Yánlíng dìzǐ jìyào 延陵弟子紀要
Essential Records of the Yán-líng Disciples by 曹存心 Cáo Cúnxīn (Rénbó 仁伯, 1767–1834); transcribed and annotated by 吳金壽 Wú Jīnshòu (Zǐyīn 子音, fl. 1830s).
About the work
A single-juǎn casebook documenting Cáo Cúnxīn’s bedside teaching for his Sūzhōu Yánlíng 延陵 (a literary name for Chángshú 常熟) disciples. The cases are presented in transcribed dialogue: a junior disciple’s draft case-and-prescription is followed by Cáo’s editorial diǎncuàn (點竄, correction-and-deletion) — making this the principal documentary record of Cáo’s pedagogical method (as distinct from the strict case-records preserved in KR3ep025, KR3ep069).
Prefaces
The hxwd _000.txt carries a preface signed Wénlán 文瀾, dated chéngfēng jiǔ nián púyuè zhōngxún (= Xiánfēng 9 = mid-fifth-lunar-month 1859). The preface explains the work’s editorial principle: Cáo’s daily outpatient practice (“clinic-patients by the hundreds, hand-pulse-takers two or three dozen”) was distributed among his disciples for initial diagnosis; Cáo would then perform a yīwǔ 一五 (one-in-five) review-and-correction. The present volume preserves the cases diagnosed by Cáo’s disciple Wú 吳 (= Wú Jīnshòu), with Cáo’s editorial corrections preserved alongside. The preface laments that of Cáo’s hundred-plus disciples, only Wú was diligent enough to compile his diagnostic-and-correction record into a usable volume — the other disciples’ editorial-correction records were not preserved.
Abstract
The text is methodologically distinctive in the KR3ep series for preserving two voices on each case: the junior disciple’s diagnostic-prescriptive attempt and the master’s correction. The pedagogical structure makes the work an unusually clear specimen of nineteenth-century Sūzhōu zǐdìpài (apprentice-style) Chinese-medical training. The first case (Sūn of Tóngjīngqiáo 桐涇橋, wǔgēng xiè 五更瀉 early-dawn diarrhea) demonstrates the teacher’s signature methodology: gānmù chéng pítǔ (liver-wood mounting spleen-earth), zhìzhōng yùnlǐ (regulating-centre transport-management) with Liánlǐ tāng variants.
Cáo Cúnxīn 曹存心 (Rénbó, 1767–1834) was the leading Sūzhōu / Chángshú physician of the late-Qiánlóng / Jiāqìng period; see KR3ep025 and KR3ep069 for his other casebooks. The composition window 1820–1859 brackets Cáo’s late clinical period plus the 1859 editorial preface; the editorial work was undertaken by Wú Jīnshòu (the same compiler as KR3ep020 Sānjiā yīàn hékè and KR3ep080 Yè Tiānshì yīàn).
Translations and research
Reminder: AI generated list - beware of hallucinations. Corrections and additions welcome
Scheid, Volker. 2007. Currents of Tradition in Chinese Medicine 1626–2006. Eastland Press — substantial coverage of Cáo Cún-xīn and the Sūzhōu Yán-líng lineage.