Techniques Used For Tending Life—Research On Editing And Publishing Of Books About Health-Care During Ming Dynasty

Tending Life culture in China has a very long history,and books are an important carrier of culture.With the development of commodity economy and the improvement of printing during the Ming Dynasty,books of medicine and health-care had shown an explosive growth,which became an important type of book alongside popular literature,imperial examination books,daily-use books and enlighten books in the publishing world.Through the research of Tending Life books in the Ming Dynasty,this paper intends to open up an entrance to understand the social significance of books at that time,and expand the research angle of Tending Life culture.The introduction puts forward three aspects of the research on health culture: the historical vein of Tending Life culture,the research on the literature and book history of Tending Life texts and the research on the social history of Tending Life culture.This is also the basic research angle and method of this paper,and carries out multi-dimensional observation on such texts from the perspective of Book History.The first chapter mainly discusses the basic appearance and the situation of print and engraving of Tending Life books in the Ming Dynasty according to three different institutions of the official carving,private carving,and commercial carving respectively.Official Tending Life books are often valuable and serious publications,while private Tending Life books are mainly written by doctors and literati,who have made certain contributions to promoting the popularization of health knowledge.For literati,this activity is also an important embodiment to realize their own value of managing the world and benefiting the people.At the same time,the consumption demand for such literature in the book market also leads to the constant circulation of Tending Life books in the commercial market.The attention in the national system and legal level paid to old-age care and health preservation,the publication participation of scholars group and the development of commercial society and book publishing in the Ming Dynasty are all the important reasons for promoting the prosperity of Tending Life literature.The second chapter selects several important Tending Life books and explores some characteristic phenomena of the publishing and social life in the Ming Dynasty by the thick description.The first is Shouqin Yanglao Xinshu,which has been reproduced many times in the whole Ming Dynasty.The three major engraving systems all participated in the publication and engraving of this book,which shows the popularity of respecting the old and valuing the aged in the Ming Dynasty throughout the country.Second,as a large series of books compiled and published by literati,Yimen Guangdu included a single list of "Zunsheng",which contained a large number of Tending Life books.Most of the books published by the literati were collected by themselves,which reflected the trend of literati’s interest in collecting and publishing books to share with friends in the Ming Dynasty,and their taste of curiosity and variety could also be seen from the selected books.The third is Shouyang Congshu,a kind of commercial book.In the late Ming Dynasty,knowledge became a new alternative commodity,and cultural consumption became an important trend.Although the books were not cheap,many scholars were still willing to spend money to buy them in order to show their consumption taste.Through exploring the rich content of a series of the editing,spreading and accepting of Tending Life books in the Ming Dynasty,the features of medical and health-care culture in the Ming Dynasty will appear more clearly and comprehensively,providing us with a new kind of possibility to understand the traditional social daily life.