Research On Historical Materials Of Medicine In Chao Xian Wang Chao Shi Lu

With Joseon bando lying between China and Japan,the traditional medicine in Joseon has a thousand and one links with that in the other two countries.Miki Sakae,the Japanese Medical historian,once pointed out that he who did not understand medical science in Joseon bando could not talk about that in Japan Island and China mainland as well.His words were a good explanation of the importance of medicine in Joseon in research of Eastern Asian traditional medicine.The recorded history of Joseon bando began in ancient Joseon,which was the first monarchy nation on Joseon bando and no definite historical materials can tell the exact time of its establishment yet.After it were the Period of the Three States(100-668),Unified Silla(669-935),Goryeo(918-1392) and the Joseon Dynasty(1392-1910).In 1910,Japanese occupied Joseon bando and declared the combination of Japan and Korea,which lasted till the end of World War II in 1945.Three years later,the Republic of Korea and Democratic People's Republic of Korea were set up one after another.Rare in texts,research on medical history of Joseon met more difficulties than of the other countries.Fortunately,the well preserved literatures,going through wars and calamities,become a precious legacy of culture nowadays and contribute rich materials for research.Among those heritages is the great chronicle Chao Xian Wang Chao Shi Lu (the True Record of the Joseon Dynasty).With historical facts in 472 years of 25 monarchs recorded in 1893 volumes in 888 copies,the work involves politics, society,economy,diplomacy,religion,astronomy,geography,music,disaster, medicine,etc.Meanwhile,it has become the fundamental data for histories and relationships of Asian countries in the present days.In 1997,it was even titled as World Record Heritage by United Nation Educational Scientific and Culture Organization.This marvelous work also includes materials in medical matters in court, rules and regulations,herbs,books,exchanges,treatments to monarchs and epidemic diseases,which solve the problems in the field of medical history in the Joseon Dynasty.A collection of more than 400,000 words of medical historical materials from this book was sifted and part of them was chosen to be divided into five parts:medical matters in court,medicinal herbs,medical texts,treatments of diseases and preventions and cures of epidemics.Medical exchanges were also analyzed and introduced among the chapters above and the medical developments and influences of the Joseon Dynasty will be described in this thesis as well.Thus contributes to the research work on medical interchanges among China,Korea and Japan.