The first civilization to go on record as using perfume regularly, extravagantly, and with nuance was Egypt. Their elaborate burial and embalming practices required spices and unguents. They burned tons of incense in elaborate worship rituals. Scent became a national obsession during the reign of Queen Hatshepsut, of the New Kingdom (1558–1085 B.C. ), who planted large botanical gardens and burned incense on the terraces leading to her temples. The Egyptians used lavish quantities of perfume and incense in their religious cults, eventually coming to enjoy them for personal daily use as well, especially during Egypt’s Golden Age. They anointed their bodies with perfumes to ward off magical hexes, for medicinal purposes, and as beauty lotions,because they prized the feel of silky, scented skin. Egyptians discovered enfleurage (pressing aromatics into fatty oils) and created beautiful glass vessels to hold their potions, including the
millefiori
and other styles Venetian glassmakers were to use centuries later; they indulged in elaborate beauty rituals and had an almost modern fascination with makeup. If we were to observe a woman of ancient Egypt fixing her face and hair before a dinner party, we would find her seated at her makeup table, which would hold a variety of elegant, imaginatively designed perfume spoons, receptacles for unguents, vases, flacons, and boxes of eye shadow. She might well have a tattoo of a scarab or flower on her shoulder—Egyptian women were fond of tattoos. (When an Egyptian tomb was opened in the 1920s and a mummy discovered to be delicately tattooed, Lady Randolph Churchill and other socialites decided to get scarab tattoos themselves.) An ancient Egyptian socialite attending a party would wear a wax cone of unguent on the top of her head; it would melt slowly, covering her face and shoulders with a trickle of perfumed syrup. It probably felt as if small beetles were crawling all over her, pushing balls of fragrance. The Egyptians were a clean, ingeniously sybaritic people obsessed with hygiene; they invented the sumptuous art of the bath—an art that might be restorative, sensuous, religious, or calming, depending on one’s mood. This they would usually follow with a massage of aromatic oils to soothe the muscles and calm the nerves—aromatherapy, a technique first used in the embalming of mummies. Researchers at Yale’s Psychophysiology Center are studying how smell can decrease stress and increase alertness. They claim that the smell of spiced apples can reduce blood pressure in people under stress and avert a panic attack, and that lavender can wake up one’s metabolism and make one more alert.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
reports that related tests at the University of Cincinnati have shown how fragrances added to the atmosphere of a room can increase typing speed and work efficiency in general.
At the Sonesta Beach Spa in Bermuda, I stretch out on a table in front of a window, through which I can see and hear the crashand caterwaul of the sea. A pretty young woman with large blue eyes enters the small room, wearing a white belted cosmetician’s dress. Fresh from Yorkshire, she hasn’t been on the island long enough to develop a tan on the twelve weekends she’s had free. Her boyfriend is in the marine division of the Bermuda police, and yesterday she went to the Cricket Cup Match with him. She has bunions on her feet, inherited from her father’s side of the family, along with the small symmetrical nose she thinks is too large, and the straight blond hair she thinks is too thin. Today she has me lie on my back and then discreetly covers me with blue terry-cloth towels, which she will rearrange as the hour progresses. In the past few days, she has seen my body enough to know its flaws and graces. Only a lover could touch it more often, or better. Now we are as relaxed about my nakedness as old spouses. She explains the next treatment: aromatherapy. This ancient Egyptian
millefiori
and other styles Venetian glassmakers were to use centuries later; they indulged in elaborate beauty rituals and had an almost modern fascination with makeup. If we were to observe a woman of ancient Egypt fixing her face and hair before a dinner party, we would find her seated at her makeup table, which would hold a variety of elegant, imaginatively designed perfume spoons, receptacles for unguents, vases, flacons, and boxes of eye shadow. She might well have a tattoo of a scarab or flower on her shoulder—Egyptian women were fond of tattoos. (When an Egyptian tomb was opened in the 1920s and a mummy discovered to be delicately tattooed, Lady Randolph Churchill and other socialites decided to get scarab tattoos themselves.) An ancient Egyptian socialite attending a party would wear a wax cone of unguent on the top of her head; it would melt slowly, covering her face and shoulders with a trickle of perfumed syrup. It probably felt as if small beetles were crawling all over her, pushing balls of fragrance. The Egyptians were a clean, ingeniously sybaritic people obsessed with hygiene; they invented the sumptuous art of the bath—an art that might be restorative, sensuous, religious, or calming, depending on one’s mood. This they would usually follow with a massage of aromatic oils to soothe the muscles and calm the nerves—aromatherapy, a technique first used in the embalming of mummies. Researchers at Yale’s Psychophysiology Center are studying how smell can decrease stress and increase alertness. They claim that the smell of spiced apples can reduce blood pressure in people under stress and avert a panic attack, and that lavender can wake up one’s metabolism and make one more alert.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
reports that related tests at the University of Cincinnati have shown how fragrances added to the atmosphere of a room can increase typing speed and work efficiency in general.
At the Sonesta Beach Spa in Bermuda, I stretch out on a table in front of a window, through which I can see and hear the crashand caterwaul of the sea. A pretty young woman with large blue eyes enters the small room, wearing a white belted cosmetician’s dress. Fresh from Yorkshire, she hasn’t been on the island long enough to develop a tan on the twelve weekends she’s had free. Her boyfriend is in the marine division of the Bermuda police, and yesterday she went to the Cricket Cup Match with him. She has bunions on her feet, inherited from her father’s side of the family, along with the small symmetrical nose she thinks is too large, and the straight blond hair she thinks is too thin. Today she has me lie on my back and then discreetly covers me with blue terry-cloth towels, which she will rearrange as the hour progresses. In the past few days, she has seen my body enough to know its flaws and graces. Only a lover could touch it more often, or better. Now we are as relaxed about my nakedness as old spouses. She explains the next treatment: aromatherapy. This ancient Egyptian
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