Six excesses

Excess or untimeliness of the six qì (wind, cold, summerheat, damp, dryness, and fire) that invade the body through the exterior to cause disease. Wind diseases are most common in spring, summerheat in summer, damp disease in long summer, dryness diseases in autumn, and cold diseases in winter. The Inner Classic (内经 nèi jīng) referred to the six excesses as the six qi (the six kinds of weather), but recognized them as causes of diseases. Plain Questions (素问 sù wèn) states, The hundred diseases are all engendered by wind, cold, summerheat, dampness, and fire. The name liù yín is a later coining, thought to have been based on a passage in Plain Questions (素问 sù wèn, zhì zhēn yào dà lùn) which states, when wind is excessive (淫) in the inner body..., when dampness is excessive in the inner body... The term was first recorded in SP-6 (Three Yīn Intersection, 三阴交 sān yīn jiāo), published in CE 1174, in which they are referred to as cold, summerheat, dryness, dampness, wind, and heat (not fire). Each of the six excesses is associated with a season. Fire and summerheat are both forms of heat. Heat in the summer (from the Summer Solstice to Beginning of Autumn) is generally called summerheat, whereas heat that occurs untimely in other seasons is called fire (or heat). Fire is other contexts denotes an intense form of heat and is contrasted with a milder form, warmth.

See externally contracted causes.

Etymology

Chin 淫 yín, dissolute, licentious; excess; evil.