| Since ancient times, the Chinese have the history of Chinese medicine on images, books and the text. These are insufficient to fill the order and to express the relationship much clearly, which stressed on the need for books with graphical representation or images of the complementary relationship. Thus, illustrations were the most traditional paradigm of ancient Chinese books.The image of the ancient Chinese medicine is an important part of Chinese medical literature and is closely related with academic inheritance of TCM. The most images of the ancient Chinese medicine are the sketch, which is determined by the characteristics of the academic content of herbal medicine. Herbal Medicine includes identification of drugs, to determine the drug’s efficacy and to establish the perfect systemic medical theory.Specifically, because of various kinds and great number of drugs, also in many different forms and combinations with the geographical factors, it is very difficult to describe the herb only by words. But the image has the characteristics of intuitive and vivid. So combination of both texts and images will be a better way to describe herbs. Drug need processing, the processing procedure and processing equipment are complex, so the images help to make them much easier, clear and vivid.This article will focus on the study of images of Ancient Chinese Materia Medica books and its purpose to expand the ideas in the field of literature study of TCM Materia Medica and to enrich the connotation of Traditional Chinese Medicine Materia Medica. The study will also show the main achievements of the Chinese herbal medicine and reveals its impact on the development and dissemination of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). Investigating range of herbal medicine in TCM ancient books, is based on "Chinese TCM ancient books catalogue", in the part of "materia medica" not including "foreign content" and which is before1911(including1911). Research content not only includes herbal medicine images, but also covers all kinds of forms of drawings appeared in ancient Chinese medicine books. This research is following the traditional bibliography classical principles and to clarify the logical relationships between the disciplines of Chinese Materia Medica internal parts, as well as with other disciplines. Using of the basic methods of philology, the scope of the collection of the specific bibliography, image content and classification is determined. According to "Chinese TCM ancient books catalogue", to conduct a comprehensive literature search, copy and retain the images, all data should be sorted out and studied. Based on using scientific research methods and Internet technology, management level and efficiency has improved significantly. Thus, this research can be completed in a relatively short period of time.A total of449Chinese medicines were eligible for the study, which were contained in the "Chinese TCM ancient books catalogue" before1911(including1911). In this study, a total of279species were studied, accounting for62.14%;56of them have images, accounting for20.01%. Research covers15048herbal images and8022were collected so far. All the images can be divided into drug charts, diagnostic charts, meridian point diagrams, interior viscera figures, foundation plans, theoretical figures, health practitioner figures, spell diagrams, figure charts, astrological charts and a total of10categories. There are many types and a huge number of the images in ancient Chinese medicine, from the Wei, Jin and Southern and Northern Dynasties to the Ming and Qing dynasties. The drug morphology figures have the largest number, mainly exist in Materia Medica. The drug processing figures followed behind, which mainly exist in<Bu Yi Lei Gong Pao Zhi Bian Lan>. The other kinds of images like diagnostic charts, meridian point diagrams, interior viscera figure are distributed in a variety of herbal books. In each kind of the10categories of the images, we give brief introduction on the basic concept, the quantity and some related books. The drug morphology figures mainly used to identify, gathering and using herbs. Most of them are engraving ink line sketches, some are hand-painted ink line sketches and a very few of them are beautiful hand-painted figures. The herbal images keep the most professional characteristics of herbal medicine and play an important role in the academic heritage. Because of the development on papermaking and printing, drug figures spread widely, which gave a large contribution to the popularization of knowledge of herbal medicine.In addition, there have many other kinds of sketches in Ancitent Chinese Materia Medica images, which reflect the integrity of the theory of TCM, and cross-cutting relevance between herbal medicine and other professional disciplines. Images based on TCM theory, such as meridian point diagrams, interior viscera figures, interpret the efficacy of the drug. Study of traditional Chinese medicine should be combined with the application of multiple disciplines, thus can give a better guide to clinical work.The drug images are used to describe the drug forms, drugs concocted processes and equipment and in addition to drug-related content (such as the ecological environment, place of origin, collection, usage, folklore, legends, etc). This type of images are full of subjective characteristics, has the largest number and which are most practical. According to the content, the drug pictures could be divided into3categories, such as drug morphology figures, drug concocted figures and drug relationship figures.The drug morphology figures directly describe the morphology of the drug, which give the reader an intuitive understanding and facilitate the identification of drugs. These kinds of pictures are widely used for easy understanding. According to the different shape of the drugs, the drug morphology figures can be divided into the drug-based figures and herb figures. The first kinds of figures are dedicated to describe the full information associated with drugs. But the herb figures show only the morphological characteristics of the medicinal parts, without involving all the information about them. The drug morphology pictures make up the shortcoming of textual description, so that people can more accurately distinguish and use drugs.The drug processing figures are used to describe the processing procedure of the drugs and processing equipment. The numbers of images in this part are far less than the drug morphology figures, but it is a very distinctive type of image of herbal medicine. This type of pictures can be divided into the drug processing maps and drug apparatus maps. The drug processing maps are involved to the people and whole process; and the drug apparatus refers to a variety of instruments. The processing procedure and the equipments are very abstract and difficult to understand and just rely on the text description, but pictures made them easier to understand and possible to heritage.The drug relationship figures focus on drugs and link out much other information associated with cultures of TCM. This type of pictures are characterized by imagination and most are ideographic rather than realistic. Although not directly depict drug form or drugs processing procedures, but it can show drug-related content (such as the ecological environment, place of origin, collection, folklore, legends, etc). Such images enlarge the content of Chinese Materia Medica and enrich the culture of TCM as well.There are6features of herbal maps in Chinese medical literature including:the huge number, rich in content, perfect in practical, the characteristics of the times, easy to understand and vivid artistic expression. It also contain5kinds of values such as academic value, historical value, application value, the value of innovation and artistic value. Finally, this article discusses about the relationship between the herbal maps and the Materia Medica academic heritage and also the relationship with traditional Chinese culture. The images reflect the changes in the content of the Chinese herbal medicine and make up for the shortcomings of simple text description. Thus it maintains the integrity of the academic heritage because of the cross-integration of herbal medicine and Taoist culture, folk culture, science and technology. This study will have important realistic meaning and historical significance. |
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