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.

    74/638 (page 64)
    -m tsz1 ts‘ao. P., XIIb, 36. 7’., CLIX. Comp, Rh ya, 142, for other ancient names. Pen Icing:—Tsz1 tslao (purple herb). The root is officinal. Taste hitter. Nature cold. Non-poisonous. Pie lu:—The tsz1 ts‘ao is also called tsz1 tan (purple cinnabar red). It grows in the mountain valleys of Tang shan [in Kiang so, App. 334] and in the country of Ch‘u [Hu kuang, App. 24]. The root is dug up in the 3rd month and dried in the shade. In the Wu P‘u [3rd cent.] it is called Tlli ifil ti hue (earth blood). This name is properly applied to Italia. [See 182.] T‘ao Hung-king :—This plant is produced in Siang yang [in Hu pei, App. 306]. Much of the drug is also brought from the district of Sin ye in the Nan yang prefecture [in SAY. Ho nan, App. 312, 231]. The people there cultivate it and employ it for dyeing a purple colour. It is not much used in medicine. Li Shi-chen :—This plant has purple flowers and a purple root, whence the name tsz‘ ts‘ao. It is cultivated for the colour yielded by its root. This root must be dug up in spring before the plant has flowered. Then the colouring matter will be found to be very bright. But if gathered after flowering the colour has-become deeper and is conse- quently inferior in quality. The top of the root [I shouid rather think the plant above the ground] is covered with white hair. By certain processes a yellow colour can be produced from the root. The Yao cliuaug people [r. App. 402] call this plant JffjJ Yyf ya lien tslao. Cl., VII, 46:—Tsz‘ tslao. Representation of Litho- sj ter muni erythrorhizon, S. & Z.