Botanicon Sinicum: notes on Chinese botany from native and Western sources. Part 3, Botanical investigations into the materia medica of the ancient Chinese / [E. Bretschneider].

  • Emil Bretschneider
Date:
1895
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Botanicon Sinicum: notes on Chinese botany from native and Western sources. Part 3, Botanical investigations into the materia medica of the ancient Chinese / [E. Bretschneider]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    24/638 (page 14)
    barbarian tribes who dwelt in or about the district of Wen shan [in N. S/d clTuan, v. App. 088]. The root lias a red rind, is of a hard solid structure. The best sort is called ^ ]|5l Pao han tslao, from a place in the country of the Si K‘iaug barbarians [Kukonor, N.E. Tibet, App. 300—• Ancient Pao han is now Ho chon in Kan su, v. App. 242]. It is not advisable to dry the root by means of artificial heat, for it then becomes fissured. Another kind of lean ts‘ao resembles fish-bowels. It is not advisable to cut it with a knife. A drug of an inferior quality is produced in Ts'ing chon [East Shan tung, v. App. 8G3]. There is also the tsz1, (purplish or violet) han tslao. It is slender, but for fault of a better drug it may also be used, Su Sung [11th century]:—The han ts‘ao grows in all the prefectures of Shen si [modern Shensi and E. Kansu, v. App. 284] and ITo tung [present Shan si, v. App. 80]. It is a plant from one to two feet high. The leaves resemble those of the liuai (Sophora). I11 the 7th month it produces violet flowers resembling those of the nai tung [unknown to me] which are followed by pods like pea-pods. The root has a red rind, is from 3 to 4 feet long, coarse or slender. In its upper part the principal root emits horizontal branches (runners) which are beset with rootlets. After the crown and the red rind have been removed, the root is dried in the shade. Kan t.^ao is still the common Chinese name for Liquorice or Glycyrrhiza. A good drawing of a Glycyrrhiza sub han islao, roots, flowers and echinate legumes, is found in the Ch. [VII, 6]. Comp. Plion to, V, 1, jf Glycyrrhiza. Sieb. cecon., 305, Glycyrrhiza, han soo. E. China introducta, rarius et quidem in provinciis insulin Sikok culta. Tatar, Cat. 25.—P. Smith, 13G. Liquorice root.