48 
HISTORY OF PHARMACY. 
rhizotomes who collected roots affected to gather them 
with superstitious ceremonies, and made no scruple about 
substitutions. The rhizotomes and those exercising phar- 
macy, had stoves appropriated to their use. They were 
called apothecas,(a7to9rjxao,) a general name for stores or depots 
of merchandize, from whence the Italian Boiega, the French 
word Boutique, as'well as that of Jijiothecary. The sur- 
geons had likewise shops bearing the name of medicinx, 
a generic term applying to all those places where a profes- 
sion was exercised depending upon medicine. They also 
assigned to the shops of the dyers the name of pharmacon. 
Those ot the pharmacopolse styled themselves pharmaco- 
poiia. 
Those of the perfumers or venders of ointments, which 
were termed myrepsi from the Greek word pvpov, took the 
title of myropolia and myrothecia. Lastly, they gave to 
the barber's shops the name of xovpcca, and in Latin that of 
tonstrinse. 
This distinction between the medical professions vvas 
never very decided nor persistent. It appeared to have but 
a momentary existence, for it was quite obliterated among 
the Romans, and its traces only discovered about the era of 
the revival of sciences and letters. 
Shortly after Celsius, physicians resumed the ancient 
custom, and practised themselves, or by deputies through 
their orders, exercising all the branches of the medicinal 
art. They continued alone to write upon every branch of 
medicine, pharmacy in particular. Works upon this sub- 
ject were still very rare, the collections of receipts very 
select, and they imparted to libraries considerable value. 
Materia Medica, however, vvas enriched by a large number 
of active substances, perfumes, spices and aromatic drugs, 
obtained from divers countries, the depths of the Indies and 
Ethiopia. 
About this epoch a knowledge of the sugar-cane com- 
