Background Korean cosmetics are widely exported throughout Asia. Cosmetics exploiting traditional Korean medicine lead this trend; thus, the traditional medicinal literature has been invaluable in terms of cosmetic development. We sought candidate medicinal herbs for skincare. Methods We used data mining to investigate associations between medicinal herbs and skin-related keywords (SRKs) in a classical text. We selected 26 SRKs used in the Donguibogam text; these referred to 626 medicinal herbs. Using a term frequency-inverse document frequency approach, we extracted data on herbal characteristics by assessing the co-occurrence frequencies of 52 medicinal herbs and the 26 SRKs. Results We extracted the characteristics of the 52 herbs, each of which exhibited a distinct skin-related action profile. For example Ginseng Radix was associated at a high-level with tonification and anti-aging, but Rehmanniae Radix exhibited a stronger association with anti-aging. Of the 52 herbs, 46 had been subjected to at least one modern study on skincare-related efficacy. Conclusions We made a comprehensive list of candidate medicinal herbs for skincare via data mining a classical medical text. This enhances our understanding of such herbs and will help with discovering new candidate herbs.

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