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Iatrochemistry

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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• Iatrochemistry
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1911 Encyclopedia Britannica
• Iatrochemistry

(coined from Gr. iarpos, a physician, and "chemistry"), a stage in the history of chemistry, during which the object of this science was held to be "not to make gold but to prepare medicines." This doctrine dominated chemical thought during the 16th century, its foremost supporters being Paracelsus, van Helmont and de la Bo gy Sylvius. But it gave way to the new definition formulated by Boyle, viz. that the proper domain of chemistry was "to determine the composition of substances." (See CHEMISTRY: I. History; MEDICINE.)