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Why was the Huangdi neijing traditionally linked to the Yellow Emperor?
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traditional Chinese medicine
In moxibustion, or moxa treatment, small cones of an herb (typically Artemisia moxa) are burned on top of needles placed in designated points of the body, generally the same points as those used in acupuncture.
The Huangdi neijing was traditionally attributed to the Yellow Emperor, or Huangdi, because he was regarded as a legendary, medically oriented ruler who supposedly acquired profound knowledge of diagnosis, the pulse, and medical prescriptions from immortals and goddesses.1
While the text has been the highest authority on medical matters in China for over 2,000 years, modern scholarship indicates it was actually composed in the 3rd century BCE, long after the Yellow Emperorās traditional reign in the 27th century BCE. The association with Huangdi served to lend the work immense historical and cultural prestige, cementing its status as the foundational text for the theoretical concepts of traditional Chinese medicine.12