The beginnings of occidental pharmacy as a legally acknowledged subject can be dated back into the 13th century. The constitutions of Emperor Frederick II., announced in 1231 after several regional attempts, are considered as the first systematic legislation concerning pharmacy. Keywords of the law are the rights and the duties of physicians and of pharmacists, above all the independence of both professions is stipulated. This law is the basis of the development of pharmacy even if it was valid only for the Kingdom of Sicily at first.

In the introduction area prehistoric beginnings, the antique basis of medicine, and especially the exciting evolution of pharmacy from the 13th to the 21st century are taken as themes. Headwords are: first pharmacists and their dispensaries in the German-speaking countries, the development of legislation concerning pharmacy, the role of monastic pharmacy, the influence of the observation of nature and of alchemy over medical knowledge, the intensive changes caused by the rapidly developing natural sciences, the influence of important scientists, the educational changes from a craft to an academic profession, and the differentiation of the profession during the 19th and the 20th century.

Subsequently the tour leads directly into a pharmacist’s shop of the early 19th century. The cherry-wood furnishings made according to the instructions of Chr. J. Faulhaber, its owner, once decorated the “Crown Pharmacy” at Ulm. In the exhibition you can find out why these furnishings had to be taken out on the orders of a supervising commission in the late 19th century, how it was given to the Town Museum of Ulm, and how it was removed once again into a chemist’s shop during the 20th century before it became a part of the stocks of the German Museum of Pharmacy.