànbīngzǐzhōu 餳餅子粥, suānrǔtāng 酸乳湯) unusual in Han Chinese formulary literature.
  3. Transmission history. The full 15-juǎn original was preserved in private collections through the Ming. The Sìkù editors compiled an abridged 5-juǎn recension (KR3ed024) from the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn that lost about two thirds of the material; the 15-juǎn hxwd recension follows a Ming reprint.

The bracket 1326–1335 is the floruit of Shātúmùsū’s Jiànchāng prefectship as recorded in the prefaces.

Translations and research

  • Hé Shíxī 何時希 (coll.). 1990. Ruìzhútáng jīngyàn fāng 瑞竹堂經驗方 (punctuated edition). Beijing.
  • Buell, Paul D. and Eugene N. Anderson. 2010. A Soup for the Qan: Chinese Dietary Medicine of the Mongol Era. 2nd ed. Brill. — broader context for Yuán-era Mongol-Chinese medical literature; the Ruìzhútáng is occasionally cited.
  • Hu Sihui’s Yǐn-shàn zhèng-yào 飲膳正要 (KR3* dietary; not in this division) is a related contemporary Mongol-Chinese medical text.
  • Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §41.3.2.

Other points of interest

The work’s kuǎn yángjīng 款洋荊 (lit. “Camphor and Vitex” preparation) for fēngshī 風濕 (wind-damp rheumatism) is one of the very few Yuán-era recipes still in active TCM clinical use that descends directly from Mongol-Chinese medical synthesis rather than from Han-Chinese mainstream lineages.

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