• CHINESE LITERATURE
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• v.95
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• pp.99-125
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• 2018

This paper aims at replying to the question of how did Regis understand and translate and annotate Ye-Kim. Grosso modo, Regis' understanding of Ye-Kim is characterized with figurism and eclecticism. As for figurism, the paper provided some textual evidences of Bouvet, a founder of the figurism. The paper demonstrated also some testimonies for demonstrating the eclectical feature of Regis' interpretation. Interestingly to see, this eclectical feature that are observed in Regis ' commentaries requires an urgent but academically strict views.

• Journal of Ginseng Culture
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• v.1
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• pp.28-42
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• 2019

What is unknown about Leibniz (Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, 1646~1716), a great philosopher and mathematician, is that he inquired about ginseng. Why Leibniz, one of the leading figures of the Enlightenment, became interested in ginseng? This paper excavates Leibniz's references on ginseng in his vast amount of correspondences and traces the path of his personal life and cultural context where the question about ginseng arose. From the sixteenth century, Europe saw a notable growth of medical botany, due to the rediscovery of such Greek-texts as Materia Medica and the introduction of a variety of new plants from the New World. In the same context, ginseng, the renowned panacea of the Old World began to appear in a number of European travelogues. As an important part of mercantilistic projects, major scientific academies in Europe embarked on the researches of valuable foreign plants including ginseng. Leibniz visited such scientific academies as the Royal Society in London and $Acad{\acute{e}}mie$ royale des sciences in Paris, and envisioned to establish such scientific society in Germany. When Leibniz visited Rome, he began to form a close relationship with Jesuit missionaries. That opportunity amplified his intellectual curiosity about China and China's famous medicine, ginseng. He inquired about the properties of ginseng to Grimaldi and Bouvet who were the main figures in Jesuit China mission. This article demonstrates ginseng, the unnoticed subject in the Enlightenment, could be an important clue that interweaves the academic landscape, the interactions among the intellectuals, and the mercantilistic expansion of Europe in the late 17th century.