History of the study of Turbellaria in China. Part 1: Ages of Materia Medica and of early expeditions by westerners

The history of the study of turbellarians in China and Japan through the early twentieth Century is reviewed. Up to the middle of the 19th Century, knowledge of the natural history of these countries, including several records of planarians from each, is to be found only in manuscripts and books of the so-called 'Materia Medica.' During the latter half of the 19th Century and into the early part of the 20th Century, several Western zoologists laid the foundation for the Western approach to the study of turbellarians in China and Japan.