Bǎomìng gēkuò 保命歌括
Versified Compendium for Preserving Life by 萬全 Wàn Quán (1499–1582, hào Mìzhāi 密齋, of Luótián 羅田).
About the work
A 35-juan systematic clinical handbook organised in versified pedagogical form (gēkuò 歌括 — mnemonic verse compilation). Each disease-class is presented through a quatrain (or longer verse) that condenses the doctrinal essentials, followed by detailed prose exposition. The work opens with 中風 zhòngfēng (stroke / wind-strike), then proceeds through the standard internal-medicine syndrome-taxonomy: cold-damage (shānghán); diseases of the Five Viscera; zábìng miscellaneous syndromes; cough, dyspnoea, and pulmonary diseases; vomiting and reflux; the liùyù 六鬱 (Six Stagnations) of Dānxī; and concluding with the obstetric and paediatric classes (Wàn’s principal specialties).
Prefaces
The jicheng.tw reprint preserves only the body of the work (kept as juan 1, 2, 3…; the front-matter juan _000 is not transmitted in the source files). The opening verse on stroke — dì zuò Míngtáng guān bāfēng, xǐ cóng zhèngwèi pà cóng chōng, xiéxū zhòufā mín duō bìng, qiángruò zhōngjiān lùn bù tóng 帝坐明堂觀八風、喜從正位怕從沖、邪虛晝發民多病、強弱中間論不同 (“The Emperor sits in the Bright Hall and watches the Eight Winds; he loves those that come from the proper station and fears those that come from the opposing — when xiéxū sets out in daylight the people have many illnesses, between strong-and-weak the discussion is not the same”) — is one of the more famous verses in the Wàn corpus, integrating the classical-medical bāfēng doctrine of Língshū 九宮八風 (KR3e0002) with the Dānxī clinical framework.
Abstract
The Bǎomìng gēkuò is the central clinical work of 萬全 Wàn Quán’s medical corpus — the systematic nèikē internal-medicine handbook that complements the more specialised paediatric and obstetric volumes of the Mìzhāi yīshū shí zhǒng 密齋醫書十種 (萬密齋醫書十種). Wàn’s distinctive contribution is the versified pedagogical method: each disease syndrome is presented in gēkuò mnemonic verse at the head of its section, designed to be memorised and recited by the student-physician, with the prose exposition providing the elaborated clinical detail. This pedagogical strategy was widely adopted in subsequent Míng-Qīng medical textbooks (cf. Yīzōng jīnjiàn 醫宗金鑑 (KR3e0090) of 1742, which adopted the same gēkuò form on a much larger scale).
The work’s doctrinal alignment is eclectic Dānxī: the framework is essentially that of 朱震亨 Zhū Zhènhéng’s (1281–1358) system, modified by Wàn’s selective integration of 劉完素 Liú Wánsù’s huǒrè doctrine, 李杲 Lǐ Gāo’s píwèi doctrine, and 張子和 Zhāng Zǐhé’s gōngxié doctrine — i.e., a synthesis of all four of the Jīn-Yuán sìdà jiā.
The work was composed during Wàn’s mature clinical period at Luótián, c. 1549–1582, and first printed posthumously. It was reprinted continuously through the late Míng and Qīng, becoming one of the most widely used clinical handbooks of the late-imperial period.
Translations and research
- 萬全, Wàn Mì-zhāi yī-xué quán-shū 萬密齋醫學全書, ed. 傅沛藩 et al. (Běijīng: Zhōng-guó zhōng-yī-yào chū-bǎn-shè, 1999).
- 萬全, Bǎo-mìng gē-kuò, ed. 羅田縣中醫院整理 (Wuhan: Húběi rén-mín, 1985).
- Zhōng-guó yī-jí dà-cí-diǎn, s.v. 保命歌括.
- 賈得道, Zhōng-guó yī-xué shǐ luè 中國醫學史略 (Tài-yuán, 1979).
- Hinrichs and Barnes (eds.), Chinese Medicine and Healing, ch. 6 (Ming clinical pedagogy).
Other points of interest
The Bǎomìng gēkuò’s versified clinical pedagogy anticipates by nearly two centuries the Yīzōng jīnjiàn approach (1742) — itself the principal clinical textbook of late-Qīng Tàiyīyuàn training. Wàn Quán’s contribution to Chinese medical pedagogy is consequently more substantial than is sometimes recognised in modern surveys focused on his paediatric work.
Links
- Companion: KR3eo025 養生四要 (Wàn’s yǎngshēng volume).
- KR3ef071 傷寒摘錦 (Wàn’s shānghán digest).
- Kanseki DB
- 保命歌括