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The Nature of Drugs

This chapter zooms in on the early decades of the seventeenth century to examine the amateurization of bencao in certain literati circles. However, it is not only about subtle debates within the neo-Confucian doctrine about the nature of drugs. The chapter also concerns the numerous and diverse attempts to live up to those ideals in late Ming China. At the time, many Confucian literati who took an interest in the subject of bencao belonged to the younger generations who came of age during or after the late decades of the Wanli reign (1572–1620). Not surprisingly, most of them lived and were primarily active in Jiangnan, the most prosperous and populous region of Ming China; but the enthusiasm for bencao did travel outside Jiangnan.