Lard and the old apothecary shops of Transylvania

“Axungia porci [lard] is very important for apothecaries as it is used in large quantities for pomades and unguents. One should buy lard before Christmas, in the months of November and December, when it is best and cheapest. The butcher’s opinion must be taken into consideration. It is best to buy large fat pigs or pigs fed with corn, since their fat is hard. Other lards are softer and never solidify, unlike lard from pigs fed with corn. In summer it melts and turns into oil and is thus unsuitable for preparing unguents.”

 Tobias Maucksch (1752-1802) thus advised his son Johann Martin in 1793 in his famous INSTRUCTIO that describes the functioning of the "Golden Stag" pharmacy from Târgu Mureş.

 

Details of the signatures of apothecary jars for the preservation of lard

The History of Pharmacy Collection of Cluj-Napoca, part of the National History Museum of Transylvania, includes four jars made of faience and porcelain for the preservation of lard. They are inscribed AXUNGIA PORCI, sometimes in shortened forms. Three of the jars are dated to the nineteenth century and one to the eighteenth century and they had been used in Saint George’s pharmacy from Cluj-Napoca (where we are now), the Engel pharmacy from Iaşi and the pharmacy of the Misericordians from Oradea [Ordo Sancti Joannis de Deo]. 
This FOCUS group is the mini-exhibition for the month of March 2016 at the collection in Unirii Square 28, in the heart of Cluj-Napoca. For details of other temporary exhibition, tickets, timetable, see the blog in Romanian HERE.
For the Romanian version of this article, see the official blog of the collection HERE. 

Exhibit of the month section at the History of Pharmacy Collection in Cluj-Napoca