This research project is an attempt to study the placenta in the perspectives of medico-cultural history. In the past, Chinese attitudes towards the placenta were diverse and ambiguous. On the one hand, some of them believed that the placenta was effective for curing a wide range of illnesses, as well as for nourishing the body and prolonging life. This belief was reinforced by both medical theories and Daoist cosmology in which the placenta plays a key in procreation and generation. In Ming China, however, certain Confucian scholars and elite doctors criticised eating placenta as a barbarian custom referring to less civilised tribes. Owing to the old belief that the placenta is bound to the forthcoming fate of a newly born baby, some of them would instead suggest that the placenta should be buried properly after his/her childbirth. Given these contradictory views, this project is not only aimed to disentangle Chinese complex towards the placenta as food/drug/panacea in terms of materia medica and material culture. It will also reveal the complexities of the placenta religiously perceived, medically processed and secularly consumed in Ming China.