Fengxianpu 鳳仙譜

Fengxianpu 鳳仙譜 is a book on garden balsam (Impatiens balsamina) written during the mid-Qing period 清 (1644-1911) by Zhao Xuemin 趙學敏 (c. 1719-1805), courtesy name Yiji 依吉, style Shuxuan 恕軒, from Qiantang 錢塘, Zhejiang. Zhao is known for his supplement to the famous materia medica book Bencao gangmu 本草綱目. His Bencao shiyi 本草拾遺 adds no less than 716 medical plants not described in the illustrious handbook.

Zhao completed his book around 1800. It is based on a fragmentary draft called Qiuhuazhi 秋花志 and other sources, but written as a record of the author's own experience with the cultivation of garden balsam. The text is divided into two fascicles, the first of which is dedicated to terminological matters and to the classification of various kinds of the fengxian flower. The classification is mainly realized according to the colours of the petals which range from red or purple to blue, white, and yellow. Zhao discerns lo less than 230 kinds. Some of them were very rare and therefore highly estimated among cultivators. The flowers were not just enjoyed because of their coloured beauty, but also because they emanated "rhymes" (yun 韻) which had even a higher importance than colours (shang yun er bu shang se 賞韻而不賞色).

The second fascicle explains methods of cultivation, irrigation, the collection of seeds, and methods of disease prevention and cure. The plant itself had also medical importance, as expounded in the chapter Beiyao 備藥.

The book is included in the series Zhaodai congshu 昭代叢書.