Herb Selection and Medicinal Plant's Diversity.
10.3937/kampomed.53.619
- VernacularTitle:生薬の選品と薬用植物の多様性
- Author:
Gisho HONDA
- Publication Type:Journal Article
- Keywords:
herbal medicine;
selection;
biodiversity;
licorice root;
cinnamon bark
- From:Kampo Medicine
2002;53(6):619-637
- CountryJapan
- Language:Japanese
-
Abstract:
It is undoubtedly important that herb can cure certain sickness. However, its activity to certain symptom varies between each plant species, growing place, harvesting time, and so on, because herb is the natural product. Here arises a key word-selection-, professional viewpoint of herb. Consulting with the old books about herb written by professionals at that time, we can imagine how much difficulty did they have and how did they make efforts on selection in order to use the herb with good quality.
At the beginning of Kampo Medicine in Japan, it was totally an imported medicine so that its original herb stuffs had to be brought from abroad. But gradually Kampo Medicine has been changed into Japanese style; lots of Japanese substitutes were developed for Chinese herb species, and also, cultivation or evaluation of those substitutes was studied. Such kind of study advanced much in Edo-era.
In the lecture, two popular herbs, licorice and cinnamon, were chosen to be discussed for examples of the above mentioned, and the author's special experiences were also mentioned.
