Shíshān yīàn 石山醫案
Medical Case Records of Stone Mountain by 汪機 Wāng Jī (Shěngzhī 省之, hào Shíshān jūshì 石山居士, 1463–1539), of Qímén 祁門 (Huīzhōu, Ānhuī).
About the work
A four-juǎn mid-Míng casebook of the founder of the Xīnān 新安 medical school Wāng Jī (Shíshān jūshì), one of the principal late-Míng physicians and the leading mid-Míng exponent of the Dānxī (Zhū Zhènhēng) tradition’s zīyīn (yin-nurturing) clinical methodology in dialogue with the Lǐ Dōngyuán / Xuē Jǐ wēnbǔ (warming-tonifying) school.
Prefaces
The hxwd _000.txt opens with an appended biographical sketch (Shíshān jūshì zhuàn 石山居士傳) describing Wāng Jī’s lineage: descendant of the Yuèguó Gōng 汪華 Wāng Huá (the Suí-dynasty founder of the Huīzhōu Wāng lineage) → Lángzhōu fǎcáo 汪建 Wāng Jiàn → after four generations 汪璹 Wāng Shù (who first moved the lineage to Qímén Chìshānzhèn 祁門赤山鎮) → 汪新一 Wāng Xīnyī (who in the late Yuán moved the family to Pǔshù 樸墅 of Shíshān 石山, whence the hào). The biography describes Wāng Jī as a man of austere conduct who took on family responsibilities — bringing his brother’s body home from Guǎngdōng after his brother’s death, recovering ancestral graves and lands lost to other lineages, contributing the largest single share to building the ancestral clan-shrine. He had been a Chūnqiū classics student trained for the imperial-examination track, but turned to medicine after his father (also a physician of the Wāng-family medical lineage) cited 范仲淹 Fàn Zhòngyān’s “if I cannot be a good minister, I will be a good physician” to redirect his career.
Abstract
Wāng Jī 汪機 (1463–1539), zì Shěngzhī 省之, hào Shíshān jūshì 石山居士 (“the Stone Mountain Recluse”), native of Qímén 祁門 (Huīzhōu, Ānhuī). The founder of the Xīnān 新安 medical school proper and one of the principal mid-Míng medical writers, alongside the Wú-school physicians 王綸 Wāng Lún, 薛己 Xuē Jǐ, and 虞摶 Yú Tuán. His principal works include Shíshān yīàn (the present casebook), 醫學原理 Yīxué yuánlǐ, and 外科理例 Wàikē lǐlì (Principles and Examples of External Medicine).
Wāng Jī’s clinical signature is a synthetic Dānxī (Zhū Zhènhēng) zīyīn approach with selective use of bǔzhōng (centre-supplementing) prescriptions from the Lǐ Dōngyuán tradition, productively avoiding the polemics of contemporary doctrinal partisans. His emphasis on fundamental-qi as the source of disease-resistance (元氣論) and his biànzhèng methodology made him the principal mid-Míng synthesist of the four-master tradition. The Xīnān school descending from him produced the lineage that eventually flowed into the late-Qīng / Republican Shànghǎi medical milieu — see 王仲奇 Wáng Zhòngqí (KR3ep059).
The composition window 1500–1539 reflects Wāng Jī’s mature clinical decades through to his death.
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located in major European languages for this specific casebook. Wāng Jī is discussed at length in Hinrichs and Barnes 2013, pp. 158–162. The Xīnān school is treated in Lu Yan, Xīnān yīxué shǐ (in Chinese).
Links
- Wāng Jī’s medical-philosophical work: KR3eb017 Yīxué yuánlǐ and others.
- Xīnān-school inheritor: KR3ep059 Wáng Zhòngqí yīàn.
- Kanseki DB
- 石山醫案