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Chapter 13 of 20
本草纲目
Overall Paraphrase
This section is a vernacular paraphrase of the "Beast Section" of the Compendium of Materia Medica, intended solely for traditional cultural study and not constituting medical or treatment advice. The original text收录了多种动物药材, and the following summarizes their properties and ancient medicinal applications by category.
Pig (Swine)
Different parts of the pig have different properties: pork is sour and cold, non-toxic; ordinary pork is bitter, slightly cold, and slightly toxic; lard is sweet and slightly cold; pig liver is bitter and warm. The ancients believed: sow's trotters can promote lactation and treat carbuncles and back abscesses; pig gallbladder is used for dysentery, urinary retention, wasting-thirst, furuncles, corneal opacities, red eyes, and scalds/burns; pig bladder is used for enuresis, postpartum enuresis, hernia, and penile sores; pig pancreas is used for cough, corneal opacities, vitiligo and leukoderma, and chapped hands and feet; pig kidney is used for kidney deficiency with seminal emission, impotence, lumbago, deafness, chronic diarrhea, leukorrhea, uterine bleeding, and postpartum night sweats; pig liver is used for recurrent dysentery, edema, liver-heat with red eyes, and bruising from falls; lard is used for red-and-white leukorrhea, constipation and urinary retention, cough, chapped hands and feet, mouth sores, and scrofula; pork is used for infantile dysentery, cough, tetanus, and traumatic injuries. These are mostly ancient empirical experiences, and some practices carry hygiene risks.
Dog
Dog meat is salty, sour, and warm; dog gallbladder is bitter, neutral, and slightly toxic. The ancients believed dog meat can greatly replenish vital qi, using yellow dog meat to make wine (Wuxu Wine) or pills (Wuxu Pills) to treat consumptive deficiency, bone-steaming tidal fever, spleen-stomach cold deficiency, and edema; dog gallbladder is used for dry eyes, liver deficiency with blurred vision, purulent ear discharge, vomiting, abdominal masses, and dysentery.
Sheep (Goat)
Almost every part of the sheep is used medicinally: mutton is bitter, sweet, and extremely hot, used for cold-consumption weakness, postpartum abdominal pain, uterine bleeding, strengthening yang and benefiting kidneys, bone-steaming chronic cold, spleen-stomach weakness, facial and body edema, traumatic injuries, and postpartum lactation deficiency; sheep fat is used for dysentery, consumptive dryness with thirst, postpartum weakness, sores, and infantile mouth sores; sheep blood is used for nosebleeds, postpartum massive bleeding, blood in stool, and retained dead fetus; sheep kidney is used for lower-jiao cold deficiency, impotence, and kidney-deficiency lumbago; sheep liver is used for red eyes, corneal opacities, eye diseases with blindness, qingmang (glaucoma-like blindness), gingival ulcers due to dental caries, and recurrent dysentery; sheep gallbladder is used for post-illness blindness, constipation, and ulcerated eye margins; sheep stomach is used for chronic illness with weakness, tonifying the middle and replenishing qi, post-stroke weakness, wasting-thirst, and scrofula; sheep horn is used for qi counterflow with restlessness, hematemesis, wheezing and cough, and traumatic pain; sheep spine and shin bones are used for lumbago, deafness, toothache, and irregular menstruation; sheep dung is used for heart-area pain, scrotal swelling, furuncles, and scrofula. The use of excrement such as sheep dung as medicine is not accepted in modern times.
Cattle (Ox)
Yellow cattle beef is sweet and warm; water buffalo beef is sweet and neutral; cow's milk is sweet and slightly cold; cow brain is sweet, warm, and slightly toxic; horn base is bitter and warm. The ancients believed beef can calm the middle and tonify qi, nourish the spleen and stomach, tonify the lower back and legs, and relieve wasting-thirst; cow's milk is used for wind-heat toxins and lower-body deficiency with wasting-thirst; cow brain is used for hematemesis, headache, spleen accumulation, and qi accumulation; horn base is used for cold dysentery, blood in stool, and red-and-white leukorrhea; cow urine and cow dung are used for edema, jaundice, cholera, heel swelling and pain, pregnancy-related lumbago, carbuncles, breast abscesses, and back sores. Cow dung and cow urine as medicine are ancient folk remedies and should not be imitated in modern times.
Horse, Donkey, Camel
Horse meat is acrid, cold, and toxic; white horse urine is acrid, slightly cold, and toxic; white horse dung is slightly warm. The ancients used them to clear heat, direct qi downward, strengthen the lower back and spine, and for external washing of scalp sores; horse urine is used for breast swelling and abdominal masses; horse dung is used for hematemesis, dysentery, intestinal colic, malignant sores, and frostbite. Donkey meat is sweet and cool, tonifying blood and qi, treating chronic consumptive strain of many years; donkey urine is used for vomiting, rabid dog bites, and wind-heat toothache; donkey dung is used for nosebleeds, damp tinea, and irregular menstruation. Camel fat is sweet and warm, used for wind disorders, skin numbness and tightness, and malignant sores with swelling and fistulas.
Ejiao (Ass-hide Glue): Made from donkey hide, sweet and neutral. The ancients used it for hemiplegia due to wind, lung wheezing, elderly constipation deficiency, dysentery, hematemesis, irregular menstruation, pregnancy bleeding, fetal agitation, and chronic cough.
Huangming Jiao (Ox-hide Glue): Made from cattle hide, sweet and neutral. The ancients used it for lung atrophy with hematemesis, hemoptysis, pregnancy bleeding, kidney deficiency with seminal loss, wind-damp migratory pain, traumatic injuries, scalds and burns, toxic swellings, and scrofula.
Niuhuang (Cow Bezoar): Gallstone from cattle, bitter, neutral, slightly toxic. The ancients used it for neonatal heat, pediatric heat convulsions, and convulsive epilepsy.
Zhada and Goubao: Pathological products or calculi from animal bodies. The ancients used them for convulsive epilepsy with toxic sores, dysphagia, carbuncles with back abscesses, and vomiting, among which compound formulas like "Goubao Pill" are complex in composition and should be viewed rationally.
Tiger: Tiger bone is acrid and slightly warm. The ancients used it for arm and shin pain, inflexible lower back and feet, joint pain, sinew and bone cramping pain, hemorrhoids with fistulas, scalds and burns, and chronic leg ulcers; tiger meat strengthens qi and physical power.
Leopard: Leopard meat is sour and neutral. The ancients believed it strengthens sinews and bones, fortifies willpower, and increases tolerance to cold and heat.
Elephant: Ivory is sweet and cold, used for urinary retention, excessive urination, and fish bones stuck in flesh; elephant hide is used for genital ulcers and non-healing sores.
Rhinoceros: Rhinoceros horn is bitter, sour, salty, and cold, used for hematemesis, pediatric convulsions, clearing heat, and dysentery with fresh blood.
Wild Boar: Meat is sweet and neutral, treating mania and tonifying the five organs; wild boar fat is used for postpartum lactation promotion, wind swelling, and scabies.
Bear: Bear fat is sweet and slightly cold, used for blackening hair, alopecia areata, and tonifying deficiency; bear gallbladder is bitter and cold, used for corneal opacities, hemorrhoids, roundworms, and pediatric convulsions.
Antelope: Antelope horn is salty and cold, used for dysphagia, chest and rib pain, abdominal pain, threatened miscarriage with abdominal pain, and erysipelas.
Deer: Deer antler (velvet) is sweet and warm, deer antler (mature) is salty and warm, and deer glue is sweet and neutral, used for consumptive deficiency, night sweats with seminal emission, lumbago, pregnancy bleeding, sinew and bone pain, impotence, and leukorrhea.
Milu (Père David's Deer): Milu antler is sweet and hot, used for tonifying deficiency, generating essence and blood, and strengthening sinews and bones, with representative formulas such as "Erzhi Pill" and "Milu Antler Pill."
Musk Deer: Musk is acrid and warm, used for wind stroke, food stagnation, migraine, promoting childbirth, hemorrhoids, and miasmic diseases.
Civet (Lingmao): Civet musk is similar to musk, the ancients used it to calm the spirit, treat heart and abdominal pain, and dispel epidemic qi.
Cat: Cat skull is sweet and warm, used for abdominal masses like turtle-shaped accumulations, phlegm wheezing, scrofula, and carbuncles.
Badger (Hog Badger): Meat is sweet, sour, and neutral, used for water distension and consumptive cough.
Rabbit: Rabbit meat is acrid and neutral, cooling the blood and resolving toxins; rabbit blood cools and invigorates the blood; rabbit droppings (mingsha) are used for constipation, pox scarring with corneal opacities, and ear sores.
Otter: Otter liver is sweet, warm, and toxic, used for consumptive cough, hemorrhoidal bleeding, and blood in stool.
Rat: Rat gallbladder, rat droppings, and male rats are used medicinally, for eye diseases, deafness, typhoid relapse, breast abscesses, fractures, tetanus, gynecological conditions, and scalds/burns.
Hedgehog: Hedgehog skin is bitter and neutral, used for hemorrhoidal bleeding, intestinal wind with blood in stool, dysentery, rectal prolapse, nosebleeds, trichiasis, and vomiting.
Macaque: Meat is sour and neutral, used for wind-consumption, chronic malaria, and warding off miasmic epidemics; macaque droppings are used for neonatal tetanus and acute convulsions.
The above are all historical records. Tiger, leopard, elephant, rhinoceros, bear, antelope, musk deer, civet, otter, and macaque involve protected animals and are strictly prohibited for modern use. Medicinal use of excrement, pathological products, and certain organs raises safety and hygiene concerns and should be treated rationally.
Organ Replacement & Inference by Analogy (Yizang Buzang, Quxiang Bilei)
The Beast Section makes extensive use of animal organs—such as pig kidney for kidney deficiency, sheep liver for eye diseases, pig liver for liver-heat with red eyes, and otter liver for cough—reflecting the traditional logic of "treating organs with organs" and "like qi resonates with like qi." The ancients believed animal parts have affinity with corresponding parts of the human body and can tonify or regulate the corresponding organs.
Part-Specific Use & Property/Channel Attribution
Different parts of the same animal have different properties and effects. For example, the pig's meat, fat, liver, kidney, pancreas, gallbladder, and bladder each have their own indications; the sheep's meat, fat, blood, kidney, liver, gallbladder, stomach, horn, spine, and shin bones are all used medicinally. This approach of "whole animal as medicine" is a hallmark of the Compendium of Materia Medica's classification system.
Flesh-and-Blood Sentient Products (Xue Rou You Qing Zhi Pin)
Ejiao, deer antler, mutton, and ox-hide glue were regarded as "flesh-and-blood sentient products"—the ancients believed they could replenish essence and blood, warm yang and tonify qi, being more restorative compared to botanical medicines, and commonly used for consumptive fatigue, essence-blood insufficiency, and postpartum deficiency.
Aromatic Penetration & Heat-Clearing Detoxification
Niuhuang, musk, bear gallbladder, and rhinoceros horn were believed to open the orifices, clear heat, and resolve toxins, commonly used for acute conditions, coma, convulsions, and sores/carbuncles, embodying the principles of "aromatic herbs penetrate and move" and "bitter-cold subdues heat."
Some Experiences May Contain Reasonable Elements
For example, pig liver and sheep liver are rich in vitamin A, and their ancient use for "blurred vision" and "night blindness" aligns with nutritional deficiency-related eye diseases; ejiao contains collagen and various amino acids used in modern nutritional support and chronic care; cow's milk for tonifying deficiency and mutton for warming supplementation also overlap with nutritional science.
Much Content Lacks Modern Evidence
The use of animal excrement (cow dung, horse urine, sheep dung, rat droppings, monkey droppings, etc.) lacks reliable efficacy and safety validation and carries risks of pathogen contamination—such practices should be abandoned today.
Safety Risks & Ethical Concerns
Practices involving "retained dead fetus" and "threatened miscarriage with abdominal pain" using animal drugs to induce labor are obstetric emergencies that require hospital care today; tiger, rhinoceros, elephant, bear, and antelope are rare protected species and are prohibited for medicinal use; self-processing of animal organs and excrement may cause infection or poisoning.
Some Descriptions Are Exaggerated
Claims such as "immediate cure," "extremely effective," or "cured within three doses" are empirical assertions from antiquity without rigorous clinical validation and should not be taken literally.
This content is based on classic Chinese medical texts and is provided solely for traditional cultural study and reading. It does not constitute any medical diagnosis, prescription, or treatment advice. Please seek timely medical attention if you are unwell.