Taoism was popular in the Wei and Jin Dynasties, and many people studied the art of longevity. The famous alchemist Ge Hong summarized the secret of longevity known as the "immortal" and wrote the Taoist experience of health preservation and longevity into "Baopu Zi Internal and External Chapters" 》. Ge Hong's "The Legend of Immortals" records 94 "immortals", all of which talk about the longevity experiences of people who are over 100 years old. The most widely circulated health book in the Jin Dynasty and almost every household is "Huang Ting Jing" written by Mrs. Wei. According to legend, Mrs. Wei was the daughter of Wei Shu, the general of Emperor Wu of the Jin Dynasty Sima Yan. She went to the mountains to practice Taoism when she was young. After receiving the true teachings from her teacher, she wrote the "Huang Ting Jing" in the form of poetry. After being copied by the calligraphy master Wang Xizhi, it became worth a hundred times more and was especially popular among women among the people and the wives of scholar-bureaucrats. This book is a masterpiece of advanced Taoism and later became a Taoist classic, playing a certain role in popularizing the knowledge of health and longevity. According to legend, there was a man named Wu Dan from Liyi who practiced this advanced guidance and lived to be 170 years old. "Book of Wei" records that Wang Lie, a native of Handan, often took Huangjing but became old and young in appearance. Later, he went to Taihang Mountain to practice martial arts. It is said that he lived for more than 300 years. "The Biography of Luo Jie in the Book of Wei" once recorded: "Luo Jie, on behalf of others,... is one hundred and seven years old, fresh and everlasting.... At the age of one hundred and ten, he will return to old age after listening to the imperial edict;... every time the imperial court has It is said that Xu Xun, a native of Runan who abandoned his official position and practiced medicine in the Jin Dynasty, lived to be 136 years old and wrote a book specializing in health care. His book "Lingjianzi" has been passed down to this day, and he is known as "Xu Zhenjun" in the world.
During the Northern and Southern Dynasties, many centenarians appeared, such as the famous eminent monk and the second generation founder of Zen Buddhism, Hui Ke, who lived to be 107 years old (see "Continued Biography of Eminent Monks"). The "Southern History? Biography of the Liang Clan" alone records several centenarians, such as "there was a woman Xia in the farmhouse who was more than a hundred years old"; Gu Siyuan from Zhongli "died at the age of one hundred and twenty"; an old man from Zhengcheng "died at the age of two" At the age of one hundred and forty, he can no longer eat grain and can only drink his great-grandson's mother's milk." Zhang Yuanshi, a native of Jingzhou, "is one hundred and sixteen years old, has extraordinary physical strength, and eats the same food."