Traditionally used for
- Eye health
- Nose & throat
- Cough & breathing
- Bowel health
- Urinary & fluids
- Skin
Cautions & contraindications
- Liver conditions
- Toxic — professional use only
☯ TCM Properties
Removes Wind-Phlegm, dissolves film, removes putrefication, shrinks furuncles and kills Intestinal parasites
Traditional Chinese Uses
Kong Que Shi ("peacock stone") is malachite, a basic copper carbonate mineral. Sour and astringent with a neutral nature and a toxic designation, entering the Liver and Gallbladder channels, it removes Wind-Phlegm, dissolves corneal film, removes putrid tissue, reduces furuncles and kills intestinal parasites. Historically it was applied for corneal opacity and nebula, conjunctivitis, hemorrhoids, throat sores, and stubborn skin lesions with dead tissue.
As a toxic copper compound, Kong Que Shi is used externally only — finely ground and applied topically — and is not taken internally in ordinary practice. Copper salts are corrosive and systemically toxic if ingested, so preparation and use require professional handling.
Relationships
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Botanical Description
Kong Que Shi (“peacock stone”) is a mineral substance, not a plant. It is malachite, a hydrated basic copper carbonate of composition Cu2(CO3)(OH)2, formed as a secondary mineral in the oxidized zone of copper ore deposits. Specimens occur as banded, botryoidal, reniform, or fibrous masses of brilliant emerald to dark green color, with a silky to vitreous luster and a pale green streak; in section they show characteristic concentric color zoning. Chinese deposits are reported from Hubei, Guangdong, and Yunnan. In traditional Chinese medicine, finely powdered, water-levigated malachite has been used externally for skin lesions and historically internally in small, processed doses to calm fright and clear toxin. Internal use is now strongly discouraged because of copper toxicity; only external, well-prepared preparations should be considered, and only under qualified guidance.
Active Constituents
Malachite, Cu2CO3(OH)2
Basic copper carbonate mineral of the oxidised zone of copper orebodiesConcentration: Stoichiometrically 57.5 percent copper by mass. No Chinese Pharmacopoeia monograph for this drug could be located, so there is no official assay, no identity test and no elemental limit of any kind behind it - the figure above is the composition of the pure mineral, not a specification the article has to meet.
The whole drug. Malachite is only slightly soluble at neutral pH, which is why it survives as an ornamental stone, but it dissolves readily in acid; gastric acid converts it to soluble copper(II) salts. Its classical actions - inducing vomiting and purgation, dispelling wind-phlegm, brightening the eyes, killing parasites - are all consequences of delivering ionic copper to mucosa. Emesis after swallowing a copper salt is a toxic effect that classical practice used as a therapeutic one.
Copper(II) ion
Essential trace metal in microgram quantities; a corrosive and haemolytic poison in gram quantitiesConcentration: EFSA's 2023 re-evaluation concluded that copper retention is not expected at an intake of 5 mg copper per day for adults, equivalent to 0.07 mg/kg body weight per day. A classical internal dose of the copper-green drugs, half a qian to one qian, is roughly 1.5-3 g of mineral and therefore delivers on the order of 0.9-1.7 g of copper: some two to three hundred times a whole day's safe intake, and within the same order of magnitude as the copper content of a reported lethal copper sulfate ingestion.
Ionic copper is directly corrosive to gastric mucosa, causes intravascular haemolysis, and produces centrilobular hepatic necrosis, acute kidney injury, methaemoglobinaemia, rhabdomyolysis and shock in the published copper sulfate poisonings. The characteristic early presentation is a metallic taste with blue-green vomit and abdominal pain. There is no scenario in modern practice in which an internal dose of this magnitude is defensible.
Azurite, Cu3(CO3)2(OH)2
The blue basic copper carbonate that forms and alters with malachite in the same ore zoneConcentration: Routinely intergrown with malachite; the Ben Cao Gang Mu already records the transformation of one into the other
Chemically a near neighbour with the same hazard - it is copper carbonate with a slightly different stoichiometry and gives the same copper(II) on contact with acid. It matters here mainly because of nomenclature: the classical Chinese mineral vocabulary of kong qing, zeng qing, shi lu and lu qing spans azurite, malachite and hollow copper-carbonate nodules without cleanly separating them, so a classical citation cannot be assumed to name the mineral in the jar.
Accessory minerals of the oxidised copper cap: cuprite, chrysocolla, iron oxyhydroxides, calcite and quartz
Gangue and secondary minerals of the supergene zoneConcentration: Variable and unquantified; there is no monograph requiring their control
Not therapeutically active. The oxidised caps of copper deposits are also where secondary arsenate minerals form, so the geological setting that produces malachite is one in which arsenic-bearing species are a realistic accessory. Without an assay this is unmeasured rather than absent.
Lead, cadmium, arsenic and mercury (trace)
Trace heavy-metal and metalloid contaminantsConcentration: Entirely uncontrolled. No pharmacopoeial monograph, and therefore no As/Pb/Cd/Hg limit, could be found for this drug. The general Chinese Pharmacopoeia figures quoted for Chinese medicines - Pb 5, Cd 1, As 2, Hg 0.2 and Cu 20 mg/kg - are attached to designated herbal pieces; note in passing that the copper figure of 20 mg/kg is about twenty-nine thousand times lower than the copper content of malachite itself, which is one measure of how far outside the ordinary contaminant framework this drug sits.
Stated plainly because the negative is the finding: this is an unstandardised mined mineral with no assay, no identity test and no elemental limits, so nothing about its trace-metal load can be asserted in either direction. Ornamental and lapidary malachite, which is what most material on the market is, is not produced to any medicinal standard at all.
Malachite green - not a constituent of this drug and not chemically related to it
Synthetic triphenylmethane dye, C23H25ClN2; contains no copper and no carbonateConcentration: Zero. The two substances share a colour and part of a name and nothing else.
Recorded here because the confusion is real and consequential. Malachite green is a synthetic dye used illicitly as an antifungal and antiparasitic in aquaculture; it is prohibited in food-producing animals in the EU and the United States, and the EU sets a reference point for action for the sum of malachite green and leucomalachite green rather than any permitted residue. IARC evaluated the group in Monographs Volume 129: leucomalachite green, the metabolite that persists in fish tissue, was classified as possibly carcinogenic to humans, Group 2B, while malachite green itself was not classifiable, Group 3. None of this evidence attaches to the mineral, and none of the mineral's copper hazard attaches to the dye. Search results, supplier listings and regulatory alerts for one will routinely surface the other.
⚠ Drug Interactions
Internal administration of any kind, and gastric acid as the enabling factor
Malachite is a copper mineral at 57.5 percent copper and is soluble in acid. A classical internal dose therefore delivers copper in gram quantities into an acidic stomach, which is the exact exposure documented in the copper sulfate poisoning literature: metallic taste and blue-green emesis, then haemolysis, centrilobular hepatic necrosis, acute renal failure, methaemoglobinaemia and cardiovascular collapse, managed in reported cases with chelation, exchange transfusion or plasma exchange. That the classical texts describe this drug as inducing vomiting and purgation is a description of the poisoning, not a separate pharmacology. Ben Cao Gang Mu already records that it is sour with slight toxicity and that overdose brings violent vomiting, abdominal pain, bloody dysentery, convulsions and collapse.
Clinical note: Do not prescribe this mineral internally. There is no modern indication for which the risk is defensible, and no dose at which the copper delivered is within any safe-intake figure. If ingestion has occurred, treat it as acute copper poisoning and involve toxicology early.
Wilson disease and other disorders of copper handling, including cholestatic liver disease
Wilson disease is failure of biliary copper excretion, so copper accumulates in liver and brain; biliary obstruction produces a similar retention. Adding a gram-scale copper load to a patient who cannot excrete copper is the clearest possible contraindication. Wilson disease is also often undiagnosed at the point a patient presents with hepatitis or a movement disorder, so it cannot be assumed absent.
Clinical note: Absolute contraindication. Also avoid in any patient with unexplained liver disease, haemolysis or neuropsychiatric symptoms until Wilson disease has been excluded.
Penicillamine, trientine, zinc acetate and other copper-lowering therapy
Copper chelators and zinc-induced metallothionein blockade are the entire management of copper overload; zinc works by inducing intestinal metallothionein to trap dietary copper. Introducing a concentrated copper mineral works directly against both mechanisms, and the interaction runs the other way too - chelation therapy will not protect against an acute gram-scale copper ingestion.
Clinical note: Never combine. Patients on copper-lowering therapy should be asked specifically about mineral and traditional preparations, which are not always volunteered as medicines.
Malachite green residues and malachite-green-contaminated fish (a name confusion, not a pharmacological interaction)
Malachite green is a synthetic triphenylmethane dye with no copper in it, used illicitly in aquaculture and prohibited in food-producing animals in the EU and the United States; its persistent metabolite leucomalachite green is IARC Group 2B. The mineral malachite is a basic copper carbonate. The two share a name fragment and a colour and nothing else, but the shared name means safety information, supplier listings and regulatory alerts for one routinely appear under the other, and a practitioner who reads a malachite green alert as applying to Kong Que Shi will draw entirely the wrong conclusions about both.
Clinical note: Keep the two apart explicitly in records and in patient conversation. Specify the mineral by formula, Cu2CO3(OH)2, when sourcing. Do not import malachite green's carcinogenicity discussion into this drug, and do not let the absence of a carcinogenicity signal for the dye reassure anyone about the mineral's copper.
Tong Lu (verdigris) and artificial copper-green articles bulked with calcined gypsum
The functions usually listed for Kong Que Shi - dispelling wind-phlegm, dissolving eye film, removing putrefaction, reducing furuncles and killing intestinal parasites - are those recorded in the materia medica under Tong Lu, copper green, which Li Shizhen describes as formed from the liquid vapour of copper. The commercial Tong Lu supply has historically comprised three quite different things: naturally formed verdigris scraped as powder or irregular flakes, a manufactured article made by blending verdigris or synthetic basic copper carbonate with calcined gypsum into blocks, and natural malachite. All three are basic copper compounds with the same acute copper hazard, but they differ in copper content, in what else is in them, and in whether they are a mined mineral or a workshop product.
Clinical note: Establish which of the three articles a formula or a supplier means before dispensing. A gypsum-extended manufactured block and a mined malachite are not interchangeable, and neither is standardised.
Kong Qing, Zeng Qing and Shi Lu in classical citations (azurite and hollow copper-carbonate nodules)
The classical Chinese vocabulary for the copper carbonates does not map cleanly onto modern mineral species. Kong qing, the hollow blue nodule of the early materia medica, is generally taken as azurite or as hollow malachite; zeng qing, kong qing and yangmei qing are graded against each other in the sources Li Shizhen quotes; lu qing and shi lu are the green massive material. Attributing a Shen Nong Ben Cao Jing indication for kong qing to Kong Que Shi is a species-level error of the same kind that this database exists to avoid.
Clinical note: Treat classical citations for kong qing and zeng qing as evidence about a related but distinct article. Where the identity matters clinically, it is the copper content that governs, and all of these minerals carry it.
Grinding, sanding or dry-powdering the mineral (occupational and dispensary exposure)
The classical preparation is exactly this: crushing, sieving and water flotation of the mineral to a fine powder, recorded in the Ben Cao Tu Jing. Dry processing of a soft carbonate generates fine respirable particulate of a soluble-in-acid copper salt, and the person exposed is whoever prepares it. The classical instruction to grind under water rather than dry has an occupational logic to it whether or not that was the original reason.
Clinical note: Never dry-grind. If the mineral is handled at all, wet-grind it with respiratory and eye protection, and do not let the dispensary generate dust.
Dosage
| Form | Amount | Frequency | Duration | Population | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| topical | Appropriate amount — external use only | Daily | — | — | No ChP monograph. Malachite, basic copper carbonate. EXTERNAL USE ONLY — historically applied to sores and as an escharotic. Soluble copper salts are emetic and nephrotoxic on ingestion; no internal dose is established. Compare dan-fan (CuSO₄). |
Evidence Tier
Limited evidence · 2 studiesRecorded studies by study design, strongest design at the top. This is a study-design tier only, not a GRADE rating: it does not weigh risk of bias, consistency or precision.
Systematic review / meta-analysis
0
Randomized controlled trial
0
Other clinical trial
0
Observational / case report
2
1 verified · 1 unverified
In vitro / animal
0
Other / unclassified
0
Verified: design read from PubMed for a DOI that resolves to the cited paper Unverified: taken from the study's recorded description
Clinical Studies
Acute copper sulphate poisoning: A case report and literature review
Case report with a review of the published literature on acute copper sulfate ingestion, setting out the characteristic course: corrosive gastrointestinal injury with blue-green vomiting, then intravascular haemolysis, methaemoglobinaemia, hepatic and renal failure and cardiovascular collapse. This describes a different copper salt from malachite, and that difference should be held in view - copper sulfate is freely soluble while malachite requires gastric acid to release its copper - but the toxic entity delivered is the same copper(II) ion, and the doses involved are of the same order as those a classical internal dose of a copper mineral would supply.
Complications and management of acute copper sulphate poisoning; a case discussion
A detailed clinical account of acute copper sulfate poisoning and its management, from a setting where copper salt ingestion is common. It is included for the management detail rather than as evidence about the mineral: it documents what a copper-poisoned patient actually looks like and what supportive care and chelation are required, which is the information a practitioner needs if a copper mineral has been swallowed. As with the preceding report, the salt is not malachite and the summary should not be read as a study of this drug.
Historical Texts
Ben Cao Tu Jing (Illustrated Classic of Materia Medica), Su Song
Northern Song, 1061Ben Cao Gang Mu (Compendium of Materia Medica), Li Shizhen - entries for Tong Qing and Lu Qing
Ming, 1596Ben Cao Gang Mu, quoting the Geng Xin Yu Ce on the grading of the blue and green copper minerals
Ming, 1596, quoting an earlier alchemical sourceReferences
- EFSA Scientific Committee; More SJ; Bampidis V; Benford D; Bragard C; Halldorsson TI; Hernandez-Jerez AF; Hougaard Bennekou S; Koutsoumanis K; Lambre C; Machera K; Mullins E. Re‐evaluation of the existing health‐based guidance values for copper and exposure assessment from all sources . EFSA Journal (2023) [DOI]
- Gaetke LM; Chow CK. Copper toxicity, oxidative stress, and antioxidant nutrients . Toxicology (2003) [DOI]
- Barber RG; Grenier ZA; Burkhead JL. Copper Toxicity Is Not Just Oxidative Damage: Zinc Systems and Insight from Wilson Disease . Biomedicines (2021) [DOI]
- Le Curieux F; Gohlke JM; Pronk A; Andersen WC; Chen G; Fang JL; Mitrowska K; Sanders PJJ; Sun M; Umbuzeiro GA; Umemura T; Benbrahim-Tallaa L. Carcinogenicity of gentian violet, leucogentian violet, malachite green, leucomalachite green, and CI Direct Blue 218 . The Lancet Oncology (2021) [DOI]
- Culp SJ; Mellick PW; Trotter RW; Greenlees KJ; Kodell RL; Beland FA. Carcinogenicity of malachite green chloride and leucomalachite green in B6C3F1 mice and F344 rats . Food and Chemical Toxicology (2006) [DOI]
- EFSA Panel on Contaminants in the Food Chain (CONTAM). Malachite green in food . EFSA Journal (2016) [DOI]
- Sinkovic A; Strdin A; Svensek F. Severe Acute Copper Sulphate Poisoning: A Case Report . Archives of Industrial Hygiene and Toxicology (2008) [DOI]
This information is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace professional medical advice. Always consult a qualified healthcare provider before using any herbal remedy, especially if you are pregnant, nursing, or taking medications.
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