Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

By examining all the prevalent varieties of therapy from self-care to religious ritual, this book explores health care practices in China, before modern times. In ancient China most people were unable to afford a doctor, even in the unlikely case that one lived near their village and was willing to treat peasants. What did they do when their children got sick? The answer is to be found in this book, which goes far beyond the history of medicine. The author uses methods of medical anthropology to explain the curative roles of popular religion, Daoism, Buddhism, and the therapeutic rites performed by imperial officials. Readers will discover the steady interaction of religious healing and classical medicine in this culture. This highly readable book builds on over forty years of study and analysis of early liturgical and medical writings, and a wide variety of other sources. Its focus on the eleventh century throws new light on a period of rapid transition in many aspects of therapy, and it will appeal to scholars and general readers alike.

History of Medicine --- Medicine --- Health & Biological Sciences --- Public health --- Medical care --- History --- Delivery of health care --- Delivery of medical care --- Health care --- Health care delivery --- Health services --- Healthcare --- Medical and health care industry --- Medical services --- Personal health services --- Community health --- Hygiene, Public --- Hygiene, Social --- Public health services --- Public hygiene --- Sanitary affairs --- Social hygiene --- Medicine. --- History. --- Anthropology. --- Medicine & Public Health. --- History of Medicine. --- History, general. --- Health --- Human services --- Biosecurity --- Health literacy --- Medicine, Preventive --- National health services --- Sanitation --- Human beings --- Annals --- Auxiliary sciences of history --- Clinical sciences --- Medical profession --- Human biology --- Life sciences --- Medical sciences --- Pathology --- Physicians --- Health Workforce --- Medicine—History. --- Primitive societies --- Social sciences

Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

China's most sophisticated system of computational astronomy was created for a Mongol emperor who could neither read nor write Chinese, to celebrate victory over China after forty years of devastating war. This book explains how and why, and reconstructs the observatory and the science that made it possible. For two thousand years, a fundamental ritual of government was the emperor's "granting the seasons" to his people at the New Year by issuing an almanac containing an accurate lunisolar calendar. The high point of this tradition was the "Season-granting system" (Shou-shih li, 1280). Its treatise records detailed instructions for computing eclipses of the sun and moon and motions of the planets, based on a rich archive of observations, some ancient and some new. Sivin, the West’s leading scholar of the Chinese sciences, not only recreates the project's cultural, political, bureaucratic, and personal dimensions, but translates the extensive treatise and explains every procedure in minimally technical language. The book contains many tables, illustrations, and aids to reference. It is clearly written for anyone who wants to understand the fundamental role of science in Chinese history. There is no comparable study of state science in any other early civilization.

Astronomers -- China -- Biography. --- Astronomy, Chinese --History. --- Astronomy, Chinese. --- Mathematics -- China -- History. --- Astronomy, Chinese --- Astronomy & Astrophysics --- Physical Sciences & Mathematics --- Astronomy - General --- History --- Astronomy --- History. --- Mathematics. --- Observations, Astronomical. --- History of Mathematical Sciences. --- Astronomy, Observations and Techniques. --- Observations. --- Astronomy—Observations. --- Astronomical observations --- Observations, Astronomical --- Math --- Science --- Annals --- Auxiliary sciences of history