A Dictionary of the Huang Di Nei Jing Su Wen

This dictionary reflects the English meanings of Chinese characters and character compounds as they have been laid down in the annotated edition of the Huang Di nei jing su wen, translated by Paul U. Unschuld and Hermann Tessenow. The Huang Di nei jing su wen is a seminal text of ancient Chinese medicine and natural philosophy. It reflects empirical knowledge and the doctrines of yin-yang and Five Agents in the perception of the human body and its organs, qi and the blood, pathogenic agents, concepts of disease and diagnosis, and a variety of therapies, including acupuncture.
To permit speedy access to the original context of the characters and character compounds listed in the dictionary, all entries are accompanied by relevant phrases marking their first usage and specific meaning in the text. The dictionary comes with a CD containing two concordances that list all characters along the pinyin alphabetical sequence of the characters immediately preceding or following the character in question. A complete reproduction of the Chinese reference text has been added as Appendix A and can be cross-referenced. Appendix B lists (in unabbreviated form) all of the 1866 characters that appear in the Huang Di nei jing su wen. This invaluable tool provides sinologists, medical historians, scholars, and practitioners with vastly improved access to a central cultural facet of Chinese civilization.

Paul U. Unschuld is Professor and Director of the Horst-Goertz Institute for the Theory, History, and Ethics of Chinese Life Sciences at Charite Universitaetsmedizin Berlin.