It was reading an article in the February issue of St George's News that started me thinking - you know, the one about perfumes and other items we used to use when we were young. Perfume. What is it about perfume. Shakespeare wrote about it. Women have risked their lives for it. Men have been seduced by it. In fact the pages of history books are coloured by the human race's bizarre obsession with it. One king loved it so much that it literally brought about his downfall. Antics Epiphanies, King of Syria from 175BC to 163BC, must have been one of the most fervent admirers of perfume ever. At the games in Daphne he had all his guests sprinkled with rose water from golden watering cans and anointed with perfume from golden dishes. On another occasion, King Antics had a ewer of perfumed oil poured over one of his subjects as a gesture of goodwill, a gesture which backfired when the king trod in the oily pool on the ground, slipped over and fell flat on his back, watched by the admiring crowd surrounding him. I bet they had a good giggle.
The human race has always been preoccupied with vanity, and has always been obsessed with trying to make the body more attractive, especially to the opposite sex. No doubt it always will be. The ancient Egyptians did it, and we still do it today. The Egyptians were a vain race, and it could be that they were probably the first people to concoct recipes for perfumes and deodorants, for it is recorded that the Egyptians used perfume 5000 years ago. Perfume in those days had a social importance, and the pharaohs gave it as official gifts. Since then its popularity has grown and spread throughout the world. Perfume is associated with glamour and sophistication, and today the perfume industry must be one of the most lucrative and thriving industries, even rivalling the computer industry.
The Egyptians were not the only ones who used perfume to enhance sexual attraction. The Greeks loved the stuff and believed that different perfumes should be used on different parts of the body. Even the Romans, who showed no interest in it to start with, became fascinated by it, and by the first and second centuries AD their use of perfumes and spices had reached ludicrous proportions. Nothing was ignored. Everything was perfumed. Not just the body or clothing, but everything that could be perfumed was perfumed. It is reported that the Emperor Nero slept on a bed of rose petals. It is also reported that he couldn't sleep if even one of them was curled. And once, on returning from Greece, he found that all the streets of Rome had been sprinkled with aromatic oils to welcome him home. It is also recorded that, at his wife's funeral, he burned more oil and incense than the Arabs could produce in 10 years. He had concealed pipes in his palace so that his guests could be sprinkled with a fine mist of exotic smells. In fact, during his reign, perfume was so widely used that it was considered unfashionable for a soldier to go into battle without it. The use of perfume was not limited to personal beautification by the self-indulgent. It also formed part of cleansing and health rituals. You can imagine the effect that the climate of the Middle East had on the human body, which was probably one reason why Egyptians loved to use oily lotions and heavily scented perfumes (it seems that the Egyptians also scented the bath). The oily creams were used to protect the skin from burning and drying in the same way that sun-block creams and lotions (and deodorants) are used today. Perfumes were also used for medicinal purposes. The Greeks believed that wearing sweet-scented flowers such as the rose or myrtle around the head relieved headaches - particularly those caused by a hangover. The soothing qualities of rose water are still known today. But probably the most important use of perfume in ancient times was its contribution to many ancient rites of worship. The word 'perfume' itself comes from the Latin 'per fumum' meaning 'through smoke'. Ancient people believed that by burning sweet-smelling woods and aromatic gums at religious services, their prayers would be wafted upward through the smoke, and they would be looked on more favourably by the gods. Even the sacrificed animals were stuffed with incense to make them smell sweeter.
The ancient Egyptians also used perfumes in the mummification process which preserved the body and so, it was thought, helped the spirit to travel to a newer life. They also believed that perfumed cedar wood contained the essence of immortality. And not only they. The Arabs, the Indians and the Jews all used perfumed woods when building their religious temples.
When the Jews returned from exile in Egypt they brought with them the hygiene habits of the Egyptians, including the use of oils and perfume. These in turn eventually became an intrinsic part of the Jewish religion. The Bible is packed with references to the religious use of perfume. Moses was told by God to build an altar of incense and to mix holy oil and perfume with which to anoint the tabernacle, the ark of the covenant, altars and sacred vessels. It is probable that it is from this Jewish rite that the ceremony of anointing which forms the basis of coronation services is derived.
Bill Hutchings
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