Xūsǔn qǐwēi 虛損啟微
Opening the Subtleties of Depletion by 洪煒 (Hóng Wěi, zì Jí’ān 緝庵, mid-Qián-lóng era)
About the work
A short, derivative but well-organised xūláo / xūsǔn (consumption / depletion) manual in 3 juǎn, written by a jǔrén 舉人 who turned to medicine after his own chronic illness, in part out of filial concern to treat his mother’s chronic condition. Digests material from 張機 Zhāng Zhòngjǐng, 朱震亨 Zhū Dānxī, 薛己 Xuē Jǐ, and 張介賓 Zhāng Jǐngyuè into clear diagnostic discriminations between qì / xuè / yīn / yáng depletions, with each section followed by representative classical and modified prescriptions.
Abstract
The work belongs to the mid-eighteenth century — Hóng’s self-preface is dated rénshēn = Qiánlóng 17 = 1752, written at the Shānyáng 山陽 / Huái’ān 淮安 prefectural office; 張廷枚 Zhāng Tíngméi’s preface is dated Qiánlóng xīnsì = Qiánlóng 26 = 1761, posthumously. The composition window of 1752–1761 here reflects this.
The CBDB id 85301 (洪煒 1823–1882) refers to a Dàoguāng / Tóngzhì–era homonym, not the medical author of the Xūsǔn qǐwēi; the medical Hóng Wěi belongs unambiguously to the mid-Qiánlóng generation. A common cataloging error misidentifies the work as 19th-century; the prefaces fix it as mid-18th-century.
Translations and research
- Charlotte Furth, A Flourishing Yin: Gender in China’s Medical History, 960–1665. Berkeley: UC Press, 1999 — for the broader xūláo discourse.
- Volker Scheid, Currents of Tradition in Chinese Medicine, 1626–2006. Seattle: Eastland, 2007.
- No dedicated Western-language study located.