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

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.

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$This is probably tbo plant so yen mentioned by the Chinese mediaeval traveller Ch‘ang chun [A.D. 1221] in North Mongolia. [See my book Chin. Medicev. Travellers, ]). 52.] Ch., VIII, G3 :—So yang. Rude drawing representing a cylindrical stem covered with scales. The drug so yang which I procured in an apothecary’s shop at Peking, and which has been examined by Professor Fluckiger, seemed to be Cynomorium coccineum, L., order Balanophorece. This is a singular, fleshy, red, herbaceous plant, which, as the genus name indicates, resembles a canine penis. According to Potanin and Przewalskt, it is a common plant in the Mongolian desert. Braun, Hankow Med., p. 40 :—So yang, reddish brown roots with wrinkled surface. Sz ch‘uan, Shan si, Ho nan. Cust. Med., p. 70 (GO) :—So yang exported 1885 from Hankow to other Chinese ports 24 piculs.— Hid., 478 (1189) : so yang, Balanopliora. Places of production : Sz clfluan, Hu peli. 11.—ff chH tsien.—P., Xlf, 1.— T., CLYT. Pen king:—ChH tsien (red arrow), also JH {If: li mu, HJ kui tu yu. Root officinal. Taste pungent. Nature warm. Non-poisonous. Pie lu :—The chH tsien grows in the river valleys (plains) of Ch‘en ts‘ang [in Shen si, App. 14], in Yung chou [Mid Shen si, App. 424], also in T‘ai shan [in Shan tung, App. 322] and Shao shi [in Ho nan, App. 281]. The root is dug up in the 3rd, 4th and 8th months, and dried in the sun. Pao P‘o-tsz‘ [4tli cent.] calls this plant ^ ^ ^ ho li LsHio and $] ^ tu yao chi, or self-moving chi, for it is said to move even when the air is still. R. grows in the$