Dictionary of the Ben Cao Gang Mu, Volume 2: Geographical and Administrative Designations

The *Ben cao gang mu*, compiled in the second half of the sixteenth century by a team led by the physician Li Shizhen (1518-1593) on the basis of previously published books and contemporary knowledge, is the largest encyclopedia of natural history in a long tradition of Chinese materia medica works. Its description of almost 1,900 pharmaceutically used natural and man-made substances marks the apex of the development of premodern Chinese pharmaceutical knowledge. The *Ben cao gang mu* dictionary offers access to this impressive work of 1,600,000 characters. This second book in a three-volume series verifies and localizes all 2,158 geographical and associated administrative names referred to in the *Ben cao gang mu* in connection with the origin and use of pharmaceutical substances.