Healing with Poisons: Potent Medicines in Medieval China

The 2023 William H. Welch Medal was awarded to Yan Liu for his book "Healing with Poisons: A Revealing Study of Risky Cures in Classical Chinese Pharmacy." The book explores how physicians, religious devotees, court officials, and laypeople used powerful substances to treat illnesses and enhance life. It illustrates how the Chinese concept of du led practitioners to devise techniques to transform dangerous poisons into efficacious medicines.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 276 pages
Publication date: 27 June 2021
Publisher: University of Washington Press

Winner of the 2023 William H. Welch Medal, sponsored by the American Association for the History of Medicine, "Healing with Poisons: A Revealing Study of Risky Cures in Classical Chinese Pharmacy" explores the intriguing relationship between medicine and poison during China's formative era of pharmacy (200-800 CE). At first glance, these two concepts may seem contradictory, but in reality, poisons were strategically employed as healing agents to treat a wide range of ailments, from chills and pains to epidemics. This study delves into the various ways physicians, religious devotees, court officials, and laypeople utilized potent substances to cure intractable illnesses and enhance life. It highlights how the Chinese concept of du, which embodies the essence of potency, influenced the development of techniques to transform dangerous poisons into effective medicines. Through a recounting of scandals and controversies involving poisons from the Era of Division to the early Tang period, Yan Liu examines how the concept of du shaped the perception of the body and the body politic in medieval China. Liu also explores a wide range of du-possessing minerals, plants, and animal products in classical Chinese pharmacy, including the highly poisonous herb aconite and the popular arsenic drug Five-Stone Powder. By recovering alternative modes of understanding wellness and the body's interaction with potent medicines, this study cautions against arbitrary classifications and exemplifies the importance of paying attention to the technical, political, and cultural conditions in which substances become truly meaningful. "Healing with Poisons" is freely available in an open access edition thanks to TOME (Toward an Open Monograph Ecosystem) and the generous support of the University at Buffalo Libraries. The DOI for the book is 10.6069/9780295749013.

Weight: 406g
Dimension: 151 x 227 x 19 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780295748993