The Pharmacopoeias - evolution and historical relevance
[1] PITA, João Rui Rocha – História da Farmácia. Coimbra: Ordem dos Farmacêuticos; Secção Regional de Coimbra; Minerva, 1998, p. 155
[2] BASSO, Paula - A Farmácia e o Medicamento: uma história concisa. [Lisboa]: CTT Correios, 2004, p. 123
[3] GUERRA, F. Carvalho; ALVES, A. Correia – Breve notícia histórica sobre as farmacopeias portuguesas até ao século XIX. Lisboa: Academia das Ciências, 1986. p. 815-834 (Sep. de História e desenvolvimento da ciência em Portugal, Vol. II), p. 818-820
[4] PITA, João Rui, org. e ed. lit. - Pharmacopea Lusitana: anno de 1704. Ed. fac-similada. Coimbra: Minerva, 2000, p. XVII
[5] GUERRA, F. Carvalho; ALVES, A. Correia - cit. 3, p. 823
[6] PITA, João Rui - cit. 4, p. XVII-XVIII
[7] Alvará de 7 de Janeiro de 1794
[8] GUERRA, F. Carvalho; ALVES, A. Correia - cit. 3, p. 824
[9] GUERRA, F. Carvalho; ALVES, A. Correia - cit. 3, p. 829
[10] COSTA, Francisco da – Pharmacopea Naval, e Castrense. Lisboa: Impressão Régia, 1819, p. [folha de rosto]
[11] GUERRA, F. Carvalho; ALVES, A. Correia - cit. 3, p. 829
[12] PITA, Rui João - Um Livro com 200 anos: a Farmacopeia Portuguesa (Edição Oficial). A publicação da primeira farmacopeia oficial: Pharmacopeia Geral (1794). Revista de História das Ideias [em linha]. Vol. 20, 1999 [visualizado em 2014-02-10], p. 47-100. Disponível em: http://rhi.fl.uc.pt/vol/20/jpita.pdf, p. 55
The pharmaceutical and medical practice, in seventeenth-century Europe and until the mid-eighteenth century, was marked not only by scientific advances and the organization of the “art of healing” related professions, but also by the strengthening of medieval healing traditions and practices. For this reason, this period was known as "medical baroque", in which both the classical or innovative doctrines contributed to the complex background that was the pharmacy of the seventeenth – eighteenth century [1]. During this period, the therapeutic arsenal was constituted by the combination of traditional methods - such as purging, bleeding and enemas - magical-religious methods - such as amulets, fumigations or use of human and animal body parts - and innovative methods that, at the time, included medicinal plants, chemical drugs, medicinal waters and the so-called "American drugs", medicinal plants from the American continent.
It was in this context that occur the development of a literature dedicated exclusively to this field of knowledge. The production of knowledge and medical healing theories, associated with the discovery of new plants with medicinal properties in the East and in America, created the need for a more streamlined reorganization of the medical literature, especially pharmacy books, whose main ex libris were the pharmacopoeias. Textbooks on pharmaceutical practice, containing information about drugs manufacture and compositions, the systematization of several natural products used in the production of drugs, in addition to curative purpose of each of them, the pharmacopoeias were a symbol of concern of the governments with health protection. [2]
Through these works, European nations tried to establish the organization of medical matter and ensure exemption of prescription products. Much of the pharmacopoeias published in Europe was developed by the Collegium Medicum of each region of the continent, formed by medical and pharmacy professionals, which in addition to producing these works, acted as supervisors of the healing practice.
In Portugal, the eighteenth century is considered the golden age of the pharmacopoeias, due to the extensive publication of this kind of works, all of them in vernacular language and directed exclusively to apothecaries. The first written in Portuguese was the Pharmacopea Lusitana (1704), written by D. Caetano de Santo António, apothecary at the Santa Cruz Monastery in Coimbra and later in the São Vicente de Fora Monastery in Lisbon. D. Caetano was also responsible for publishing a translation, Latin to Portuguese, of the Pharmacopea Bateana (1713), written by the English Jorge Bateo, which was the first physician of Charles II, King of England [3].
In 1716, John Vigier, French druggist established in Lisbon and first surgeon of D. João V, published the Pharmacopea Ulyssiponense Galênica e Chimica, as the result of years of work with the French chemist Nicolas Lemery [4]. For several decades, this pharmacopoeia was a reference in Portugal on teaching how to produce chemical drugs. Another great reference was the Pharmacopea Tubalense Chimico-Galénica, published in Coimbra in 1735, by the court apothecary Manoel Rodrigues Coelho, born in Setúbal, hence the name given to the pharmacopoeia.
After the reissue of the Pharmacopea Tubalense, followed the publication of the Pharmacopea Portuense (1766), by the surgeon António Rodrigues Portugal, the first to be published in Oporto. In the next decade, was published the Pharmacopea Dogmática Médico-Chimica e Theorico-Prática (1772), also in Oporto, consisting of two volumes, written by brother-apothecary and Benedictine monk João de Jesus Maria, born in Braga, administrator of the apothecary of Santo Tirso Monastery [5]. The third volume, also of his authoring, is a unique and singular work, in manuscript format, was never been published despite having all the authorizations for that to happen.
In the final decades of the eighteenth century, the Pharmacopea Lisbonense (1785) was published in Lisbon, with a revised and enlarged reissue in 1802, by the apothecary Manuel Joaquim Henriques Paiva, medical doctor graduated from the University of Coimbra. Finally, the Pharmacopeia Geral para o Reino e Domínios de Portugal (1794), also known as Farmacopeia de D. Maria (Queen Mary Pharmacopoeia), the first Portuguese official pharmacopoeia, according to a charter from January 7 1794, written by Francisco Tavares, medical doctor and first surgeon of the kingdom, on the orders of Queen Maria I [6], according to the statutes of the University of Coimbra from 1772, to "fight against the disorder existing in the manufacture of medicinal products due to the lack of an official pharmacopoeia which would serve to regulate the required uniformity of pharmaceutical compositions in the apothecaries of the kingdom and its domains" [7]. This work was, until 1835, the only legal reference on how they should practice pharmacy [8], but nevertheless other pharmacopoeias existed, the so-called unofficial pharmacopoeias, such as the Pharmacopea Chymica, Medica e Cirurgica, and also Elementos de Pharmácia, both by António José de Sousa Pinto. Another reference pharmacopoeia was the Pharmacopea Naval e Castrense (1819) by Jacinto da Costa, surgeon at the Navy Hospital [9] and Royal Navy, Surveyor in Civil Surgery and Naval Pharmacy, Chief-surgeon of the National Artillery Battalion Lisbon West [10]. This work was published for use in the Portuguese military hospitals, has happened in other countries [11].
In 1833, was published the Pharmacopea das Pharmacopeas nacionaes e estrangeiras, excepto a geral destes reinos, compilation made by B.J.O.T. Cabral.
The Codigo Pharmaceutico Lusitano approved by Decree of October 6, 1835, authored by Agostinho Albano da Silveira Pinto, medical doctor and director of the Royal Surgical School in Oporto and Royal Academy of Navy and Trade, replaced the outdated first official Portuguese pharmacopoeia. It was also known as “Tratado de Pharmaconomia” (Pharmacoeconomics Treaty) and was in force until 1876.
In 1838, a commission was designated, composed of several health professionals to draft a new official pharmacopoeia - the Farmacopêa Portugueza - even though it has only been published and approved by Decree of September 14, 1876. It was in force until 1935, and then replaced by the Farmacopeia Portuguesa.
The pharmacopoeias were a reflection of what is proposed as a standard for the pharmaceutical and medical practice, emerging as a reference of a remarkable period in the history of sciences and health professions in Portugal [12].
[Text drafted by the Pharmaceutical Documentation Center of the Portuguese Pharmaceutical Society team]