First published in 1998. This study uses the Mawangdui Medical Manuscripts to form a basis for information about early Chinese medical literature. Since the 1970S there has been a succession of manuscript discoveries in late-fourth to second century B.C. tombs in several regions of China, the provinces of Hubei and Hunan being particularly fertile ground for manuscripts. The medical Mawangdui manuscripts are part of a large cache of manuscripts discovered in 1973 in Mawangdui tomb 3, situated in the north-eastern part of the city of Changsha, Hunan.