An Ever-Expanding Pharmacy: Zhao Xuemin and the Conditions for New Knowledge in Eighteenth-Century China

Bencao gangmu shiyi (Supplement to Systematic Materia Medica) has been recognized as the most outstanding sequel to the sixteenth-century encyclopedia Bencao gangmu, adding over nine hundred drugs to Li Shizhen’s magnum opus. In this article, I investigate the key conditions that rendered it possible for its author, Zhao Xuemin (fl. 1753–1803), to access the textual, empirical, and material resources necessary to accomplish such a feat. I argue that despite Zhao’s efforts to frame his work in a classical light, his humble status as a sojourning private secretary in fact enabled him to derive new knowledge from both elite and lowbrow circles. Zhao and his interlocutors represent an expanding, if oft-neglected community of knowledge, who embraced literary documentation of contemporary experience as a way of transcending the accomplishments of previous authorities. Their existence signifies the beginning of a transition from a literati-dominated culture toward mass society.

摘要：:

本文探讨清代赵学敏著《本草纲目拾遗》成书的历史条件。作为流寓幕客的赵学敏在交游中接触到多样的文献与实物资料，不断修订自己的手稿。这部本草书凭记载当下经验而超越前人经典，亦预示着由士人主导的中国传统文化在十八世纪向近代大众社会的转型。