Abstract: AIM: To establish the theory and method for the identification of Traditional Chinese Herbal Medicines (TCHMs) by ¹HNMR. METHODS: Most of the Traditional Chinese Medicines are of botanical origin and each of them has characteristic chemical constituents. The general extract which contains these characteristic and relatively regular herbal constituents can be obtained by a suitable extraction and separation procedure, and was named the characteristic general extract of the TCHM. The ¹HNMR finger-prints of these extracts were obtained on the NMR spectrometer. On basis of studies of the chemical constituents and structures of these characteristic general extract, the characteristic signals in these ¹HNMR fingerprints can be assigned. RESULTS: The ¹HNMR finger-prints of every kind of these TCHMs has highly characteristic features and reproducibility. The finger-prints of the same kind of TCHMs distributed in different areas are highly identicle. The finger-prints of the characteristic general extracts from many TCHMs such as Panax ginseng, Gastrodia elata and Coptis chinensis, etc. have shown characteristic signals of their active constituents. The signals from δ 0.87～1.64 and δ 4.16～5.12 on the finger-prints of Panax ginseng show clearly the existence of Ginsenosides, and the signals from δ 6.60～7.35 on the finger-print of Gastrodia elata show clearly the existence of Gastrodin and p-Hydroxybenzyl alcohol. The similar situation the active compounds can be shown clearly can be found on the ¹HNMR finger-prints of Coptis chinensis, etc. CONCLUSION: The ¹HNMR characteristic signals and data of most TCHMs obtained by the method of this paper can be regarded as references and relative standard spectra in the identification of TCHMs.