Story
Antiquity outside of China
More than a century before China, we have a description of conduits running through the body and delivering various fluids in ancient Egypt (blood, water, air, mucus, etc.). Disruptions in the balance of these fluids could be the source of diseases. Around 1534 BC, the British Museum's Ebers papyrus (Eber 854a) depicts conduits (called metu) through which various fluids travel.
The origins of Chinese acupuncture
The Chinese are accustomed to judging the worth of a cultural activity based on its age. Placing yourself under the authority of an old master, whether mythological or from a more than 5000-year-old tradition, ensures the seriousness and credibility of the approach. "One cannot enter the room without walking on traces," explains the Master (Interviews XI, 19). As a result, the Chinese thinker openly claims guardianship and flees anything that resembles the liberty of thought prized by European thinkers.
The desire to include acupuncture in a very ancient lineage has led to the belief that the existence of sharpened instruments in the Stone Age or bone or bamboo needles under the Zhou (-1045 -256) are proofs of the practice's antiquity, even if these needles were only used to hold the hair or drain the pus from abscesses.
The discovery in 1973 of 14 medical texts in a newly excavated tomb at Mawangdui in Hunan allowed the history of Chinese medicine to be substantially rewritten. Currently, experts on these texts have established the following chronology:
When the Mawangdui tomb was closed in 168 BCE, no acupuncture technique was known. The texts of these tombs clearly reveal that the typical aspects of Chinese therapy were not yet established during the Qin (-221, -206) and early Han periods. Indeed, they never mention the use of acupuncture needles, even when they describe the courses of the ducts on the skin's surface and the application of moxibustion.
The first precisely dated mention of acupuncture is found in Sima Qian's (-145, -87) "historical chronicles" (the Shiji) compiled around 90 BC. JC. The author mentions a doctor named Chunyu Yi (-216, -150) who is accused of improper therapeutic practice for implanting needles in patients in this book. The doctor was compelled to demonstrate the therapeutic benefits of acupuncture in two trials, -167 and -154, at a time when this practice was just beginning to proliferate. Acupuncture might thus be traced back to the middle of the second century BC. It will then progressively establish itself as the principal therapy of systematic correspondence medicine.
As a result, the Huangdi Nei Jing, the reference work on acupuncture, massages, gymnastics, and therapeutic medications, is partly later. The texts are diverse, with some likely dating from the Warring States period (-500 to -220) and others from the first century BC. In any case, there is no copy of the Han period, and all of the versions that have come down to us have been subjected to numerous revisions throughout the ages.
The Nanjing, or "Classic of Difficulties," unites the Huangdi Neijing's various and sometimes confusing points of view. The text, written between the first and third centuries, painstakingly discloses the conceptual structure of systematic correspondences that has served as the foundation of traditional Chinese medicine for nearly two millennia.
Entrance into Europe
Willem Ten Rhyne, a Dutch doctor from the Compagnie des Indes (1679), found acupuncture in Nagasaki, Japan, where he lived for two years, and Kampfer introduced it to Europe in the 17th century. Dujardin and Vicq d'Azyr describe the procedure in their respective writings a century later. However, it appears that the composer's father, Louis Berlioz, was the first to undertake the procedure in France (1810), followed by numerous doctors subsequently. The consul Darby was involved in its distribution in Europe beginning in 1853, but it wasn't until 1927 that it became popular, thanks to the work of the sinologist George Soulié de Morant.
The Industrial Revolution
The Chinese Emperor outlawed acupuncture in 1822, and it was removed from the Imperial Medical College curriculum. She will, however, survive. Before rehabilitating this practice, Mao Zedong would try to destroy it due to its Taoist origins, which are incompatible with Marxist theory.
Acupuncture now has a significant role in Chinese medicine treating a wide range of illnesses, particularly in hospitals, some of which have been converted into tourist attractions. Colossal experiments have been carried out, not necessarily in accordance with conventional orthodox ideas, leading to the proliferation of sites located beyond meridians and the introduction of new procedures such as acupuncture analgesia.
Taiwan, where expert acupuncturists who escaped Mao's purges when he came to power were able to find refuge, remains one of the pinnacles of traditional acupuncture.
George Soulié de Morant (1878-1955), a French consul in China, studied acupuncture during his lengthy tenure in the Middle Kingdom and returned to France with an imposing treatise that is still used today.
0 Comments