(1) Discarding impurity: Taking away the mud and impurity and non-pharmaceutical parts, thus making the herbs clean and pure.

(2) Breaking into fine pieces: Some medicinal materials should be pounded or ground into powder for convenience in decocting, making preparations or administrating.

(3) Cutting：According to different requirements, cut medicinal materials into pieces, parts or tiny bit, etc., for convenience in decocting or further preparing, drying, and storing, etc..

Processing herbs with water is a kind of method of treating pharmaceutical materials for the purposes of cleaning, softening, or making them easy to cut or regulate medicinal properties, reducing their toxicity, or making mineral drugs pure, fine and smooth, etc.. The commonly-used methods are listed as follows.

(1) Washing: Mud and impurity on the surface of the pharmaceutical materials should be washed with water.

(2) Softening: Softening is a method for making the medicinal materials soft gradually through permeable actions such as sprinkling, washing, soaking-with-sealing with clean water so as to make them easy to cut.

(3) Rinsing: Rinsing is a method for removing the salty elements, offensive smell, poisonous substances from the medicinal materials by putting them a certain time in a large container with water which must be running or changed frequently.

(4) Powder-refining method with water: This is a method for refining and getting the fine powder by grinding the insoluble and mineral medicinal minerals in water. This method is first applied to crush the medicinal materials into particles, and then to grind them in a mortar which contains a certain amount of clean water (its level above the drugs). During grinding, the supernatant suspension is decanted and then water is added again. The procedures above may be repeated until all the coarse particles are ground into fine particles. The sediment of coarse particles will be left when the supernatant fluid of suspension is decanted, from which fine powder is precipitated, separated and then dried in the sun for use. The medicinal herbs through powder-refining method with water are pure, fine and smooth, easily absorbed and light stimulative when used exteriorly; during the process, the loss of medicinal materials can also be reduced.

Processing with fire is a method which is used in treating crude medicinal materials by heating with fire. This method includes the following commonly used ones, such as parching, stir-baking with adjuvants, calcining, and roasting in ashes, etc..

(1) Parching: By parching, some of the pharmaceutical components can be destroyed or eliminated, their properties and effects can be properly changed, their irritant properties and side-effects can be reduced and their side-nature of coldness or dryness may be moderated. Parched medicinal materials have the actions of checking offensive odor and tastes and invigorating the spleen, and they are easy to be pounded into pieces or powder and stored, and their effective components may be dissolved easily in decoction. Parching may be divided into two procedures with adjuvants or without adjuvants.

① Simple parching: It is the procedure of stir-baking without adjuvants. According to the degrees required, parching may be divided into three kinds, parching medicinal materials until they become yellowish, burnt-color or carbonized. By parching them into yellowish we mean that they are stir-baked into yellow surface or till they bulge while there is no change in their interior. The medicinal materials parched into yellowish can reduce the coldness and check the tastes. By parching them into burnt-color we mean that they are toasted into burnt- yellow or burnt-brown surface and yellow interior with burnt odor. Mter they are parched into those with burnt-color, they can promote the action of invigorating the spleen and digestion. By parching them into carbonized one we mean that their surface becomes burnt black and the interior is burnt yellow while their medicinal properties still exist. After parching, their effect of arresting hemorrhage can be reinforced.

② Complex parching：It is the procedure of stir-baking with certain amount of solid adjuvants until the degrees needed. The commonly-used adjuvants are mud, bran, rice, talc or powder of surf clam shell, etc..

(2) Stir-baking with liquid adjuvants：This procedure is a method for the purpose of correcting their pharmaceutical properties, increasing their therapeutic actions or reducing their side effects through gradual increase of permeation of the liquid adjuvants into the medicinal materials during processing. The commonly used liquid adjuvants include honey, wine, vinegar, salt solution, and ginger juice, etc.. The procedures are respectively known as stir-baking with honey, wine, vinegar, salt solution and ginger juice. Since the used adjuvants are different, their effects are also different. For example, honey-stir-baked Chinese medicinal herbs have better effects on moistening the lung and relieving cough, invigorating the stomach and spleen, or can moderate the pharmaceutical properties and reduce the toxic effects; wine-stir-baked ones can promote the blood circulation and reduce the side-effects of some pharmaceutical herbs; vinegar-stir-baked ones can exert more remarkable effects on soothing the liver and relieving pain and reducing the toxic effects; salt-solution-baked ones will strengthen the effects on tonifying the kidney, nourishing yin and lowering the fire, etc.； ginger juice-stir-baked ones can get more obvious effects on relieving cold, vomiting and reducing the toxic effects.

(3) Calcining: It is a method of treating crude medicinal materials by direct or indirect burning with strong fire. The purposes are to make them pure, clean, crispy, easy to be powdered and their effective components decocted out or their natures change to produce better therapeutic effects. Some crude medicinal herbs of hard minerals or shells may be burned directly till they are thoroughly reddish, then they are quickly put into vinegar or clean water, which is called tempering. Some medicinal herbs as Xueyutan (Cmni Carbonisatus), Zonglfitan (Trachycarpi Carbonisatus) should be burned and carbonized in a sealed refractory container till its bottom gets fully flushed.

(4) Roasting in hot ashes: The process requires to wrap the raw medicinal materials with wet paper or dough and roast them in smouldering ashes till the coat becomes burnt black so as to eliminate some oil, irritant materials or reduce toxic side effects.

It is a method for treating medicinal materials with fire and water or sometimes with other adjuvants added. These frequently used methods are as follows.

(1) Steaming: Steaming is a method of processing crude medicinal materials by putting them in a steaming pot or the like so as to heat them with steam.

(2) Boiling：Boiling is a method of treating the crude by heating them in clean water or other liquid adjuvants at boiling temperature.

(3) Scalding：Scalding is a method of treating the crude by putting them into boiling water, and stirring them for a short while before taking them out.

The medicinal materials through the above treatments can promote therapeutic effects, reduce their toxicity, change their nature and effects and are easily stored.