OBJECTIVE To es tablish the fingerprints of pith-nodecayed and pith-decayed Scutellaria baicalensis ，and to investigate the difference of their anti-inflammatory activities. METHODS HPLC method was adopted to establish the fingerprints of 5 batches of pith-nodecayed S. baicalensis and 5 batches of pith-decayed S. baicalensis . SIMCA 14.1 software was adopted to screen the markers of weight difference between pith-decayed S. baicalensis and pith-nodecayed S. baicalensis ，using variable importance in projection （VIP）＞1 as standard. Using the inhibitory rates of NO ，IL-6 and IL- 1β in supernatant of lipopo- lysaccharide（LPS）-induced monocyte macrophages （RAW264.7 cells）as indexes ，the anti-inflammatory activities of pith-decayed and pith-nodecayed S. baicalensis were evaluated and median effective concentration （EC50）of NO were calculated. The gray correlation method was used for spectrum-effect relationship analysis ；SPSS 26.0 software was used for cluster analysis using the inhibitory rates of NO ，IL-6 and IL- 1β in cells at the concentration of 50 μg/mL. RESULTS There were 15 common peaks in 5 batches of pith-nodecayed S. baicalensis and 5 batches of pith-decayed S. baicalensis ，and the similarity of them was greater than 0.990. There were total of 8 peaks with VIP 1.0，they were peak 14，12，15，6，10，13，11 and 4. At jcqinge@163.com the concentration of 50 μg/mL，the inhibitory rates of pith- decayed S. baicalensis extract to NO ，IL-6，IL-1 β and the average EC 50 were 62.14％-71.13％，3.32％ -18.38％ and 93.12％-95.47％ and 25.35 μg/mL，respectively；those of pith-nodecayed S. baicalensis extract were 39.52％-50.19％， 6.21％-22.55％，94.10％-96.44％ and 58.63 μg/mL，respectively. Average NO inhibition rate of pith-decayed S. baicalensis extract was significantly higher than that of pith- nodecayed S. baicalensis extract；average EC 50 and average IL- 6 inhibitory rate of pith-decayed S. baicalensis extract were significantly lower than those of pith-nodecayed S. baicalensis extract（P＜0.05）. There was no statistical significance in average inhibitory rate of IL- 1β（P＞0.05）. The correlation degrees of peaks 2-3，5-8 and 10-11 with inhibitory rate of NO were all greater than 0.8. The correlation degrees of peaks 2，5，8-9 with inhibitory rate of IL- 1β were all greater than 0.9. The correlation degrees of 15 common peaks with inhibitory rate of IL- 6 were all less than 0.8. Ten batches of samples could be grouped into two categories ，K1-K5 were clustered into one category and T 12-T16 were clustered into one category. CONCLUSIONS At the concentration of 50 µg/mL，the inhibitory effect of pith-decayed S. baicalensis extract to NO is stronger than that of pith-nodecayed S. baicalensis extract，while the inhibitory effect on IL- 6 is weaker than that of pith-nodecayed S. baicalensis extract；they have similar inhibitory effect on IL- 1β. The corresponding components of peak 6，10-11 are preliminarily identified as main chemical components of the difference in anti-inflammatory activity between pith-decayed S. baicalensis and pith-nodecayed S. baicalensis .