Translations:Kampo/5/en

In 753 A.D., the Chinese priest Jianzhen (in Japanese Ganjin), who was well-versed in medicine, arrived in Japan after five failed attempts in 12 years to cross the East China Sea. As he was blind, he used his sense of smell to identify herbs. He brought medical texts and a large collection of materia medica to the imperial palace in Nara, which he dedicated to the Emperor Shōmu in 756, 49 days after the emperor's death. They are kept in a log-cabin-style treasure house of the Tōdai-Temple (Tōdai-ji) known as Shōsōin.