1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910826988603321

Autore

Nappi Carla Suzan <1977->

Titolo

The monkey and the inkpot : natural history and its transformations in early modern China / / Carla Nappi

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Cambridge, Mass., : Harvard University Press, 2009

ISBN

0-674-05435-0

Edizione

[1st ed.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (251 p.)

Classificazione

NK 3400

Disciplina

508.0951

Soggetti

Natural history - China - History - 16th century

Medicine, Chinese - History - 16th century

Naturalists - China

Physicians - China

Scholars - China

Learning and scholarship - China - History - 16th century

China Intellectual life 960-1644

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Frontmatter -- CONTENTS -- List of Illustrations -- Ex-Voto -- Note on Conversions -- Prologue: A Curious Instinct, A Taste for Ink -- 1. Conception: Birth of a Naturalist -- 2. Generation: Anatomy of a Naturalist -- INTERLUDE. Here Be Dragons: A Reader's Guide to the Bencao gangmu -- 3. Transformation: Elements of Change -- 4. Transformation: Sprouts of Change -- 5. Transformation: Bodies of Change -- 6. Transformation: Creatures of Change -- Conclusion. Rot and Rebirth: The Afterlife and Reincarnation of a Naturalist -- Appendix A. Li Shizhen, Lidai zhujia bencao [Bencao works through the ages] -- Appendix B. Contents of the Bencao gangmu [Systematic materia medica] -- Notes -- Glossary of Chinese Characters -- Index

Sommario/riassunto

This is the story of a Chinese doctor, his book, and the creatures that danced within its pages. The Monkey and the Inkpot introduces natural history in sixteenth-century China through the iconic Bencao gangmu (Systematic materia medica) of Li Shizhen (1518 - 1593). In the first book-length study in English of Li's text, Carla Nappi reveals a "cabinet of curiosities" of gems, beasts, and oddities whose author was devoted



to using natural history to guide the application of natural and artificial objects as medical drugs.