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Chinese/Japanese Pulse Image chart:. Wellcome Collection. Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0). Source: Wellcome Collection.
Illustration of Sparrow-Peck Pulse (quezhuo mai) from Renyuan maiying guizhi tushuo (Pictorial Handbook of Pulse Images Based on the Person). This is a specialist text on pulse diagnosis attributed to the third-century master Shuhe, edited and revised by Shen Jifen in the Ming period (1368-1644). It discusses various pulse images and the medical conditions to which they relate, and contains 48 pulse image diagrams. This undated edition was engraved and published in Japan.
The text states: Sparrow-Peck Pulse is one of the Sixteen Weird Pulses (guai mai). It is also known as Second Corpse (ci shi) or Milk Hoard (rucang). The pulse image of Sparrow-Peck Pulse is described as coming frequently and rapidly beneath the fingers, like a sparrow pecking at its food. There are either three or 8-9 occurences to each sequence of exhalation and inhalation. A patient having this pulse will die within three days. If the pulse is found at the spleen location, death will occur within about two hours (lit. a watch of the day, shichen)