Perfumed history: historical mysteries of scents
The mystery of composing perfumes has come from the ancient times. Historians say, that Queen Cleopatra once went to sea on a ship with perfumed sails – to meet the envoy of Marcus Antonius. Napoleon, this brave and courageous soldier, spent a flacon or two of perfumes a day!
Perfumes were known even in ancient Egypt and Judea. The Bible includes many records about perfumes and also some recipes of them. The whole Mediterranean civilization from the times of Carthage and up to Punic Wars was built on “perfume trade”. The Romans considered perfumes to be aphrodisiacs – the substances that ignite the love flame in a person. Perfumes were also popular in the Islamic East – for example, Koran glorifies them. And this was East to bring spices, perfumes and perfumers’ knowledge to Europe – the Moors spread perfumes in the conquered lands of Spain. Crusades only strengthened the love of Europeans towards perfumes, but in the middle ages the church suppression of “body beauty” practically made the perfume fashion vanish.
However, this fashion resurrected with the times of Renaissance, when scents were considered temptation means. For example, the book “Courteous Ladies” by Brantom describes a courtieress, that used to wear under her dress a sponge with musk and amber, “for not to smell like a sheep”! In France glove-makers were in charge of making perfumes, and only in 1614 they were officially allowed to be named perfumers. XVII is the century of perfume boom in Europe: even the queens themselves composed their perfumes. Moliere used to mock on this situation in some of his comedies, and Louis XIV was so much annoyed by this helter-skelter around perfumes, that he even intended to ban them!
Jean-Mari Farina, the famous creator of “Cologne water”, was the private perfumer of Napoleon. Being sent to exile to the isle of St. Helen, Napoleon could not get his favourite perfumes, so the local perfumes had to restore the recipe. Not log ago they were made with the help of modern technologies according to the notes, left by the latter perfumer. This perfume is now on sale in France, but unfortunately, “Napoleon’s” scent resembles simple floral cologne.
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