The nineteenth century brought the progressive demarcation of the professions devoted to the healing arts in Brazil, with a emphasis on rights and responsabilities. Academic medicine made a growing distinction between those who prescribed medicine and those who engaged in making or selling it. The article explores this process, with an emphasis on pharmaceutical practice in the province of Bahia in the latter half of the century. Within this context, it addresses changes and constancies in laws and in their local enforcement as well as relations between pharmacists, on the one hand, and, on the other, the government, physicians, and those who made or sold medicine illegally or without authorization.
healing arts; history of pharmacy; history of health; nineteenth century; Bahia; Brazil