The ancient Egyptians who were themselves actual descendants of the near mythical and pre-historic Sumerian civilizations are credited to have had the worlds earliest holistic medicine systems. These systems were officially endorsed and recognized by even the almighty priest class that wielded such enormous powers over the populace.

Ancient Egyptian medicine traditions of 1000 B.C. and of an even much earlier period, are known to have used garlic, opium, castor oil, coriander, mint, indigo, and other herbs for medicine and the Old Testament also mentions herb use and cultivation, including mandrake, vetch, caraway, wheat, barley, and rye. This is an over simplification however as Egyptians had an almost universally revered reputation as practitioners of highly sophisticated forms of medicine. The excellent embalming of mummies is a prime example of an Egyptian practice which could be traced even further back in time to near pre-historical times by Egyptian calendars' reckoning. Records of the existence of these highly sophisticated healing systems are just beginning to emerge with the discoveries of new methods of understanding the language semantics of antiquity Egypt.

Chinese herbal medicine like it's near counterpart in Egypt also has great antiquity, with therapeutic roots extending back to Zhou Dynasty, Late Bronze/Early Iron Age at about 2500 to 3000 years ago. From its shamanistic origins, herbalism in archaic China evolved in response to causation or origination concepts current at the time. These notions of the causes of disease in human society related directly to the troubled socio-economic environment that prevailed in early China in the latter half of the first millennium BC.

The Shennong Bencao Jing, the first Chinese herbal book compiled in the Hang Dynasty era, lists 365 medicinal plants and their uses. Ma-Huang the shrub that introduced the drug ephedrine to modern medicine is among the plants listed in the compilation. Included are references to 247 substances that were used by these early people for many different maladies among them back pain relief. Succeeding generations from the Han Dynasty to the Tang Dynasty augmented on the Shennong Bencao Jing.