NOTES
When quoting from the Bencao gangmu, I follow the original Chinese and cite chapter and entry (e.g., 14.28). My translations follow Paul Unschuld’s with emendations where possible, though much of this manuscript was written before his translations were published. The reader can find Unschuld’s translations of the passages I cite by looking up the same chapter and entry in his complete translation: Li Shizhen, Ben Cao Gang Mu, the complete Chinese text translated and annotated by Paul U. Unschuld, 9 vols., University of California Press (2021–24).
Introduction
Epigraph: Bencao gangmu (Systematic compendium), chapter 41, entry 18 (hereafter, citations to chapter and entry number for this work will be set as chapter.entry, for example, as 41.18).
1. This is true also of the classics. Li quotes the Book of Songs over a hundred times, but also the Mencius, Book of Changes, and others.
2. Unschuld, introduction to Li Shizhen, A Catalog of Benevolent Items, 8.
3. There is some debate about the meaning of the title, since it is like that of Duan Chengshi’s (d. 863) miscellany titled Miscellaneous Morsels from Youyang (You-yang zazu). Xie explains in his preface that he is discussing weaving together of information from different genres like making ribbons woven from five colored threads.
4. Xie, Wuzazu, juan 1, “Heaven.”
5. Shenbao 申報 (newspaper). “Lun leiji longjian ershi 論雷擊龍見二事 [On thunderbolts and dragons: two accounts]. July 16, 1877.
6. Lam, “Premodern Fiction and Fiction Collections,” 249.
7. Shenbao 申報 (newspaper). “Jinghua yuan chushou” 鏡花緣出售 [Flowers in the Mirror goes on sale]. December 29, 1880.
8. West and Idema, introduction to Wang Shifu, The Story of the Western Wing, 3.
9. Rolston, review of The Story of the Western Wing.
10. For translation and commentary of “Yingying’s Story,” see Yu, Bol, Owen, and Peterson, eds. Ways with Words, 173–201.
11. This summary is adapted from Lanselle, “This Fearful Object of Desire,” 206.
12. For a book-length discussion of paintings with these kinds of multilayered meanings, see Wu Hung, The Double Screen.
13. Again, this is mostly Lanselle’s summary; see “This Fearful Object of Desire,” 207.
14. Guidebooks specifically for merchants included titles such as Guide for Merchants and Traders (Shanggu zhinan) and A Reference Book for Merchants and Traders (Shanggu painlan). One was titled Categories of Essential Concern for Literati and Merchants (Shishang leiyao), speaking to an awareness of publishers of their highbrow and middlebrow audiences.
15. For thorough investigations of the Bencao gangmu, see Nappi, The Monkey and the Inkpot; Métailié and Hsu, “The Bencao gangmu of Li Shizhen”; and the introduction to Li Shizhen, Ben cao gang mu (translated by Paul Unschuld).
16. See Zheng Jinsheng et al., Dictionary of the Ben Cao Gang Mu; and Zhang Zhibin, Bencao gangmu yinwen suyuan.
17. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 48.08, “rou.”
18. See the entry in Zheng Jinsheng et al., Dictionary of the Ben Cao Gang Mu, 3:662.
19. Searching the LoGaRT (Local Gazetteers Research Tool) produced over twenty-one thousand hits for titles collected in the Complete Song Biji. Some titles are cited hundreds of times each.
20. Shang Wei, “The Making of the Everyday World”; and Schonebaum, Novel Medicine.
21. Son, Writing for Print; He, Home and the World.
22. Atwood, “The Textual History of Tao Zongyi’s Shuofu,” 1.
23. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 67.
24. Although Pu’s collection was composed over a thirty- or forty-year period in the last decades of the seventeenth century and beginning years of the eighteenth, it wasn’t published until 1766. From that date until the Dianshizhai pictorial, at least ten collections of anomalous accounts often mentioned by modern scholars as literary heirs to Liaozhai were published; see Wang, “Foreign Devils, Chinese Sorcerers,” 2.
25. He Bian, “An Ever-Expanding Pharmacy,” 157. She discusses the prefaces to many benaco texts in her book Know Your Remedies.
26. Bibliographic Treatise in the New History of the Tang, Xin Tangshu yiwen zhi (1060). The generic term xiaoshuo is not as broad in scope as the general term “narrative” but it is a catch-all term in the Chinese tradition (Gu, Chinese Theories of Fiction, 17). See Plaks “Toward a Theory of Chinese Narrative.”
27. In Yuanling County in Hunan.
28. Zhiyan zhai commentary to Honglou meng. See Yu, Rereading, 8.
29. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng, Jin ping mei (Plum in the golden vase), chapters 43 and 44.
30. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 51.31.
31. Zeitlin, Phantom Heroine, 28; Furth, A Flourishing Yin, 54.
32. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 52.37.
33. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 52.34.
34. Pu Songling, Liaozhai, “dizhen,” 170.
35. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 39.17.
36. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 40.02.
37. Li Shizhen is speaking specifically about bugs here.
38. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 5.10.
39. For ease of reading, I translate chong as “bug” or sometimes “worm.” Although it can mean more generally any small animal that creeps or flies, is hairy or naked, and has a shell or scales, the texts in which I find that term—often medical ones—are discussing specific small critters that we would usually classify as insects or insects in their larval stage. Perhaps “insect” would be a better translation, since the term can be used metaphorically to refer to people or people who behave badly. Historically, chong could mean “creature,” but it was invariably modified when it had that use. I define chong as Li Shizhen does, as worm/bugs, in contradistinction from animals with scales 鱗, animals with shells 介, fowl 禽, four-legged animals 獸, and people 人. See chapter 3 for more discussion of chong.
40. Xie Zhaozhe, Wuzazu, juan 9.
41. Barnes, Intimate Communities, 101–2.
42. Publisher’s note in the 1624 edition of Feng Mengleng, Stories to Caution the World (Jingshi tongyan).
43. Wanbao quanshu (Complete book of myriad treasures) Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin. Thanks to Richard Smith for this reference.
1. Fortune Telling, Storytelling
1. Yang and Hu, “Mapping Chinese Folk Religion,” 514.
2. Lackner and Zhao, Handbook of Divination.
3. Durrant et al. in Zuo Tradition/Zuozhuan records more than 130 accounts of divination, to name one example.
4. Besio, “Zhuge Liang and Zhang Fei,” 75.
5. Luo Guanzhong, Sanguo yanyi, 1:434. Jian Yong does this also in chapter 41.
6. Ho, Chinese Mathematical Astrology, 116–17.
7. Ho notes that “Chinese novels abound with mentions of ‘xiu zhong yi ke’ (a divination done under the sleeves), that Li Ruzhen in his Jinghua yuan regards as being how immortals get news of happenings in distant places and seek foreknowledge of coming events.” Ho, Chinese Mathematical Astrology, 137.
8. Among the most famous of these temples and shrines are the Temple of the Marquis of Wu in Chengdu, Sichuan, and the Temple of the Marquis of Wu in Baidicheng, Chongqing. Zhuge Liang’s function as a door god is usually performed in partnership with Sima Yi of Wei.
9. Cao Xueqin, Honglou meng, chapter 47, page 538. Quotations from Honglou meng, unless otherwise noted, are from Cao Xueqin, Bajia pingpi Honglou meng.
10. Cao Xueqin, Honglou meng, chapter. 4. Yucun may be somewhat more sympathetic than my brief summary implies, since he declines to fake the planchette reading, though this is really because it would not “stop people from talking.” This episode also facetiously invokes mantic arts when Yucun originally learns that Xue Pan is a member of a powerful house by consulting a handbook for local officials entitled “Amulet for Protecting Officials” (Huguanfu).
11. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone, 102, 69.
12. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone, chapter 102, page 74, I follow Hawkes, with emendations. Ho Peng Yoke has some theories as to why the liuren method was superior to the Yijing in the prediction of mundane affairs in his Chinese Mathematical Astronomy, 32.
13. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone, chapter 102, 5:74.
14. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone, chapter 101, 2328.
15. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone.
16. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone, chapter 101, 5:43.
17. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone, chapter 94, 4:337–39. Brigid Vance discusses this kind of glyphomancy as a key to dream interpretation in “Deciphering Dreams.” See also Kelly, “Riddles in Jin Ping Mei.”
18. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone, chapter 116, 5:295.
19. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone, chapter 95, 5:305. The titular Stone begins and ends his story at the base of Greensickness Peak (Qinggen Feng).
20. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone, chapter 5, 1:130. The novel’s insistence on good reading is repeated throughout, as well as in prefaces and commentary. See Schonebaum, introduction to Approaches to Teaching the Story of the Stone. See also Yu, Rereading the Stone.
21. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone, chapter 114, 5:1524.
22. Miaofu xuan (a.k.a. Taiping xianren) commentary.
23. In Rolston, How to Read, 336.
24. Yehe, “Du Honglou meng zhaji,” 286. This is a late-Qing work. Rolston, How to Read, 322.
25. The wives do this on three separate occasions: chapters 24, 44, and 45.
26. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng, Jin ping mei Cihua, 1:13, 272.
27. Found in manuscripts. See, for example, “Xiao’er gezhong jingtu”; “Yaoshu fang”; and “Zhuyou chaoben.” These sources are discussed in Unschuld and Zheng, Chinese Traditional Healing, 1:162–64.
28. Roel Sterckx gives an account of the history of the heavenly horse and its affiliation with dragons in The Animal and the Daemon in Early China, 184.
29. Also known as Yang Dexian fu shagou quan fu.
30. Ling Mengchu’s (1580–1644) 1628 collection Slapping the Table in Amazement (Erke pai’an jingqi) contains a story that mentions the Luma method.
31. See Schonebaum, Novel Medicine.
32. Unschuld and Zheng, Chinese Traditional Healing, 2:1780.
33. Unschuld and Zheng, Chinese Traditional Healing, 1:174.
34. For the sake of consistency with the Egerton and Roy translations, I do not disambiguate between Ximen Qing’s primary wife and his concubines.
35. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng, Jin ping mei Cihua, 4:40; Xiaoxiao sheng, Jin ping mei Cihua, 61.25a.
36. The method of fortune telling based on the “eight characters” of one’s horoscope, traditionally attributed to a shadowy tenth-century figure named Xu Ziping.
37. The Dragon Canon is an abbreviated reference to several works on geomancy that contain this term in their titles and that are doubtfully attributed to Yang Yunsong (late ninth century).
38. Wuxing is a term used by physiognomists who correlate the five planets—Mars, Saturn, Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury—with the five phases—fire, earth, wood, metal, and water—and with the forehead, nose, right ear, left ear, and mouth.
39. Sanming mitan refers to the Han dynasty concept that divided human fate into three categories: allotted fate, deserved fate, and contingent fate.
40. Chen Duan (895–989) played a significant role in Chinese philosophy but has also become a magus figure in popular lore, associated with numerology, physiognomy, and other mantic arts. For his biography, see Song shi (History of the Song [dynasty]), vol. 38, juan 457.
41. I follow Roy, Plum, with emendations. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng, Jin ping mei Cihua, 29.4b. Yan Junping (fl. first century BCE) made his living by fortune telling in the market of Chengdu but was also a devoted Daoist teacher, reputed to have instructed the famous Confucian scholar Yang Xiong (53 BCE–18 CE). For his biography, see Ban Gu, Han shu, vol. 7, juan 72.
42. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng, Jin ping mei Cihua, 2:172.
43. Paul Varo Martinson considers this issue in his dissertation “Pao Order and Redemption.”
44. Daily-use encyclopedias usually contained chapters devoted to medicine, culture, practical arts like agriculture or carpentry, and to divination. Many included all, and all included some of the following chapters that provided guidance on how to perform different methods of divination: “Choosing days” (zeri), “Fate Calculation” (zhanwu, buke, buyuan, zhanke), “Interpretation of dreams” (mengjie), “Fate calculation from the stars” (xingming), “Physiognomy” (xiangfa), “Statutory diseases” (fabing, qubing).
45. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng, Jin ping mei Cihua, 122, with emendations.
46. Tang Xianzu, Tang Yireng xiansheng zichai ji, 346–48; 2554.
47. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng, Jin ping mei Cihua, 3:147.
48. See my discussion of Li Pinger’s death in Novel Medicine, chapter 5.
49. Jidu (Sanskrit: Ketu) is the name of one of two imaginary “dark stars,” or invisible planets (the other being luohou, Sanskrit: Rahu), introduced into China during the Tang dynasty through the translation of works on Indian astronomy as part of a theory to account for lunar eclipses. In China, it was regarded as a baleful influence presaging disaster.
50. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng, Jin ping mei Cihua, 3:127, with emendations.
51. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng, Jin ping mei Cihua, chapter 29, 10b.
52. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng, Jin ping mei Cihua, 2:213. These words are traditionally attributed to Chen Tuan.
53. “Hsun-Tzu’s Philosophy as a Key to the Novel.” Roy, “Introduction,” xxiv–xxvii.
54. Roy, “Introduction,” xxv.
55. Sima Qian, Shiji, vol. 7, juan 74, 2348. Translation adapted from Sima Qian, Records of the Historian, 74.
56. Xunzi, Xunzi, book 17, 179.
57. Xunzi, Xunzi, book 9, 78.
58. See the introduction in Schonebaum, Approaches to Teaching the Plum in the Golden Vase.
59. See Yu, Rereading the Stone, chapter 1.
60. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone, 4:298.
2. Thunder, Writing, and Justice
Epigraph: Dianshizhai huabao (1890), “Xiezi beiji,” daketang edition, 13:114. The article also reports that “people from Jiangbei have been specifically collecting old notebooks, newspapers like Xin Wen, Shen, and Hu, paying ten times the price, and transporting them to Tianjin for sale to shoe shops as insoles. They can earn about 50 wen per jin. This pursuit of private gain in defiance of principle is extreme.”
1. Another account of reverence for lettered paper from Dianshizhai huabao (henceforth, DSZ) 134 (1890). See also the entry showing a parade to dispose of the ashes of lettered paper in the ocean. It was held on the twentieth day of the third month and included people dressed in costumes from traditional drama. The banner at the front of the procession reads: “Respectfully Escorting Sacred Remains.” Daketang edition, 7.102.
2. It became more and more difficult to sustain this custom in late-nineteenth-century Shanghai. Printed reading materials, including newspapers, were increasingly common, and paperwork generated by firms and factories made lettered paper virtually ubiquitous. Nonetheless, Shanghai gentry and other upholders of traditional values frequently published articles in Shenbao exhorting people to continue showing proper reverence.
3. See, for instance “Fenglei shi jing” in Shenbao, May 17, 1887.
4. Shenbao “Leiji buxi zigu,” March 14, 1873; Dianshizhai huabao, “Leimai nifu,” DSZ 4600.
5. Shenbao, “Zhenji kou er,” August 10, 1886.
6. Huntington, “The Weird in the Newspaper,” 364–65.
7. I follow Pollard in translating Yuewei caotang biji “Perceptions” since Yuewei caotang is simply the name of Ji’s study and so has no direct bearing on the contents, but yuewei suggests the notion of small inklings or perceptions, xii. Ji Yun, luanyang xiaoxia lu, 11, 26, 152, 66, 138.
8. This is the case with “accounts of the strange” by Pu Songling, Yuan Mei, and Ji Yun.
9. See accounts from Systematic Compendium and Illustrated Admonishments, below.
10. Cao Xueqin, Honglou meng, 60.188. The concept of “heaven” (tian) traditionally encompassed the phenomenological reality of the sky, a principle that governs the universe, the natural order of things or the laws of nature, and a supreme cosmic force that is also a moral authority and ultimate arbiter of right and wrong.
11. Taishang ganying pian, in Daozang, 1159.1.la–21a.
12. Brokaw, Commerce in Culture, 37.
13. Yuan Mei, Zibuyu, “The Thunder God Becomes Polluted” (Leigong bei wu), 23:455. Santangelo, “Introduction,” 1126.
14. Zou Diguang, styled Yangu, also known as Yugou, was a native of Wuxi in Zhejiang Province during the Ming dynasty (now Wuxi, Jiangsu). He became a jinshi (imperial scholar) in the second year of Wanli (1574) and held the position of xuezheng (educational administrator) in Huguang. He was skilled in poetry and prose and excelled in painting landscapes. Zou initially published Quan jie tushuo privately, but it was reprinted widely by Anzheng Tang.
15. Anzheng Tang was associated with at least five printers and produced some eighty imprints from the beginning of the sixteenth century through the second decade of the seventeenth century. The variety and quality of the Anzheng Tang printshop was typical of Jianyang in the late Ming, producing a wide variety of texts, including the classics, histories, household encyclopedias, medical works, and illustrated works of fiction. Chia, Printing for Profit, 52.
16. Chia, Printing for Profit, 164–66.
17. Zou Diguang, Quan jie tushuo, 2:18b–19a.
18. Zou Diguang, Quan jie tushuo, 3:6b–7a.
19. Wang Tonggui, Ertan (1603), juan 6.
20. See Meulenbeld, Demonic Warfare, for a brilliant and extensive discussion of this novel.
21. Cited from the Essentials of Martial Classics (Wujing zhongyao), which contains the Transmission of the Five Elements (Wuxing zhuan), a text that had been lost by the late Ming.
22. Zhao Zhiwu, Xinke simin binlan Wanshu cuijin, 1.9a.
23. Shen Gua, Mengxi bitan quanbuan, 21.
24. Huang Liuhang, A Complete Book Concerning Happiness and Benevolence, juan 16.
25. Ji Yun, Yuewei caotang biji, 229.
26. Luanyang xiaoxia lu, 138.
27. I follow Pollard, with emendations. See Ji Yun, Real Life, 148–49.
28. Wang Tonggui, Ertan leizeng, “Leizhen,” juan 49. See chapter 6 for another instance of this life-restoring measure. Thanks to Mark Meulenbeld for this reference.
29. Huang Liuhong, Complete Book of Happiness and Benevolence, juan 4.
30. Hong Mai, Yijian zhi, “Leizhen quan,” 600; and “Leizhen ji,” 1116.
31. Cheng Yi (1033–1107), quoted in Bol, “This Culture of Ours,” 327; Yishu, 18.237 in Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi, Er Cheng ji.
32. One of the earliest sources that attests to this ending is Zhu Changzuo, pages 123–24, 126, 143ff. Shenglie zhuan also has Wei Zhongxian see spirits of the murdered officials coming back to haunt him just before his suicide.
33. Ji Yun is most likely referring to Yetan suilu by He Bang’e, which was published in 1791, the same year as this account (100).
34. Ji Yun, Yuewei caotang biji, rushi wo wen, 4.
35. Ji Yun, Yuewei caotang biji, luanyang xiaoxia lu, 120.
36. Shenbao subscribers received the Dianshizhai pictorial every ten days, but it was also available as a standalone publication and in bound volumes of twelve issues.
37. Dianshizhai huabao, “Leiji wugong,” DSZ 0422.
38. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, chapter 5.
39. Versions of lost texts cited in the Systematic Compendium frequently tally with versions recorded in the Shuofu. Zheng et. al., Dictionary of the Ben Cao Gang Mu, 3:487.
40. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, chapter 37, abbreviated from Shuofu, chapter 25. Thanks to Paul Unschuld for this observation.
41. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium 37.05. Thunderbolt mushroom is one of the things that results from “transformations of the qi of items struck by thunderbolt.… It has neither a seedling nor leaves but is able to kill worms/bugs and repel evil qi.”
42. Li Ruzhen, Jinghua yuan, chapter 30.
43. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 51.05. The word for elephant, xiang, also refers to the images from which the first Chinese characters were derived.
44. Wang Chong, Lunheng, juan 6, 16a–b.
45. Wang Chong, Lunheng, juan 6, 293.
46. Wang Chong, Lunheng, juan 6, 17b.
47. Wang Chong, Lunheng, juan 6, 18a.
48. Wang Chong, Lunheng, juan 6, 23, “on thunder and the void.” Wang gives the example of Lady Zhong, wife of Duke Hui of Lu, who was born with “Wife of Lu” clearly written on her palm and hence married into Lu.
49. Anonymous, Huang Ming zhaoling 皇明詔令 1.27– 28b.
50. Huang Ming zhaoling, 1.33ab.
51. Qian Xiyan, Kuaiyuan, 683.
52. Edward Davis writes that the four thunder deities, or the four names for a single thunder deity from at least the third century BCE—Leizi, Leishi, and Leigong—and the triad of other divinities—Tianmu, Fengbo, and Yushi—with whom he is linked, all retain their importance in the thunder magic texts of the Song. See Society and the Supernatural in Song China, 250.
53. Davis, Society and the Supernatural in Song China, 250.
54. Davis, Society and the Supernatural in Song China, 25.
55. Ming Shi 明史, 7654, quoted in Meulenbeld, Demonic Warfare, 154.
56. Pu Songling, Liaozhai zhiyi “The Thunder God (Leigong)”; Yuan Mei, “The Thunder God Becomes Soiled” (Leigong beiwu), in Zi buyu. Paolo Santangelo argues the thunder god is a particular target of sarcasm in Yuan Mei, Zibuyu, “Introduction” 30-31.
57. In addition to character talismans in the Berlin medical manuscripts that had “rain” on top or “thunder” on the side, many have the character shang 尚, “prefer,” on the top, as in the chazi divination from Stone, above.
58. Medical Manuscript “Zhuyou ke daquan” 祝由科大全. BUC 8388.
59. Unschuld and Zheng think this manuscript might be from the south since some incantations that attend the talismans use terms (like “skin cold” pihan for malaria yaozi) common there, Chinese Traditional Healing, 1650.
60. Incantations and spells bear titles such as “Thunder Bill to Arrest Demons,” “Spell to Dispel Spirits,” “Spell to Lock Away Spirits,” and “Spell to Close the Demon Gate.” Some of this wording agrees with contemporary search warrants for criminals issued by secular authorities.
61. Li seems to be referencing the myth that when Cang Jie was inventing/discovering Chinese characters, wheat fell from the sky. Told in the Huainanzi.
62. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 10.39 “Pilizhen.”
63. As the Cheng brothers argued in the late Song. See Hammond, “The Interpretation of Thunder,” 487–503.
64. Qiong Zhang makes this point in “From ‘Dragonology’ to Meteorology,” 348.
65. Wang Tingxiang, Yashu, 881. I follow Qiong Zhang, “From ‘Dragonology,’” 348, with emendations.
66. Wang Tingxiang, Yashu, 226.
67. Li Ruzhen, Jinghua yuan, chapter 79.
68. Elman, On Their Own Terms, 278.
69. Shenbao, “Lun leidian,” April 13, 1877.
3. Dragons and Blood
1. Xie, Wuzazu, juan 9.
2. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 43.01.
3. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 39, preface.
4. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 43.01.
5. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 48.01.
6. Zhao Erxun, “Disasters” (zaiyi). The fraught history of this text, the period it recounts and the period in which it was written all complicate its relationship to dragons, however. See Chen Hsi-yuan.
7. Peking Gazette (Jingbao).
8. In 1900, instructors at the Chengzhong Primary School in Shanghai compiled their own teaching materials under the leadership of principal Liu Shuping. They published Illustrated Character Lessons from Chengzhong Elementary (Chengzhong mengxuetang zike tushuo) the following year. The book presented over three thousand characters, each with a pronunciation guide, a brief definition for students under the age of ten, and more detailed definitions for older students.
9. The term biji xiaoshuo, for instance, occurs as early as the Southern Song dynasty in Xuezhai zhanbi by Shi Shengzu in the phrase “the predecessors’ notes and novels (bijixiaoshuo) indeed have character errors,” but these are two related categories, not a single genre. “The term bijixiaoshuo was not used as a generic category until the 20th century” (Tao Min and Liu Zaihua, “Biji xiaoshuo” yu biji yanjiu, 109). That xiaoshuo does not map directly unto fiction, see Schonebaum, Novel Medicine, chapter 1; Idema, “Review”; Owen, “Postface”; Mair, “Narrative Revolution.”
10. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 43.01.
11. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 43.01, 43.03, and 43.04, respectively.
12. Lu Rong, Shuyuan zaji [Miscellaneous records from the bean garden].
13. Lu Rong, Shuyuan zaji.
14. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 43.01.
15. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 43.01.
16. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 43.01, “dragon bone” (longgu).
17. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 43.01, “dragon bone.”
18. Shen Gua, Mengxi bitan quanbian, “transformation to stone in Zezhou” (Zezhou hua shi).
19. Yuan Mei, Zibuyu (1788), mentions dragons mostly as things seen fighting in the sky during storms or as metaphors. Yuan Mei also mentions accounts of people who attained dragon artifacts—a horn, a claw, and so on—that had powers.
20. Pu Songling, Liaozhai zhiyi, “dragon” (long).
21. Zhang Youhe, Liaozhai zhiyi huijiao, 285.
22. Pu Songling, Liaozhai zhiyi, 143, “eyeless dragon” (long wuyan), originally in Liaozhai zhiyi shiyi, possibly not written by Pu Songling, but later incorporated into Liaozhai texts. See Barr, “The Textual Transmission of Liaozhai,” 518–19. About half of the dragon records from Liaozhai are from the shiyi.
23. Feng Xisai (the Yutang commentary), in Pu Songling 蒲松齡. Liaozhai zhiyii huijiao huizhu huiping ben 聊齋志異會校會注會評本 [Accounts of anomalies from Liaozhai, collated, annotated, and critiqued edition]. Shanghai Guji, 2011: 454–56. Wang Ji, quoted in Systematic Compendium entry on dragon saliva, says that it has a strong fishy smell. Official Qing history records a dragon hanging in the sky that stank terribly of fish. Zhao Erxun, Qing shigao “on calamities” (zaiyi 1). Yuan Haowen also mentions a dragon that stank of rotting fish in Xu Yijian zhi [Continued records of the listener]: “dragon sighting at Sangu Temple” 3.53.
24. Pu Songling, Liaozhai zhiyi, “eyeless dragon,” 143.
25. This term (nielong) seems to be rather rare, occurring notably and repeatedly in Journey to the West (Xiyouji). Perhaps our commentator was influenced by those represented dragons.
26. Timothy Brook discusses this chapter in his book The Troubled Empire, 18–20.
27. Xie Zhaozhe, Wuzazu, juan 9, 2b, 1616.
28. Ji Yun, Luanyang Xiaoxia, 228.
29. Chen Jiru, Taiping qinghua, juan 2.
30. Snyder-Reinke, Dry Spells, 44.
31. Ji Yun, Ji Xiaolan jiaxu, 276.
32. Pu Songling, Liaozhai zhiyi, “Long: sanze,” Library of Congress, 1832.
33. Yuan Xuansi, a.k.a. Yuan Songli, was a writer during the Kangxi reign, from modern Shandong’s Zibo.
34. Qu Qianqiao, a native of Changshan in Shandong, jinshi 1577.
35. Adapted from Pu Songling, Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio.
36. Library of Congress copy, juan 4, 10a. Originally in Liaozhai siyi yishi.
37. Xie Zhaozhe, Wuzazu, juan 4.
38. Other animals do too. In the histories and the Liaozhai, among other works, we see elephants rewarding the hunter who protects them from the lion, dogs caring for their elders, and so on.
39. Brook, too, discusses Xie’s entry; see The Troubled Empire.
40. The dragon-horse (longma) is a (mythological) creature with the head of a dragon and the body of a horse. It is mentioned in a number of standard histories such as the Zhouli (Rites of Zhou), and Hanshu (Dynastic history of the former Han).
41. Pu Songling, Liaozhai zhiyi, “Giving Birth to a Dragon” (Chanlong) 948.
42. Pu Songling, Liaozhai zhiyi, “A Strange Matter Concerning Pigeons” (Geyi), 1625.
43. In the “calamities and anomalies” section following dragons.
44. Shenbao, “Lun leiji long jian ershi,” July 16, 1877.
45. For more on these, see Schonebaum, Novel Medicine, introduction and chapter 1.
46. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 43.01, 43.03.
47. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, quoting Sun Simiao’s Qianjinfang, chapter 17.
48. It seems that this was the insect now known as Martianus dermestoides Chevr., which produces quinones as defensive compounds, that have anti-inflammatory properties.
49. Medical records include Yangchong miaofang (Wondrous recipes of the foreign bug), dating from the early Republican period; Yangchong puxu (Register of [recipes with] the foreign bug), from the late Qing; and Yaofang chaoben (hand-copied book of pharmaceutical recipes), from 1930.
50. Zhao Xuemin, Bencao gangmu shiyi, “Jiulongchong,” 143.
51. Unschuld and Zheng, Chinese Traditional Healing, 332.
52. Unschuld and Zheng, Chinese Traditional Healing, 2443; See also Lu Xun, “Fuqin de bing.”
53. He Bian first made this observation in her dissertation Assembling the Cure, 264.
54. Transforming realgar into a watery liquid with nitrokalite is cited in Systematic Compendium (9.07) and the Baopu zi.
55. Quoted in Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 9.07, 10.15. This case is reminiscent of those in Hua Tuo’s biography in which he “saw” that a large chong was inside a patient, prescribed medicine, and caused the chong to be vomited out. He then pushed his cart around, with the various chong dangling from it. See Hsu, Innovation in Chinese Medicine.
56. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 9.07.
57. The Feng Menglong version of the story does not mention realgar, but many later versions of the story do. See Idema,(2009, 3, 28–29. Thanks to my anonymous reader for pointing this out to me.
58. Supplement to the Systematic Compendium was not published until 1871. On the text, see Needham and Gwei-djen Lu, Science and Civilization in China, 325–28; and Unschuld, Medicine in China, 164–68. The other significant commentary to the Bencao, first published about 1652, was Cai Liexian’s Bencao wanfang zhenxian (Needle and thread for the ten thousand prescriptions in the Bencao). This work was intended to make the Bencao more usable by acting as an index to its contents, arranged by illness rather than object.
59. Dragon saliva is now known as Longxian xiang. Ambergris is a solid, waxy, flammable substance of a dull gray or blackish color produced in the digestive system of sperm whales.
60. Though he can be forgiven for missing a short entry in the enormous Taiping guangji, 197:1476.
61. Nappi, The Monkey and the Inkpot, 142.
62. Zhao Xuemin, Bencao gangmu shiyi, “Longxie,” in lin bu, 388.
63. Translation modified from Needham and Lu, Science and Civilisation in China.
64. See Liu Shubing, Chengzhong mengxuetang zike tushuo.
65. Dianshizhai huabao, “Xiren jianlong” 西人見龍 [Westerners see a dragon], DSZ 0646.
66. Some believe that the shenqilou refers to the real phenomenon known in the west as fata morgana (mirage), which were historically believed to be fairy castles in the air or false land created by witchcraft to lure sailors to their doom.
67. Shen Gua, Mengxi bitan, juan 21, “yishi.”
68. Xie, Wuzazu, juan 9, 3a.
69. Ji Yun, Yuewei caotang biji, 275.
70. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 43.03. I follow Unschuld’s translations in Li Shizhen, Ben cao gang mu, 3:537–38, with emendations.
71. Pu Songling, Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio, 373–75.
72. The Historian of the Strange (Yishi) comments on 197 of the almost five hundred entries in Liaozhai.
73. Dianshizhai huabao, “Shenlou miaojing” 蜃樓妙景 [Miraculous sight of the mirage], DSZ 1968.
4. Water, Connoisseurship, and Curiosity
Epigraph: Wu Cheng’en, Journey to the West, chapter 69. I follow Anthony Yu’s translation, with emendations, 3:477.
1. Snyder-Reinke, Dry Spells, 15–16, 41–46, 103–9.
2. Cao Xueqin, Story of the Stone, chapter 41. I follow David Hawke’s translation, vol. 2, 313–15, with modifications.
3. Karl Wittfogel, Oriental Despotism; Philip Ball, The Water Kingdom; and Andrew Mertha, China’s Water Warriors all discuss this notion.
4. Wu Yueniang gathers snow to brew tea in chapter 21 of Jin ping mei, where she and Ximen reconcile, which seems to be a symbol of caring.
5. The Cheng Hua cup in Stone was likely a forgery, but it is not clear if Cao Xueqin was aware of their extreme rarity. See Schonebaum and Lu, Approaches to Teaching the Story of the Stone, 241.
6. Pu Songling, Liaozhai zhiyi “Yishu” (The healing arts), 2020.
7. Lu Yu et al., Chajing, chapter 5.
8. Lu Yu et al., Chajing, juan 5, “boiling.”
9. Li Yuhang, The Promise and Peril of Things, 85.
10. Yuan Mei is partial to tea and water from near his hometown.
11. Wai-yee Li discusses Yuan Mei and water connoisseurship in The Promise and Peril of Things, 85–87.
12. Likely a teapot with a chimney that boils water quickly due to increased surface area.
13. Yuan Mei, The Way of Eating, juan 4, 17a–b. I follow S. J. Chen’s translation, 381–83.
14. “Drinking Tea at Pop Min’s” in Ye, Vignettes from the Late Ming, 88–90.
15. Ji Yun, Yuewei caotang biji, juan 1, 5.
16. See Jiang Yuanxin, “More Than Just a Drink,” chapter 3.
17. Clunas, Superfluous Things, 171.
18. Manuscripts in the Berlin collection frequently require sourceless water with their medicine or talismans.
19. Wu Cheng’en, Xiyou ji, chapter 69.
20. Pu Songling, Liaozhai zhiyi, 623.
21. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 5.14.
22. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 5.14.
23. Li Yuhang, The Promise and Peril of Things, 83–92.
24. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 5.15.
25. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 5.15, 5.28.
26. Zhao Xuemin, Bencao gangmu shiyi, “shuibu.”
27. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 5.01.
28. Zhao Xuemin makes the same claim when he discusses, for instance “chicken spirit water,” gathered on the seventh of the seventh month, noticeably heavier than other water.
29. In the late-Qing Berlin medical manuscript Zhouyue foweiben, BUC 8238; Unschuld and Zheng, Chinese Traditional Healing, 1305.
30. This manuscript records about ten such tricks.
31. Medical manuscript Yishu zachao. The contents of this part are known from other manuscripts in this collection such as Unschuld 8453 and 48022. Examples include how to make “characters fly onto a wall” and to “fill more wine into a cup than it can hold.”
32. Zhang Yingyu, More Swindles from the Late Ming, xv.
33. Pu Songling, Liaozhai zhiyi, “Plum Girl” (Mei nü), 1756.
34. Santangelo, “Introduction,” 130.
35. Yuan Mei, Zibuyu, “The Ghost Is Netted When It Puts on Clothes” (Gui zhuoyi shouwang), 192.
36. Yuan Mei, Zibuyu, “The Immortal Who Could Be Folded Up” (Ziedie xian), 309.
37. Yuan Mei, Zibuyu, “Sun the Commissioner” (Sun Fangbo), 810.
38. Yuan Mei, Zibuyu, “Water Ghost Broom” (Shuigui zhou), 253.
39. Yuan Mei, Zibuyu, “Water Ghost Afraid of the Word ‘Clamor’” (Shuigui wei xiaozi), 522.
40. For example, Fangji gejue fuzhou.
41. Unschuld and Zheng, Chinese Traditional Healing, 2275–76.
42. Pu Songling, Liaozhai zhiyi, “Spitting Water” (Penshui), 16.
43. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 3.05; Tianzhongni (Mud from the fields), 07:38; Changpu (Japanese sweet flag), 19:06.
44. Pu Songling, Liaozhai zhiyi, “River City” (Jiangcheng), juan 6.
45. Li Shizhen, Bencao gangmu 52.19: “Such fluids irrigate the viscera and bowels and nourish and moisten the extremities. Therefore, people practicing life-prolongation exercises swallow their saliva and inhale the qi, saying that this is to irrigate the sacred root of life with lucid water.”
46. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 52.19.
47. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 50.23.
48. Liji (Book of rites), “Yueling” (Proceedings of government in the different months), 290.
49. There was also a lingering association of rainbows and bugs in materia medica texts in which the ni 蜺, often translated as “secondary rainbow,” was a colorful cicada. Li Shizhen, Bencao gangmu, 41.16.
50. Keightley, The Ancestral Landscape, 91.
51. Keightley, The Ancestral Landscape, 92n42.
52. Reading honghong for “rainbows.”
53. Some of these other rainbows were thought to be paired with hong: “The hong and ni are the essence of yin and yang, the hong is called male, and the ni is called female ” (Guo Pu, Erya yintu 爾雅音圖).
54. Kong Yingda (581–618), for instance, writes, “If the clouds are thin and leak sun, the sunshine and the raindrops will give birth to rainbows” (“Commentary on the Book of Rites” [Liji zhushu]).
55. Strassberg, A Chinese Bestiary, 1.
56. Shen Gua, Mengxi bitan quanbian, juan 21. Leah Ya Zuo also discusses this passage in Shen Gua’s Empiricism, 182.
57. Zhu Xi , Zhuzi yulei, 3.4a2. I follow Gardner, “Zhu Xi on Spirit Beings,” 110, with emendations.
58. Such as those in Inquiries into the Classics of Heaven (Tianjing huowen) likely posed by You Yi.
59. Quoted in Hongjun Liu, “Scholarly Study of Hong (Rainbow),” 93.
60. Zhu Xi is generally ranked as second only to Confucius (551–479 BCE) in influence in the Chinese philosophical tradition.
61. Xie Zhaozhe, Wuzazu 2001:12.
62. See “Feijishi,” or “Weigao” in Fang Li, Taiping guangji.
63. Liu An, Huainanzi: “Children did not become orphans / Wives did not become widows / Rainbows did not appear” (1b.10–17).
64. Fan Yizhi, Wuli xiaozhi, juan 2, “hongni.”
65. Liu Xiang, Shuoyuan; Xin Xu; Wang Chong, Lunheng; Sima Qian, Shiji; Zhanguo ce, all discuss rainbows as portents of assassination and use this phrase.
66. Miao Wenyuan, Zhanguo ce, book 25; Sima Qian, Shiji, chapter 86.
67. Hayakawa et al., “Unusual Rainbow and White Rainbow,” 33.
68. Wang Chong, Lunheng, juan 43, “Biandong” (Change and movement).
69. Wang Chong’s statement is attributed to Dong Zhongshu in his biography by Ban Gu. Wang Chong did in fact rail against the omenology of his day. It was not that he disbelieved in omens and divination but that the practitioners of both were overly reliant on set systems to interpret those signs and therefore were often incorrect. See Puett, “Listening to Sages,” 275.
70. Wu Zhen, Xin Tangshu, 950.
71. Li Fang, Taiping yulan, juan, 878, reiterates what is in the official histories of the Han, later Han, Jin, and Sui, as well as more popular texts, specifically collecting instances in which rainbows and white rainbows were evil omens of assassination, rebellion, and “divergence.”
72. Zhang Mingshi, “Jingyan fang,” chapter on heavenly phenomena, 3.
73. Luo Guanzhong, Sanguo yanyi, 1. I follow Roberts, with emendations.
74. In Yuan Hong, Hou Han ji; Fan Ye, Hou Han shu; and Sima Guang, Zizhi tongjian (Comprehensive mirror for aid in government). George A. Hayden points out that omens recorded in Hou Han ji, Hou Han shu, and Zizhi tongjian, are not included in the novel (p. 45).
75. That rainbows as omens pointing to improper sex, or to inversion of sexual roles, dates to Zheng Xuan’s commentary on the (Book of Songs). The passage reads, “There is a rainbow in the east, no one dares point at it,” (Mao 51). Zheng Xuan explains this, “The rainbow is a taboo for people so that nobody dares to point at it, the situation is quite similar to that of a woman of easy virtue eloping with fancy man no one is emboldened to look at.” Liu Hongjun discusses this interpretation in “Scholarly Study of Hong (Rainbow),” 87–99.
76. Luo Guanzhong, Sanguo yanyi, chapter 108.
77. Xie Zhaozhe, Wuzazu, juan 1.5a.
78. “When earth qi rises, it becomes clouds, when sky qi descends, it becomes rain,” Li Shizhen, 5.01 “Rain water” 雨水. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 8.39.
79. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 842.11, qiuyin.
80. Ji Yun, Yuewei caotang biji, 1800; “Gu wang ting” 32a, 1452–53; Zhu Xi, Zhuzi yulei; Li Fang, Taiping guangji.
81. Medical manuscript Jingxin lingfu.
82. Medical manuscript Shiquan yao’an.
83. Medical manuscript Wuxing hecan.
84. A Buddhist-type figure, since it seems that many healing methods were given names that aligned them with bodhisattvas during the second half of the Qing dynasty. There is a focus on the Daoist Taishang Laojun, Guanyin Bodhisattva, Guanyin Pusa, Amitabha, and Amituofo (Unschuld and Zheng, Chinese Traditional Healing, 1703).
85. Mafeisan is the subject of a fair amount of debate, with some thinking it really was used as an early general anesthetic and comprising some properties of cannabis or opium. See, for instance, Zhao et al., “Was Mafeisan an Anesthetic in Ancient China?” One way of translating mafeisan is “powdered, boiling water.”
86. Luo, Sanguo yanyi, juan 29. I follow Mair, “The Biography of Hua-t’o,” with emendations.
87. Mair, “The Biography of Hua-t’o,” 697, with emendations.
88. For a detailed discussion of non-elite medical practices, see Schonebaum, Novel Medicine.
89. BUC 8041.
90. Unschuld and Zheng, Chinese Traditional Healing, 2121.
91. Wuxing hecan. Another manuscript also has long incantations addressed to spirits from the realms of Buddhism (Shakyamuni and Guanyin), Daoism (Yuhuang Dadi), Confucianism (Kongfuzi), and medicine (hua tuo). Other spirits include the “immortal teacher who generates flesh” (shengrou xianshi) and the “immortal teacher who mends sinews and sets bones” (duanjin jiegu xianshi). BUC 8564. “Instructions on secret medical patterns obtained from a teacher (oral and written spells)” Shishou yimifa jue (zhou).
92. Historical figures from the Three Kingdoms period, mentioned here together to invoke their (fictional) Oath of the Peach Garden as depicted in the novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms, chapter 1. Guan Yu is miswritten Guan Ye, suggesting the author’s literacy level was pedestrian.
93. Zhao Xuemin, Chuanya, 7.
94. About 47 of the 881 Berlin healing manuscripts are devoted primarily to zhuyou 祝由—the “invocation of the origins” or apotropaic healing with written amulets and oral spells—but many others include these methods as part of a comprehensive practice including pharmaceuticals and sometimes acupuncture and moxibustion.
95. Quoted in Unschuld and Zheng, Chinese Traditional Healing, 80.
96. Archimedes’s screw is a machine used for transferring water from a low-lying body of water into irrigation ditches. Water is pumped by turning a screw-shaped surface inside a pipe.
97. Yi Lantai, Xiyang lou toushi tu tongbanhua.
98. “Filling a cup with more wine that it can hold” jiuman guobei, in “Wondrously effective recipes transmitted at home.” BUC 48022, described in Unschuld and Zheng, Chinese Traditional Healing, 2741.
99. He, Home and the World, discusses how later collections came to view many Ming dynasty texts as “hucksterish” (baifan), 3–9; Schonebaum, Novel Medicine, 102–5.
100. Wu Cheng’en, Juanxiang guben Xiyou zhengdao shu, 30.6a.
101. During the Qing era, the term Western Ocean (Xiyang) expanded from referring to maritime routes mostly in the Indian Ocean to a more expansive concept of the Western World, or European countries generally.
102. Juan 1. The same goes for “nose flushing water” and “daily essence oil.”
103. The latter is preserved in the Dao zang (Daoist canon).
104. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 8.29.
105. Since the Song, vitriol water (danshui, lit. “gall water”), an aqueous copper sulfate solution naturally occurring around weathered copper ore deposits, was used to produce solid copper. See Jost, “The Secret Method and the State.”
106. “This is a secret of the immortals: one pound of cinnabar, two ounces of sulfate of copper, four ounces of saltpeter, place in a small-mouthed porcelain jar, and use lacquer to seal its mouth. Bury it in the ground for forty- nine days, when you take it out, look to see if it has become water, then the medicine is complete. If the transformation is incomplete, put [the pot] back in [the ground].”
107. Leiwan, “thunderbolt fungus,” Polyporus mylittae, is a medicine used traditionally for removing parasites. Feijin occurs only once in the Bencao gangmu, where it is an unidentifiable substance; Santangelo believes it to be a kind of paper. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 3.20: “For [patients] who have already died of cholera with contorted sinews, if there is still a little warmth below the heart, mix two liang [of zhusha] with three liang of beeswax [39–02], burn this and fumigate [the patient].”
108. Yuan Mei, Zibuyu, 430–31. I follow Santangelo’s translation, with emendations.
109. For more on these epidemics, see Li Zimo.
110. Hanson, Speaking of Epidemics, 115–21.
5. Unseen Practices
1. Unschuld, Tessenow, and Jinsheng, Huang Di Nei Jing Su Wen, 180–83.
2. Unschuld and Zheng, Chinese Traditional Healing, 10.
3. See Harper, Early Chinese Medical Literature, 152–53.
4. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 42.23.
5. The six domestic animals in China are pigs, cows, sheep, horses, dogs, and chickens.
6. A Liaozhai story (“Shuimangcao” 水莽草) describes ghosts who cannot reincarnate until they poison a new victim with the same poison that killed them as “shuimangcao.” Thanks to Eric Bennett for this reference. Li Shizhen is clear that mangcao is very poisonous. Systematic Compendium, 17.31.
7. Selling the sickness is discussed in Schonebaum, Novel Medicine, 58–59 and 134–36.
8. Zhou Zuoren, Bingzhu houtan, 89–96.
9. Zhou Zuoren, “Tan Guolai,” in Bingzhu houtan, 89–96.
10. Zhou Zuoren, Bingzhu houtan, 96.
11. Paul Unschuld suggests this in Medicine in China, 48.
12. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 12.08, quoting Zhubing yuanhou lun.
13. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 12.08.
14. See Hinrichs, Shamans, chapter 7.
15. “Extraordinary recipes for convenient use,” Jianbian qifang.
16. Xu Feng, “Zhenzhi xuefa” 針治穴法 (Needling techniques for acupoint therapy), BUC 8493 juan 2.
17. “Divine Method for Expelling Gu Poison” (Bi gudu shenfang).
18. The Washing away of Wrongs (Xiyuan lu), a manual for coroners and magistrates investigating death, records that a body can be tested for gu poison by touching it with a silver hairpin which would then turn permanently yellow. Juan 28, “On Poison” (Fudu).
19. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 42.23.
20. Lu Fengzao, Xiaozhi lu, juan 10.
21. Xie Zhauzhe, Wuzazu, juan 11.
22. See Cai, Witchcraft.
23. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 42.23.
24. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 51.50.
25. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 42.23.
26. Thanks to Nalini Kirk for these thoughts.
27. In the Qing novel Yesou puyan (Humble words of an old rustic), the protagonist, Wen Suchen, a virtual Confucian superman, is poisoned with gu. His convalescence takes one thousand days with a steady diet of cohosh and turmeric, a recipe he may have received from Fan Chengda (1126–93), who records it, claiming a judge, Li Shouweng, discovered these prescriptions during some judicial hearings. Fan Chengda biji liuzhong, 132; Fan Chengda, Treatises of the Supervisor, 147.
28. Unschuld, Medicine in China, 47.
29. Shenbao “Yanggu hairen zhi fangfan,” November 7, 1923.
30. Feng and Shyrock, “The Black Magic in China Known as Ku,” 23.
31. Nanzhong zaji (Miscellaneous anecdotes about Southern China), quoted in Feng and Shyrock, “The Black Magic in China Known as Ku,” 16.
32. See Cai, Witchcraft and the Rise of the First Confucian Empire.
33. Loewe, Crisis and Conflict, 81–90.
34. Cai, Witchcraft and the Rise of the First Confucian Empire, 230n98: “The witchcraft scare at the end of Emperor Wu’s reign was probably the most striking tragedy of the Western Han; it caused a sensation and immediately attracted the attention of historians.… In The History of Former Han the term wugu became virtually synonymous with the events surrounding this massacre.”
35. Wang Xianqian, Hou Han shu jijie, 66.1a–b.
36. Wang Xianqian, Hou Han shu jijie, 6.36b–37a.
37. Cai, Witchcraft and the Rise of the First Confucian Empire, 6.
38. There are cases in Qingshi gao and Zhaoyuan Xianzhi, among others. Shih-Pei Chen et al., LoGaRt, has 350 gazetteers that discuss gudu in the Qing dynasty alone.
39. See Yonglin Jiang, Great Ming Code, 18; Da Ming lü, article 312; Da Qing lüli, 289.
40. The Qing code specifies for wives and concubines who attempt or successfully kill their husbands with gu or other conjured demons, death by slicing article 315. http://
lsc .chineselegalculture .org /eC /DQLL _1740 /5 .6 .6 .315. 41. Cited by Zheng Xuan in his annotations to Zhou li. Liang Cai, Witchcraft and the Rise of the First Confucian Empire, 229n80.
42. Translation from Durrant et al., The Zuo Tradition, 1329–31.
43. Translation from Durrant et al., The Zuo Tradition, 1331.
44. Translation from Durrant et al., The Zuo Tradition, with emendations.
45. Schonebaum, Novel Medicine, chapters 5 and 6.
46. Bodde, Festivals in Classical China, 100.
47. Dianshizhai huabao, “Gudu yujiu,” DSZ 2443.
48. Shenbao, “Yinshu Shazi zhihaiwen,” April 3, 1926.
49. Schonebaum, Approaches to Teaching Plum in the Golden Vase, introduction.
50. Shenbao “Dulu yutan,” June 13, 1924.
51. Shenbao “Dulu yutan,” June 13, 1924.
52. Shenbao, “Qiji chengyin shuo,” September 15, 1891.
53. Yuan Mei, Zibuyu, 14-9, pages 726–27.
54. The Systematic Compendium disambiguates between “reanimating life gu” and “gu poison,” for instance, though without going into detail, 10.13 “Shi dan” 石膽 (Stone bile).
55. Zhou Qufei, Vicarious Replies from beyond the Ranges, Collated with Commentary (Lingwai daida jiaozhu) and Lang Ying, Qixiu leigao (Seven categories of notes), have similar wording, for instance.
56. Chen Hsiu-fen, Shiwu, yaoshu yu gudu, 13.
57. Some scholars see tiaosheng as another practice meant to assist a gu demon to enter a living body. The gu demon then pays for this assistance by transferring the belongings of the victim to the person who helped it.
58. Xie Zhaozhe, Wuzazu, juan 11.
59. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 18.21, 23.21.
60. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 39.3, 34.10.
61. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 13.11, quoted from Shennong bencao jing.
62. Sima Qian, “Fengshan shu” in Shiji. Also, Duke De of Qing suppressed gu by means of dogs. Shiji, ch. 5, I. 9.
63. Li Zhizhen, Systematic Compendium, 50.02. Citing Fengsu tong (Descriptions of habits and customs).
64. For example, Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 17.36.
65. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 50.23.
66. It occurs, for instance, in the Three Sui Quash the Demon’s Revolt (Sansui pingyao zhuan, preface, 1620), chapter 4; The Scholars (Rulin waishi, 1750), chapter 34; Humble Words of an Old Rustic (Yesou puyan, ca. 1780, published 1882); Exposure of Officialdom (Guanchang xianxing ji 1903–5); The Romance of Gold and Stone (Jinshi yuan, mid-eighteenth century); Precious Mirror for Appreciating Flowers (Pinhua baojian, ca. 1848); and A Collection to Amuse the Eyes and Awaken the Heart (Yumu xingxin bian, 1792).
67. Qiu Zhonglin “Buxiao zhi xiao,” 49–92.
68. See T’ien, Male Anxiety and Female Chastity; Yü, Kuan-yin.
69. See Maram Epstein’s discussion in chapter three of Orthodox Passions, which includes a survey of gegu in Qing gazetteers.
70. Yu, Sanctity and Self-Inflected Violence, 79.
71. Wu Zhen, Xin Tangshu jiumu, 195:2a–b.
72. Quoted in Wu, “Moral Ambivalence in the Portrayals of Gegu,” 249.
73. Zhu Xi, Zhuzi yulei, “daxue.”
74. Zou Diguang, Quan jie tushuo, 37a.
75. See Lu, Accidental Incest, 147–53; Wu, “Moral Ambivalence,” 253–63; Epstein, Competing Discourses, 134, 246.
76. See Jimmy Yu, Sanctity and Self-Inflected Violence, 75–78.
77. Quoted in Yenna Wu, “Moral Ambivalence in the Portrayals of Gegu,” 252–53. The novel Xingshi yinyuan zhuan has a scene very similar to this one, except that both daughters-in-law act in concert, and both cut their thighs rather than their livers. Chapter 52.
78. 15b. Maram Epstein does find that men cut their flesh to cure their mothers twice as frequently as their fathers in Qing gazetteers. See Orthodox Passions, 93.
79. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 52.34.
80. The earliest textual use of this phrase I’ve found is Feng Menglong, Quelling the Demon’s Revolt (Pingyao zhuan, preface, 1620), but it may have entered common parlance by that time and been known to Li Shizhen.
81. Li cites from Records Taken during My Winter Days (Yudong xulu, 1528), a miscellany by He Mengchun (1474–1536) later recorded in Zhang Tingyu et al., Ming shi, juan 137, case 25.
82. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 52.34.
83. That this act was ultimately un-filial because it made cannibals out of parents and that respect for lineage entitled one to eat one’s children was not lost on authors of the twentieth century, notably Lu Xun in “Diary of a Madman,” and “Medicine.”
84. Many treatments in Systematic Compendium require that the healer “not let the patient know [what they are eating or drinking].” This is usually because the medicine is from a disagreeable source, such as straw from a pigsty (50.01) or spider web (40.10).
85. Yü, Kuan-yin, 539n26.
86. Da Qing huidian shili, juan 403, quoted in Theiss 2004, 54.
87. Da Qing huidian shili [Collected statutes of the Qing, with substatutes based on precedent], 1899, juan 403.
88. Da Qing huidian shili [Collected statutes of the Qing, with substatutes based on precedent], 1899, juan 403.
89. Dudbridge, The Legend of Miaoshan.
90. Stories of wives practicing gegu in the hope of rescuing their in-laws’ lives are recorded in such books as Record of Bodhisattva Guanyin’s Efficacious Response. See Yuhang Li, Becoming Guanyin, 128.
91. Chun-fang Yü, Kuan-yin.
92. Theiss, Disgraceful Matters, 48–49.
93. Fong, “Signifying Bodies,” 107.
94. Chun-fang Yü, Kuan-yin, 538n21. Women who practiced gegu became notable only after the Song. Yü notes that Chen Menglei’s Gujin tushu jicheng contains short biographical sketches culled from local gazetteers. Only 4 out of 61 women in pre-Song times are recorded as having practiced gegu, 14 out of 51 (about one fourth) women in the Song, 306 out of 632 Ming women (about one-half), and 226 out of 340 Qing women (about two-thirds).
95. Liaozhai zhiyi (Strange tales from Liaozhai), has several stories about gegu, enhancing its reputation as an unorthodox or even magical practice. See, for instance, xiaozi 孝子, “filial son,” and liancheng 連城 “Liancheng [heroine of the story].”
96. Yi-li Wu has pointed out to me that this is also reminiscent of male scholar-officials of this time who likened themselves to abandoned, yet ever faithful, women.
97. T’ien, Male Anxiety and Female Chastity, 1988.
98. Chun-fang Yü, Kuan-yin, 340.
99. T’ien, Male Anxiety and Female Chastity, 161. The 1771 Shexian gazetteer lists nineteen filial sons who cut their thighs to cure parental illness in the Ming and fifty-one cases in the early Qing. Huizhou had been noted for gegu in the Ming.
100. Qiu Zhonglin, “Buxiao zhi xiao,” 93.
101. Chun-fang Yü, Kuan-yin.
102. Guan Yu refuses any anesthetic, instead playing a game of go to take his mind off the pain.
103. “Killing a wife to cure a mother” (shaqi liaomu), Dianshizhai huabao 2725 9/219.
104. “Slicing the thigh to pray for rain” (gegu qiyu), Dianshizhai huabao 3384 11/230.
105. Shenbao, “Gegan liaobing,” December 9, 1882.
106. “Jingbao quanlu” as reported in Shenbao, March 2, 1880.
107. Shenbao, “Gegan qiumu,” November 9, 1880.
108. Jingbao, April 26, 1878.
109. I have found a few scant references to slicing the heart (gexin) but no narratives.
110. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 1.19, 43.01.
111. The liver was not the only organ with physical and metaphysical life functions however; the heart stored spirit (shen), the spleen stores knowledge, the lung stores the soul (po), kidneys store intention/memory (zhi).
112. Maria Sibau discusses the story “A Slice of Liver for Grandma” from Lu Renlong’s collection Exemplary Words for the World (Xingshi yan), in which a young woman practices gegan but is unable to locate her liver, even though there was no pain or blood. Heaven intervenes and makes her liver pop out. Reading for the Moral, 78.
6. Animating Forces
Epigraph: “Reading with My Ears: Lecture at National Taiwan University, July 2008,” in Xu Shiyan, Mo Yan Speaks, 228.
1. Schonebaum, Novel Medicine, chapter 2, “Reading Medically.”
2. For example, in Dianshizhai huabao: “The way of heaven is not far” (Tiandao bu yuan), 7:259; and “The way of heaven is clear and evident” (Tiandao zhao zhang), 12:93.
3. Yi-Li Wu, Reproducing Women, 74.
4. de Vries, “The Dangers of ‘Warming and Replenishing.’”
5. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, juan 6, introduction.
6. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 5.24.
7. For a survey of one man’s struggle with these concepts, see Lu Miaw-fen, “The Question of Life and Death.”
8. Giles must also have taken these accounts as generally true records of real events since he feels the need to point out that these are false. Giles, “The ‘Hsi Yüan Lu’ or ‘Instructions to Coroners,’” 4n5.
9. Zhang and Unschuld, Dictionary of the Ben Cao Gang Mu, 1:54.
10. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 47.12.
11. “Effective,” as in huisheng zhibaodan, “most treasured elixir to make life return” (BUC 8224, BUC 8475, BUC 8815). “Potent,” as in laozhai huanzhe zhi huishengshu, “technique of restoring to life patients suffering from consumption” (BUC 8033).
12. Yifang jichao BUC 8051: “emergency rescue from violent death, emergency rescue from hanging death, emergency rescue from drowning death, emergency rescue from nightmare death.”
13. “Book of Drugs and Demons” (Yaosui shu).
14. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium uses this term at times, and so does the novel Jin ping mei.
15. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 4.27.
16. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 4.27.
17. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 48.01.
18. Scene 35. Mercury was believed by and about Daoists to be able to preserve bodies indefinitely. But this may also be a bawdy reference to semen, which is both shuiyin and pure essence. See the effect of cinnabar and mercury on stabilizing the hun and po, below.
19. Zeitlin, The Phantom Heroine, 136.
20. Tang Xianzu, Xiuxiang Mudan ting.
21. Zeitlin, The Phantom Heroine, 137.
22. Examples include “The Fan Tower Restaurant as Witness to the Love of Zhou Shengxian” (Nao Fanlou duoqing Zhou Shengxian), published around 1627 in Feng Menglong’s Constant Words to Awaken the World (Xingshi hengyan). For a discussion of these and other sexual cures, see Schonebaum, Novel Medicine, chapter 4.
23. See, for example, Feng Menglong’s “For One Penny, A Small Grudge Ends in Stark Tragedies,” in Stories to Awaken the World.
24. “Ji congxiong tanju” in Ji Yun, Ji Xiaolan jiashu, 110–12.
25. Quan jie tushuo, “Retribution for a teacher misleading others.”
26. For instance, juhun zhouyu fa, “oral incantation method to recall one’s hun-soul.”
27. Daofa jizhong.
28. Dansha (cinnabar) in Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 9.1.
29. Schonebaum, Approaches to Teaching the Story of the Stone, introduction.
30. It is hard to imagine that these letters are authentic, but they are authoritative. They circulated in print since at least 1935, contributing to the sense not only that Ji Yun believed all these mechanisms really were at work in the world, but also that his biji really were all based on true accounts. Ji Yun, Jiashu, 220.
31. I count at least one hundred accounts of wandering, separated, or returning hun in Ben She, Mingdai biji xiaoshuo daguan, and Ben She, Qingdai biji xiaoshuo daguan.
32. “Xu xinqixie” in Yuan Mei, What the Master Would Not Discuss (Zi buyu). The Systematic Compendium also states that red date pits treat gudu, other invading bad qi, and the germination of worms.
33. Yuan Mei, Zi buyu, 168.
34. “Two Scholars of Nanchang” (Nanchang shiren), in Yuan Mei, Zi buyu, 1.3.
35. Yuan Mei, Zi buyu, 1.3, Yuan Mei, Yuan Mei quanji, 4:3.
36. Ji Yun, Yuewei caotang biji, 10:246.
37. Experts in cultivating longevity inhale deeply during the period of living qi.
38. Zhang and Unschuld, Chinese Traditional Healing, 1:24.
39. See Schonebaum, Novel Medicine, chapter 6.
40. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 18.61.
41. For more on laozhai, depletion illnesses, and contagion, see Schonebaum, Novel Medicine, chapter 6.
42. Another example of this effect is the tujun “soil-mushroom.” The Systematic Compendium (28.285) notes, “In Nanyi they fatally poison people with gelsemium [herb] and hang the corpse [of the victim] in a tree. Where its juice drips on the ground a jun-mushroom grows. They store it and call it ‘mushroom medication.’ It is an extremely violent poison for humans. All this must be known. Therefore, these things are recorded here.”
43. Fujino, “On Chinese Soul-Inviting and Firefly-Catching Songs,” 40–57.
44. The Analects, book 1.15, alludes to the inner luminosity of jade revealed by “cutting and polishing.”
45. Such as Photorhabdus luminescens, suspected to be the cause of “angel’s glow” in the wounds of civil war soldiers.
46. See “Lu Pan” in Liaozhai zhiyi.
47. Li Zhizhen, Systematic Compendium, 12.03: Li cites Xia Ziyi, Guaizheng qi fang 怪症奇方 [Extraordinary Prescriptions for Strange Diseases].
48. Zhenjun Zhang, “On the Origins of Detached Soul Motif,” 167–84.
49. “Pang E” in Records of the Hidden and the Visible World (Youming lu) is believed to be the earliest detached soul story in Chinese literature (early fifth century).
50. Ji Yun, Yuewei caotang biji, juan 5, 241.
51. Xunzi, Xunzi, juan 5.
52. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng, The Plum in the Golden Vase, volume 1, chapter 12, page 432.
53. Li Shizhen, Systematic Compendium, 15.05.
54. Xie Zhaozhe states that “ghosts are thought to dwell in the roots of camphor and willow trees,” so perhaps that is how they derive their power. Wuzazu, juan 10.
55. Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng, The Plum in the Golden Vase, “Introduction,” 20.
56. ter Haar, White Lotus Teachings, 263.
57. ter Haar, White Lotus Teachings, 172.
58. Objects that can come alive are discussed by Schipper, “Chiens de paille et tigres en papier,” 83–94; de Groot, The Religious System of China, 6:1103; Hong Mai, Yijian zhi, juan 7, and Systematic Compendium, to name just a few.
59. Such as “clapper spirit” (paiban jing) and “pole spirit” (gaojing) from Kuaiyuan zhiyi. Thanks to Rania Huntington for this reference.
60. Ji Yun, Ji Xiaolan jiashu, 175.
61. Ji Yun, “Luanyang xiaoxia lu” 223 in Yuewei caotang biji.
62. Kuhn, Soulstealers, discusses some of these on page 4.
63. Puppeteers appear in Qiwen louji zhaichao, 213:2b–3a (quoting a mid-Ming source). An example of shamans is found in Hong Zhou, Yijian zhi, 3:30:532. Ter Haar discusses fortune tellers in Telling Stories, 92–106.
64. Xu Ke, “Zhiren wei sui” 紙人為祟 means “A Paper Effigy Causes Harm”; it’s an entry from juan 83 of Qingbai leichao.
65. Xu Ke, “Zhiren wei sui,” in Qingbai leichao.
66. Ji Yun, Ji Xiaolan jiashu, 146–47.
Conclusion
1. Held in the Unschuld collection in the Berlin State Library (BUC 8503).
2. David Der-wei Wang, “Foreign Devils,” 97.
3. It was taboo to write in full a character in the emperor’s given name, so the author writes Kangxi’s name with one stroke missing.
4. Known also by the titles Supplement to Outlaws of the Marsh (Hou shuihu zhuan) and Conclusion to Outlaws of the Marsh (Jie shuihu zhuan).
5. David Der-wei Wang, “Foreign Devils,” 97.
6. Catherine Vance Yeh, “Recasting the Chinese Novel.”
7. David Der-wei Wang, “Foreign Devils,” 102.
8. See also Shuhui Yang, “Growing from the Waist.”
9. Li Shizhen, Bencao gangmu, 12.03.
10. Li seems to quote from the Yi shuo, chapter 7, “strange illnesses” (qiji 奇疾).
11. Ji Yun, Ji Xiaolan jiashu, 257–58.
12. Brokaw, Commerce in Culture; Chia, Printing for Profit; McDermott, A Social History of the Chinese Book; Son, Writing for Print; He, Home and the World.
13. Preface to Feng Menglong, Jingshi tongyan (Stories to caution the world).
14. Idema, “Review of Chinese Theories of Fiction,” 397.
15. See, for example, the June 2022 workshop “Premodern Chinese Literature as an Archive of Vernacular Knowledge and Everyday Life Culture,” hosted by Roland Altenburger and Rainier Lanselle at the Institute of East and South Asian Cultural Studies, Julius Maximilian University of Würzburg, https://
www .crcao .fr /2022 /05 /25 /premodern -chinese -literature -as -an -archive -of -vernacular -knowledge -and -eeveryday -life -culture / ?lang =en. 16. Allen, “Narrative Genres,” 283.
17. Lam, “Premodern Fiction and Fiction Collections,” 251.