Hemorrhage is a devastating type of stroke, accounts for 15-20% of all strokes. This disease can cause cognitive dysfunction with a very high mortality rate. Cupping therapy of Traditional Korean medicine has frequently been used to relieve a variety of diseases or clinical conditions, although not in the memory loss after hemorrhage. This study was designed to evaluate the effects of cupping therapy on learning and memory with Y-maze test, as well as its effects on different molecular changes in hippocampus following the induction of hemorrhage in rats. Cupping, using vacuum cupping machine, was applied at target area for 5 min daily for 7 consecutive days, commencing 1 day after brain impairment. As a result, induction of hemorrhage enhanced memory deficit, suppressed brain-derived neurotrophin factor (BDNF) in the hippocampus. Cupping treatment effectively reversed collagenase-induced cognitive impairment in SD rats which was represented by improvement of spontaneous alterations in Y-maze test. In addition, BDNF expression was enhanced after cupping therapy. The present results suggest that the therapeutic effects of cupping treatment after hemorrhage is involved in expression of BDNF.