The Worshipful Society of Apothecaries of London, a History, 1617-1967

[c.1967]

Storage: Medical WZ 402 C782

Oxford: Pergamon Press

The illustrations depict important Society activities. Concern with the quality of imported drugs and spices led the Society to set up its own successful manufacturing business. It also established a garden at Chelsea for the study of native and exotic medicinal plants which became the richest collection in Europe. Occupational boundary disputes, however, challenged relationships between apothecaries and physicians and apothecaries and chemists and druggists. The 1815 Apothecaries Act introduced compulsory apprenticeship and formal qualifications for apothecaries and was the beginning of regulation of the medical profession in Britain. In 1841 the chemists and druggists set up the Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain to raise the standard of the pharmacy profession through proper education. These disputes provide the context for the early development and regulation of pharmacy in New Zealand.