used for more than 1000 years, were no longer effective. These doctors then
began to seek a new view on the causative factors of infectious diseases.
Subsequently, they tried to define the newly infectious diseases, and
proposed a hypothesis called ‘warm-climate disease’ by which all infectious
diseases arise in or are due to a warm climate environment. None the less,
it is very interesting that those medical doctors had not known of the exis-
tence of microorganisms, and some of these virulent microorganisms were
responsible for a variety of infectious diseases that plagued many Oriental
societies until the late nineteenth century. During the late Renaissance
period, a number of Christian missionaries arrived in China, Japan and
Korea; they brought various western diseases, but they also brought various
western medicines, and some of the missionaries even performed surgical
operations. There was an episode in which a Chinese emperor of the Qing
dynasty had a malaria infection, and the royal family doctors tried to
cure him, but failed with the traditional formulae. Interestingly, when a
missionary father had the chance to give him a drug containing quinine,
which was derived from the bark of the Cinchona tree, the emperor
completely recovered from the malaria infection. This is an example by which
the Oriental world became aware of the realities and efficacies of modern
western medicine. However, looking more closely at the story, it becomes a
bit more controversial because there had already been a traditional herbal
medicine with superior effectiveness in malaria infection, artemisine, the
active ingredient isolated fromArtemisia annua, and now used for malaria
resistant to quinine. However, it is not known why the royal family doctors
did not useArtemisia annuafor the Emperor at that time.
During the 500-year period of the Chosun dynasty in Korea, TKM flour-
ished in both aspects of the development of its own identity and the great
expansion of its use for the health benefits of the general public. These
outcomes were largely a result of the Great King Sejong’s policies on science
and technology development in the early Chosun dynasty. In that period,
various scientific and technological innovations and advances were made:
the development and adoption of a standard calendar, the establishment of
a standard metrology system for the units of weight and measurement and,
most importantly, the invention of the Han Geul(Korean alphabet). Han
Geulis based on phonetic letters, entirely different from the ideographic
Chinese alphabet, and basically consists of 14 consonants and 10 vowels.
The invention of the Korean alphabet made the dissemination of TKM
information and practices rapid and easy. Consequently, several epoch-
making contributions for the advancement of traditional Oriental medicines
were also achieved. These are summarised in the next section.
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