A Healing History
Ten coordinates for understanding two thousand years of Chinese medicine.
The Inner Canon of the Yellow Emperor
The foundational theory of Chinese medicine: yin-yang, the five phases, zang-fu organs and meridians — a holistic framework honoured for over two millennia.
The Divine Farmer's Materia Medica
China's earliest extant pharmacopoeia, recording 365 drugs in three grades and establishing the theory of the four natures and five tastes.
Zhang Zhongjing's Treatise on Cold Damage
Established treatment by syndrome pattern. Formulas such as Cinnamon Twig Decoction remain in use today — the 'ancestor of formula books'.
Hua Tuo
Pioneered surgery with the anaesthetic mafeisan and created the Five Animal Frolics exercise regimen.
Ge Hong's Handbook for Emergencies
A portable manual of urgent remedies, including qinghao for malaria — the seed that grew into artemisinin 1,600 years later.
Sun Simiao's Invaluable Prescriptions
Compiled the medical learning of preceding ages; his essay 'On the Absolute Sincerity of the Great Physician' remains the cardinal text of TCM ethics. Monk Jianzhen carried herbs and texts to Japan.
Imperial Grace Formulary
The formulary of the Song state pharmacy — among the world's earliest official pharmacopoeias, preserving formulas such as Four Gentlemen and Huoxiang Zhengqi.
Li Shizhen's Compendium of Materia Medica
Completed after 27 years: 52 volumes, 1,892 drugs, 11,096 formulas, translated into many languages. Joseph Needham called it the greatest scientific achievement of the Ming.
The Warm-Disease School
Ye Tianshi and Wu Jutong systematised the treatment of epidemic fevers; An Gong Niu Huang Wan remains an emergency classic.
Going Global
Artemisinin won the Nobel Prize in 2015; ICD-11 adopted a traditional-medicine chapter in 2019; ISO/TC 249 has published over one hundred international standards.