Code and Data for "Early Han-Dynasty Bodily Pathways - A Spatial Reconstruction and Comparative Analysis"

This repository contains the analysis code and processed/raw data accompanying our manuscript. It provides a reproducible pipeline for extracting, quality-controlling, averaging, and rendering participant-drawn linear courses within predefined anatomical body regions. The pipeline processes drawings separately by pathway system, pathway number, body region, and body view. It identifies the main course of each drawing, excludes geometric outliers, selects suitable body views, calculates regional mean courses, and combines overlapping regional results into final pathway representations. Repository structure repository/ ├── raw_data/ │ ├── MY/ │ ├── MZ/ │ ├── T/ │ └── Z/ ├── masks/ ├── scripts/ │ └── average_linear_courses.py └── results/ Contents Raw data (raw_data/) Participant drawings in PNG format with transparent backgrounds. Drawings are organized by pathway system in the folders MY, MZ, T, and Z. All front, back, and side drawings belonging to one pathway system are stored together in the corresponding system folder. File names encode the pathway system, participant number, pathway number, and body view: <SYSTEM><PARTICIPANT>_<PATHWAY NUMBER>_<VIEW>.png For example: MY01_03_front.png The supported body views are front, back, and side. Masks (masks/) Anatomical body-region masks used to restrict the extraction and averaging of courses to predefined regions within the body outline. Mask file names indicate the anatomical region and corresponding body view, for example: arm_back.png leg_side_inner.png Scripts (scripts/) average_linear_courses.py — Extracts and skeletonizes participant-drawn courses, excludes form and length outliers, selects suitable body views, computes regional mean courses, blends overlapping regional courses, and generates combined pathway representations. Results (results/) The script creates a separate output folder for each pathway system: results/ ├── MY/ │ ├── tables/ │ ├── means/ │ ├── combined/ │ └── skeletons/ ├── MZ/ ├── T/ └── Z/ The output includes: CSV tables containing quality-control results, excluded outliers, and selected body views. Regional mean-course images for each pathway number, body region, and retained view. Primary views are shown as solid lines; secondary views as dashed lines. Combined pathway representations for each pathway system, pathway number, and body view. Optional diagnostic skeleton images. Requirements Python ≥ 3.10 Dependencies: numpy, pandas, Pillow, scikit-image, scipy The required packages can be installed using: pip install numpy pandas pillow scikit-image scipy Usage The script automatically locates the repository folders based on its position in the scripts/ directory. No paths need to be entered manually. From the repository root, run: python3 scripts/average_linear_courses.py Alternatively, change to the scripts/ folder and run: cd scripts python3 average_linear_courses.py Participant drawings are read from the pathway-system folders under raw_data/, anatomical masks are read from masks/, and all outputs are generated automatically under results/.