Fùkē bīngjiàn 婦科冰鑑
The Crystal Mirror of Gynecology by 柴得華 Chái Déhuá (= Chái Huáshēng 柴華生, mid- to late Qīng)
About the work
An eight-juǎn systematic gynecology by the mid-to-late-Qīng physician 柴得華 Chái Déhuá. The bīngjiàn 冰鑑 (“crystal mirror”) title — invoking the metaphor of utterly clear reflection — declares the work’s aspiration to lucid, unambiguous gynecological reasoning. The work covers the canonical topical sequence — tiáojīng, bēnglòu, dàixià, qiúzǐ, tāiqián, línchǎn, chǎnhòu, fùrén zábìng — with each entry presenting a zhěnmài 診脈 (pulse-examination) note, étiological discussion, zhìfǎ 治法 (therapeutic-method) statement, and prescribed formula.
Prefaces
The KR hxwd _000.txt carries the author’s zìxù 自序 (self-preface). Chái relates: in his youth he had been gravely misdiagnosed with a wēnbìng 溫病 (warm-disease) condition and barely survived; this experience led him to abandon the literati track for medicine. After many years of close study he gained “shǎo yǒu dé” (a little understanding). He notes the proverbial difficulty of gynecology — fùrén yǐ xuè wéi zhǔ (women’s medicine takes blood as principal), and “qì gù bù yì lǐ, ér xuè yóu nán tiáoxiè yě” (qì is already not easy to regulate, but blood is even harder to harmonise). He laments that the existing gynecological literature is “lùn ér bù xiáng, yǔ ér bù chàng” 論而不詳，語而不暢 (discussion not detailed, statement not fluent) and undertakes his own systematic exposition.
Abstract
Chái Déhuá 柴得華 (also recorded as Chái Huáshēng 柴華生) is a mid-to-late-Qīng physician otherwise undocumented in standard biographical reference works. Internal evidence places the work in the mature Qīng systematic-gynecology tradition: extensive citation of 王肯堂 Wáng Kěntáng (1607 Zhèngzhì zhǔnshéng), 武之望 Wǔ Zhīwàng (1620 濟陰綱目), 張介賓 Zhāng Jièbīn (1624 / 1640 婦人規), and the Yīzōng jīnjiàn·Fùkē (1742). The catalog meta dynasty 淸 is correct; notBefore 1750 / notAfter 1850 brackets the working range.
The work belongs to the broader Qīng systematic-gynecology corpus, alongside the Nǚkē jīnglún of 蕭塤 Xiāo Xūn (KR3ei029), the Nǚkē qièyào of 吳道源 Wú Dàoyuán (KR3ei017), and the Fùkē yùchǐ of 沈金鰲 Shěn Jīn’áo (KR3ei023).
Translations and research
- Yi-Li Wu, Reproducing Women. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2010.
- No dedicated study located.
Links
- No verified Wikipedia or Wikidata entry located.
- 婦科冰鑑 jicheng.tw
- Kanseki DB
- 武之望 CBDB