142

APOTHECARIES.

the confectionarii should take an oath to keep by them freshand sufficient drags, and to make up medicines exactly ac-cording to the prescriptions of the physicians; and a pricewas fixed by which the stationarii might vend medicines soprepared, and keep them a year or two for sale in a publicshop, or store. The physicians at Salerno, had the inspec-tion of the stores of the stationes, which were not to beestablished in every or any place, but only in certain towns.That the confectionarii were those who made up the medi-cines, or confectionary, appears pretty evident; whilst pro-bability favours our belief that the statio were the placeswhere they were deposited for sale. It should be re-marked, that the word apotheca very seldom occurs in thatedict; even when it does, it evidently implies the ware-house where drugs were preserved ; whence, apotliecariiwere evidently those who kept those warehouses.

The term prescription, in its physical sense, has also ameaning which we conceive may be adduced from the prac-tice of that day; and perhaps from what we have seen inthis article, it claims a more ancient descent; for at theperiod now under consideration, in Europe , as well as inEgypt , it should appear, that the drugs to be advised byphysicians, and prepared by their ministers, the subalternapothecaries, were in the first place prescribed specificallyby the edicts or institutions of the respective governments.Whether this practice was likewise common in ancientGreece, Arabia, and Rome, we are not informed.

From the application of the same identical terms in theRoman pandects above mentioned, and their recurrence inthe edict last spoken of, no doubt remains on our mind butthe same sense was implied in both of those instruments ; andour belief is farther strengthened from the following circum-stances. After a physician had passed an examination, andpreparatory to his having obtained a licence to practise, itbecame essential he should swear to observe Formurn curiatractenus observatam; and if he found quod aliquis confec-tionarius minus bene conficiat, he was obliged to giveinformation to the Curia. In their turn, the confectionariisware they would make up Confectiones secundum pradictamformam. It was likewise necessary that electuaries, syrups,and other medicines should be accompanied with a certifi-cate from a physician, to show that they were properlyprepared.

To many it may appear somewhat extraordinary thatthis edict alludes only to certain medicines commonly-employed, which probably had been previously fixed upon