The earliest classification is to be found in Taishang Lingbaozhi Caopin, which was written in the closing years of the Eastern Jin dynasty (317-420) and later collected in the Dao Zang (" Daoist Canon "); it can be described as the world's first illustrated mushroom field guide.
菇蕈種類繁多，最早對其做分類的是東晉末年收存在《道藏》中的〈太上靈寶芝草品〉，可說是世界最早的一本菌類圖鑑。