The Precious Scents are a Scented Advantage

In our efforts to know or comprehend nature, humans have a scented advantage. The advantage comes from the perfumes we’ve found, developed, and adored for ages.

Perfume has been regarded for millennia as a necessity. Human material and spiritual pursuits are permeated with a scented quality. Did you know that the word perfume originally meant something like “the smoke of incense”?

Scented air helps us to see things and think differently than we might without it. Natural perfumes have volatile oils that seem to vanish into thin air. But by breathing in that air, our olfactory system sends the odorants to the brain and distributes it to the rest of the body.

Dominique Roques, who’s spent his career sourcing natural materials, opens the Prologue to his book, “In Search of Perfumes”, with the following:

“Perfumes are at once familiar to us, yet mysterious.”

Author Roques spent 30 years travelling the globe, on a mission for the perfume industry to source natural essences in the lands where they’re native. Grown in exotic places around the world that most of us only dream about, the 17 scents he speaks of come from the familiar floral scents — rose, lavender and jasmine; or resins – benzoin and balsam, as well as fragrant leaves, seeds, fruits, roots and woods of many plants.

Roques mentions that perfumes are indeed different now than they’d been for their 3,000 years of history. Ever since the discovery in the mid-1800s that chemistry can mimic scented compounds, perfumes were changed from all-natural to formulas that emphasized synthetic compounds rather than whole essences.

In contrast, natural materials, only, are what aromatherapy focuses on. Unlike perfumes, aromatic essential oils are, in aroma-therapy, made for mind-body connections and can facilitate communicating with nature.

I’m curious to think what the landscape of perfumery would be like today, if the mixtures depended on natural materials for scent, rather than combinations of synthetic fragrances.

Of course, I haven’t turned away from my passion for natural essences. Far from it! However, I have taken note of modern perfumes as we know them today, comparing their use with the aromatic blends of aromatherapy.

And I like the parallels between perfumes and essences, mostly because perfume has a long, long history of human adoration. On the other hand, aromatic blends of essential oils represent natural scents, as perfumes of the long-ago past used to do. In aromatherapy, we intentionally inhale blends of essential oils for well-being.

Frankincense

It’s true that the smoky aroma of Frankincense brings out mixed reactions in us. Some love it and some don’t. Burned at festive occasions, before ritual or prior to reading sacred scripture in many religions, Frankincense is, and maybe always has been, a catalyst of our emotions.

The aroma, and the smoke, of incense suggests space and in some ways, a connection to spirit. Incense smoke clears away negativity from our consciousness and up-lifts our outlook so we can breathe freely.

Sandalwood – A Plant-Human Relationship

India is the country most culturally connected with a specific Sandalwood species, Santalum album. In a recent paper, the author develops the theme of Sandalwood’s history with the people of India from about 3,000 yeas ago to the present. Examining the cultural associations in different periods of India’s history, he revealed that Sandalwood was “believed to soothe the troubles of all humanity.”

For human beings, memories of Sandalwood are not so different to those of Frankincense, as an ingredient in cosmetics and personal toilette as well as the incense of religious ceremonies.

Frankincense & Sandalwood: the Most Valued Scents

For all the time that perfume has existed, it’s assumed a deep-rooted connection to our idea of material or spiritual perfection. Of the most valuable scents, two have helped us evolve as a species. They are Frankincense & Sandalwood. In another post, I present a few words about these precious oils, followed by blends with other oils for emotional healing and joy. See the post, Double Notes for Two Precious Oils, here.

NOTES:

Text quoted is from:
Roques, Dominique. In search of perfumes: a lifetime journey to the source of nature’s scents, 2023. Translated from the French by Stephanie Smee, 2021. Published by HarperVia, (HarperCollins) New York, NY.

Image of perfumed smoke in a censer by Sayak Bala from Unsplash.com

Fill Your Day with a Perfumed Air!

This page is for information only and is not intended as advice or treatment for any condition.

Perfume of the Precious Scents