We Can Learn from History

   Acupuncture; history notes

 

                Are we too superior in our conceits to recognize the ability we ought to see in others?

                '

                I write here in hope that we may more enjoy the fruits of acupuncture. The French and Russians began to enjoy those fruits of the acupuncture part of Chinese Health Care many years ago. Our AMA has not pointed us to a legal road to making acupuncture an active part of our health care system. It  that seems finding and setting up that road is up us, we the people. 

               

                 The people of some countries have struggled a bit with deciding how to regulate acupuncture, bur most have allowed it legal practice. Russian elites have demanded it. Chinese demand that extensive education and careful oversight of the the practice be established and maintained. European countries have demanded that all acupuncturists be medical doctors as well. Some of them have neglected the supervision of its teaching.

 

                Some knowledge of the history of acupuncture may prove of help to to us. Allow me to pass on some of that history which have begun to learn.

 
Before 900 AD                

                A medical school was established in China during the Tang dynasty before 900 AD. Its name, translated to English can be, the Imperial Institute of Physicians. The college trained 350 students at a time in herbal medicine and surgery. Herbal medicine seems to have been the more important part of the instruction. Surgery was mainly limited to fractures, skin diseases, and wounds.

 
600 AD                

Tang emperors also organized the nation's doctors into the grand Medical Service. It will be great when we can organize our healthcare to include the best of the kinds available in other countries. The development of organized healthcare in China began at least as early as 600 AD. Certainly we ought to be able to improve and extend our healthcare in the near future.

 
About 700 AD             

    Chinese health care was regulated and delivery improved beginning in about 700 AD. Prospective doctors underwent rigorous examinations. Future doctors were examined on their familiarity with the principles of acupuncture and its diagnosis and techniques, also on the best written works. 

 

                Chinese controlled the quality of their health care then and now. There were and are laws prohibiting the practice of healthcare and cure without licenses.

 

                    

According to surviving healthcare books and documents from as far back as the Tang, a variety of maladies were treated. their practice dealt with tuberculosis, goiter, rickets, beriberi, dropsy, Cholera, dysentery, measles, smallpox, and leprosy.

As we begin to use our choice of the very best European and Asiatic healthcare, we can learn from and adopt some of their methods of  control and safety. There  is much of value we can learn if we would. We can learn to benefit from acupuncture as have the French, and Russians, and others. Our healthcare professionals have much to teach others.

Let's get back to the Tang dynasty way of dealing with acupuncture. On the second day of their examinations was a demonstration of one's effectiveness of dealing with the needles of acupuncture. A great deal more of Chinese history is becoming available these days and the Chinese share share much of their modern healthcare understanding, knowledge, and techniques. We can learn from them and help them to learn from us.

 Acupuncture points

                In 1027 AD the sung dynasty emperor, Je Tsug ordered Wang Wei, a noted acupuncturist and sculpture to cast two hollow figures with the acupuncture points points marked by their names and small holes. The figures were covered with wax and filled with water. These figures were used to train and test students. Similar figures are used by students and teachers and students today, Since the Sung dynasty only about a dozen points have been changed, added, or deleted. I understands that a total of about 365 points are used today. For the interested person there is much historic and present day information available online.

 
 Chaing Kai-shek              

 During the reign of Chaing Kai-shek, western medicine was extolled and acupuncture was repressed and schools closed. Still, the Chinese people looked to their traditional medicine. Thousands were killed by quacks and the untrained in the use of traditional medicine. Many came to doubt their ''medicine."

When the communist consolidated power acupuncturists began to use the needles where they were most likely to be used correctly, on themselves. A graduate from their schools may have pricked himself ten thousand times refining his skills and touch until teachers and testers were sure of his ability. There remained much to be learned of diagnosis.  

 

                Now, acupuncture has been modernized by Chinese doctors also trained in western medicine. Acupuncture is used extensively. Electronic needles are used, and their use has moved into most modern Chinese medicine. 

 "Head Zones"

                In 1893 Sir Henry Head, a British nerve specialist, noticed that some patients suffering from diseased gallbladders and kidneys felt pain in parts of the body far from from the stricken organs. The pain was external, on the surface of the skin, and a specific disease always resulted in pain from the same place. Think of the diagnostic possibilities, Some wise doctors have been trained in "Head Zones."

German doctors soon began to use their knowledge of "Head Zones" to deaden areas of the skin to relieve pain in internal organs. Does that remind you of anything in particular?

 

                Some American doctors add to this practice by injecting these surface areas with chemical Anesthesia to get the same result. American doctors were amazed to find that their injections in Head Zones not only relieved pain, but in many cases cure diseases. Head Zones have been too largely forgotten, but there is still a bit of ongoing work being done in the U.S. and elsewhere. 

 

            By the way, the areas of the skin Dr. Head linked with the gallbladder and kidneys are the same ones acupuncturists use today and the same ones they have used for many hundreds of years.

 

                I believe that we can benefit from careful training of good acupuncture practitioners in the U.S. I believe we would benefit even more by good appropriate oversight of those practitioners and of all physicians and health practitioners. For developing appropriate training of acupuncturists in the U.S. we could increase exchange of healthcare practitioners between China and America.

 

                

            Thank you for reading

 

 

                                                                                                RCS 

Acupuncture: history and scientific observation

 Acupuncture: history notes
 

                Are we too superior in our conceits to recognize the ability we ought to see in others?

               

             I write here in hope that we may more enjoy the fruits of acupuncture. The French and Russians began to enjoy those fruits of the acupuncture part of Chinese Health Care many years ago. Our AMA has not pointed us to a legal road to making acupuncture an active part of our health care system. It  that seems finding and setting up that road is up us, we the people. 

               

                 The people of some countries have struggled a bit with deciding how to regulate acupuncture, bur most have allowed it legal practice. Russian elites have demanded it. Chinese demand that extensive education and careful oversight of the the practice be established and maintained. European countries have demanded that all acupuncturists be medical doctors as well. Some of them have neglected the supervision of its teaching.

 

                Some knowledge of the history of acupuncture may prove of help to to us. Allow me to pass on some of that history which have begun to learn.

 

                A medical school was established in China during the Tang dynasty before 900 AD. Its name, translated to English can be, the Imperial Institute of Physicians. The college trained 350 students at a time in herbal medicine and surgery. Herbal medicine seems to have been the more important part of the instruction. Surgery was mainly limited to fractures, skin diseases, and wounds.

 

                Tang emperors also organized the nation's doctors into the grand Medical Service. It will be great when we can organize our healthcare to include the best of the kinds available in other countries. The development of organized healthcare in China began at least as early as 600 AD. Certainly we ought to be able to improve and extend our healthcare in the near future.

 

                 Chinese health care was regulated and delivery improved beginning in about 700 AD. Prospective doctors underwent rigorous examinations. Future doctors were examined on their familiarity with the principles of acupuncture and its diagnosis and techniques, also on the best written works. 

 

                Chinese controlled the quality of their health care then and now. There were and are laws prohibiting the practice of healthcare and cure without licenses.

 

                According to surviving healthcare books and documents from as far back as the Tang, a variety of maladies were treated. their practice dealt with tuberculosis, goiter, rickets, beriberi, dropsy, Cholera, dysentery, measles, smallpox, and leprosy.

            As we begin to use our choice of the very best European and Asiatic healthcare, we can learn from and adopt some of their methods of  control and safety. There  is much of value we can learn if we would. We can learn to benefit from acupuncture as have the French, and Russians, and others. Our healthcare professionals have much to teach others.

            Let's get back to the Tang dynasty way of dealing with acupuncture. On the second day of their examinations was a demonstration of one's effectiveness of dealing with the needles of acupuncture. A great deal more of Chinese history is becoming available these days and the Chinese share share much of their modern healthcare understanding, knowledge, and techniques. We can learn from them and help them to learn from us.

 

                In 1027 AD the sung dynasty emperor, Je Tsug ordered Wang Wei, a noted acupuncturist and sculpture to cast two hollow figures with the acupuncture points points marked by their names and small holes. The figures were covered with wax and filled with water. These figures were used to train and test students. Similar figures are used by students and teachers and students today, Since the Sung dynasty only about a dozen points have been changed, added, or deleted. I understands that a total of about 365 points are used today. For the interested person there is much historic and present day information available online.

 

                During the reign of Chaing Kai-shek, western medicine was extolled and acupuncture was repressed and schools closed. Still, the Chinese people looked to their traditional medicine. Thousands were killed by quacks and the untrained in the use of traditional medicine. Many came to doubt their ''medicine."

                When the communist consolidated power acupuncturists began to use the needles where they were most likely to be used correctly, on themselves. A graduate from their schools may have pricked himself ten thousand times refining his skills and touch until teachers and testers were sure of his ability. There remained much to be learned of diagnosis.  

 

                Now, acupuncture has been modernized by Chinese doctors also trained in western medicine. Acupuncture is used extensively. Electronic needles are used, and their use has moved into most modern Chinese medicine. 

 

                In 1893 Sir Henry Head, a British nerve specialist, noticed that some patients suffering from diseased gallbladders and kidneys felt pain in parts of the body far from from the stricken organs. The pain was external, on the surface of the skin, and a specific disease always resulted in pain from the same place. Think of the diagnostic possibilities, Some wise doctors have been trained in "Head Zones."

            

            German doctors soon began to use their knowledge of "Head Zones" to deaden areas of the skin to relieve pain in internal organs. Does that remind you of anything in particular?

 

                Some American doctors add to this practice by injecting these surface areas with chemical Anesthesia to get the same result. American doctors were amazed to find that their injections in Head Zones not only relieved pain, but in many cases cure diseases. Head Zones have been too largely forgotten, but there is still a bit of ongoing work being done in the U.S. and elsewhere. 

 

            By the way, the areas of the skin Dr. Head linked with the gallbladder and kidneys are the same ones acupuncturists use today and the same ones they have used for many hundreds of years.

 

                I believe that we can benefit from careful training of good acupuncture practitioners in the U.S. I believe we would benefit even more by good appropriate oversight of those practitioners and of all physicians and health practitioners. For developing appropriate training of acupuncturists in the U.S. we could increase exchange of healthcare practitioners between China and America.

 

                Check RCS Posts for health related posts.

            Thank you for reading

 

 

                                                                    RCS 

Japan: Our First Glimpse

Urbanized 

                    The evidence suggests that Japan has been inhabited continually for about 30,000 years, that's since the Upper Paleolithic. You probably know that it is an island nation in the Pacific ocean not far from the east coast of China. You may not know, that although it is a relatively small country, that it is also an archipelago of over 6,800 islands, the 11th most populated country on Earth, and the most urbanized in the world.

                    The people we have called Japanese call their country Nippon and sometimes Niho. Perhaps we could call them ipponese.

                    The people on the Japanese islands were beginning to take on some of there present characteristics by about 17,000 BP. At that time they lived in villages, hunted, harvested the country-side, practiced some agriculture, and fished ocean, and stream.

Jomon:

                    Their homes are recognizable by being constructed partially below ground level. They used baked clay vessels that are some of the earliest dated anywhere in the world to so early a time. We have called these people Jomon and there culture has been recognized as having lasted for well over 10,000 years.

Yayoi:

                    In historical times, about 1,000 BC, another people began to enter islands of the archipelago and began to intermingle with Jomon people. I believe the southernmost of the islands were the first they entered and began to move into other islands from there They may have come to the main Japanese islands from Okinawa.

                    By 660 BC thes Yayoi people had brought their culture to most of the islands. They brought metal work, wet rice farming, and a new style of  pottery, most of which seems similar to that of China and Korea. In fact, by this time the son of Amaterasu had founded a kingdom in central Japan. The royal line of that kingdom is the one which exists in Japan today. By the way, I believe that most Japanese now refer to Amaterasu's son as, Emperor Jimmu.

                    We have a lot to learn. 

                    I hope to write more about Japan soon. Please remind me to do so.

                    Thank you for reading.

                                                                                        rcs

        

Asia by an Asian

 

Conversation about the rise of Asia takes place at the University of California at Berkeley

Modern History

Silk Road Ramble

 History With RCS: Another piece of Silk Road history. Introducing the back-story of cities along the Silk Road.

 

                We may gain some interesting knowledge of our world by learning the stories of the trade routes we have come to call the Silk Road. I have just begun to find their names and a of information about them. I will mention three of them here. Their names are. Kashgar, Bukhara, and Kucha. In the process of this first look at these first three cities I have discovered some bits of information I hope to follow up on later. You may guess at what they may be as you read on.

                If you want you can record your guesses in the "comments" section of this post. You can also ask questions, make suggestions, and help me correct errors.

Kashgar: 

                The city of Kashgar is an oasis city in the Tarim Basin region of southern Xinjiang, China; a region which is now mostly desert. Kashgar is one of the western most cities in China. It is near the boarder of Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Pakistan. The Tarim Basin is a large geological feature of about 390,000 square miles. Water that flows into the Basin does not flow out, still it is mostly desert. Xinjiang is the part of China in which the Uygur live. The Uygur are a Muslim people of whom you may have heard on TV. The Silk Road divides into three branches to cross the Tarim Basin east to west or visa versa. As we continue you will find that the Road has many branches. 

                The Han Chinese have been a power in the Tarim Basin from about about 76 BC so have a strong claim on it. How many years are there before 76 BC? 

                The four countries I mention above each of whose names ends in -stan may remind you of Persia or Iran or both. You can find that these countries have historical connections with Iranians. I think that we can call kashgar a city with an Iranian history. The people of Kashgar were once of the Zoroastrian religion and some may still practice it. Most people in Iran practice Zoroastrianism to this day. Wikipedia people say that the city has been ruled by Chinese, Turkic, Mongol, and Tibetan Empires. I did not know that there had been a Tibetan Empire.

                I believe that ancient Iranians were important all along the the Silk Road from the eastern Mediterranean through to India and China. I see at this moment that Iranians were documented as important on the Road by 525 BC on inscriptions found at Persepolis. I suspect that we will find that they were important there long before.

                I remember reading that some not so early Iranians were called Saka by some and that some had red hair. Can it be so? We may have a lot to learn, but we are learning. Stick with me for a while.

 

Bukhara, our second Silk Road city:

                It probably existed 3,000 years ago, it is now the capital city of the Bukhara region of Uzbekistan. Bukhara has served as a center of trade, scholarship, and religion. Most people of the city still speak Tajik, a form of the Persian language. Remember that Persia is what we once called Iran. Uzbek is the language of the countryside and a second language of the city people. The Republic of Uzbekistan is now a Muslim country. It was anciently settled by Iranians. They were called Scythian and founded a kingdom there in about 900 BC.      

                As we continue learning we find that Tajik is a Persian language and that Uzbek is a Turkic language strongly effected by Persian.

                Bukhara became part of the Abbasid Caliphate in 819 AD and  was the capital of the Samanid Empire. At its greatest, about 900 AD, the empire included all of Afghanistan, huge parts of Iran, Turkmenistan,, Kyrgyzstan, and parts of Kazakhstan and Pakistan. The Abbasid Caliphate was the 3rd from the Prophet(Muhammad). They were significantly dependent  upon the Persian Buddhist family the Barmakids!

                The Barmakids could begin a new story that we won't follow just know. We have now passed well into the historic period which I intend to review at a later stage of this examination of the Silk Road. The Samanid Empire was a Sunni Iranian empire which included what are now the countries mentioned in the paragraph above. The Samanids brought Persian culture to a receptive Islamic world. Thanks to that fact the Islamic world has brought brought much of that culture to the West. It seems to me that I have it said that the Spanish Caliphates  so like the concept of pants that the fad spread to to the rest of the western world. I am pretty sure that there is truth in that.

                I will ramble on to the third city of this essay. Please help me to correct my errors or to add information in "comments" immediately below the end of this essay.

                Ancient Iranians called themselves Arya of ethnicity airya. I don't know how one would translate "ethnicity" to ancient Iranian. Speaking of ancient Iranians, at a very early date, on their way from the northeast to a place much nearer to what we have called "the western world," a significant number of them may have stopped off at India for a time.

                In a later essay of this Silk Road trip I might turn in at India. I think that some Europeans may have received fine fabrics from Indian before ever hearing of Chinese silk. People of the Near East more certainly did. As we look more into India, we may learn more of an ancient language called Kuhj. Some students of ancient languages consider Kuhj to be a fore-barer of the Indo-European languages. In sanscrit it seems to mean something like "rob" or "steal." Were our ancestors known thieves?

                I'm not concerned. Most genealogists can find kings and saints in one's family as well as a horse thief or Two.

                Another city on the Silk Road was Kucha. Kucha was an old Buddhist kingdom on the branch of the SR which ran along the north side ob what is now the Taklamakan desert in the Tarim basin and south of the Muzat river in China.

                "Kucha" comes from the Kuchan scripts of late antiquity. Kuchan is an India script. It may have connections with a writing used in Tibet. The Chines might like it be something from Han Chinese, but they are stretching a lot to do so.

                The city of Kucha in the Silk Road was a Central Asian metropolis. Its population was said to have been Indo-European. I believe that I am not wrong to call it an early Iranian people. It is also said that they were notably red-haired and blue eyed.

                I feel I have rambled far enough for now so I will bid you good bye.

                Thank you for reading.

                                                                                                        rcs

  

It's Not Made of Silk

History With RCS: We might call these sentences Silk Road 101 as though they were an introduction to a semester on the topic.

            I think that on another blog I may have called it the Iranian Horsemen Road. Anyway,I believe that by 2000 BC there was already enough silk on the great trading network , we have called the Silk Road, to fairly call it a silk road.

            By the time Europeans knew that they were trading with China and India, the Road ran from beyond Java to Italy and included more than trade just with India and China..

I believe that India early traded fine textiles on the Road.

From about 500 BC to about 200 BC Persian(Iranian) horsemen and their wheeled vehicles kept trade moving along the Road from the far east to the near east.

The Chinese, especially those of the Han Empire, did a good job of keeping trade moving on the Road from 206 BC to about 220 AD when the Ottomans closed it. During those 400 or so years the Han's traded a lot of silk.

Does anyone want to know what was  going on along the route before 500 BC to about about 2000 BC?

The Chinese now have a new fast railroad link along the Road. What else is going on their? Is it true that the Iranians controlled the road the longest.



                                                            by Richard Sheehan






 

Feragama Valley Notes

History With RCS: Introduction to the Silk Road: the new Silk Road, the Old Silk Road, and the ancient Silk Road             

            You have heard of the Silk Road. You may have hear of the New Silk Road, the Old Silk Road, and the ancient Silk Road. 
They are all a part of the Feragama Valley, and the Feragama Valley is part of big doings and happenings. These doings and happenings form the backstory of much of what is happening and being done beyond your National borders.

            Find out. Listen and look for: doings and happenings, personages and news in and around the Feragama Valley.  
The Silk Road which has become a tourist destination is part of it. Beginning to learn about the Feragama Valley cultures may change your vision of the present and likely futures. Understanding of this valley's cultures can help us all to a better understanding of the happenings and doings of our world today. Beginning to know the history of this area and
it's people helps us to understand the way of things more than one may believe just now.

        In Zoroastrian literature the valley is referred to as the 
Zoroastrian homeland. The history of that particular homeland goes back more than 4000 years before today and is touching us now. The cultures of people of the Valley goes back 10,000 years more.

        Russia took control of the Valley between 1855 and 1884.

The peoples of the Valley were in contact with Xi'an(China) from, at least 1100 BC through the Dark Ages of Europe, when Ai'an of present China was an important cultural and political center.

        For one who wants a quest in history, I say take hold of a thread from an early culture of the Indian sub-continent. A culture, in perhaps the north of India, had an important connection with the Valley. That thread can take you places few of today have gone; to places from which many of today can benefit.

        Thank you for the visit. Come back soon just to check things out or to make a real search of the site.

 

                             RCS