Dongui bogam (Principles and Practice of Eastern Medicine) (2015-2)

The Dongui bogam, compiled by Heo Jun (1539–1615) in 1610, the second year of King Gwanghaegun, is Korea's greatest work of traditional medicine, gathering the medical books then circulating in Joseon and China and treatments drawn from clinical experience. In 1596 King Seonjo ordered Heo Jun, Yang Ye-su, Yi Myeong-won and others to compile a medical book, but the work was halted by war. Heo Jun then gave fourteen years of effort to it and finally completed it in 1610: the Dongui bogam. At home and abroad it is judged the greatest medical book written by a Korean. The first edition was printed in wooden movable type by the Royal Medical Office in November 1613, the fifth year of Gwanghaegun, three years after compilation, in 25 volumes in 25 books. It comprises two volumes of contents, the Internal Landscape (4 volumes, 26 sections), External Form (4 volumes, 26 sections), Miscellaneous Diseases (11 volumes, 38 sections), Decoctions (3 volumes, 17 sections) and Acupuncture and Moxibustion (1 volume, 1 section): 25 volumes and 108 sections in all. It is arranged under these five main headings, each subdivided, giving for each disease its theory, prescriptions and sources. The Dongui bogam spread widely not only in Joseon but in China and Japan. It reached China at the end of Ming and beginning of Qing and was printed there several times from 1763 (Qianlong 28). In Japan it was first printed by a Kyoto bookseller in 1724 (Kyoho 9) and reprinted by an Osaka bookseller in 1799 (Kansei 11), becoming required reading in East Asian medicine. The copy at the Academy of Korean Studies has no royal grant record. But the royal seal 'Seonsa jibo' is stamped at the head of the preface, and outside the right border is a rectangular red seal added later by the Government-General, 'Held at the Jeoksangsan archive, Muju; donated by the Government-General of Joseon', showing that it is the Jeoksangsan archive copy. Since other archive copies carried the grant record on the inside leaf, that page seems to have been lost at some point, perhaps when the book was donated. The Academy's copy is the same edition as the National Library's, complete, and in very good condition.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Seongnam, Gyeonggi

Designation

National Treasure · 국보