Although the Grocers were the recognised drug dealers of this country,
apothecaries who were associated in their Guild were also recognised.
Some authorities name Richard Fitznigel as apothecary to Henry II
before he was made Bishop of London. But this evidence cannot be
trusted. The first definite allusion to an apothecary in England occurs
in 1345, when Edward III granted a pension of sixpence a day for life
to Coursus de Gangeland, an apothecary of London, in recognition of
his services in attending on the king during his illness in Scotland.
The record of this grant is found in Rymer’s “Foedera,” which was not
published until 1704, but Rymer was historiographer royal, appointed
by William III, and his work was a compilation from official archives.
An earlier mention of an apothecary is found in the Scottish Exchequer
Rolls wherein it appears that on the death of Robert the Bruce, in
1329, payments were made to John the Apothecary, presumably for
materials for embalming the king’s body. Dr. J. Mason Good, who wrote
a “History of Medicine, so far as it relates to the Profession of the
Apothecary,” in 1795, mentions, on the authority of Regner, that J.
de Falcand de Luca publicly vended medicines in London in 1357, while
Freind (“History of Medicine,” 1725) states that Pierre de Montpellier
was appointed Apothecary to Edward III in 1360.
It is clear, therefore, that the apothecary was a familiar professional
personage in England five hundred years ago. Conclusive evidence of his
practice is given by Chaucer, who, in the Prologue to the “Canterbury
Tales” (written in the last quarter of the fourteenth century),
describing a “Doctour of Phisike” says--
Ful reddy hadde he his apothecaries
To send him dragges and his lettuaries
For eche of hem made other for to Winne.
The satirical suggestion of the mutual obligations of physicians and
apothecaries has been familiar for all these centuries.
It seems certain that in Henry VIII’s reign the apothecaries were
doing a considerable amount of medical practice, besides selling
drugs. The Act of 1511 incorporating the College of Physicians and
giving them the exclusive right to practise physic in London and
for seven miles round, was largely used, if not intended, against
apothecaries. In 1542, however, an Act was passed which rather modified
the severe restrictions of the original statute, and under the new law
apothecaries became more aggressive. In Mary’s reign the Physicians
again got the legislative advantage, and there is a record in the
archives of the College of Physicians (preserved by Dr. Goodall, who
wrote “A History of the Proceedings of the College against Empiricks,”
in 1684) stating that in Queen Elizabeth’s reign the President and
Censors of the College summoned the Wardens of the Grocers’ Company
and all the apothecaries of London and the suburbs to appear before
them, “and enjoyned them that when they made a dispensation of medicine
they should expose their several ingredients (of which they were
composed) to open view in their shops for six or eight days that so the
physicians passing by might judge of the goodness of them, and prevent
their buying or selling any corrupt or decayed medicines.” The grocers
and apothecaries do not appear to have raised any objection to this
decree. Whether they obeyed it or not is not stated.