宜麟策

Yílín cè 宜麟策

Strategy for the Auspicious Unicorn (i.e. for Producing Worthy Heirs) compiled by 汪和鼎 (Wāng Hédǐng, fl. late-19th c.), from the discourses of 張介賓 (Zhāng Jièbīn, 1563–1640)

About the work

A late-Qīng one-juǎn fertility-treatise compiled by Wāng Hédǐng 汪和鼎 as an editorial reorganisation of the Yílín cè fertility-chapters in Zhāng Jièbīn’s Jǐngyuè quánshū 景岳全書 (1700, posthumous; the chapter Fùrén guī 婦人規 contains Zhāng’s principal fertility-doctrine). The title — Yílín cè, “Strategy for the Auspicious Unicorn” — alludes to the Shī jīng “Lín zhī zhǐ” hymn celebrating noble offspring; the auspicious unicorn (qílín) is the conventional figure for distinguished progeny in Chinese fertility-literature.

Abstract

Zhāng Jièbīn’s original chapter is one of the most influential late-Míng fertility-theory treatises. The catalog meta records: “汪和鼎 整理自 張介賓 之論述” — “Wāng Hédǐng arranged from Zhāng Jièbīn’s discourses.” Wāng functions as anthologist-redactor; he contributes no original doctrinal material but reorganises Zhāng’s text into a compact stand-alone treatise focused on the fertility question, divorced from the wider gynaecological-clinical context in which it appears in the Jǐngyuè quánshū.

Composition window: Zhāng’s original is late-Míng (composed pre-1640, first published 1700); Wāng’s redaction is late-19th-century. We bracket the date to Wāng’s working life 1860–1900 (the late-Qīng date the redaction is most-likely to have been prepared). The catalog meta dynasty 清 reflects the date of the redacted text (the principle of dating by received recension applies).

Distinctive features of Zhāng’s fertility-doctrine, preserved in the Wāng redaction:

1. The xúnjǐng (timed-conception) doctrine: that conception is best on days 1, 3, and 5 after the cessation of the menses (the shítiān fēnyáng yang-days), which yield male offspring; later days yield female offspring. This is the SòngDānxī orthodoxy that Yú Qiáo’s Guǎngsì yàoyǔ (KR3ei071) had also adopted.
2. The zhītāi (recognising-pregnancy) chapter on early pregnancy diagnosis through pulse-taking and abdominal-palpation.
3. The tāijiào (foetal-education) chapter on prenatal psychological and dietary regimen — descended from Lǐ jì’s “Yuè lìng” pregnancy-prohibition section.
4. The bǎotāi (preserving-the-foetus) chapter with Zhāng’s signature prescriptions: the Zhǔtāi yǐn 主胎飲, the Bǎoyīn jiān 保陰煎, the Tāiyuán yǐn 胎元飲.

The Hǎiwài huíguī recension preserves the WāngHédǐng compilation. The work is one of the few independently-circulated Qīng versions of Zhāng’s fertility-theory.

Translations and research

• Charlotte Furth, A Flourishing Yin (1999), chapter 7 — extensive discussion of Zhāng Jiè-bīn’s fertility-theory.
• No standalone English translation located.

Links

• 海外回歸中醫善本古籍叢書 (Hǎiwài huíguī Zhōngyī shànběn gǔjí cóngshū).
• 宜麟策 jicheng.tw
• Kanseki DB