The Imperial Maritime Customs and Sino-British exchange of materia medica, 1850s–1900s

Abstract

Abstract The Imperial Maritime Customs under British influence accomplished and facilitated much work on the transmission of new samples and first-hand information on Chinese drugs to Britain and beyond. It also participated in the shaping of China’s tariff and trade regulation, and quantified China’s drug trade with Britain and others in terms of modern statistics. Its intersection with the British presence was in part characteristic of the dissemination of British and foreign materia medica in Chinese society. The matters between drugs and the Imperial Maritime Customs adds a unique perspective on the networks and activities that engaged China further in global trade and the modern world.