Gamacuoni

01 · Lineage & Regional School

Gamacuoni, Male, Tibetan, from Qinghai, is a third-batch national representative bearer of Tibetan Medicine (Ⅸ-9). The tradition is documented in Qinghai. Within the regional tradition and school record of Tibetan Medicine in Qinghai: Bloodletting therapy is used in Qinghai, Tibet, Sichuan, Gansu, and parts of Yunnan; Qinghai is one of the birthplaces and places of transmission and dissemination of this therapy. The diseases it targets are common and frequently occurring conditions among the peoples of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau; the instruments are easy to carry and the operation is simple, suiting the actual conditions of the plateau, where the land is vast and the population sparse and medical resources are limited. It is therefore most often performed locally at grassroots Tibetan medicine institutions. As early as the 8th century, Yutok Yonten Gonpo discussed the bloodletting therapy in the 'Four Medical Tantras'. The famous 17th-century Tibetan medical scholar Dima Danzin Pengcuo elaborated on it in his work 'Teachings on Bloodletting Therapy: Clarifying Errors,' and the 101 bloodletting points selected in that book are still used by Tibetan medicine practitioners today.

02 · Mastery & Signature Works

Male, of Tibetan ethnicity, born in July 1953 in Yushu City, Yushu Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai Province. He is a national representative bearer of Tibetan Medicine (the processing technique of the Tibetan medicine Arula), a third-batch national intangible cultural heritage project. He is a chief physician and professor. At the age of eighteen he studied Tibetan medicine under the folk Tibetan physicians Gasen, Gama Tudeng and Kaluo. He later studied under the Tibetan medicine master Cuoru Cailang, inheriting the Arula processing technique and the formulation technique for the Tibetan medicine Seventy-Flavour Pearl Pill. He has a thorough command of the processes for Tibetan medicinal raw materials, including collection, identification, screening, blending, charging, processing and varietal appraisal. He has accumulated extensive experience in Tibetan medical processing techniques and clinical practice. Within the documented technical tradition of Tibetan Medicine in Qinghai: Tibetan bloodletting therapy (called 'Darika' in Tibetan) is one of the external therapies of Tibetan medicine. It is a therapy in which a knife or needle instrument is used to cut or prick the veins and, in a few cases, the arteries of the patient to release diseased blood and the noxious qi that travels with the blood, thereby achieving the aim of curing disease. Tibetan bloodletting therapy has a long history. Tibetan medicine has more than 200 kinds of instruments for external treatment, among which the knives commonly used in Tibetan bloodletting are the feather-shaped knife, oblique-bladed knife, axe-bladed knife, crescent knife, and sickle-shaped knife. Bloodletting therapy is generally performed on a Tibetan bloodletting chair; the Tibetan medicine taken before bloodletting is the Three-Fruit Decoction. A patient who is to undergo Tibetan bloodletting therapy must decoct and take the Three-Fruit Decoction — prepared from Terminalia chebula (golden hook), Terminalia bellirica (hairy hook), and Phyllanthus emblica (emblic myrobalan) — five days in advance; the time of bloodletting is then chosen according to Tibetan astrological and calendrical calculation. The concrete implementation steps are, in order: the vein-distension method, the knife-entry method, identifying the point location, observing the appearance of the blood, determining the volume of blood to be let, and the concluding sedation method. Once the diseased blood has been released, the effects of relieving pain and eliminating disease can be achieved. Within ten days from the day of bloodletting, the patient should rest and strictly avoid acidic foods. In addition, bloodletting therapy is not suitable for pregnant women, people who faint at the sight of blood, people over 70 years of age, those who are extremely emaciated, those with an empty stomach, or those who are excessively tense. Tibetan bloodletting therapy strictly follows the theories of Tibetan medicine and applies treatment according to pattern differentiation based on the patient's specific condition and individual differences; it has remarkable efficacy and possesses both scientific and practical value. The bloodletting instruments carry strong Tibetan craft characteristics, and the timing of bloodletting strictly follows the theory of traditional Tibetan astrological and calendrical calculation, giving the therapy a pronounced Tibetan cultural character. The diseases it targets are common and frequently occurring conditions among the peoples of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau; moreover, the instruments are easy to carry and the operation is simple, suiting the actual conditions of the plateau, where the land is vast and the population sparse and medical resources are limited. The therapy therefore has socioeconomic value. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "Preparing with San Guo Tang": Five days of San Guo Tang—three myrobalans—are taken beforehand, and the moment of cutting is then fixed by Tibetan calendrical reckoning. "Raising the pulse": The first step, with the patient seated in a purpose-built chair: the practitioner raises the vessel and fills it so there is somewhere for the knife to go. "The incision": The vessel is opened to let out diseased blood with the poison travelling with it; when the colour turns bright red the cut is closed. "Locating the vessel": The points to be opened are fixed: a hundred and one recorded in the seventeenth-century manual are still used by Tibetan practitioners.

03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status

For many years he has undertaken undergraduate teaching at university level; he served as chief editor of monographs including Monograph on the Principles of Tibetan Pharmacy and Processing Techniques of Tibetan Medicinal Materials, took part in compiling textbooks including the National Undergraduate Teaching Syllabus for Tibetan Medicine, and published more than forty papers including A Brief Discussion of the Efficacy of Tibetan Medicines and The Theory of the Five Elements; twenty-six textbooks on Tibetan medicine received the Second Prize for National Teaching Achievement and the First Prize for Provincial Teaching Achievement. He has trained a large number of students specializing in Tibetan medicine and pharmacy.

04 · Associated Heritage Item Dossier

05 · Fellow National Bearers Lineage

National representative bearers recorded under the same item code, ordered from the first to the sixth batch. Batch order is not a teacher–student relationship.

06 · Archival Sources & Bibliography

1. Gamacuoni · National Representative Bearer Archive