Li Gao

Also known as Zi Mingzhi · Zi Hao Dong Yuan Lao Ren · Li Dongyuan

Li Gao, courtesy name Mingzhi, came from a wealthy family of Zhending and in old age called himself the Old Man of Dongyuan. The History of the Yuan (Yuanshi) says the loss of his mother to illness drove him to study medicine, and he paid a large fee to become the pupil of Zhang Yuansu of Yizhou, learning all his methods. Having bought an official post supervising taxes at Jiyuan, he faced an epidemic that swelled the head and face, and he had his prescription carved on stone for public use. During the wars at the end of the Jin he took refuge in Kaifeng before returning north, and late in life he passed his learning to Luo Tianyi. He held that poor diet and overwork damage the spleen and stomach and give rise to illness, writing Treatise on the Spleen and Stomach (Piwei lun) and two other books in which his Buzhong yiqi decoction appears. He died in 1251 aged seventy-two, and Luo later edited and printed his works.