Am.  Jour.  Phann.  ) 
October,  1913.  | 
Landmarks  of  Pharmacy. 
449 
Version  is  now  translated  as  "the  perfumer"  and  indeed,  it  is 
probable  that  the  principal  office  of  the  Hebrew  apothecary  was 
connected  with  the  compounding  of  perfumes,  incense,  anointing 
oils,  pomades,  etc.,  for  there  are  no  distinct  references  in  the  Bible 
to  any  medicine  for  internal  administration.  The  connection  be- 
tween the  priests  and  physicians  did  not  exist  as  in  Egypt. 
The  word  "  apothecary  "  itself  is  of  more  modern  origin,  being 
derived  from  the  Latin  "  apothec,"  which  originally  meant  a  ware- 
house, particularly  of  drugs,  the  apothecary  really  being  a  ware- 
house man,  corresponding  more  closely  to  the  wholesale  druggist 
of  to-day  than  to  the  retailer.  The  same  root  gives  rise  to  the 
French  "  Apothecaire,"  the  "  Boticario "  of  the  Spanish  and 
Portuguese;  the  "  Bottejago  "  of  the  Italian;  the  "  Apotheke  "  of 
the  Dutch,  German  and  Danish  and  the  "  Apothecare "  of  the 
Swedish,  all  of  which  words  are  used  to  designate  the  practitioner 
of  the  art.  The  word  "  apothec  "  itself,  meaning  the  repository 
or  warehouse,  gives  rise  also  to  the  Spanish  "  Botica  "  (of  which 
a  variant  form  means  a  wine  cellar),  the  Italian  "  Bottega  " ;  the 
Dutch  "  Apotheck  " ;  the  Danish  and  Swedish  "  Apothek  "  and  the 
German  "  Apotheke."  * 
In  ancient  Greece  the  word  pharmacy  had  its  origin  in  a  word 
"  Pharmakon,"  which  meant  eventually  a  drug,  medicine  or  a 
poison,  but  the  root  of  which  meant  simply  "  to  mix,"  and  the 
transition  stages  of  the  word  included  meanings  connected  with 
noxious  or  poisonous  drugs  and  with  sorcery.  In  the  New  Testa- 
ment (the  principal  original  manuscripts  of  which  are  in  Greek) 
the  word  "  Pharmakeia,"  wherever  it  occurs,  is  translated 
"  sorcery  "  or  some  similar  word.  The  Pharmakotribae  of  early 
Greece  were  the  drug  grinders  and  although  history  is  not  quite 
clear  upon  the  subject,  they  may  have  been  compounders  as  well 
and  assistants  to  the  Seplasarii,  who  were  ointment  makers  prin- 
cipally. The  herbalists  of  that  period  were  called  "  Botanologoi  " 
and  the  root  cutters  were  "  Rhizotomoi." 
The  Greek  word  "  Pharmakopoeus  "  meant  a  purveyor  of  toxic 
drugs  and  was  used  in  a  disreputable  sense.  The  "  Pharmacopoloi  " 
of  Greece  were  the  traveling  quack  doctors  and  the  classification 
was  sometimes  made  as  a  term  of  reproach,  as  where  Epicurus 
sneeringly  refers  to  the  fact  that  Aristotle  was  one  of  the  Pharma- 
copoloi in  the  early  days  before  he  became  a  philosopher.  The 
most  disreputable  association  of  the  same  root  word  by  the  Greeks 
was  in  "  Pharmakoi,"  a  term  applied  to  condemned  criminals. 
