apothecary

English[edit]

WOTD – 3 June 2010

English Wikipedia has articles on:

apothecary and pharmacy

From Old French apotecaire, from Medieval Latin apothecarius (“storekeeper”), from apotheca (“shop, store”), earlier Latin apotheca (“repository, storehouse, warehouse”), from Ancient Greek ἀποθήκη (apothḗkē, “a repository, storehouse”), from ἀπό (apó, “away”) + τίθημι (títhēmi, “to put”) literally "a place where things are put away,"

apothecary (plural apothecaries)

(dated) A person who makes and provides/sells drugs and/or medicines.
- c. 1591–1595, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Romeo and Ivliet”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act V, scene iii], page 75, column 2:
  O true Appothecarie! / Thy drugs are quicke. Thus with a kiſſe I die.
(nonstandard, dated) A drugstore or pharmacy.
- 1919, S.A., “Pharmacy in Russia”, in Soviet Russia, volume 1, number 27, page 6:
  The Russian people as a whole almost revered the apothecary, and they entered it as they would enter a sanctum.
- 1998, Karen Holliday Tanner, Doc Holliday: A Family Portrait, University of Oklahoma Press (2001), →ISBN, pages 205–206:
  He was befriended by a local druggist, Jay Miller, who worked at the apothecary at the corner of Sixth and Harrison Street.
- 2001, Audrey Horning, “Archeology and the Science of Discovery”, in Barbara Heath et al., Jamestown Archeological Assessment, U.S. National Parks Service, page 31:
  Seeds found in a 1630s refuse-filled clay borrow pit, located near an apothecary, illustrate colonists^{[sic, meaning colonists’]} intense interest in experimenting with the medicinal qualities of New World plants.
glass jars similar in fashion to those datedly used for medicine

(person who makes and sells drugs): druggist, pharmacist, chemist
(store that sells drugs): drugstore; pharmacy; apothecary's shop, apothecary's (UK)

pharmacist — see pharmacist

pharmacy — see pharmacy