Preliminary Translation of the Tianhui Laoguanshan Manuscript on Piercing as Therapy

Abstract

This translation forms a triptych with the following two articles in this double special issue: Gu Man, Zhou Qi, and Liu Changhua, “Techniques for Piercing the Mai Recorded in the Laoguanshan Han Tomb Bamboo Slips” and Zhou Qi, “Research on the Lacquered Channel Figurine Excavated from a Han Tomb in Tianhui.” Here you can read an entire Tianhui Laoguanshan text in translation on the subject of therapeutic piercing. The contribution by Gu, Zhou, and Liu positions the therapy in relation to ideas and techniques in other manuscript texts contemporary to the one translated here and the printed classics of Chinese medicine. These articles are accompanied by opinion pieces written by current practitioners of Chinese medicine as expert witnesses to the evolution of the techniques and their relevance, or not, to modern practice. Together, we present an interdisciplinary analysis that we hope will engage the reader actively in the process of multifocal interpretation. The text here is introduced by a translator’s introduction that reflects broadly on the unique challenges of rendering this fascinating work into English.