Academic Heritage Of Literature Of Herbal For Relief Of Famines Between China And Japan

In Chinese ancient history, famines occurred frequently, people constantly took various measures to respond to natural disasters. With the development of theories and measures, some documents and literature about the measures and events of famines had been appearing successively, this type of literature was collectively referred to as "famine relief literature". As one of the effective measures of famines, part of the books recorded wild plants using to eat which can relieve famines instead of food. Before the Ming dynasty, the records of famines relieving had been found in all kinds of books. Until the Ming dynasty, they began to exist some books which specifically studied on a variety of wild edible plants to relieve famines. These books had closed relationship with herbalism of TCM, which were known as "Herbal for Relief of Famines" and formed a branch of herbalism."Herbal for Relief of Famines" was considered as the pioneer of famines books, which was written by Zhu Su。Zhu Su was a seignior in Ming Dynasty Chengzu. He was not a professional doctor, but he had a profound knowledge of the medical. For the purpose of relieving famines, he applicated the methods of herbalism into the "Herbal for Relief of Famines"."Herbal for Relief of Famines" was the first book of famines herbal in the history of our country, it created a new field of edible plants research in China. The book had a double nature of herbalism and agronomy. In the aspect of herbalism, the book studied some edible function in medicinal herbal, discovered some wild medicine resources, which had never been recorded in books. The basic medicine theory was discussed in detail in the book, which enriched the theory of medicinal properties and expanded the research scope of herbalism. In the other aspect of agriculture, the purpose of the book was to relieve famines, the book expounded the gathering, edible methods, the toxicity, the cultural control of wild plants and so on. It had very high practical value.Some famines books also integrated the content and ideas of "Herbal for Relief of Famines" to guided the perfect famines relief measures.The knowledge of "Herbal for Relief of Famines" covered agriculture and medical fields. It was published as medical books and recorded in agricultural books which attracted extensive attention of medical scientists and agronomists. According to the demand in different times, different regions and areas of the people published the books. They got, added or deleted the knowledge in the book from different angles, which made the inheritance versions of the book differently, the descriptions were similar or different, the volume numbers and species of medicine made big changes, forming a more sophisticated version and a variable evolutional system.When "Herbal for Relief of Famines" had finished, a mass of similar works were appeared. Because of the far-reaching influence on "Herbal for Relief of Famines", the works gathered the related contents similarly and widely, and sorted out them systemly. They found out the effective opening way to deal with the famines. At the same time, it was the effective means to relieve of famines. The books for the purpose of relieving of famines developed the medica academic from different angles and expanded the research scope of herbalism, which formed a unique branch of herbalism.The emphasis of herbal books for relieving of famines contain name, source, origin, collection, character, nature and flavor, incompatibility, edible methods, efficacy, toxicity of note, processing methods and so on. It’s very important for us to pay more attention to the local populations of wild herbal medicine resources. The research method of traditional herbal medicine works is worth using for reference. We should collect the kind and practical value of edible medica and make the kind and amount of Herbal for Relief of Famines richly. The Herbal for Relief of Famines make people fully understand the use value of edible medica, which supplements the herbalism and agronomy. It is also collected, arranged and used in later generations for famine history books which could reflect the practicability and universality.Around the late17th century,"Herbal for Relief of Famines" was spreade to Japan. Because of its unique content and practical value of herbal medicine, it received serious attention in famous Japanese herbalism. Some famous scholars began to annotate the book including the famous people once promoted dissemination of "Compendium of Materia Medica". They collect the content of "Herbal for Relief of Famines" from the "Agricultural Administration Encyclopedia" which spread to Japan. They carved and published the book alone so that the Japanese doctor could learn and study. Since then, for the convenience of using, they annotateed the book. At the same time, they still opened classes, teached "Herbal for Relief of Famines" and made it spread widely in Janpan.Under the influence of "Herbal for Relief of Famines" and similar books, Japanese herbal scientists in edo period inherited physical investigation research method, combining theory and practice, comparing to China’s original records, Studying plants grow in the field of Japanese, compiling a batch of annotation research compendium of material medica book and Japanese’s works. A group of Japanese agronomists absorbed the ideas of "Herbal for Relief of Famines" in their agriculture work into the medica famines content, which played a good role for relieving famines in Japan,it enriched famines medica resources and make use of the method in some extent.The Japanese scholars of herbalism and agronomist respectively from different points inherited the compendium of "Herbal for Relief of Famines" and other books famines relieving literature. Combining famines knowledge of China with Japan, field trips to the domestic wild herbal medicine resources, enriched the content of the "Herbal for Relief of Famines", opened up a wider field to the research of herbals.In summary,"Herbal for Relief of Famines" which was written by Zhu Su in Ming Dynasty is a very unique work. Its knowledge covers the field of medicine and agriculture,and its influence affected many countries,like China,Japan and other east Asian countries. Therefore,It is in very special status in the history of science and culture."Herbal for Relief of Famines",contributing to a group of similar books appeared in China and Japan, made Herbal for Relief of Famines development to a higher level, formed a unique branch of herbalism, To a certain extent promoted the herbalism between the two countries and the development of agriculture.