History of Argentine Pharmacy (from Francisco Cignoli)

According to the dictionary, the word pharmacy referrs to the science and the practice of this science but not the place were medicines are preparated or expended (called Botica in spanish, I really don't know how to say it in english). So, the "boticario" prepares and expends medicines while the pharmacist profess and excercise the pharmacy.
In the colonial Buenos Aires there weren't pharmacies but "boticas".
The first doctors which came to this part of America prepared the medicines on their own. In the records of January 24th 1605, the Buenos Aires Cabildo stated that the first surgeon, sir Manuel Alvarez, asked to be paid four hundred pesos per year and adittionally the amount due to the medicines and ointments which were administrated to the population. In 1770 Sir Agustín Pica, asked to the Cabildo autorization to practice as a "boticario" in Buenos Aires. As Buenos Aires didn´t count with Protomedicato, the Cabildo was the one in charge of the validation of the titles and precedents of the doctors, surgeons, "boticarios", as long as of the control of their practice and instalation.
In 1782, in the virreinato of the Provincias del Río de la Plata, there were 31 "boticas" and 4 first-aid kits, from them 16 "boticas" and 3 first-aid kits were in Argentina and they were distributed in the following way:
Boticas: 9 in Buenos Aires; 4 inCórdoba; 2 in Salta and 1 in Tucumán
First-aid kits: 2 in Mendoza and 1 in Jujuy.
When the Protomedicato was created, it was in charge of the supplying of pharmacy articles to all the "boticas" of the country. Some years later, in1782, Francisco Marull was named as the pharmacy supplier and then, it was Narciso Marull who occupied this position until 1809.
So, drugs were imported from Spain but all type of trees and plants were exported from America.
It is important to mention Pharmacy The Star, the oldest in the city been founded in 1834 and being in their current ubication from 1885, which was visited in diverse occasions by big personalities of the national politics as Bartolomé Mitre, Bernardino Rivadavia among others.