This product is made by combining lead, sulfur, and niter, with the main component being lead tetroxide (Pb₃O₄). It is produced in Henan, Guangdong, Fujian, Hunan, Yunnan, and other places. It originates from the Shennong Bencao Jing.

bubble_chart Morphological Characteristics

It is an orange-red or orange-yellow powder with a dull luster, opaque, heavy in texture. When rubbed with fingers, it initially feels sandy, then becomes smooth, and can stain the fingers orange-yellow. It has a metallic, pungent taste. The best quality is characterized by its orange-red color, fine and smooth texture, absence of coarse particles, and not forming lumps when exposed to water. It is insoluble in water and alcohol, soluble in nitric acid, and releases chlorine gas when dissolved in hydrochloric acid. When heated intensely, it releases oxygen and partially converts to lead oxide.

bubble_chart Properties and Meridians

Acrid and salty, cold, toxic.

1. Benjing: "acrid, slightly cold."
2. Bencao Fahui: "acrid, slightly cold, toxic."
3. Bencao Zheng: "acrid, slightly salty and slightly astrigent."

1. Changsha Yaojie: "act on foot shaoyang meridian. Act on gallbladder meridian. Act on foot jueyin liver meridian."
2. "Essential Medicine Dividing and Preparing": "Act on liver and spleen meridians."
3. Bencao Zaixin: "act on heart and kidney meridians."

bubble_chart Efficacy

Detoxification, tissue regeneration, expectoration, and calming anxiety.

bubble_chart Indications

Treats Yongju, ulcers, incised wounds with bleeding, aphtha, eye nebula, burns and scalds, fright epilepsy, manic and depressive psychosis, malaria, dysentery, vomiting, and regurgitation.

1. Combined with Fossil Bone, taken internally to astringe the spirit and calm fright, reduce phlegm, used for manic and depressive psychosis, fright epilepsy, dysphoria insomnia, and severe palpitations. Externally used to dry dampness and heal sores, treating non-healing ulcers, eczema with water from the river, and bleeding from incised wounds.
2. Combined with Sweet Wormwood, together preventing malaria attacks.
3. Combined with calcined Gypsum, draining pus to remove toxins, promoting tissue regeneration to close wounds, used for Yongju after ulceration, with pus and water dripping, long non-healing, and eczema, athlete's foot.
4. Combined with dried alum, used externally, treating Yongju sores, eczema, scabies, mouth and tongue sores, pus in the ears, and female genital ulcers.
5. Combined with Coptis Rhizome, used externally, one to resolve heat toxins, one to astringe eczema, treating Yongju ulceration, eczema, and scabies.
6. Combined with Sulfur, used for scabies, tinea, and skin eczema.

bubble_chart Usage and Dosage

For external use: grind into powder and sprinkle or apply as a paste; or boil into an ointment. For internal use: take in pills or powder form.

bubble_chart Cautions and Contraindications

Avoid taking in cases of vomiting and retching due to deficiency-cold.

1. Bencao Jingshu: "Vomiting and retching due to stomach deficiency and vomiting caused by cold should not be treated with this."
2. Bencao Huiyan: "For fright epilepsy due to blood deficiency, do not administer indiscriminately."

bubble_chart Processing and Storage

Gangmu: "For all uses, remove the salt by rinsing with water, eliminate sand and stones by washing, dry by sedimentation, lightly roast over a low flame until it turns purple, place on the ground to remove fire toxin, and then use in medicine."

bubble_chart Modern Pharmacology

Long-term exposure to or ingestion of lead tetroxide can lead to the accumulation of lead in human organs, resulting in symptoms of acute lead poisoning. Lead tetroxide has been experimentally proven to have carcinogenic effects on animals, but its carcinogenicity in humans has not yet been confirmed.

bubble_chart Selected Prescriptions

1. Consumptive thirst and restlessness. Use one qian of Minium, taken with freshly drawn water. After taking the medicine, it is advisable to eat buckwheat porridge.
2. Persistent vomiting. Use four liang of Minium, add half a jin of rice vinegar, boil until dry, then calcine until red-hot in charcoal fire. After cooling, grind into powder and mix with rice to form pills the size of Chinese parasol seeds. Take seven pills each time, swallowed with vinegar soup. This prescription is named "Bixia Dan".
3. Infantile vomiting of water. Grind Minium into powder, mix with jujube pulp, and form into pills the size of gorgon seeds. Pierce one pill with a needle, burn it over a lamp, then grind into fine powder and mix with breast milk for administration. This prescription is named "Shaozhen Wan". Another formula: Add a small amount of Cinnabar and dried alum to the Shaozhen Wan prescription.
4. Rebellious stomach qi. Use two liang each of Minium and Alum, and half a liang of raw stibnite. First, place the Minium and Alum in a crucible, calcine until red-hot, let cool for two days, then add stibnite, grind into powder, mix with a little rice, and form into pills the size of mung beans. Take fifteen pills daily, swallowed with rice soup.
5. Red and white dysentery. Mash jujube pulp, add equal parts of Minium and Alum, each the size of Chinese honeylocust fruit seeds, mix with a little rice, and form into balls the size of bullets. Thread the balls with iron wire, burn thoroughly over a lamp, cool, then grind into fine powder and take with rice soup. Another formula: Stir-fry Minium until purple, add equal parts of stir-fried Coptis, grind finely, mix with paste to form pills the size of sesame seeds. Take fifty pills each time, swallowed with fresh ginger and licorice root soup.
6. Pregnant women with abdominal pain and diarrhea. Use one silky fowl egg, make a small hole in the shell to let the egg white flow out, leaving only the yolk. Fill the hole with five qian of Minium, mix well, seal with mud, roast in fire ash until dry, then grind into fine powder. Take two qian each time, swallowed with rice soup.
7. Hematemesis and hemoptysis. Use one qian of Minium, taken with freshly drawn water.
8. Malaria with chills and fever. Use equal parts of Minium and plant soot, grind finely. On the day of onset, take three qian on an empty stomach, swallowed with rice soup. Two doses can cure. Adding rice or garlic to make pills is also effective. Another formula: Use one liang of Minium and three liang of Changshan powder, mix with honey to form pills the size of Chinese parasol seeds. Take fifty pills each time, swallowed with warm wine. Take once in the morning and once when the disease is about to onset, effective. Another formula: Use two liang of stir-fried Minium and one hundred cloves of garlic, mash into paste, form into pills the size of Chinese parasol seeds. Take nine pills each time on an empty stomach, swallowed with river water. Most effective when taken after two or three malaria episodes. This prescription can also treat dysentery. Another formula: Use half a liang of stir-fried Minium and two liang of Sweet Wormwood soaked in child's urine, grind into powder. Take two qian each time, swallowed with wine for more chills, or tea for more fever.
9. Infantile malaria with high fever and no chills. Use two qian of Minium, taken with honey water. If accompanied by aversion to cold, take with wine. This prescription is named "Guiku Dan".
10. Wind disease. Use two liang each of Minium and Alum, grind separately. Place two bricks on the ground, lay seven layers of paper on the bricks, spread Minium on the paper, then spread Alum on top. Surround with willow wood and burn until about ten jin of wood is consumed, then stop and let cool. Combine and grind the medicine. Take two qian each time, swallowed with warm wine. This prescription is named "Qufeng San".
11. Infantile fright attack of noxious factor (symptoms include sudden colicky pain in the heart and abdomen, distension and qi rushing; or sudden collapse, cold limbs, even fatal). Use one small teaspoon of Minium, mix with three ge of honey, and administer.
12. All eye diseases (for eye diseases, nebula with blurred vision can be treated, but nebula without blurred vision cannot be treated). Use half a catty of honey, boil it in a lead pot until it turns purple, then add two taels of Minium and one tael of water, and continue to refine until all the moisture is gone. Pour it onto a piece of silk cloth to filter. Collect the fine powder that filters through, put it in a bottle, and bury it underground for twenty days before taking it out to apply to the eyes. Apply seven times a day. If the medicine sticks and the eye cannot open, wash it and reapply. Another recipe: Mix Minium and honey evenly, spread it on a cloth, and apply it to the taiyang acupoint. Effective for treating red and painful eyes. Another recipe: Grind equal parts of Minium and Alum into powder and apply to the eyes. Another recipe: Grind equal parts of Minium and cuttlebone sepium into powder, mix with honey, steam, and apply to the eyes. Treats long-term redness and nebula in the eyes. Another recipe: Mix half a tael of Minium with carp gall fel to form a paste and apply to the eyes. Treats eye growths. Another recipe: Grind equal parts of Minium and calomel into powder, blow a small amount into the ear. For left eye disease, blow into the right ear; for right eye disease, blow into the left ear. Treats smallpox-induced nebula.
13. Infant carcinoma of the tongue (thickened tongue). Use one grain of Minium, the size of a soybean, placed under the tongue.
14. Infantile aphtha (ulceration). Use one qian of Minium and one liang of raw honey, mix well, steam until black, and apply to the sores with a chicken feather.
15. Armpit odor. Mix Minium with calomel, blend with saliva, and frequently apply to the armpits.
16. Scorpion sting. Mix Minium with vinegar and apply to the affected area.
17. Knife wound. Apply equal parts of Minium and Talc to the wound.
18. External hemorrhoids with swelling and pain. Grind equal parts of Minium and Talc into a fine powder, mix with freshly drawn water, and apply five times a day.
19. Chronic shank ulcer. Use one liang of Minium, one liang of yellow wax, and five qian of sesame oil, boil into a paste. First wash the affected area with scallion and pepper soup, then apply the medicinal paste. Another method: Grind Minium with water, then stir-fry, take one liang; soak yellow in wine for seven days, dry, and also take one liang; take half a liang of calomel. Grind each into fine powder. First wash the sore with bitter tea, then fill the sore with calomel, apply Minium on top, and cover with a paste made from the yellow powder. Do not remove, and improvement will be seen in a few days.