The idea of making medicines available outside major urban centres is not new. Louis XIV, amazed by the cures carried out around him by Jean-Adrien Helvétius, worked with him in 1706 for the supply of his medicines to the poor sick people of the provinces. The preparation, expedition, and distribution of the "remedies of the king" were organized in large with the assistance of the stewards and Helvetius. These "medicine boxes" are the ancestors of portable pharmacies. But the latter will especially appear in the 19th century with the development of communication channels that encourage tourism and travel. The portable pharmacy "especially convenient for people who travel by car" (Reichard, 1805) will be a growing success. The purpose of this exhibition is to show the different models from the 18th to the 20th century, civil and military, used on land as well as at sea and to show the pharmaceutical catalogues that proposed them.

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