Yáo Qiú 姚球 (CBDB 442423; no confident dates), fl. early 18th c., native of the Sūzhōu region (probable). He is essentially known only as the actual author of the Běncǎo jīng jiě 本草經解 (KR3ec044), which was published in 1724 under the pseudepigraphic attribution to Yè Tiānshì 葉桂. The reattribution to Yáo was established by Qīng kǎojù scholars who noted that the work’s pharmacological doctrine differs from Yè’s actual writings.
Other Yáo Qiú records in CBDB (id 562713) lack dates and may or may not refer to the same person. No further biographical record survives.