Shénnóng 神農 (“the Divine Husbandman”), also known as Yán Dì 炎帝, is one of the legendary Three Sovereigns (三皇) of mythic Chinese antiquity. He is conventionally credited with inventing agriculture, the plough, and the systematic identification of medicinal plants. According to Huáinánzǐ 淮南子 Xiūwù xùn 修務訓, Shénnóng “tasted the hundred herbs and the waters of the springs, so that the people could come to know what to take and what to avoid.” On this etiological tradition were grafted the pseudepigraphic ascriptions of the Shénnóng běncǎo jīng 神農本草經 (KR3ec001) and a whole sub-genre of shénnóng-titled works listed in 《漢書·藝文志》 (e.g. ShénnóngHuángdì shíyào 神農黃帝食藥). Modern scholarship treats Shénnóng as a culture-hero attribution, not a historical figure. The textual core of the Běncǎo jīng dates to the Han, not to any Zhou or pre-Zhou period.