Seven Selected Occurrences of 痰積, 積聚, and 食積 in Electronic Texts

Starting with Seven Locations, Without Claiming the Whole

This note examines seven locations where 痰積, 積聚, and 食積 occur, selected from electronic text records with character forms normalized for search and comparison after each sentence and its surrounding context were checked separately. The selection was not designed to represent the whole; it brings the examples whose locations have so far been verified into closer view. These seven occurrences therefore cannot support an estimate of usage across any one book or across classical texts as a whole.

What can be done here is limited to describing what each term appears alongside and what distinctions the surrounding passages make in the immediate contexts currently available. The exact editions, volume or fascicle numbers, pages or folios, source facsimiles, transcription and character variants, layers of attribution, responsibility for the Korean renderings and their collation, and later reception have not yet been established. This note is therefore neither a study collating editions or facsimiles nor a definitive translation.

Nor does this note link the seven locations into a genealogy of terms or use them as evidence validating a present-day diagnosis. It is not a systematic survey of the complete body of material or a study of reception history, but a short note that reads occurrences in selected electronic records within their contexts. The sections that follow examine those occurrences in turn while keeping this boundary in place.

Two Selected 痰積 Contexts in Jingui Gouxuan

In the normalized electronic record of Jingui Gouxuan, identified as a work by Zhu Zhenheng (朱震亨), the two locations selected for this note appear in different settings. One is in the section on ‘Diarrhea (泄瀉)’ and the other in the section on ‘Dizziness (頭眩).’ Only these two locations, whose surrounding sentences and normalized line positions were checked in the electronic record, are read here.[2]

First, line 569 of ‘Diarrhea’ distinguishes patterns of diarrhea associated with dampness, qi deficiency, fire, phlegm, and food accumulation, then states ‘痰積，宜豁之’ and continues with historical methods of treatment.[2] At this selected location, the term 痰積 occurs within a sequence about diarrhea and treatment. The wording shows only its place in a historical passage; it is not a current treatment recommendation or evidence of efficacy.

Second, line 826 of ‘Dizziness’ states ‘右手脈實，痰積’ while distinguishing phlegm, fire, and pulse patterns.[2] The sentence places 痰積 alongside an observation that the pulse in the right hand is replete. At this selected location, 痰積 appears with a pulse observation in a discussion of dizziness.

The two locations show only these different contexts: diarrhea and treatment in one, and dizziness and pulse in the other. The exact edition, volume or fascicle number, page or folio, facsimile, collation of the transcription and character variants, responsibility for the Korean renderings and comparison with other translations, and later reception have not been verified.[2] The line numbers also identify positions only within this normalized electronic record, so the conclusions are limited to these two selected contexts.

Distinctions of Form and Movement in Zabing Guangyao

The selected contexts from Zabing Guangyao, whose electronic title reads ‘清 日本·丹波元堅撰’, appear under ‘Internal Causes · Accumulations and Gatherings (內因類·積聚).’ This portion arranges passages from earlier texts together with source-attribution markers, so the compilation heading in the electronic record must be read separately from the layer of citation that follows each passage.[3]

The first selected context, beginning at line 4459 and continuing through lines 4461–4463, says that ‘when pressed, its form and signs can be verified (按之形証可驗也),’ then distinguishes 瘕 as moving when pushed and having no fixed location, 癖 as lying to one side at the flanks, and 結 as deep within and firmly bound.[3] One graph in the category name immediately preceding the passage is blank in the electronic record and has therefore been excluded from the quotation and interpretation. The 《聖濟》 marker at the end of the context identifies a source attribution, so the passage as a whole is not presented as the compiler’s independent claim.

The second selected context, beginning at line 4465, describes 積 as ‘having form’: it accumulates layer by layer, develops gradually, becomes hard, and does not move; it describes 聚 as ‘without form’: it gathers and disperses, with no regularity in appearing or ceasing.[3] For 聚, the passage adds that distension may or may not be present, pain may or may not be present, and it arises with contact and comes and goes at times. The 《景岳》 marker following this explanation distinguishes the cited words from the compiler’s arrangement.

What has been verified so far is limited to these two selected contexts and their line positions in the normalized electronic record, together with the source-attribution markers they contain. The exact edition, volume or fascicle number, page or folio, facsimile, collation of the transcription and character variants, responsibility for the Korean renderings and comparison with other translations, and later reception have not been verified.[3] This section therefore does no more than provisionally describe the distinctions of form, movement, location, and persistence within the two contexts.

Three Selected Contexts in Donguibogam

In a normalized electronic record of the Miscellaneous Disorders part of Heo Jun’s Donguibogam, the three locations selected for this note comprise one 痰積 occurrence in the section on vomiting (吐門) and two 食積 occurrences in the sections on vomiting and internal injury (內傷門). Because the three locations appear in different explanations and with different source-attribution markers, each context is read separately here.[4]

First, in the ‘Hacheongo (霞天膏)’ context in the section on vomiting, the text says that long-standing phlegm becomes viscous and hard, adheres ‘within the chest (胸臆之間),’ and becomes entangled ‘outside the intestines and stomach (腸胃之外).’ It then states, ‘前倒倉法能治癱勞鼓噎之證乃虛氣有痰積也.’[4] A historical treatment account continues between the two quotations, but this note omits its details and makes no claim about current treatment or efficacy. [丹心] is retained as a source-attribution marker in the electronic record.

The selected line 2081 locator is not a line of the original Chinese text but the location where 痰積 appears in the Korean access translation. The parallel Chinese context appears at line 2078 in the same normalized electronic record.[4] Line 2081 is therefore not treated as a Chinese-text locator grounded in an edition, and the correspondence between the two lines is asserted only within what can be checked in this electronic record.

Second, line 2073 of ‘The Meaning of Dochang (倒倉之義)’ in the section on vomiting lists abdominal pain, 痞癖, 食瘧, jaundice, fullness, nausea, belching, and acid regurgitation alongside 食積 and 痰飮, and carries the [正傳] marker.[4] Third, line 9929 of ‘Food Accumulation Resembling Cold Damage (食積類傷寒)’ in the section on internal injury states ‘凡傷食成積亦能發熱頭痛證似傷寒’ and carries the [入門] marker.[4] These two markers show layers of earlier citation only; they do not establish the edition, extent of quotation, or transmission relationship of the predecessor texts.

At the three locations, historical treatment language remains context only. The exact edition, volume or fascicle number, page or folio, facsimile, transcription and character variants, complete bibliographic details of the predecessor texts corresponding to [丹心], [正傳], and [入門], responsibility for the Korean renderings and comparison with other translations, and later reception have not been verified.[4] Nor is there yet a publicly traceable edition locator, so the conclusions are limited to these three selected contexts in the normalized electronic record.

Distinctions Visible Across the Seven Occurrences

Placed side by side, the seven occurrences first reveal differences in their immediate contexts. In two locations from Jingui Gouxuan, 痰積 appears respectively in a sequence about diarrhea and historical treatment and in one about dizziness and pulse observation.[2] In two locations from Zabing Guangyao, the text distinguishes form verified by pressing, movement and location, firmness, and the changes involved in gathering and dispersing.[3] In three locations from Donguibogam, 痰積 and 食積 appear in distinct contexts: one describes positions ‘within the chest (胸臆之間)’ and ‘outside the intestines and stomach (腸胃之外),’ another lists a range of symptoms, and a third describes fever and headache as resembling cold damage (傷寒).[4]

Within these seven locations, the three terms do not appear in a single fixed context or form of explanation. That difference, however, can be described only among the selected examples. It provides no basis for estimating the distribution of usage across any book or period, judging whether the examples are mutually representative, or reconstructing a historical genealogy or later reception.[2][3][4]

The line numbers identify positions within normalized electronic records, not pages or folios in an edition. Because the exact editions and facsimiles, transcription and character variants, cited predecessor texts, responsibility for the renderings and their collation, later reception, and publicly traceable source locations have not been established, the quotations and renderings remain provisional.[2][3][4] This note is not a systematic literature survey, an edition or facsimile study, a translation edition, a genealogy or reception history, or a validation study.

The conclusion that can be retained is therefore narrow. The seven selected locations show that 痰積, 積聚, and 食積 occur alongside different observations, distinctions, and descriptions of illness in their respective immediate contexts.[2][3][4] That is as far as this short note goes: it sets those contexts alongside their source-attribution markers and the limitations of the material.