In Chinese tradition, Shennong — the Divine Farmer — stands as a legendary ancestor of agriculture and medicine. Centuries later, his name was attached to the Shennong Bencao Jing, one of China’s foundational works of materia medica.

The text includes cannabis under the name mafen (麻蕡), a term associated with the plant’s flowering or fruiting material, although the exact identification of particular plant parts became disputed in later commentaries.

Whether we read Shennong as myth, cultural ancestor or symbol of accumulated plant knowledge, the trace is important. Cannabis appears in the tradition attached to his name not as scandal, but as materia medica:

a plant observed, classified, tested, feared, respected and used.

For LIBERA HERBA, this is not a call to romanticise ancient medicine.
It is a reminder that modern prohibition is young.

The plant’s place within human knowledge
is much older.

Factual Note

Shennong is a legendary culture hero associated with agriculture, medicinal plants and the origins of Chinese medicine. He should not be presented as the historical author of the Shennong Bencao Jing.

The surviving work is generally understood as an anonymous compilation from approximately the first or second century CE, drawing on earlier traditions and later transmitted through commentaries.

Cannabis appears in the text under the heading mafen (麻蕡). Later medical literature disagreed over whether terms such as mafen, mabo and mahua referred to particular flowers, flowering spikes or fruiting material. The entry therefore documents cannabis within early Chinese materia medica, but it does not prove that the legendary Shennong personally used or described the plant.

Shennong – the herb before the crime

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