Fenner's Complete Formulary and Handbook (1888)

Back before the advent of the huge pharmaceutical industry that we have today medicines were compounded right behind the counter by your local pharmacist. As late as the 1940's 50% of prescriptions were compounded by a pharmacist rather than manufactured in a factory. Fenner's Complete Formulary is a handbook published in 1888 that shows the techniques and ingedients used to compound the various remedies.

Fenner's was basically a recipe book for pharmacists preparing products for their pharmacies. There are instructions for making everything that could be found in a well stocked pharmacy in the late 1800's.

Many of us are trying to formulate our own medicinal cannabis preparations through trial and error. Fenner's shows us the methods used when cannabis was a medicine that was valuable and accepted by mainstream health providers.

By following these procedures your 'homemade' medicine will be identical to the pharmaceutical preparations of yesteryear.

Fenner's Complete Formulary contains;

Official and Unofficial Preparations Generally Used or Required In The Practice of Pharmacy and the Business of the Chemist, Manufacturing Pharmacist, Manufacturer of Proprietary Medicine, Physician, Perfumer, Etc.

If you do a search for "cannabis" you will see several methods used to prepare it as medicine back when it was a valued ingredient in the American Materia Medica.

The Southwest School of Botanical Medicine has made this resource available on their website as a free download, along with numerous other herbal manuals, eclectic texts, ethno-botanical works, and a massive image repository.

Here are the links to Fenner's Complete Formulary and Handbook:

PART I and PART II - Introductory material; Part 1, Drugs and medicinal substances defined, Part II, methods of preparation described - 53 pages, 7 illustrations, bookmarked Acrobat (.pdf) file - 300K (1/05)

Part IIIA- WORKING FORMULA - Abstracts, alkaloids, waters, balsams, waxes, cerates, papers, colors, confections, cordials, decoctions, elixirs, plasters, emulsions, essences, extracts, distilled extracts, and fluid extracts - over 1,000 formulae in this first section alone. 242 pages, bookmarked Acrobat (.pdf) file - 1M (7/05)

Part IIIB- WORKING FORMULA - Glycerites, infusions, linaments, mucilages, oils (fixed, animal, vegetable, volatile, mixed), oleoresins, pills, pitch, powders, resins, resinoids, sugars, soaps, teas, spirits, juices, suppositories, syrups, tinctures, homeopathic preparations, triturations, troches, ointments, wines - over 1,500 formulae in this second section. 272 pages, bookmarked Acrobat (.pdf) file - 1M (12/05) 

PART IV. - THE STANDARD REMEDIES AND PROPRIETARY MEDICINES. "The following formulas are designed for making a complete line of Standard Proprietary Remedies, which may be prepared and put up by druggists, or others, for local trade or for the market." - 118 pages, 236 formulae and recipes, bookmarked Acrobat (.pdf) file - 250K (1/05)

PART V. TOILET PREPARATIONS AND PERFUMES. Cosmetics, mouth products, hair products, lip salves, perfumes, colognes, sachets, etc. - 43 pages, 190 recipes, bookmarked Acrobat (.pdf) file - 130K (1/05)

PART VI. MISCELLANEOUS FORMULA. Adhesives, baking powder, inks, polishes, wines, real and artificial, varnishes, etc. - 45 pages, 180 recipes, bookmarked Acrobat (.pdf) file - 140K (1/05)