Yòukē zhézhōng mìchuán zhēnběn 幼科折衷秘傳真本
True Secret-Transmission Recension of the Eclectic Synthesis of Paediatrics attributed to 秦昌遇 Qín Chāngyù (撰), transcribed by 孟作霖 Mèng Zuòlín (錄, 1892)
About the work
A single-juǎn late-Qīng manuscript-recension of 秦昌遇 Qín Chāngyù’s late-Míng paediatric treatise Yòukē zhézhōng 幼科折衷 (KR3ej018), transcribed by 孟作霖 Mèng Zuòlín (zì Yǔsūn 雨蓀, studio-name Jìshìxuān 濟世軒) at the Guāngxù 18 (1892) eighth lunar month from a borrowed manuscript witness. The work is presented as the mìchuán zhēnběn 秘傳真本 (secretly transmitted true recension) — a family-medicine bìběn 秘本 marketing trope of late-Qīng manuscript paediatric texts. The recension supplements Qín’s Yòukē zhézhōng with material drawn from late-Qīng paediatric clinical practice, including a substantial discussion of shíèr jīng 十二經 (twelve channels) doctrine.
Prefaces
Transcriber’s preface by 孟作霖 Mèng Zuòlín zì Yǔsūn 雨蓀, dated Guāngxù 18 rénchén 壬辰 = 1892 zhuàngyuè 壯月 (eighth lunar month). Mèng frames the work in the standard zhézhōng (eclectic balancing) methodological language: paediatric medicine, through the wàng wén wèn qiè 望聞問切 (four diagnostic procedures), separates biǎolǐ xūshí 表裡虛實 from the patient-pattern, and the zhézhōng book is fēnmén shèn jiǎn, bìngqíng xībèi, xǐjìng fúcí, dú cún jīngyào 分門甚簡，病情悉備，洗淨浮辭，獨存精要 (with extremely simple categorisation, complete pathological coverage, washed clean of empty rhetoric, retaining only the essential). He explains the work’s near-disappearance from print: Yuèfěi luànhòu, kānbǎn jìn fèi 粵匪亂後，刊板盡廢 (after the Yuèfěi / Tàipíng rebellion, the printing-blocks were entirely destroyed), so all surviving witnesses are manuscript copies jiē yǒu bì ér bù xuān zhī yì 皆有秘而不宣之意 (kept secret and not disseminated). Mèng’s youthful introduction to the work through his elder’s recommendation, his subsequent decade-plus of paediatric specialism, and his eventual acquisition of a manuscript through zhījǐ 知己 (a sympathetic friend) are recounted; Mèng confesses that wéi shāo yǒu túgǎi, réng bù miǎn yǐ wù chuán wù zhī bì 維稍有塗改，仍不免以誤傳誤之弊 (with only minor corrections, the work still suffers from the errors-transmit-errors (yǐ wù chuán wù) problem characteristic of unauthorised manuscript reproduction). The preface closes with a stern instruction: yí zūn zhī, zhòng zhī, jiǔ ér cáng zhī, qiè wù jiè yú wàirén 宜尊之、重之、久而藏之，切勿借於外人 (this should be revered, treasured, long-preserved, and never lent to outsiders).
Abstract
The Yòukē zhézhōng mìchuán zhēnběn is a late-Qīng manuscript transmission of 秦昌遇 Qín Chāngyù’s late-Míng paediatric treatise Yòukē zhézhōng (KR3ej018). The two recensions differ: KR3ej018 represents one published recension (or hybrid manuscript-print); the present KR3ej034 represents the mìchuán manuscript tradition, with later editorial supplements including the Shíèr jīng 十二經 (twelve channels) discussion. The transmission story — surviving print blocks destroyed in the Yuèfěi (Tàipíng) campaigns of 1850–1864, surviving manuscript copies guarded as family secrets — is one of the more striking documentary records of the textual impact of the mid-nineteenth-century rebellions on the Chinese medical-publishing trade. The date bracket reflects the original composition (c. 1620–1641) and the transcription (1892); the manuscript represents centuries of accumulated transmission and editorial layering.
Translations and research
- No specialised scholarship on the manuscript recension located. For the underlying Qín Chāngyù Yòukē zhézhōng see KR3ej018.
Other points of interest
The preface’s Yuèfěi luànhòu, kānbǎn jìn fèi (after the Yuèfěi rebellion, the printing blocks were entirely destroyed) is a documentary reference to the well-attested destruction of medical-publishing infrastructure in lower-Yángzǐ China during the Tàipíng campaigns (1850–1864), with permanent loss of much late-Míng and Qīng medical kèbǎn 刻版 woodblock heritage.