A study of traditional medical books in East Asia in the early modern and modern periods: Centering on the acceptance, development and return of the Shang Han Lun

2022 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 21K19971
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Research Activity Start-up
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Review Section: 0101:Philosophy, art, and related fields
• Research Institution: Ritsumeikan University
• Principal Investigator: XIANG Jingjing 立命館大学, 立命館アジア・日本研究機構, 研究員 (30910682)
• Project Period (FY): 2021-08-30 – 2023-03-31
• Keywords: 古方派 / 復古 / 『傷寒論』 / 儒学 / 後藤艮山 / 香川修庵 / 山脇東洋 / 吉益東洞

Outline of Final Research Achievements

This study clarified the acceptance, development, and return of traditional Chinese medical texts in East Asia in the early modern and modern periods. Specifically, this study used the case of the Shang Han Lun (Treatise on Exogenous Febrile Disease), a medical book about infectious diseases by the Later Han physician Zhang Zhongjing. This study traced how Shang Han Lun was accepted, developed, and returned in East Asia. This is an attempt to reread the study of Japanese medical history, which has generally been discussed in relation to modern Western medicine, from the perspective of its relationship with East Asia. This study examined the boom in commentaries on the Shang Han Lun that began among Japanese physicians in the mid-modern period, focusing on the influence of Medicine during the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the influence of Japanese Confucian scholars, and epidemics such as measles, smallpox, typhoid fever, and the common cold.

Free Research Field

医学思想史、東アジア医学交流史

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

本研究は、近接諸分野での成果を活かしつつ、『傷寒論』の受容・展開・還流という観点から、医学史と思想史との間に横たわる研究的棲みわけを越えた点に、学術的意義を有する。
また、近世日本医家たちの思想を読み解くことで、中国医学が近世日本において遂げた展開を追うとともに、この思潮が現在の漢方医学に連なっていく過程も明らかにした点に、社会的意義を有する。