THE GOLDEN MIRROR IN THE IMPERIAL COURT OF

THE QIANLONG EMPEROR, 1739-1742*

MARTA HANSON
Universityof California, San Diego

During the course of the eighteenth century, the Imperial Print-

ing Office (Xiushu chu) of the Manchu controlled Qing dynasty
(1644-1911) completed three publishing projects of considerable
importance for medicine in Chinese history. These projects were
the imperial encyclopedia Synthesis of Books and Illustrations, Past
and Present (Gujin tushu jicheng, 1 728) , the Imperially Commissioned
Golden Mirror of the Orthodox Lineage of Medicine ( Yuzuan yizong jin-
jian, 1 742) , and the ninety-seven volumes and one hundred addi-
tional titles in the "category of medical authors" (yijia lei) of the
Complete Compilation of the Four Treasuries (Siku quanshu, 1 782) .3 Not
only do the medical texts in these compilations collectively span
nearly all of recorded Chinese medical history, they also preserve
a wide range of sources about the intellectual, social, cultural, and
political dimensions of medicine in early-modern China. This arti-
cle focuses on the second of these three imperial publications; the
only one of the three devoted exclusively to medicine and the sole
medical treatise to come out of the Imperial Printing Office dur-
ing the Qing dynasty. The Golden Mirror was also the first Chinese
medical compendium published under imperial aegis with a com-
bination of textual exegesis, comprehensive clinical subjects, and

* I thank Catherine
Jami for suggesting that I write this article and for her
recommendations to improve it. I am also grateful to Benjamin Elman, Hugh
Shapiro, Nathan Sivin, Robert Westman and the journals' anonymous reader for
their excellent suggestions. Chinese characters are given in the glossary only for
primary texts, their authors, and technical terms or phrases used in this article.
'
Gujin tushu jicheng, ed. Chen Menglei, presented to throne by Jiang Tingxi
in 1725. The medical section was recently published separately as Gujin tushu
?6/M'Mg, yijia lei (Medical Section of the Synthesis of Books and Illustrations, Past
and Present), 11 vols. (Beijing, 1987). Also known as the Imperial Encyclopedia.
2
Yizong jinjian,eds. Wu Qian- al., 2 vols. (Beijing, 1990). Referred to as the
GoldenMirror.
3 The
catalogue for this library is the Siku quan.shu zongmu, eds. Yongrong
(1744-1790) et al., 2 vols. (Beijing, 1983). The 97 titles with abstracts listed in vol.
l, j. 103-104, of the catalogue were reprinted in the library. The remaining 100
medical titles listed in j. 105 have only abstracts. The library is referred to as the
Four Treasuries (siku).
112

extensive use of mnemonics, diagrams, and illustrations to reach

as broad an audience as possible. 4
The Qianlong emperor (r. 1736-1796) was clearly pleased with
the Golden Mirror. To express his approval, he bestowed an award
of three imperial gifts upon the officials who supervised the pub-
lication : an imperial copy of the complete treatise, a raise in salary
by one full rank, and a small bronze model of an acupuncture man
made specifically to commemorate its completion (see Figure 1).
This model resembled the life-size human in bronze that was in
the Imperial Academy of Medicine during the fifteenth century for
teaching purposes.' To emphasize the importance of these three
gifts, they were inscribed on the box that contained the acupunc-
ture model.' Such a cluster of gifts for a medical publication
was rare, if not unprecedented in the imperial court. These gifts
should not be read as markers of the superlative quality of the
completed text, but rather seen within a court system of gift giving
as symbols of imperial favor. The Golden Mirror was one of multi-
ple publishing projects in the first decade of the Qianlong reign
that represent the initial stage of the emperor's obsession with
defining orthodoxy (zheng) in all realms of Chinese knowledge as
a tool of Manchu control over both Chinese culture and the Chi-
nese. In Chinese, the character zheng, translated here as ortho-
doxy, could also mean simply upright or correct and was often
contrasted with its antonym xie, often translated as heterodoxy,
which could also just mean wayward or wrong. One of the most
significant contrasts to the European experience with religious and

4 For its
significance among Qing imperial publications, see Gugong Museum
Library et al. (eds.), Qingdai neifu ke.shumulu jieti (Annotated catalogue of the
printed books in the Imperial Household of the Qing Dynasty, Peking, 1995), 308-
309. Also cited in Qingshigao (The Draft History of the Qing Dynasty), eds. Zhao
Erxun et al. (Beijing, 1977), vol. 15, 4336.
5 Lu Gwei-djen and Joseph Needham, CelestialLancets:A History & Rationale of
Acupunctureand Moxa, (Cambridge, 1980), 130. Also Asaf Goldschmidt, The Trans-
formations of ChineseMedicineduring the NorthernSongDynasty (A.D. 960-1127): I he
Integration of ThreePast Medical Approachesinto a ComprehensiveMedical SystemFol-
lowing a Waveof Epidemics(Ph.D. dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1999),
201-204.
6 Gao
Mingming, "Yizongjinjian de bianxuan ji qi chengjiu" (The editing of
the GoldenMirror of the OrthodoxLineage of Medicineand its achievements), Zhong-
hua yishi zazhi, 22.2 (1992), 81b. The Museum at the Shanghai College of Tradi-
tional Chinese Medicine has on display one of the original models.
' Fu
Weikang, "Yizong jinjianzhi bianxuan yLiQingting banjiang" (The editing
of the GoldenMirror of the OrthodoxLineage of Medicineand the bestowal of a Qing
imperial award), Yishiwenxian 3 (1997), 32.
 113

Figure 1: Acupuncture Model Award for the GoldenMirror

political orthodoxy is that the overriding concern among Chinese

rulers over orthodoxy and heterodoxy was not with what people
believed per se but rather with how they behaved and what they
did, or their "orthoprax" and "heteroprax" as other scholars have
argued.' It is in this sense that the medical orthodoxy promulgated
by the Golden Mirror was fundamentally about establishing the best

8 Alexander Woodside, "State,

Scholars, and Orthodoxy: The Ch'ing Acad-
emies, 1736-1839," in Liu Kwang-Ching (ed.), Orthodoxyin Late Imperial China
(Berkeley, 1990), 164.
114

standard for physicians to guide their practice and not an unreal-

istic exercise in thought control over medical matters. It was also
about selecting one medical lineage of texts and their commentar-
ies from the past as the only correct and thus legitimate model to
follow for the present.
Since at least the Northern Song dynasty (960-1126) under the
Taizong emperor (r. 976-997), imperial publishing projects also
had a political function to consolidate the support of southern
scholars and integrate their more sophisticated scholarship and
extensive libraries into the newly unified empire.9 Qianlong simi-
larly used imperial patronage to enlist Chinese scholars in the serv-
ice of the government, securing in the process their allegiance to
Qing rule while simultaneously adopting their scholarly standards
as those of the Qing state.'o
Why, however, did the Qianlong emperor order a medical text
so early in his reign? This was not a self-evident choice with so
many other possible domains of humanistic and scientific knowl-
edge. Who was involved in the project and what did they stand to
gain from their participation? The answers are not obvious since
precious little evidence remains on the backgrounds of the impe-
rial physicians chosen for the project. Moreover, what does their
selection of texts reveal about their own intellectual alliances?
What did these scholars, in other words, choose from the array of
possibilities in classical Chinese medical literature to create a medi-
cal orthodoxy for the Qing dynasty? The imperial patronage of the
Golden Mirror functioned to distinguish the Qianlong emperor
from his two immediate predecessors, neither of whom had spon-
sored a comparable publication. It was also an effective way to
present himself, more emphatically than they had, as a benevolent
albeit non-Chinese ruler, who, following Chinese precedents, was
concerned about the health of all his subjects in the empire.
In the first two reigns of the Qing dynasty, however, there were
more translations than publications of medical texts in the impe-
rial court. Most of these were anonymous translations into Manchu
of Chinese medical texts on smallpox, food therapy, pulse taking,

9 Johannes L. Kurz, "The Politics of Collecting Knowledge: Song Taizong's

Compilations Project," 77.4-5 (2001), 289-316.
10See
Benjamin Elman, FromPhilosophyto Philology:Intellectualand SocialAspects
of Change in I.ate Irnperial China (Cambridge, Mass., 1984), 100-108. Also R. Kent
Guy, !he Emperor'sFour Treasuries:Scholarsand the State in the Late Ch'ien-lungEra
(Cambridge, Mass., 1987), 38-49.
 115

properties of medicinals, and disease diagnosis." The remaining

texts were Jesuit translations of Western medical and anatomical
knowledge into either Chinese or Manchu. 12 There is no evidence
that members of the Imperial Academy of Medicine were involved
in any of these translation projects. Before the Golden Mirror, there
is no indication that Qing imperial physicians had any scholarly
responsibilities whatsoever, besides the editing of one text on
the medicinal properties of substances (Yaoxing tongkao) dated to
1722.'3 Although completed at the end of the Kangxi reign, the
Imperial Encyclopedia was not published until 1728, five years after
the Yongzheng emperor succeeded to the throne." It was the first
publishing endeavor with significant medical content to come out
of the prestigious Imperial Printing Office. Of the 520 volumes,
the medical section was one of the largest of all the major divi-
sions, requiring eleven dense volumes in its modern edition. A
wide range of other medical topics such as records of epidemics,
biographies of physicians, and information on medical institutions
were also spread throughout the rest of the Imperial Encyclopedia.
Three years later in 1731, the Imperial Printing Office printed four
charts on acupuncture that depicted the locations of acupuncture
points and meridians from different perspectives on the human
body. 15 During the last three years of the Yongzheng reign and the
first four of the reign of Qianlong (1732-1739), however, there is
no further evidence of imperial publications of medical transla-
tions, charts, or texts anywhere within the palace.

" Yu
Yongmin, "Zhongguo Manwen yixue yizhu kaoshu" ("Annotated Bibli-
ography of Manchu Medical Texts in China"), Manzu yanjiu 2 (1993), 54-60;
Hartmut Walravens, "Medical Knowledge of the Manchus and the Manchu Ana-
tomy,"tudes mongoleset sibiriennes,cahier 27 (1996), 359-374; and Marta Hanson,
"Manchu Medical Manuscripts and Texts from the Qing Dynasty:A Bibliographic
Survey," Saksaha: a Reviezuof Manchu Studies, forthcoming.
12For the transmission of western medicine
by the Jesuits, see "Late Ming-Mid
Qing: Themes, 4.2.7 Medicine," in Handbookof Christianityin China, Vol. 1: 1635-
1800, ed. Nicolas Standaert (= Handbookof Oriental Studies,Section 4: China, gen.
ed. N. Standaert) (Leiden, 2001), 786-802.
There was another Chinese publication on the medicinal qualities of mate-
ria medica (Bencaopinhui jingyao xuji) during the Kangxi reign dated to 1720, but
it is not clear which office compiled it within the palace. Ma Jixing, Zhongyi
wenxian xue (Studies in Chinese Medical Literature) (Shanghai, 1990), 384.
For the politics of this publication and an introduction to its contents, see
Lionel Giles, Index to the ChineseEncyclopedia(British Museum, 1911; rep., Taipei,
1969). Also Endymion Wilkinson, ChineseHistory:A Manual, rev. and enlarged ed.
(Cambridge, Mass., 2000), 605-607.
15
Ma Jixing, Zhongyiwenxian xue, 384.
116

Up to this point, medical texts in the Qing imperial court were

written mostly in Manchu, sometimes in Chinese, sometimes about
Western but mostly about Chinese medicine, published here and
there, but not as an imperially endorsed medical orthodoxy. Al-
though not necessarily a direct response to this situation, it is
nonetheless in this context that the Qianlong emperor sent his
first edict in mid-December 1739 ordering his officials "to compile
a medical text in order to rectify medicine."
For imperial physicians, medicine was a practical realm of
knowledge where they could assert their own priorities without
obvious political pitfalls. The Golden Mirror thus also reveals how
the physicians in the Imperial Academy of Medicine (Taiyi yuan)
of the early-Qianlong reign fashioned a medical canon for the
Qing Imperium by selecting the medical currents of thought and
standards of scholarship dominant among their own socio-intellec-
tual circles in southern China. Their selection represents the aca-
demic fashions of one particular group of medical authors based
in the southern provinces-Anhui, Jiangsu, and 7,hejiang-of
the Jiangnan region, and in neighboring Jiangxi province. The
wealthiest area of the new Qing empire and the regional core of
elite Chinese scholars, the Jiangnan region extended across the
lower reaches of the Yangzi river and included the modern-day
cities of Huizhou, Nanjing, Suzhou, and Hangzhou. These physi-
cians were influenced by a broad movement of scholars concen-
trated in the Jiangnan region who turned away from what they
considered the empty philosophical speculation of earlier aca-
demic fashions and toward the texts from antiquity that they be-
lieved were the repositories of the most reliable knowledge. They
hoped to find in their reconstructions of texts from the golden age
of antiquity answers to their present-day questions. This shift
from speculative philosophy to philological analysis was historically
rooted in the policy questions of the civil examinations from the
mid-fifteenth to sixteenth centuries that valued responses showing
"learning based on what can be ascertained" (kaojuxue) .16 By the
early seventeenth century, this textualist movement is called Han
learning (hanxue) because of the focus on recovering texts from
the Han dynasty (202 BCE-220 CE) shorn of all later interpola-
tions. It is also referred to as the evidential scholarship (kaozheng)
16For
examples of these earliest precedents of evidential scholarship in Ming
policy questions, see Benjamin Elman, A Cultural History of Civil Examinations in
Late Imperial China (Berkeley, 2000), 451-59.
 117

movement because the scholars reconstructing Han texts empha-

sized philological exegesis, historical analysis, and textual criticism
to place classical learning on a more solid foundation.'7 This move-
ment reached its peak in the mid to late eighteenth century, be-
ginning with the reign of Qianlong and continuing into the early
nineteenth century through the reign of Jiaqing (r.
During the early 1740s, such methods were just beginning to as-
cend within the imperial court and were integrated into the Golden
Mirror. The Golden Mirror thus played a role not just in the crea-
tion of a medical orthodoxy, but more broadly, in the early forma-
tion of what later became called evidential scholarship.

THE PROJECT AND ITS ACTORS

The Imperial Physicians

On 17 December 1739, the Qianlong emperor sent an edict to two

of the top officials in the Imperial Academy of Medicine, the Jun-
ior Administrative Assistant Wang Bing and the Head Supervisor
Wu Qian: "All of you in this office ought to compile a medical text
in order to rectify medicine (yizheng During the Qing
dynasty, the Imperial Academy of Medicine maintained a staff of
sixteen: a Commissioner of the 5th rank, two Administrative Assist-
ants of the 6th rank, and thirteen Imperial Physicians of the 8th
rank.2 The Imperial Physicians were divided among sections (ke)
of medical knowledge established at thirteen since the Southern
Song dynasty (1127-1278), but altered to eleven during the Qing
dynasty.21 The Imperial Academy of Medicine also had roughly

" On the
emergence of evidential scholarship, see Elman, From Philosophyto
Philology, 38-49. On these points about the textualist movement, see Guy, The
Em?eror'.sFour Treasuries,38-40. For an early overview of evidential scholarship in
history, see Tu Wei-yun, Xue.shuyu shibian (Scholarship and Epochal Change)
(Taipei, 1971).
ls Elman, A Cultural History of Civil Examinations, 448.
'9 yizong jinjian, vol. 1, 3, line 3.
2 Chen Keji (ed.), Qinggong yianyanjiu (Research on the Medical Cases of the
Imperial Palace) (Beijing, 1990), 2203-4. The Qing followed the Ming system of
using nine ranks (#1-9) of two degrees each (a-b) to grade officials and offices
into eighteen categories from the highest rank la to the lowest 9b. Charles O.
Hucker, A Dictionary of Official Tilles in Imperial China (Stanford, 1985), #1315.
?1
"Qualifying Examinations," in Joseph Needham and Lu Gwei-djen, Science
and Civilizationin China, vol. 6: Biologyand BiologicalTechnology,Part VI: Medicine,,
ed. Nathan Sivin (Cambridge, 2000), 109-110. Also Ma Boying, Zhongguoyixue
wenhua shi (A History of Medicine in Chinese Culture) (Shanghai, 1994), 505-508.
118

twenty-six clerks of the 9th rank as well as twenty Master Physicians

and thirty Students of General Medicine who fell below the offi-
cial ranks.22 The Qing government used the same rooms in the
Imperial Palace and largely followed the same administrative struc-
ture for the Academy of Medicine as the previous Ming dynasty
(1368-1644). The main difference was only that a member of
the Imperial Household Department (Neiwu fu), usually a Prince
(wang), or a Grand Secretary (da xueshi), was also assigned as its
overseeing Manager.2' For the Golden Mirror project, however, the
Qianlong emperor assigned both a Prince and a Grand Secretary.
Two weeks later, on 31 December, Qian Doubao, the then Com-
missioner of the Imperial Academy of Medicine, responded to the
emperor's edict with a lengthy memorial.2' He began with the most
compelling reasons for the publication:
The way of medicine deteriorates daily and its techniques are lost in trans-
mission. This is because medical texts are disorganizcd and people do not
understand the orthodox lineage. Now our emperor above has a compas-
sionate and humane heart, sees the people as his children, and wishes that
they may all reach a long life.

Qian also argued that by commissioning a medical book, the Qian-

long emperor would be realizing the unfulfilled aims of his im-
mediate ancestors, the Kangxi (r. 1662-1722) and Yongzheng (r.
1723- 1735) emperors .15 Rather than fulfilling his predecessors un-
documented intentions, the Golden Mirror functioned instead to
distinguish the Qianlong emperor from them.
Qian Doubao then sketched a brief history of the most impor-
tant medical figures and texts in antiquity to support his argument
to use the writings of Zhang Ji (150-219), the most influential
physician from the Later Han dynasty (25-220 CE), as the founda-
tion of this imperial medical text. Zhang Ji was the first to sepa-
rate the category of "cold-damage disorders" (shanghan), from
other types of "miscellaneous disorders" (zabing), singling out
cold as the most serious of the pathogenic factors in the climate.
Cold-damage disorders had several diagnostic interpretations: all
illnesses caused by cold during the winter; syndromes due to ex-

22 Chen
Keji (ed.), Qinggongyian yanjiu, 2204.
23 Hucker,
Official Titles, #6184.
Concurrently the Chief Minister of the Court of Imperial Entertainments,
Qian Doubao was also in charge of all matters related to catering in the Imperial
Household Department, for court officials, and during special imperial banquets.
Hucker, Official Titles, #3348.
yizong jinjian, vol. 1, 3, lines 14-15.
 119

cessive cold any time year that cause the combination of a fever,
aversion to cold, and body aches; and all feverish symptoms due
to external climatic factors, such as wind stroke (zhongfieng) , damp-
ness and warmth (shiwen), hot (re) and warm (zM) disorders, as
well as cold.26 The issue in the Golden Mirror regarding the choice
of Zhang Ji's writings, however, rested not on singling out cold
among the other climatic factors, but rather on the distinction
attributed to him between "methods" ( fa)-the diagnostic criteria
for differentiating between types of syndromes-and "formulas"
gang) , namely the standard for the basic ingredients in a prescrip-
tion for each syndrome. To support this decision, Qian argued:
All of the texts before Zhang Ji's works have methodsbut have no formulas
(youfa mufang). The Treatiseon ColdDamage (Shanghan lun) and the Treatise
of the Essentialsof the GoldenCasketand MiscellaneousOrders(Jinkui yaoluezabing
established the norms for formulas and methods; they were [thus] the
first to have methodsand have formulas (youfa youfang). Being the only true
current of thought of the orthodox lineage of medicine, they initiated the
models practiced for generations, and thus truly are works of the sages
(shengshu).28
This argument was an integral dimension of efforts by southern
physicians at the end of the Ming and beginning of the Qing dy-
nasty to raise their own status as physicians vis-a-vis the greater
social prestige of scholar-elites and officials. They did this, for ex-
ample, by presenting Zhang Ji as the sage in the medical tradition
comparable with Confucius and Mencius in the Confucian tradi-
tion.`9 Held among late-Ming and early-Qing adherents of the
Cold-Damage current of thought, Qian used the distinction that
earlier medical canons from antiquity were repositories of meth-
ods for determining syndromes, whereas Zhang Ji's later medical
writings were the first to link these specific types of syndromes to
standard medical formulas.

26 China
Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine et al. (cds.), Zhongyidaci-
dian (Dictionary of Chinese Medicine) (Beijing, 1998), 565.
In the first imperial publications of Zhang Ji's writings during the North-
ern Song dynasty, the earliest extant edition titled Treatiseon ColdDamageand Mis-
cellaneousDisorders(Shanghayazabing lun) was divided into two texts in 1065 and
1066, and reprinted again in 1088: the first on Cold Damage disorders called the
Treatiseon Cold Damageand the second on miscellaneous disorders titled the Es-
.sentiaLsof the GoldenCasket.For textual history of Zhang Ji's works, see Ma f ixing,
Zhongyiwenxian xue, 110-135.
28 Yizong jinjian,vol. 1, 3, lines 21-24.
29 See Chao
Yuan-ling, "I,ineages and Schools: Zhang Zhongjing and Sidajia
in Ming and Qing," paper presented at The Tenth International Conference on
the History of Science in East Asia, Shanghai, August 20-24, 2002.
120

One of the earliest physicians to make this argument was

Yu Chang (1585-1664), a man from Xinjiang county in southern
Jiangxi province who was also one of the most influential pro-
ponents of securing the foundation of clinical medicine by re-
constructing the original Han version of Zhang Ji's writings. In
passages from two of his most famous books, he wrote that Zhang
Ji was "the god of establishing formulas" zhi shen) and the
"primary ancestor of establishing formulas" ( lifa zhi The in-
terweaving of Yu Chang's commentary on the writings of Zhang Ji
into the textual fabric of the Golden Mirror shows the pervasiveness
of his influence.
What is striking about Qian's proposal, however, is this: Nearly
all imperial compilations of medical texts since the Tang dynasty
(618-907) had taken as their foundation writings attributed to
legendary sages31 such as the Divine Husbandman (shennong) for
materia medica 31 or the elusive Yellow Emperor (huangdi) for acu-
puncture33 as well as for the foundational texts of Chinese medical
theory, The Inner Canon of the Yellow Eml) ffor. Basic Questions (Huang-
di neijing: suwen) and Divine Pivot (lingshu). 34 These attributions
rested on the idea of "legendary sages as culture-givers" and "sov-
ereigns as technical innovators" who passed on the arts of civiliza-
tion to human society during a mythical Golden Age. Developed
in the context of the political unification of the Former Han dy-
nasty (206 BCE-22 CE) to legitimate a new political order with an
emperor at the pinnacle and Heaven as the ultimate source of

3 Yu
Chang, Chapters on the EsteemedTreatise (Shanglun pian, 1648), j. 1; and
the Recordo fMethodsAmongPhysicians ( Yimenfalu, 1658), j. 4.
See list in Ma Boying, Zhongguoyixue wenhua shi, 508-514.
32
Although citations to the Divine Husbandman's Materia Medica (Shennong
bencao)date to the first century C.E., the earliest extant edition was not compiled
until the sixth century by the scholar Tao Hongjing (456-536), who added ')I.nl'
canon to the end of the title. With the NewlyRevisedMateria Medica (Xinxiu beru:ao)
of the Tang dynasty completed in 659, it became the foundation for imperial
materia medica. Tamba no Mototane, Zhongguoyiji kao (Studies of Chinese Medi-
cal Books) (Beijing, 1983), 86-110.
:\3
Although the third-century physician Huangfu Mi (215-282) was the first to
synthesize and standardize acupuncture texts in his 'A-B' Canon of the YellowEm-
peror (Huangdi jia yi jing) published in 282 C.E., attribution of original authorship
remained to the legendary Yellow Emperor. See Coldschmidt, "The Transforma-
tions of Chinese Medicine," 180-206.
34The Inner Canon was based on
writings by several anonymous authors, com-
piled sometime during the first century R.C.E. when it was attributed to the leg-
endary Yellow Emperor, and thereaftcr became the theoretical foundation of
classical Chinese medicine. Nathan Sivin, "Huangdi neijing," in Early Chinese7'exts:
A BibliographicalGuide, ed. Michael Loewe (Berkeley, 1993), 196-215.
 121

legitimacy, this idea remained influential thereafter.35 Zhang Ji,

however, was a historical figure who responded to epidemics in
Henan province while he was an official of the Later Han dynasty.""
Zhang Ji's medical texts were not even well known until the Ying-
zong emperor (r. 1064-67) of the Northern Song dynasty (960-
1127) ordered revised editions of them published. 17 Zhang Ji's
writings on "cold damage" (shanghan) did not even become a sepa-
rate discipline (ke) within the Academy of Imperial Medicine until
the Ming dynasty.38 Zhang Ji's medical writings were not therefore
widely read among literate physicians until relatively late in Chi-
nese medical history. Furthermore, despite this previous imperial
patronage, Zhang Ji's writings had never been published as the
foundational texts of a larger medical compendium before the
Golden Mirror. Why then, out of many other possibilities in the
classical Chinese medical corpus available in the mid-eighteenth
century, did Qian Doubao, Wu Qian, and their colleagues in the
Imperial Academy of Medicine choose the primary texts in the
Cold Damage current of medical thought? Their choice relied on
the southern medical lineages within which Wu Qian, at least, had
been educated. Cold Damage scholarship was not only one of the
most dominant medical discourses of the era, it was one of the
earliest in which physicians applied to medical texts the philologi-
cal methods of the Han learning movement then current in the
academies of the Jiangnan region. These physicians also saw in
Zhang ,Ji a model for themselves as physicians on a par with the
Confucian scholar-officials of higher social status. 39
Returning to the memorial, Qian then requested that all of the
medical books be taken out of the library of the Imperial House-
hold Department and moved to the offices of the Imperial Acad-

On the concept of "sovereigns as technical innovators" appearing with and

reinforcing the Han ideology of a bureaucratic political order, see Nathan Sivin,
"Text and Experience in Classical Chinese Medicine," in Knowledgeand the Schol-
Medical Traditions, ed. Don Bates (Cambridge, 1995), 188-190.
arly36
He Shixi, Zhongguolidai yijia zh?ian lu (Record of Biographies of Physicians
in Chinese History) (Beijing, 1991), vol. 2, 664-684.
3i
Ma Jixing, Zhongyiwenxian xue, 110-135. Also Goldschmidt, "The Transfor-
mations of Chinese Medicine," 66-68.
38
Liang Jun, Zhongguogudai yi zheng shilue (A Brief History of Medicine and
Government in Chinese Antiquity) (Inner Mongolia, 1995), 157.
Chao Yuan-ling, "Lineages and Schools," 4-5, 12-14. Chao discusses both the
application of evidential methods and the significance of raising the status of the
physician Zhang Ji in medicine to that of a sage comparable to Confucius and
Mencius in philosophy.
122

emy of Medicine. He also recommended issuing an order to the

provinces for local officials to collect manuscripts and medical
books-published and unpublished-and send them directly to
the court. 40

The Grand Secretary.

The Qianlong emperor responded shortly after with another edict:

"I order the Grand Secretary Ortai to consider and discuss this
memorial; this entire matter of compiling a book is appropriate.
Moreover, I order that the Grand Minister Supervisor of the Im-
perial Household Department examine it thoroughly."41 Ten days
after Qian's memorial on 10 January 1740, the Grand Secretary
Ortai (1680-1745) responded with a second memorial detailing the
personnel and material requirements for the project.42 A vacant
room in the Imperial Academy of Medicine had been found, but
would have to be renovated. The two Imperial Physicians, Wu Qian
and the Muslim doctor Liu Yuduo (fl. 1739-1746),43 were available
to oversee the project as Editors-in-chief, along with eight Assist-
ant Editors. He also suggested that if there were not enough peo-
ple in the Imperial Academy of Medicine to complete the project,
"then we should go to the officials in the Hanlin Academy and the
other Ministries to check those who are familiar with medical
learning for inclusion in this group." Shortly after, he continued
on the same subject: "If there are still not enough people, then
send notice to the Directorate of Education in the capital and,
according to precedent, select National University Students who
have taken the civil-service examinations and have the best callig-
raphy."44 This project would clearly require expertise, literary tal-
ents, and personnel beyond the Imperial Academy of Medicine,
but still well within the immediate pool of personnel within the
palace and capital.
Regarding the budget, Ortai recommended the following:

4
Yizong jinjian,vol. 1, 3, lines 24-25.
Yizong jinjian,vol. 1, 4, lines 9-10.
42 "O-er-t'ai," in Arthur W. Hummel, Eminent Chinese the
of Ch'ing Period (Tai-
pei, 1991), 601-603.
43 Liu Yuduo was one of the two most
important Muslims to serve in the Im-
perial Academy of Medicine during the Qing dynasty. Yang Daye, "Qinggong
Huizu yuyi Zhao Shiying he Liu Yuduo" ("The Muslim Physicians Zhao Shiying
and Liu Yuduo in the Imperial Palace") Li.shidang'an 4 (1995), 126.
44
yizong jinjian, vol. 1, 5, lines 22-24.
 123

The salaries of the officials and functionaries, the monthly expenses, meals
at work, support staff, and silver bullion should be determined according to
the standards for the History of the Eight Banners (Baqi tongzhi) project in the
Imperial Printing Office. They should also use tables, chairs, miscellaneous
paper, brushes, and inks according to this precedent.45
While Ortai was organizing these initial arrangements for the me-
dical project, he was simultaneously involved in at least five other
imperial publishing projects, including the History of the Eight Ban-
ners mentioned in his memorial, which was completed in 1741.46
He was the main editor for an illustrated treatise on agriculture
(Shoushi tongkao, 1742) as well as one of two main editors for a set
of three commentaries on classical texts about ritual in Chinese
antiquity (Sanli yishu, 1745) Y Beyond the projects initiated within
the first four years of Qianlong's reign, he would also edit a text
on the laws governing the military affairs of the empire (Zhongshu
zhengkao, 1746)4s as well as two other treatises on Manchu history-
a genealogy of the Manchu clans and family (Baqi manzhou shi zu
tongpu, 1745) and a study on the laws governing bannermen
(Baqi zeli, 1746) .'
Ortai's broader editorial responsibilities within the first decade
of the Qianlong reign clearly place the medical project within a
much larger imperial publishing initiative. In the first five years of
Qianlong's reign, his style of governance was not yet fully formed
and the meaning of his Manchu ethnic origins were still being
defined. He patronized publishing projects that projected him as
a rightful heir of the classical Chinese heritage in disciplines of
knowledge required to rule, while simultaneously ordering histo-
ries of the Manchu people themselves. Although overlooked in
most histories of this pivotal period, medicine, agriculture, as-
tronomy, and mathematics were integral dimensions of this mani-
fold imperial enterprise.'

45
yizong jinjian, vol. 1, 5-6, lines 24-26.
On this source, see Mark Elliott, The Manchu Way: The Eight Banners and
Ethnic Identity in I,at,- ImfJerialChina (Stanford, 2001).
" For a list of nine
publications Ortai supervised, see Hummel, Eminent Chi-
602a. Also Qingshi gao vol. 15: for Shoushi tongkao, 4335; and for the three
titles of the Sanli yishu, 4233-34, 4236.
48 Hummel, Eminent Chinese,602a.
49
Qingsh.igao, vol. 15, 4281.
50 Hummel, Eminent Chinese,602a. For the two Manchu treatises, see Pamela
Crossley, A Translucent Mirror: History and Identity in Imyerial Ideology(Ber-
keley, 1999) and The Manchus (Cambridge, Mass., 1997). On laws governing
banncrmen, see Elliott, The Manchu Way.
Although Ortai was not directly involved, the Imperial Printing Office also
124

The Prince

Although terse, we learn from the Qianlong emperor's response

to Ortai's memorial that the imperial budget reflected bureau-
cratic prestige: "The Offices of Medical Books and of the Imperial
Printing Office are not the same. The salary of the editors in the
Medical Office should be half of what those in the Printing Office
are paid. The remainder will be as agreed On 14 March
of the same year, 1740, the Qianlong emperor's closest brother
Prince Hongzhou (1712-1770), the fifth son of their father, the
Yongzheng emperor, submitted a third memorial on this matter."
Only one year apart, the two had largely been educated together
and, up until their father's death, were being simultaneously train-
ed in government administration. In their first official positions,
for example, they were both assigned to be on the Council of Miao
Control, which the Yongzheng emperor had established during
the summer of 1735 to suppress the Miao rebellions in southwest-
ern Guizhou province.'4 This may well have been their first expe-
rience working directly with Ortai and Zhang Tingyu (1672-1755),
the two most important officials of the first decade of the Qianlong
reign, who were also simultaneously a Grand Minister (dachen) and
Grand Secretary. Both also had significant roles in the Imperial
Printing Office.55 Not long after Hongli (1711-1799) ascended to
the throne to become the Qianlong emperor, however, he had the
council abolished. When Qianlong bestowed upon his younger
brother the contents of their father's private estate, Hongzhou
became one of the wealthiest among the surviving princes, but also
one of the most eccentric.'6 Although he is remembered most for
his unconventional behavior, he is not as well known for the ma-
jor publishing projects he supervised in the Imperial Printing Of-

published three books related to calendrical, astronomical, and numerological

matters from 1737 to 1741. Qingshi gao, vol. 15, 4341, 4350.
52
Yizong jinjian,vol. 1, 6, lines 9-10.
53 Ibid.,
pp. 7-8. For Prince Hongzhou, see in Hummel, Eminent
Chinese,919.
Harold Kahn, Monarchyin the Emperor'sEyes:Image and Reality in the Ch'ien-
lung55Reign (Cambridge, Mass., 1971), 110.
"Chang T'ing-yii," in Hummel, Eminent Chine.se,54-.56.Before becoming the
regent for the Qianlong emperor and his Chief Grand Councillor, Zhang Tingyu
served in the Hanlin Academy and in the personal "Southern Study" of the Kang-
xi emperor. Guy, The Emperor'sFour Treasuries,27.
56 Prince
Hongzhou, for instance, was said to have enjoyed watching rehears-
als of his own funeral during banquets. See Kahn, Monarchyin the Emperor'sEyes,
113-4.
 125

fice. From 1736 to 1740, when he wrote the memorial concerning

the Golden Mirror, he was designated, at least in name, the Super-
visor of no less than seven publishing projectS.17 There were Ming
precedents for princes either to be assigned to publishing projects
or to devote themselves to scholarship in order to keep out of the
political fray and void any suspicions of higher political ambitions
on the part of the reigning emperor. 18 During the first decade of
the Qianlong reign, Prince Hongzhou's involvement in the Golden
Mirror and position as Supervisor for several other publishing pro-
jects suggest a similar political function for a Prince who, once the
constant companion and closest brother of the reigning Qianlong
emperor, could now possibly become a political liability or threat.
When Prince Hongzhou turned his attention to the Golden Mir-
ror, he first summarized the matters discussed in the previous two
memorials and edicts, addressed problems of initiative, listed re-
sources that needed to be secured, and recommended changes of
previous goals. In the first memorial, for instance, Qian Doubao
had recommended that provincial officials send medical books
from their regions to the court for consideration. This idea had
not been followed through, however; nor had the office been
renovated and opened. The suggested number of editors and ar-
chivists had not yet been selected, either." By all appearances, the
project had stalled.
Prince Hongzhou wrote that when he consulted with Qian Dou-
bao and others about the delay in the project, Wu Qian informed
him that he had already written a manuscript that was 80-90% fin-
ished and only needed editing. Prince Hongzhou wrote:
I humbly think that what Wu Qian has called 80-90% completed can be
examined and compared in detail with the books of the library of the Impe-
rial Household Department. It is as stated in the imperial edict: Of all the
books in the world, none will surpass this one. Please have all the medical
books in the Inner Court and Wu Qian's incomplete manuscript sent to the
Imperial Academy of Medicine."
" These include the
following: a collection of lectures about the classics on
ritual (Rijiang liji jieyi)started in 1736 and the anthology on Ming and Qing exam
essays (Qinding sishu wen) for which Fang Bao was the main editor; an agricultural
treatise Shollshi tongkao begun in 1737; a work on divination (Xieji bianfang shu)
initiated in 1738; the sub-statues of the Qing code (Da Qing Iiili) started in 1739;
and a history of the Directorate of Education (Guozijianzhi) and a government
treatise on how to deal with catastrophes (Kang ji lu), both completed in 1740.
5RZhao
Qian and Zhang Zhiqing, "Book Publishing by the Princely House-
hold during the Ming Dynasty: A Preliminary Study," trans. by Nancy Norton
Tomasko, The East Asian Libraryjournal 10/ (2001 ) , 85-128.
59
Yizong jinjian,vol. 1, 7, lines 16-19.
" Ibid., lines 23-25.
126

Prince Hongzhou concluded his memorial by saying that with the

Inner Court's medical books and Wu's manuscript there was no
further need to request medical books from the provinces.61
The emperor issued his fourth and final edict with these suc-
cinct words: "What has been memorialized is suitable for the Im-
perial Household Department; I also order that the Prince take
full responsibility."62 The failure to collect medical books from the
provinces must have remained on the Qianlong emperor's mind,
however, because the following year, in 1741, he attempted to re-
vive the book-collecting project his father the Yongzheng emperor
had initiated, but to no avail. He did not attempt a second effort
to start collecting books for another thirty years, yet this time he
succeeded. His February edict of 1771 would mark the beginning
of the Four Treasuries, the most extensive book collecting project,
intensive literary inquisition, and ambitious scholarly project of the
Qing dynasty.6'
Within the first five years of his reign, however, the Qianlong
emperor had not yet secured the trust of wary officials jaded
by previous experiences with the thin imperial line between liter-
ary projects and factional politics."' Nor had he gained sufficient
power within the court to start a medical compilation or a book-
collecting initiative that would require personnel and textual re-
sources well beyond what was already available within the palace.
Just over three years after the first 1739 imperial edict in Decem-
ber ordered the compilation of a medical treatise, Prince Hong-
zhou sent forward his final memorial on 10 January 1743. He
concluded how the problems encountered had been resolved,
summarized the work done on the project, and affirmed that
the final version had been completed the previous Despite
greater ambitions for an empire-wide collection of medical books,
all the human and textual resources required for the Golden Mirror
had to be found in what was available already within the imperial
palace.

61Ibid., 8, lines 2-3.

p.
62 Ibid., line 5.
63 For an
English translation of the 1741 proposal, see Guy, TheEmperor'sFour
Treasuries,28; and for a discussion of the Edict of 1771, 34-37.
28.
Yizongjinjian, vol. 1, 9-10.
 127

The Staff

The hierarchy of participants listed in the beginning of the text

gives a good indication of the division of labor for the Golden Mir-
ror within the bureaucracy of the Manchu imperial court. In addi-
tion to Prince Hongzhou and Grand Secretary Ortai, eighty people
were officially assigned to this project:

1) Six Supervisors-the Commissioner of the Imperial Academy of Medi-

cine Qian Doubao (rank 3b), one Administrative Assistant (rank 5a),
and four Manchu officials in various capacities of the Imperial House-
hold Department. 66
2) Two Editors-in-chief-the southern physician" Wu Qian and the Mus-
lim doctor Liu Yuduo (both rank 5b).
3) Fourteen Compilers-which included six Imperial Physicians (yuyi,rank
7a-8a), six Medical Secretaries (limu, rank 8-9), a former Erudite of the
Directorate of Astronomy, Liu Yuxi,68and a Tribute Student by Pur-
chase of the First Class (lin gongsheng). 69
4) Twelve Assistant Compilers-including one Imperial Physician, two
Elite Physicians (yishi, rank 9b),i four Medical Secretaries, two un-
ranked Medical Students (yishing) ,?'two National University Students
(jiansheng),i2and a Government Student (shengyuan).i3
5) Ten Editorial Assistants-consisting of five Imperial Physicians, three
Medical Secretaries, and two Elite Physicians.
6) Two Archivists who were Supernumerary Medical Secretaries of the
Imperial Academy of Medicine.

66 Three were Bureau Directors (rank 5) and one was a

Wing Commander
(rank 6).
6i Hucker,
Official 1tles, #8139. Imperial Physician was the most prestigious
title for physicians in the Imperial Academy of Medicine. Four to eighteen filled
the post in the Ming and ten to fifteen during the Qing. If all of the officials in
the Imperial Academy of Medicine participated in editing the GoldenMirror, then
from 1739 to 1742 there would have been fifteen Imperial Physicians, including
the three top medical officials-Qian Doubao, Wu Qian, and Liu Yuduo.
68 Liu Yuxi
may well have been a brother of the Muslim doctor Liu Yuduo pre-
viously mentioned.
69 Hucker,
OfficialTitles,#3726, 3719. Tribute Student by Purchase of the First
Class was a title given to men who were selected among those already entitled as
Stipend Students or Government Students as the best candidates for the provin-
cial examinations.
iO Hucker,
OfficialTitles,#2997. Elite Physicians numbered anywhere from ten
to thirty in the Qing Imperial Academy of Medicine and were given rank 9b, a
nozninal rank without civil-service status.
il Hucker,
Official Title.s,#2993. Student of General Medicine or Medical Stu-
dent is the designation for Medical Assistants in the Imperial Academy of Medi-
cine. No quota was given during the Ming and Qing.
i2 Hucker,
Official Tilles, #856. National University Students is the generic
name for students who had been admitted to the National University in the capi-
tol maintained by the Directorate of Education.
i3 Hucker,
Offcial I'itles, #5193. Government Student is the generic term for
students fully subsidized by the Qing state at prefectural-level academies who were
eligible to participate in provincial-level examinations.
128

7) Eleven Copyists-comprised of six National University Students, four

Government Students, and a Military Student (zuusheng).
8) Twelve Sub-copyists-including four National University Students, seven
Government Students, and one Medical Student.
9) Nine Work Superintendents including seven from the Imperial House-
hold Department, who were assigned to the Imperial Printing Office,
and two Storehouse Managers."

Just barely half of the participants (39) were members of the Im-
perial Academy of Medicine hierarchy; the remaining half was
drawn from other sectors of the largely unranked imperial bu-
reaucracy. Of the top ten officials, only Prince Hongzhou, Grand
Secretary Ortai, and Commissioner Qian Doubao were above the
middle rank. The remaining seven-the Administrative Assistant
(rank 5a), the four Manchu officials serving as Supervisors (ranks
5 to 6), and the two Editors-in-chief (rank 5b)-were all in the
middle ranks. Most of those involved were below the official lad-
der. The officials assigned to the Imperial Academy of Medicine
dominated the middle-rank positions of Compilers (#3), Assistant
Compilers (#4), Editorial Assistants (#5), and Archivists (#6). To
ensure good calligraphy and literary quality for this imperial pub-
lication, nearly all of the twenty-three copyists and sub-copyists
were selected from the unranked officials of the National Univer-
sity and Government Students. 15 Four of the nine Work Superin-
tendents also came from the Imperial Household Department: a
Director of the Southern Park in the system of imperial parks in
and near the capital (rank 4b), a Director of the Office of the
Paymaster (rank 5a) responsible for issuing pay and rations to
members of the Inner Banners,76 a Vice-Director of the Office of
Palace Justice who was responsible for the judicial discipline of
personnel (rank 5b), and a Warehouseman from the Storage Of-
fice (rank 6a to sub-official status)."
The far fewer high-level officials and Imperial Household De-
partment personnel compared to the middle-rank to below-rank
officials suggest that the Golden Mirror was not one of the imperial
publishing projects of highest priority during the early Qianlong
reign. The delays and complications during the three-year process,

i4 See the list of

is The participants given in the Yizong jinjian,vol. 1, 11-13.
only exceptions were the Military Student among the Copyists and the
Medical Student among the Sub-copyists.
i6 Both of these Directors were also
" The concurrently Assistant Commandants.
remaining three members of this last group were a Sub-prefectural
Magistrate (rank 5a) and two Work Superintendents from the Imperial Printing
Office.
 129

while giving a sense of its logistical complexity, also support this

general assessment. Yet, the Golden Mirror was the first and only
Qing attempt to establish a medical orthodoxy. As such it was one
of the earliest manifestations of the Qianlong emperor's obsession
with intellectual orthodoxy as a means of social control. It also
reveals the dominant role southern intellectuals played in decid-
ing what that orthodoxy would be in all realms of Chinese scholar-
ship, including medicine.

The Imperial Printing Office

This exchange of edicts and memorials between Qianlong and his
officials about the Golden Mirror reveal not only that it was an un-
precedented publication for the Qing dynasty, but also that it was
assigned to two of the people that the Qianlong emperor most
trusted during the first decade of his reign: his closest brother
Prince Hongzhou and his Grand Minister and Grand Secretary
Ortai. Shortly after his succession, the Qianlong emperor raised
Ortai's hereditary rank first to Viscount (zi) and then, early in
1738, he raised it again to Earl of the third class (bO).78 From this
point on, Ortai controlled several important government posts
along with his counterpart Zhang Tingyu. In addition to the Golden
Mirror, Ortai served as the Director-general for many of the offi-
cial publications of the Imperial Printing Office up to his death in
1745.'9
Just over sixty years before, in 1680, the Kangxi emperor had
established the Imperial Printing Office in the Hall of Military
Glory (Wuying dian), which was located on the grounds of the
palace in Beijing. Under the authority of the Imperial Household
Department, the office was in charge of printing all imperial com-
pilations, court documents, and other literature, in addition to
storing the wooden blocks and copper and wooden moveable type
used to print imperial editions." Similar to the Imperial Academy
of Medicine, during the Qing dynasty the Head Manager of the
Imperial Printing Office was usually either a Prince or a Grand
Minister."

i8 The order of the noble nomenclature for the six

highest titles used during
the Qing dynasty was as follows: Prince (wang), Duke (gong), Marquis (hou), Earl
(bo), Viscount (zi), and Baron (nan). Hucker, #7519.
i9 Hummel, 602a.
HO
Shiow jyu Lu Shaw, The Imperial Printing of I;arly Ch'ing China, 1644-1805
(Asian Library Series, 20) (San Francisco: Chinese Materials Center, 1983), 1-4.
Hucker, #2630, 6184.
130

The following summary of what types of books the Imperial

Printing Office published directly preceding and through the com-
pletion of the Golden Mirror places this project in the broader
context of Qianlong's active approach to imperial patronage of
scholarly projects in Chinese. During the first full year of his reign
in 1736, he ordered the official Fang Bao (1668-1749) to edit an
anthology of examination essays from the Ming and early Qing
dynasties (Qinding sishu wen, 1739), a project for which the Prince
Hongzhou was also a Supervisor." Fang Bao was one of the most
important editors in the Imperial Printing Office off and on for
twenty years from 1722, when he was appointed the head of its
editorial bureau, to about 1740, when he retired from government
service.83 The Qianlong emperor also ordered in 1736 the print-
ing of a collection of 260 of his own study notes titled Knowledge
Accumulated Day by Day (Rizhi huishuo, 4 j.).S4 These study notes
were appended the next year to a wider range of his student
writings (Le.shan tang quanji, 40 j.), which had previously been a
much shorter (14 j.) manuscript completed in 1730, and for which
Prince Hongzhou also wrote a preface. These two works represent
the corpus of the prince Hongli before he became the Qianlong
emperor; afterwards they became widely respected, distributed,
and read as imperial writ.15 To ensure that these publications were
widely distributed throughout the empire, in the same year he
ordered that the treasurers of each province put aside sufficient
funds to cover the costs of printing and distributing to bookstores
in their jurisdictions copies of all government-commissioned
works."
Early in 1737, the Qianlong emperor also ordered that both

82 For an
analysis of Fang Bao's editorial projects that focuses on this project,
see R. Kent Guy, "Fang Pao and the Ch'in-tingSsu-shu-wen,"in Benjamin A. Elman
and Alexander Woodside (eds.), Education and Societyin Late Imperial China, 1600-
1900 (Berkeley, 1994), 150-182.
83 See
"Fang Pao," in Hummel, I, 235-237. Fang had two high points in his
literary career from 1690-1'702under the Kangxi emperor and again from 1736-
1740 in the early Qianlong reign. See Guy, "Fang Pao," 151-162.
H4The same
year he also had commissioned the compilation on rituals (Ri-
jiang liji jieyi), for which Prince Hongzhou was a Supervisor. See Qingshi gao vol.
15 (Beijing, 1986), 4236, 4325, 4405.
" Hummel, I, 370. As a source for the
emperor's self image, see Harold Kahn
"Some Mid-Ch'ing Views of the Monarchy," JAS 24/2 (1965), 230-231. For the
history and quality of these sources, see Kahn, Monarchyin the Emperor'sEyes,168-
172.
86This
point is made in Guy, The Emperor'sFour Treasuries,27.
 131

Fang Bao and Ortai oversee the editing of a collection of com-

mentaries on the three most important ancient texts on ritual.
During the same year, in addition to the Regulations for the Bureau
of Arrests (Dubu zeli), the Qianlong emperor also ordered two books
related to the history of science: an illustrated compendium on ag-
riculture in seventy-eight volumes (Shoushi tongkao) that Ortai ed-
ited and a new edition of the Kangxi emperor s 1723 treatise based
on the new epicyclical astronomy of the Jesuits (Lixiang kaocheng
houbian) S7 The Qianlong emperor reinforced the edict issued two
years previously to provincial treasurers by issuing another in 1738
requesting that private publishers reproduce and distribute impe-
rial publications." In a similar effort to establish orthodoxy, two
years later in 1739 he ordered that a work on divination stand-
ardize the hemerological knowledge in calendars and almanacs
throughout the empire (Xieji bianfang shu). Prince Hongzhou ap-
pears again as one of the Supervisors for this project. During the
same year, he ordered that work both resume on the Dynastic His-
tory of the Ming (Mingshi) based on research initiated in 1679 un-
der the Kangxi emperor'9 and begin on reprinting the standard
editions of the Thirteen Classics (Shisan jing) and the Twenty-one
Dynastic Histories (Ershiyi shi). In 1740, the emperor also ordered
two projects related to government: a collection of the edicts of the
previous Yongzheng emperor (Shizong Hui huangdi shengxun) and
the considerably expanded and final form of the Great Qing Code
with Sub-statutes (Da Qing lli) ,90 which had not been revised since
1646 and to which Prince Hongzhou had also been assigned.9'
Finally, Ortai's two major editing projects on science and medi-
cine, the illustrated treatise on agriculture and the Golden Mirror,
were both printed two years later in 1742.

THE CONTENTS OF THE GOLDEN MIRROR

Nearly all histories of medicine during the Qing dynasty discuss

the importance of the Golden Mirror. In one historical account of
Qing medicine, the Golden Mirror stands out as the first of the most

8i
Qingshi gao, vol. 15, 4311, 4335, 4341.
88 See
89 Guy (1987), 27.
9 Qingshi gao, vol. 15, 4267, 4350.
Qingshi gao, vol. 15, 4278, 4311.
Wilkinson (2000), 547.
132

influential medical books in the category of collectanea (cong-

Most medical histories stress its breadth, editorial accuracy,
medical coverage, and use of mnemonic rhymes.9' Recent publica-
tions tend to focus on the clinical side of the Golden Mirror, since
it remains a popular source for learning Chinese medicine in
Asia.`'`'
All secondary sources praise the Golden Mirror for its clinical
range, quality, and practicality, yet none have emphasized that this
medical canon intended for the Qing empire had a specific re-
gional origin. Although the editors presented their work to the
emperor as rooted in the orthodox medical tradition from antiq-
uity, it was significantly biased toward the fashions of Cold Dam-
age scholarship among medical scholars in the Jiangnan region of
Central China. Furthermore, although the Kangxi emperor was
interested in the medicine of the and praised non-Chinese
medicines from Mongolian and Manchurian origin," there is no
obvious trace of Western or even non-Chinese medicine in his
grandson's Golden Mirror, despite his exposure to it. Instead, the
Golden Mirror reflects back to the reader two important qualities: a
reassertion of classical Chinese medicine of a particular southern
regional variety from a specific historical moment; and an empha-
sis on the evidential methods of textual scholarship that would
reach a peak in the 1770s and early 1780s with the Four 7reasur-
ies. 17 Scholars from the Jiangnan region largely developed and
propagated these textual and philological methods; the Golden
Mirror was not only one of several introductions since the Kangxi

92 Fan
Xingzhun, Z-hongyllishi xue lue (Summary of Studies on the History of
Chinese Medicine, Shanghai, 1986), 436-8.
" For the book's content, Gao
Mingming, "Yizongjinjian de bianxuan _ji qi
chengjiu," 80-83. For just the awards, Fu Weikang, " Yizong jinjianzhi bianxuan yu
Qingting banjiang," 32.
94 See a
compilation of mnemonic rhymes for Chinese medicine, Dong Lian-
rong et al. (eds.), Lidai zhongyige fu jingxuan (Best Selection of Songs and Rhymes
in Chinese Medicine from Past Dynasties, Beijing, 1991).
Standaert, "Late Ming-Mid Qing: Themes, 4.2.7 Medicine," 78'7-790.
96 For the
Kangxi reference to the use of Mongolian jorhai roots for aching
joints, see Tingxun geyan (Aphorisms from Palace Lectures, Yongzheng preface,
1730), 36a. For Kangxi account of the use of the dried fruit of yenggeamong the
Manchus and Mongolians for stomach and bowl problems, see Qing Siaengzuyuzhi
(Edicts of the Kangxi emperor of the Qing), in Zhanggu congbian (Taipei, 1964),
18b. Cited in Jonathan D. Spence, Emperorof China: Self-Portraitof K'ang-hsi, (New
York, 1988 ), 99.
9i
Guy, The Emperor'sFour Treasurie.s,38-66.
 133

reign of this type of southern textual scholarship to the Qing im-

perial court, but also the first one on medicine."'

Evidential Scholarship in Medicine

The editors of the Golden Mirror divided the compilation into fif-
teen divisions with a total of ninety juan or volumes. The first two
divisions reprinted definitive editions of the two parts of the Han
physician Zhang ,Ji's classic book, Treatise on Cold Damage and Mis-
cellaneous Disorders (Shanghan zabing lun). These two editions with
commentary-the Treatise on Cold Damage (Shanghan lun, j. 1-17)
and the Essentials of th? Golden Casket (finkui yaolue, j. 18-25 )-com-
prise twenty-five volumes, more than a quarter of the entire book.
Both texts illustrate how the seventeenth-century trend of Han
learning in Chinese philosophy, literature, and history influenced
eighteenth-century medical scholarship. Although evidential schol-
arship has been studied from many different angles during the late
Ming and Qing dynasties, research remains to be done on how
medical scholarship participated in its formation.
Medical scholars participating in the Ming "Han learning" move-
ment, published critical editions of the two editions of the Golden
Casket, reconstructions of the Inner Canon of the Yellow Emperor, and
the Divine Husbandman's Materia Medica Canon as well as the 1rea-
tise on Cold Damage.99 The famous sixteenth-century ,Sy.stematic Mate-
ria Medica (Bencao gangmu, 1596) by Li Shizhen (1518-1593) was
one of the earliest previous medical treatise to use the philologi-
cal methods that would become characteristic of evidential schol-
arship in the mid to late eighteenth century.100 Although there
were earlier efforts in other medical subjects, the Golden Mirror was
the first comprehensive medical treatise to apply such methods;
this time to the Treatise on Cold Damage and the Essentials of the
Golden Casket of Cold Damage scholarship.101 These Ming medical
scholars thought that by eliminating later interpolations in their

9' On official and semiofficial

patronage, Elman, From Philosophyto Philology,
100-105.
yy Zhao Pushan, Zhongguo
" gudai 'yixue (Chinese Medicine in Ancient Times)
(Beijing, 1997), 179-197.
' The
exception is Georges M6taili6, "The Bencaogangmu of Li Shizhen: An
Innovation in Natural History?" in Elisabeth Hsu (ed.), Innovation in ChineseMedi-
cine (Cambridge, 2001), 221-261. See section on "Kinds (zhong) and the investiga-
tion of things," 240-250
... For the
proponents of Cold-Damage scholarship, see Ren Yingqiu, Zhongyi
134

reconstructions of Han medical canons they could recover ancient

truths and thereby improve clinical efficacy.
Both Li Shizhen's Systematz*c Materia Medica and the imperial
Golden Mirror contributed through medical scholarship to the for-
mation of what would be called evidential scholarship (kaozheng)
by the late eighteenth century. The influence of the regional base
of these early efforts can be seen most clearly in the editors' choice
of which of several possible editions of Zhang Ji's original text to
use. For the Treatise on Cold Damage, the editors could have chosen
either the earliest extant edition by the Shandong physician Wang
Shuhe (third c.) of the Jin dynasty (266-316) or the first imperially
commissioned edition compiled by Lin Yi (eleventh c.) and other
imperial physicians of the Northern Song dynasty during the late
eleventh century.102 They also had as an option the earliest ex-
tant twelfth-century commentary of the Treatise on Cold Damage by
the physician Cheng Wuji (fl. 1144-1156)-also from Shandong
province who lived during the Northern Jin dynasty (1115-1234).
Cheng's commentary had been published in 1144 and transmitted
in several Ming editions to the early eighteenth century. 113
Instead, however, they chose the late-sixteenth-century edition
compiled by Fang Youzhi (1522-1593?), a physician from wealthy
She county in the southern Anhui province. Fang was the most
influential of the early physicians to apply to medical sources from
the Han dynasty the philological methods fashionable among cer-
tain scholars as part of the method of the "investigation of things"
(gewu). Similar to his contemporaries who were attempting to re-
cover the original texts of the classics and histories from the Han
dynasty, Fang Youzhi believed that medical texts from antiquity
had been distorted through the process of transmission and inter-
polation to the point that the original meaning of their authors
had been lost. His Critical Essay on Sections of the Treatise on Cold
Damage (Shanghan lun tiao bian) from 1589 was said to be the prod-
uct of two decades of labor. He filtered through the interpolations
in the editions by Wang Shuhe, Lin Yi, and Cheng Wuji, from the
third through twelfth centuries, in order to recover the authentic
medical writings of Zhang Ji for physicians of the sixteenth cen-
tury. Fang thought that his predecessors Lin Yi and Cheng Wuji

gejia xueshuo (Doctrines of Schools of Thought in Chinese Medicine) (Shanghai,

1980), 91-119.
102Table 2-3-2, zuenxian 113.
103Table 2-3-9, Ma Jixing, Zhongyiwenxian yanjiu, 129.
Ma Jixing, Zhongyi yanjiu,
 135

blindly venerated Wang Shuhe's edition to the extent that they

could not see Wang's alterations of Zhang's original writing. 104 By
meticulously reconstructing it for the first time, Fang also partici-
pated through medical scholarship in what would become more
widely known later as evidential scholarship in the classics and
history.
Similarly with the Essentials of the Golden Casket, the editors of the
Golden Mirror had available to them Lin Yi's Northern-Song impe-
rial edition from 1066-when it was first separated from Zhang Ji's
original text 105 -but they relied on the commentaries of Zhao
Liangren (1304-1373) and Xu Bin (fl. 1662-1722).106 Zhao Liang-
ren was one of the first to write an explanation of the formulas in
the Golden Casket and was a disciple of Zhu Zhenheng (1281-1358),
a fellow Zhejiang physician credited with introducing northern
medical innovations to the south. 117 Also from Zhejiang, Xu Bin
was a disciple of Yu Chang who, influenced by Fang Youzhi's cri-
ticism of Wang Shuhe's earliest edition, continued the same
methods of textual exegesis in medical scholarship. Yu Chang and
Xu Bin both shared Fang Youzhi's skepticism of later interpola-
tions and applied philological methods to recover what remained
of Zhang Ji's original writings in modern-day transmissions. 108 All
three medical scholars compiled the texts and wrote the commen-
taries that placed the Cold Damage current of thought in the
Jiangnan region.
The structure of the two texts also reveals how the integration
of philological methods in the Golden Mirror participated through
medicine in the formation of the Han learning and evidential
scholarship movement that came to dominate the classics and his-
tory later in the eighteenth century. The most obvious example is
Fang Youzhi's emphasis in the first quarter of the treatise on dif-
ferentiating Zhang Ji's original passages from later interpolations
and commentary. The term "corrected" (dingzheng) before the
heading of the first two chapters, the "Corrected Complete Works

104Ren
Yingqiu, Zhongyigejia xueshuo, 101. Also Paul Unschuld, Medicine in
China: A Historyof Ideas (Berkeley, 1985), 209; and Chao Yiian-ling, "Lineages and
Schools," 4-5.
Table 2-3-6, Zhongyiwenxian yanjiu, 122.
106Introduction, Ma Jixing,
'' He Shixi, _Jinkui yaolue, Yizong jinjian,vol. 1, 451.
7.hon?gr?olidai yijia zhuanlu, vol. 3, 63-64.
108
Biography of Yu Chang, with a section on his disciple Xu Bin, Qingshigao,
j. 502, 13868-9.
136

of Zhongjing" (Dingzheng Zhongjing quanshu),109 signaled the philo-

logical methods of evidential scholarship and emphasized the
authenticity of their product. The editors also used "critical essays"
(bian), "rectification of errors" (zhe.ngzuu), and "reservations" (cun-
yi) to strengthen these editorial claims of authenticity. The "critical
essay" was, in fact, the dominant genre scholars used in evidential
research to support their claims of intellectual rigor." In the
Golden Mirror, the term "critical essay" not only began the twenty
subsections of the Treatise on Cold Damage, it was fully integrated
into the structure of the text. The foreword stated, for example,
that the editors separated the "canonical text" (jingtven) from both
the "commentary" (zhushi) of the edition used and the "collected
commentaries" (jizhu) of other famous scholars of the original
text. They also added a "critical essay" (bianlun), after the canoni-
cal text, whenever the original characters were either missing or
incorrect, and following the collected commentaries to indicate
new insights."' The second and third terms, "rectification of er-
rors" and "reservations," were grouped together in the main head-
ing for the two chapters that conclude the Treatise on Cold Damage
(j. 17) and the Essentials of the Golden Casket (j. 25). 112
"Rectification of errors" was one of the most important methods
used in Li Shizhen's earlier S y stematic Materia Medica and later
became a standard method in eighteenth-century evidential
scholarship."' In these sections, the editors systematically worked
through all suspect characters and problems inherited from previ-
ous editions of Zhang Ji's medical writings. "Reservations," on the
other hand, was not used as an explicit method in medicine, be-
fore it became a key section in the Golden Mirror. All clinical
situations when the canonical passages were imprecise or their de-
scriptions failed to match new observations, fell under "reserva-
tions." The editors of the Golden Mirror clearly sought to improve
clinical practice first through the philological methods of textual
scholarship; however, there was one important way that medicine
differed from the conventional arenas for such scholarship. The
element of contemporary experience in clinical practice-the pa-

"Zhongjing" refers to Zhang Zhongjing, the style name of Zhang Ji.

Elman argues that these scholars "stressed the genre of critical essays (pien)
as the key to a form of scholarship based on detachment and impartiality." Elman,
From Philosophyto Philology,45.
"' Foreword,
Yizong jinjian,vol. 1, 4, lines 11-14.
Yizong jinjian,vol. l, j. 15, 404-428;j. 25, 697-721.
M6taili6, "The Bencaogangmu of Li Shizhen," 240-50.
 137

tient's and the physician's-made medicine a realm distinct from

classics or history, the two central fields in which evidential meth-
ods would dominate. Although the editors argued that Zhang Ji's
medical writings were the best repository of both clinically effec-
tive methods and formulas, they were neither sacrosanct writings,
nor transcendent of time and place; but rather the best resources
for clinical action in the present.

Southern Medical Scholarship

The regional origin of these trends in medical scholarship, in fact,

is no more evident than in the collected commentaries where the
opinions of southern physicians dominate. The commentators for
the Treatise on Cold Damage, for example, included the already
mentioned Fang Youzhi from She county and Cheng Yingmao (fl.
1670) from Xin an county in Anhui-the main editor Wu Qian's
native province-as well as the Ming imperial physician Wang Ken-
tang (1549-1613) from Jintan county in Jiangsu province, and Yu
Chang from Xinjian county in Jiangxi province. Except for the
famous editors of the earliest extant editions of the Treatise on Cold
Damage, such as Wang Shuhe, Lin Yi, and Cheng Wuji who all lived
in northern provinces, all of the Ming and Qing commentators
were physicians from the Jiangnan region.
Moreover, this southern dominance is also evident when one
examines the other texts selected for inclusion in the Golden Mir-
ror. The biography for the main editor Wu Qian in the Draft His-
tory of the Qing Dynasty lists fifteen southern physicians whose
works were published in the Golden Mirror. seven from Hangzhou
in Zhejiang province-including Yu Chang's disciple Xu Bin-
three from the Huizhou region in Anhui province, three from
Suzhou in Jiangsu province, Yu Chang from Jiangxi province, and
one physician of unknown origin. 114 One of the physicians from
Hangzhou was Zhang Zhicong (1610-1674), who through a mas-
ter-disciple relationship with another Hangzhou physician, Lu
Zhiyi (fl. 1646), was introduced to the scholarship of Lu Zhiyi's
father, Lu Fu (fl. 1594-1616).us Lu Fu wrote a philological recon-
struction of the Divine Husbandman's Canon of Materia Medica, the
earliest text in the materia medica tradition. Following in the foot-
steps of Li Shizhen for materia medica and Fang Youzhi for Cold

114
Biography of Wu Qian, Qingshigao, j. 502, 13879-80.
Biography of Zhang Zhicong, Qingshi gao, j. 502, 13871-2.
138

Damage scholarship, Lu Fu was one of the most important early

medical scholars participating in the formation of the Han Learn-
ing movement that occurred equally in classics, history, and
civil-service examination essays.116 Arguably the most influential
proponent of the Cold-Damage tradition of medicine in the sev-
enteenth century, Zhang Zhicong had over fifty physicians con-
sider themselves his disciples, forming an extensive social network
throughout the Jiangnan region. "' All of the other scholars listed
in Wu Qian's biography were also known for their textual scholar-
ship in the Cold-Damage tradition. While Wu Qian still lived in
Huizhou of Anhui province, he clearly had been trained in the
Cold-Damage scholarship of the Jiangnan region and brought this
disciplinary formation with him to the Manchu court of the Qing
when he became an imperial physician. Through the manuscript
that Wu Qian reported to Prince Hongzhou in 1740, he intro-
duced the regional trends of textual methods in contemporary
Cold-Damage scholarship-dominant among the elite physicians
in the southern urban areas of Huizhou, Hangzhou, and Suzhou
whose work he knew best-as the standard of medical orthodoxy
for the Qing empire.
The remaining thirteen divisions of the Golden Mirror reflect the
thirteen medical sections within the Imperial Academy of Medi-
cine itself, with a few deviations. Except for the four sections on
famous formulas (j. 26-33), diagnosis (j. 34), phase energetics (j.
35), and miscellaneous disorders (j. 39-43) that came after Zhang's s
two texts, the remaining sections of the Golden Mirror largely fol-
lowed the administrative divisions within the Imperial Academy of
Medicine: cold-damage disorders (j. 36-38), gynecology and obstet-
rics (j. 44-49), pediatrics (j. 50-55), smallpox, other pox diseases
(j. 56-59) and variolation methods (j. 60), external medicine (j. 61-
76), ophthalmology (j. 77-78), acupuncture and moxibustion (j.
79-86), and orthopedics (j. 87-90).

Medical Rhymes and Smallpox

The overall structure of medical knowledge in the Golden Mirror

reveals a synthesis of the new evidential scholarship on Cold

For the influence of Lu Fu's reconstruction on later materia medica, see

Unschuld, Medicinein China: A History of Pharmaceutics(Berkeley, 1986), 183-202;
and Unschuld, A History of Idea.s,209.
Iii Ren
Yingqiu, Zhongyi gejia xueshuo, 104-105. Master-disciple charts for
"Zhang Zhicong," in He Shixi, Zhongguolidai yijia zhuan lu, vol. 3, 574.
 139

Damage, classical Chinese medical subjects, and a new Manchu

emphasis on smallpox (douzhen) and variolation methods."' The
Qianlong emperor and his officials continued the legacy of his
grandfather, the Kangxi emperor, by promoting in the Golden
Mirror the Chinese methods of smallpox variolation.119 Nowhere is
this clearer than in the devotion of three sections to children's
illnesses comprising eleven of the ninety volumes. Two of the
other most notable characteristics of the Golden Mirror were the
rhymes and illustrations used throughout to facilitate memoriza-
tion. 120 The last phrase of the foreword concludes that the editors
"used chants keys (,qeqian) to make it easier for readers to commit
[the information] to memory and therefore called [the sections]
"essential formulas" Except for the first three chapters,
in fact, the headings of the remaining twelve either had "essential
formulas" or "essential points" (yaozhi) to emphasize the use of
mnemonic rhymes to facilitate memorization of the medical ortho-
doxy.
I use one illustration from the pediatric section to exemplify all
of these qualities. The first chapter on smallpox begins with an
illustration of a child's face to instruct physicians on how to read
the facial patterns of pox marks to make an informed prognosis
on whether or not the child will survive smallpox. Forty-three illus-
trations of children with different patterns of pox marks on their
bodies guide the physician through possible manifestations of the
deadly childhood disease and appropriate therapeutic responses.
The drawing of a child with the pattern called "Without a base
diagram" (wugen tu) represents a case when pox marks cover the
trunk, but not below the ankles or on the feet of a child's body
(see figure 2). 122

Chang Chia-feng, "Disease and Its Impact on Politics, Diplomacy and the
Military: The Case of Smallpox and the Manchus (1613-1795)," Journal of the His-
tory of Social Medicineand Allied Sciences57 (2002), 177-197.
In 1747, Qianlong also appointed the Muslim doctor who worked on the
GoldenMirror, Liu Yuduo, as the smallpox specialist in charge of variolation in the
palace. Yang Daye, "Qinggong Huizu," 126.
120One modern scholar notes that
although one can find rhymes in medical
texts from the Song and Yuan dynasties, the GoldenMirror had the greatest quan-
tity. Gan Zuwang, Gan Zuzuang yihua(Medical Anecdotes of Gan Zuwang, Beijing,
1996), 367. Medical rhymes from the GoldenMirror for cold-damage disorders,
gynecology, pediatrics, and ophthalmology are reprinted in Dong Lianrong (ed.),
Lidai ziaongyigefujingxuan, 42-46, 123-150, 294-322, and 393-405.
121Foreword in
Yizong jinjian,vol. 1, 16.
Yizong jinjian,vol. 2 (Taipei edition, 1993), 1248.
140

Figure 2: "Without a Base" Case of Smallpox and Mnemonic Rhymes

When pox marks appeared from the body's center, it was an in-
dication of death. The essay following the drawing used the ver-
nacular style of chants written in seven-character phrases. Four
phrases of seven characters each summarized in a pithy rhyme
 141

what the pattern indicated and what formulas were most appro-
priate to treat it. A commentary followed to flesh out important
points, along with a list of the most important ingredients for the
appropriate formula. The explanation ended with a "rhyming for-
mula" (jangge) written in the same literary style of the previous
four phrases of seven characters each. Although "rhyming for-
mula" was not always given in the forty-two other cases, the ingre-
dients of the remaining formulas were always listed. The chapter
on smallpox patterns concluded with an illustration showing how
a physician should pick a sample from a smallpox scab and with
what kind of needle (see figure 3) .
Following precedent, the instructions were given in four seven-
character phrases, followed by a commentary, and a list of the
substances required to clean the needle. The compilers of the
imperial Golden Mirror intended their version of medical orthodoxy
not only to represent the trends of textual scholarship in the
south, but also to be a popular medical manual to be read, me-
morized, and put into practice by the widest possible audience
throughout the empire. Its continued presence today attests both
to their success as well as the persistence of imperial prestige.

CONCLUSION

The memorials to the emperor about the Golden Mirror used ge-
nealogical discourse and an appeal to the lost Way of medicine to
justify the project as a means to restore the "orthodox current of
thought" (xaz) of medicine.'24 The metaphor of the "Golden
Mirror" emphasized the role of the editors as an extension of the
discerning mind of the emperor, distinguishing without error the
true from the false, the authentic canonical passages from later
interpolations, the efficacious from the ineffective. The Golden
Mirror was intended to clarify order out of chaos and restore the
genuine medical lineage from antiquity.
Yet, there was a hitch. The memorials argued that Zhang Ji's
Treatise on Cold Damage and Essentials of the Golden Casket were the
first of the early Han medical texts "to have methods and have

Ibid., 1274-5.
For a comparable case in the Confucian tradition, see Thomas A. Wilson,
Genealogyof the Way: The Construction and Usesof the Confucian Tradition in Late
Imperial China (Stanford, 1995).
142
 143

formulas." This argument was common among physicians of the

late Ming and early Qing in the Jiangnan region who were attempt-
ing to raise the prestige of Cold Damage scholarship in Chinese
medicine through the application of evidential methods and com-
parisons with the sages of the Confucian tradition.125 In response
to the emperor's order "to rectify medical learning," the editors
utilized the then current methods of textual analysis to justify plac-
ing Zhang Ji's writings at the origin of their newly constructed
orthodox genealogy of medicine, while rejecting other possibilities
of comparable prestige from the medical canons of antiquity. By
making this editorial choice, they placed the intellectual fashions
of certain elite medical circles in the southern provinces of the
Jiangnan region at the center of the Qing Imperial court orthodo-
xy. They simultaneously participated in the formation of the move-
ment in evidential scholarship that would reach its height at the
end of the Qianlong reign.
These Chinese scholars employed evidential methods and impe-
rial canonization as effective tools to support the Qing court's
claim to its position as standard-bearer of Chinese civilization-
which depended on forming an orthodoxy-and as a benefactor
to the Chinese population. The Golden Mirror can thus be read as
a manifestation of a distinct stage in the process of imperial docu-
mentation through which the Qing court simultaneously defined
Chinese culture while assuming authority over it. Furthermore, the
Golden Mirror contributed to the Qianlong emperor's early efforts
to mark his reign as distinct from those of his immediate predeces-
sors. Nevertheless, it was also a product of the limits of the Qian-
long emperor's powers in the first decade of his rule when he had
not yet secured the power to compel his officials to carry out his
wish to collect medical books throughout the empire. How the
Chinese scholars within the Qing court organized medical knowl-
edge in the Golden Mirror, nevertheless, reveals the emphasis on
canonical selection, evidential methods, and dominance by south-
ern Chinese scholarship that would reach full maturation in the
completion of the Four Treasuries exactly forty years later.

Chao Yuan-ling, "Lineages and Schools," 1-14.

144

ABSTRACT

In the last month of 1739, the third of the Manchu rulers, the Qianlong
emperor (r. 1736-1795), ordered the compilation of a treatise on medi-
cine "to rectify medical knowledge" throughout the empire. By the end
of 1742, eighty participants chosen from several offices within the palace
bureaucracy based in Beijing completed the Golden Mirror of the Orthodox
Lineage of Medicine, the only imperially commissioned medical text the
Qing government's Imperial Printing Office published. The Golden Mir-
ror represents both the limitations in the power of the Qianlong emperor
and the dominance in the Manchu court of Chinese scholarship from the
Jiangnan region during the first decade of his reign. Chinese scholars
participating in the compilation of the Golden Mirror fashioned a medical
orthodoxy for the empire in the mid-eighteenth century from regional
trends in scholarship on history and the classics centered in the Jiangnan
region since the sixteenth century. The Golden Mirror is an illuminating
example of how medical scholars participated in the formation of evi-
dential scholarship in early-modern China and why Manchu patronage,
southern Chinese scholarship, and medical orthodoxy coalesced in the
imperial court of the Qianlong emperor.

GLOSSARY

Baqi manzhoushi zu tongpu

Baqi tongzhi 1
Baqi zeli 1746
Bencaogangmu 1596
1.::1,
Bencao ?inhui jin?yao xuji ?? p?????, 1720
bian m "critical essay"
bianlun?J?? "critical essay"
bo 18 "Earl"
Chen Menglei (b. 1651)
Cheng Wuji (fl. 1144-1156)
Cheng Yingmao ??? (fl. 1670)
congshuXS "collectanea"
cuny "reservations"
dachen "Grand Minister"
Da Qingluli 1740
da xueshi "Grand Secretary"
dingzhenga7 ? "corrected"
DingzhengZhongjingquanshu
douzhen "smallpox & other pox diseases"
Dubu zeli 1737 7

J rt. "methods"
fang 11 "formulas"
Fang Bao (1668-1749)
 145

fangge 15pf?:"rhyming formula"

Fang Youzhi (1522-1593?)
geqian "chant keys"
gewum4m "investigation of things"
going -0"Duke"
gongsheng j%% "'Tribute Student"
Gujin 1728
1740
hanxue learning"
Hongli (1711-1799)
Hongzhou iJLlf (1712-1770)
hou "Marquis"
huangdi "Yellow Emperor"
fluangdi jia yi jing-* FfI
Huangdi neng: suwen,lingshu iit; (1st c. B.C.E.)
Huangfu Mi (215-282)
I.I.Zhu "collected commentaries"
,Jiaqing empcror A & (r. 1796-1820)
jiansheng %h% "National University Student"
Jiangnan
Jiang Tingxi (1669-1732)
1742
Jinkui yaolue lun Zhu I
?inkuiyaolue zabing lun ?1???.?-.''???'?, 1066, 1088
Jing shi guan Office of Classics and History
jingwen "canonical text"
juan qg "volumes"
Kangji lu 1740
Kangxi emperor (r. 1662-1722)
kaojuxue t-0-r,4- "learning based on what can be ascertained"
kaozheng-t,,V "evidential scholarship"
ke f4 "sections"or "disciplines"
Leshantangquanji 1730
lifa zhi .shen "God of establishing formulas"
lifa zhi "Primary ancestor of establishing formulas"
limu k N "Secretary"
Li Shizhen
lin gong.sheng "Tribute Student by Purchase, First Class"
Lin Yi 4 L (l lth cent.)
Liu Yuduo iJlhEli(fl. 1739-46)
Liu Yuxi (fl. 1739-42)
Lixiangkaochenghoubian 17377
Lu Fu !AtM(f1. 1594-1616)
Lu 7,hiyi l1z.IHi (fl. 1646)
Mingshi *
nan T "Baron"
Neiwufu Imperial Household Department
Ortai "5'1;fgAg (1 680- 1 745)
Qian Doubao (fl. 1739-42)
146

Qlanlong emperor (r. 1736-1796)

Qjndingsishu wenth * iIl -$$ %,17 37
QingShengzuyuzhi
Qingshigao k , 1928"
"hot [disorder]
R?iang liji jieyi F???A???, 1736
Rizhi huishuoH 1736
Sanliyzshu "
shanghan "cold-damage [disorder]
Shanghanlun 1088
Shanghanlun tiao bian
Shanghanzabing lun cent. C.E.
Shanglun pian 1648
Shennong "Divine Husbandman"
Shennongbencao jing c.
shengshu? ? "works of the sages"
shengyuan "Government Student"
Shisan jing
shizveniifnrt "damp and warm [disorder]""
ShizongHui huangdishengxun
Shoushitongkao 1742
.siku "Four Treasuries"
Siku quanshu 1782
Siku quanshuzongmuVq EI, 1782
Taiyi yuan R
Taizong emperor 976-997)
Tingxun geyan 1730
wangI "Prince"
Wang Bing -IM (fl. 1739-42)
Wang Kentang J: ?: (1 549- 1 6 1 3)
Wang Shuhc,T-94P (3rd cent.)
wen "warm [disorder]""
wugentu "Without a base diagram"
Wu Qian (fl. 1739-42)
wushenglJt1.:."Military Student"
Wuyingdian Hall of Military Glory
1739
Xinxiu bencao
Xiushu chu Imperial Printing Office
Xu Bin 1662-1722)
yaojue "essential formulas"
Yaoxingtongkao
yaozhi V, - "essential points"
yijia lei "category of medical authors"
yimai xiangcheng "joined in one vein"
1658
yishengU1.:. "Medical Student"
yishi "Elite Physician"
yizhengyixue order to rectify medicine"
 147

Yingzong emperor (r. 1064-67)

Yongrong (1744-1790)
Yongzheng emperor (r. 1723-1735)
youfa wuftng "have methods but have no formulas"
youfayoufang "have methods and have formulas"
Yu Chang u ? ( 1585-1664)
yuyi "Imperial Physician"
Y'uzuan yizong jinjian 1742
jabing OG "miscellaneous disorders"
Zhanggucongbian
Zhang Ji ( 1 50-2 1 9)
Zhang Tingyu
Zhang Zhicong (1610-1674)
Zhang Zhongjing (style name for ZhangJi)
Zhao Erxun (early 20th c.)
Zhao Liangren (1304-1373)
"orthodox current of thought"
zhengpaliEiJt-Z
zhen,?zemiEW "rectification of errors"
Zhengwucunyipian "Chapter on rectification of errors and areas of
doubt"
zhon?feng ? J?""wind stroke"
Zhongshuzhengkao ??C??, 1746
zhushi "commentary"
Zhu Zhenheng *J1!t' (1 28 1 - 1 358)
i 1"-"Viscount"