The first record of prescription of ginseng as a medicinal herb appears in Shen-Neng Pharmacopoeia(AD 456-536), and during the Koryo Dynasty(AD 918-1392) it was renowned as the best medicine with miraculous potency. Since then, it has been called Korean Ginseng,which means ginseng from Koryo. Especially, ancient Chinese emperors strove to find a medicinal herb with miraculous virtue in the high mountains and secluded valleys. Korean Ginseng was the most precious herb to them.

The efficacy of ginseng which has been proven by modern medicine was much more mysterious to ancient people, together with veiled ingredients and its human shape. It was actually used for blood nourishing and as a tonic. At the same time it was called a cure-all and was believed to be a miraculous medicine, a source of eternal youth. Later, ginseng is referred to by the scientific name Panax Ginseng C. A. Meyer, after a Russian botanist Carl Anton Meyer, of which pan(all) combined with axos(medicine) means cure-all.

In spite of simmani's endeavor to find ginseng in mountains, the growing demands for wild ginseng could not be fulfilled. Due to the acute shortage of wild ginseng, people eventually started to sow ginseng seeds and cultivate them. That was 1000 years ago from now. At first, the seeds were planted in the mountains. However, the cultivation was very difficult, for ginseng is a semi-shade plant particular about soil and climate; its stems growing in the shady place are very thin and weak so they can be easily attacked by insects and blights; further, it is a perennial plant growing exceptionally slow, compared to other plants. Nevertheless, the steady research on cultivation methods under the heaven-blessed climate condition for ginseng enabled the mass cultivation in the field in 1900's. Then, the cultivation of ginseng began across the country in Korea.

Korean Ginseng has been renowned to Western Europe as well as in Asia including China,Japan and other neighboring countries amid active international exchanges crossing the boundaries among countries. Further, owing to the reputation for efficacy of ginseng, more people in countries such as China, Japan, the United States, Canada and Nepal are cultivating epigones of ginseng. However, the pronoun for ginseng is Korean Ginseng planted in its original soil, at the most suitable field, with the oldest history of cultivation, for the best quality.