Bezoar

Bezoar

　　　A gallstone from the gallbladder of a yellow or water buffalo, also known as Choubao. A precious traditional Chinese medicine. Intact bezoars are mostly oval, irregularly spherical, or triangular pyramidal in shape, with a few being tubular or granular. Bezoars are lightweight, with surfaces ranging from golden to yellowish-brown, fine-textured and lustrous. The cross-section is golden or brownish-yellow, featuring neatly arranged, densely layered concentric ring-like striations. It has a delicate fragrance, a slightly bitter then sweet taste, and a cool nature. It functions to reduce fever, detoxify, and calm convulsions. Taken internally, it treats high fever with loss of consciousness, mania, infantile convulsions, spasms, and similar conditions. Applied externally, it treats sore throat, oral ulcers, abscesses, and toxin-related ailments. Inner Mongolia is a major production area for bezoars, and in recent years, techniques for artificially cultivating natural bezoars have been developed.

Bezoar is mainly produced in the northwest, north, northeast, and southwest regions of China. It is a gallstone formed in the liver of bovines, which belong to the phylum Chordata, class Mammalia, and family Bovidae. Among the better-quality producing areas, those in Beijing, Hebei, Inner Mongolia, Liaoning, and Sichuan are considered to yield the highest quality. Therefore, when purchasing, you may prioritize bezoars from these regions.

1. Domestic bezoar (Beijing bezoar): Produced at slaughterhouses across the country.

2. Imported bezoar.

(1) Golden Mountain Bezoar: Mainly produced in Canada, Chicago, Argentina, Uruguay, and other places.

(2) Indian Bezoar: Mainly produced in India.

【What Are the Benefits (Effects) of Bezoar?】

1. Clear Heat and Detoxify

For individuals with a heat-prone constitution or those who are prone to excessive internal heat, bezoar is highly suitable. Due to its strong heat-clearing and detoxifying properties, it is used for sore throat, ulceration, and mouth sores, and can be applied externally in combination with musk, pearl, and borneol, such as in Babao Chuihou San (Eight-Treasure Throat-Spraying Powder); or taken internally with herbs like Herba Hedyotis Diffusae, Lonicera japonica, Scutellaria baicalensis, and realgar, such as in Niuhuang Jiedu Wan (Bezoar Detoxification Pill), treating all types of abscesses and toxin-related conditions. For conditions like breast cancer, scrofula, and suppurative infections, this ingredient is used as the main therapeutic drug, combined with musk, frankincense, and others to clear heat, detoxify, activate blood, and disperse nodules, such as in Xihuang Wan (Rhinoceros Bezoar Pill).

2. Cool the Liver and Calm Wheezing

Bezoar has excellent effects in cooling the liver and calming wheezing, offering significant medicinal benefits. With its heat-clearing, liver-cooling, wind-extinguishing, and convulsion-calming properties, it is used to treat convulsions and spasms caused by excessive heat in febrile diseases. It is often combined with cinnabar, scorpion tails, and uncaria stems, such as in Niuhuang San (Bezoar Powder); for treating acute infantile convulsions, high fever with loss of consciousness, and spasmodic seizures, it can be paired with musk, pig bile, and tabasheer, such as in Niuhuang Baolong Wan (Bezoar Embrace-Dragon Pill).

3. Open Orifices and Revive Consciousness

In addition to the above effects, bezoar also helps open orifices and revive consciousness, making it a highly health-promoting medicinal substance. Bezoar can also clear the heart, resolve phlegm, open orifices, and revive consciousness. It is used for conditions where heat enters the pericardium in febrile diseases, leading to loss of consciousness and delirium, or for stroke, convulsions, epilepsy, and other conditions where phlegm-heat blocks the orifices, causing loss of consciousness, locked jaw, and unresponsiveness. When used alone as a powder dissolved in light bamboo juice, it is the remedy for infantile locked jaw described in "Waitai Miyao" (Arcane Essentials from the Imperial Library). When combined with herbs like musk, cinnabar, rhinoceros horn, and coptis root, its efficacy is even more remarkable, such as in Angong Niuhuang Wan (Calming the Palace Pill with Bezoar).