'A priceless book about medicines of an Eastern Country( Donguibogam)

[조영희]

There are a cave in the rock by GongAm Naru Ferry, the Pagang River, the Hangang River.
A Herbdocter Hur Jun(1539 – 1615)  wrote The Dongui Bogam in the cave.
He was first published the book in 1613 during the Joseon Dynasty of Korea.

"Hur Jun is knowledgeable of all the medical texts and superior in the usage of herbal medicine."
                                           -According to the Seonjo Chronicle dated July 2, 1604,-

These are UNESCO’s World Cultural Heritages in Korea.
Korea has many other great world heritages  on the UNESCO 'Memory of the World' list.
Among them, Donguibogam is especially interesting.
It’s such a surprise because China is the country from which Eastern medicine comes.
But the first Eastern medical World Heritage went to Korea.
Donguibogam means 'The Ideas and Practice of Eastern Medicine.'
It was written by a royal doctor, Heo Jun, with the help of other doctors in 1613.
UNESCO chose Donguibogam as  a world heritage because it is a collection of  in East Asia at that time.
What is worth our attention is that the work developed the ideas of 'medicine for prevention'

and 'public health care by the state'

The use of public health care systems was new in the 19th century.
So Donguibogam was centuries ahead in 1613.

As of July 2009, it is on UNESCO’s Memory of the World Programme.
"Donguibogam is noted for its originality and the quality of contents, and is widely used even today

as an important heritage of East Asia, thus significantly contributing to the development of world medicine.”

                                                                                                            -UNESCO-

Donguibogam literally means “Treasured Paragon of Eastern Medicine”,

and UNESCO described it as an “encyclopedic bible of medical knowledge of treatment techniques compiled in Korea”.
The original edition of Dongui Bogam is currently preserved by the Korean National Library.

Donguibogam developed a unique and independent form of traditional Korean medicine
and innovatively reformed the disease classification system.

The title literally means 'a priceless book about medicines of an Eastern Country.'
The word 'Eastern' is not the antonym to the Western World's 'Western',
but  Heo Jun gave the book such name because Eastern Country was one of sobriquets of Korea.
The book is regarded important in traditional Korean medicine and one of the classics of Oriental medicine today.