Huóyòu kǒuyì 活幼口議
Oral Discussions on Reviving the Young by 曾世榮 Zēng Shìróng (撰); postface by 丹波元胤 Tanba Genin (1820)
About the work
A twenty-juǎn Yuán-period paediatric treatise by 曾世榮 Zēng Shìróng (1253–1332, zì Déxiǎn 德顯) of Héngyáng 衡陽, companion to his better-known Huóyòu xīnshū 活幼心書 (KR3ej007, 1294). The work was recorded in the Jiāo Hóng guóshǐ jīngjí zhì 焦竑國史經藉志 (the Míng scholar 焦竑 Jiāo Hóng’s bibliographic catalogue) and circulated in Chinese in defective manuscript copies before being recovered in complete form from the Korean Yīfāng lèijù 醫方類聚 (15th c.) and brought back into Chinese circulation through the Japanese kobō-ha / kaō-ha 漢方 medical-philology tradition. The 1820 Japanese reprint by 丹波元胤 Tanba Genin and his uncle 丹波元堅 Tanba Genken (Cǎitíng 茝庭) is the principal modern critical edition base.
Prefaces
The received front-matter contains a 1820 postface (bá 跋) by 丹波元胤 Tanba Genin of Dōngdū 東都 (Edo) at the Liǔpàn jīnglú 柳沜精盧, dated Bunsei 3 gēngchén 文政庚辰 = 1820 first month of winter (mèngdōng) 22nd day. The postface explains the work’s transmission: Tanba family’s old manuscript copy was only eight juǎn and corrupt beyond reading; his uncle 丹波元堅 Tanba Genken (Cǎitíng 茝庭) later extracted a fuller version from the Korean Yīfāng lèijù (the great fifteenth-century Korean medical encyclopaedia compiled under King Sejong); Tanba Genin reflects on the work’s kuǎnbào zhōng wù miǎn wéi cháojūn xiàchóng 懷抱中物免為朝菌夏蟲 (the contents of the maternal embrace freed from being a morning-mushroom or summer-cicada — i.e. ephemeral, dying young) as expressive of Zēng’s yòuyòu zhī xīn 幼幼之心 (compassion for children). The postface also recounts the survival history of Zēng’s other work, the Huóyòu xīnshū: when Héngyáng was devastated and several thousand houses burned, the woodblocks of the Huóyòu xīnshū were thrown into a pond by hǎoshì zhě 好事者 (well-intentioned persons) and survived intact — tiānxīn zhī shǐ rán 天心之使然 (clearly the doing of Heaven’s heart). Ten years later in autumn the uncle Tanba 蒨園啟 Qiànyuánqǐ acquired a complete copy through the Zhúdòng hòurén 竹洞後人 人見友雪 Rénjiàn Yǒuxuě collection; Tanba Genin made a fresh transcription for family use.
Abstract
The Huóyòu kǒuyì is, alongside the Huóyòu xīnshū, one of the two principal Yuán-period paediatric works, both by Zēng Shìróng. The two works are complementary: the Xīnshū is the systematic textbook (organised into juézhèng shīfù / míngběn lùn / xìnxiào fāng); the Kǒuyì is the more discursive oral-discussion-style treatise (the kǒuyì 口議 of the title implying kǒushòu 口授 transmission). The work covers paediatric zhěnshì lǐliáo 診視理療 (diagnosis and treatment), píngsù jūyǎng 平素鞠養 (general nurture), bǎoshè 保攝 (protection), rǔbǔ 乳哺 (breastfeeding), and xīxì 嬉戲 (play), all chúnchún jiējiē 諄諄諦諦 (earnestly and meticulously). Its twenty juǎn preserve a substantial body of late-Sòng / early-Yuán paediatric jiāfāng 家方 (household prescriptions) and yīàn 醫案 (case-histories) drawn from Zēng’s Héngyáng practice. The text’s survival is one of the principal cases in the Sino-Japanese-Korean medical-philological circuit: lost in defective copies in China, preserved by the Korean Yīfāng lèijù (1445), and reconstituted in early-nineteenth-century Edo by the Tanba family. Date: Zēng’s dates of activity bracket the work’s composition (c. 1290 first activity → 1322 last attested writings).
Translations and research
- 熊秉真 Xióng Bǐngzhēn (Hsiung Ping-chen), A Tender Voyage. Stanford UP, 2005 — discusses Zēng Shìróng in the Yuán paediatric tradition.
- Yīfāng lèijù 醫方類聚 (Korean 15th c.) — the principal Korean source for the complete text.
- 丹波元胤 Tanba Genin, Yīkō 醫考 / Yījí kǎo 醫籍考 — Japanese bibliographic studies of Sino-Japanese medical-text transmission.
- Huóyòu kǒuyì jiàozhù 活幼口議校注 — modern Chinese punctuated edition (multiple imprints).
Other points of interest
The Tanba family — 丹波元簡 Tanba Genken-no-Mototada 丹波元簡 (Líshū 櫟蔭), 丹波元堅 Tanba Genken 丹波元堅 (Cǎitíng 茝庭), his nephew 丹波元胤 Tanba Genin, and the broader Tanba clinical-philological lineage — were the dominant Sino-Japanese medical-text philologists of the Edo period (Bunsei–Tenpō eras). The 1820 Huóyòu kǒuyì postface is a representative example of their critical-edition methodology: provenance traced, source-witnesses identified, transcription justified, and the textual-survival story morally interpreted. The work’s recovery is one of the principal achievements of the late-Edo Sino-Japanese medical-philological revival.