Yījīng guóxiǎo 醫經國小 (alt. Yījīng xiǎoxué 醫經小學)
A Primer of the Medical Classics by 劉純 Liú Chún (zì Zōnghòu 宗厚 / Jǐnghòu 景厚, 1363 – c. 1489, Huáinán Wúlíng 淮南吳陵 → Guānzhōng 關中, Shǎnxī).
About the work
A six-juǎn early-Míng pedagogical primer of Chinese medicine in gējué 歌訣 (rhymed mnemonic) form, completed by the late-Yuán / early-Míng physician Liú Chún in Hóngwǔ 21 / 1388 as an introductory textbook for medical students and private-school medical training. The work’s title-variant — Yījīng guóxiǎo 醫經國小 vs. Yījīng xiǎoxué 醫經小學 — alludes to the Zhū Xī xiǎoxué 小學 / Sīshū tradition of Confucian elementary-text compilation, applying the same pedagogical model to medical education.
The six juǎn are organised topically:
- Běncǎo 本草 (materia medica)
- Màijué 脈訣 (pulse-diagnosis)
- Jīngluò 經絡 (channels and collaterals)
- Bìngjī 病機 (pathomechanism)
- Zhìfǎ 治法 (therapeutic methods)
- Yùnqì 運氣 (cosmic-cyclical correspondences)
The work is divided into 72 sections across the six juǎn. Liú’s editorial method, as stated in his self-preface, was to gather the essentials of the Sùwèn, Língshū, Nánjīng, Zhāng Zhòngjǐng, Wáng Shūhé, and the JīnYuán Sì dàjiā (Liú Wánsù 守真, Zhāng Cóngzhèng 子和, Lǐ Dōngyuán 明之, Zhū Dānxī 仲修) — particularly his own father’s teacher Zhū Dānxī (Liú Chún’s father Liú Shūyuān 劉叔淵 had been Zhū’s direct disciple) — and arrange them as rhymed mnemonics for ease of recitation, with brief explanatory notes appended where needed.
The work was a standard early-Míng medical pedagogical text and circulated widely through the MíngQīng tradition; the Hóngzhì 弘治 / Zhèngtǒng 正統 imprints (the latter dated 1438 at Shǎnxī, edited by Chén Yǒujiè 陳有戒) are the textus receptus.
Prefaces
The hxwd _001.txt (no _000.txt) is header-only and does not transcribe the body of the text or its prefatory matter. The hxwd entry is essentially a placeholder for an unpopulated digital text. The standard 1438 Chén Yǒujiè edition carries Liú Chún’s self-preface dated Hóngwǔ wùchén 洪武戊辰 = 1388, plus Chén’s Zhèngtǒng 3 / 1438 reprint preface.
Abstract
The 1388 dating is established beyond doubt by Liú’s self-preface; the work is one of the earliest dated Míng medical compositions. Liú Chún’s traditional dates of 1363–1489 (126 years, evidently a hagiographic exaggeration) reflect the late-Imperial tradition’s celebration of him as a long-lived Daoist-medical sage; modern scholarship is divided on his actual death-date (some sources giving 1448 instead). His father Liú Shūyuān 劉叔淵 was a direct disciple of Zhū Dānxī (Zhū died 1358), making Liú Chún a “grand-disciple” of the most influential of the Sì dàjiā; this Dān-xī-school transmission is the principal intellectual genealogy of the Yījīng guóxiǎo and Liú’s other works.
Liú’s principal additional works are the great Yùjī wēiyì 玉機微義 (50 juǎn, 1396 — the most ambitious individually-authored early-Míng clinical compendium, organised by the Sì dàjiā doctrinal divisions), Zábìng zhìlì 雜病治例 (1 juǎn, 1408), and Shānghán zhìlì 傷寒治例 (1 juǎn, date uncertain). These four works were collected as the Liú Chún yīxué quánshū 劉純醫學全書 by modern Chinese-medical-bibliography editors.
CBDB has Liú Chún at c_personid uncertain.
Translations and research
No European-language translation of the Yī-jīng guó-xiǎo located. For Liú Chún and the post-Dān-xī early-Míng medical tradition see Charlotte Furth, A Flourishing Yin (California, 1999); Volker Scheid, Currents of Tradition (Eastland, 2007).
Other points of interest
The gējué mnemonic-verse format of the work was extremely influential in late-Imperial medical pedagogy and became a standard format for medical-primer composition through the Qīng (cf. KR3er084 Yúnlín shéngòu, KR3er096 Yīxué yányuè, and the imperial Yīzōng jīnjiàn 醫宗金鑑 of 1742, all of which include substantial gējué sections modelled on Liú’s work).
Links
- Person notes 劉純 (author).
- Liú Chún’s other principal work: Yùjī wēiyì 玉機微義 (1396).