Sharpening the Needle: British Interpretations of Acupuncture, 1802–30

Abstract

In the eighteenth century, acupuncture was invariably described in terms of and in conjunction with its exotic Asian context, although those descriptions generally separated the technique from the theories that explained it in China and Japan. Moxibustion, on the other hand, existed in the medical literature independently of its origins. Medical dictionaries and encyclopedia, for example, often listed moxa under the techniques of actual cauterization and adustion, to which it was likened, or under the herb artemisia, from which the moxa tinders were made. By the end of the eighteenth century, moxa was familiar enough to be mentioned as a treatment option, albeit a slightly unusual one, without further explanation. Although moxa and acupuncture were first reported to the European audience in similar tones and by the same individuals, moxa had the advantage of familiarity — at least by analogy. Lacking this analogical quality, the practice of acupuncture languished, especially in Britain, despite the encouraging tones in which it too was initially reported. The eye-witness authority of Ten Rhyne and Kaemp-fer, which eventually tempted the French to experiment with acupuncture, evidently left the mass of British practitioners unmoved.

… how much soever our theory may exceed theirs, it will be well if their practice, upon examination, do not prove more safe and agreeable than ours, whilst they draw the main part of their medical assistance from… gentle purgatives, emollients, alteratives, and other salubrious remedies, calculated to strengthen, rather than fatigue and weaken..¹

Universal History, 1759