ambergris

Ambergris

Ambergris (Ambra grisea, Ambre gris, ambergrease, or grey amber) is a solid, waxy, flammable substance of a dull gray or blackish color produced in the digestive system of sperm whales.

Ambergris has a peculiar sweet, earthy odor. The principal historical use of ambergris was as a fixative in perfumery, though it has now been largely displaced by synthetics.

Source

Ambergris occurs as a biliary secretion of the intestines of the sperm whale, and can be found floating upon the sea, or in the sand near the coast. It is also sometimes found in the abdomens of whales. Because giant squids' beaks have been found embedded within lumps of ambergris, scientists have theorized that the whale's intestine produces the substance as a means of easing the passage of hard, sharp objects that the whale might have inadvertently eaten.

Ambergris is usually passed in the fecal matter. Ambergris that forms a mass too large to exit via the anus is expelled via the mouth, leading to the reputation of ambergris as primarily coming from whale vomit. ^[1]

Ambergris can be found in the Atlantic Ocean; on the coasts of Brazil and Madagascar; and on the coast of Africa, of the East Indies, The Maldives, mainland China, Japan, India, Australia, New Zealand and the Molucca islands. Most commercially collected ambergris comes from the Bahama Islands and Providence Island in the Caribbean.

Physical properties

Ambergris is found in lumps of various shapes and sizes, weighing from 15 g (½ oz) to 50 kg (100 pounds) or more. When initially expelled by or removed from the whale, the fatty precursor of ambergris is pale white in color (sometimes streaked with black), soft, with a strong fecal smell. Following months to years of photo-degradation and oxidation in the ocean, this precursor gradually hardens, developing a dark gray or black color, a crusty and waxy texture, and a peculiar odor that is at once sweet, earthy, marine, and animalic. Its smell has been generally described as a vastly richer and smoother version of isopropanol without its stinging harshness.

In this developed condition, ambergris has a specific gravity ranging from 0.780 to 0.926. It melts at about 62 °C to a fatty, yellow resinous liquid; and at 100 °C it is volatilized into a white vapor. It is soluble in ether, and in volatile and fixed oils.

Chemical properties

Ambergris is relatively nonreactive to acid. White crystals of a substance called ambrein can be separated from ambergris by heating raw ambergris in alcohol, then allowing the resulting solution to cool.

Replacement compounds and economics

Historically, the primary commercial use of ambergris was in fragrance chemistry, although it has also been used for medicinal and flavoring purposes. Ambergris has historically been an important perfume odorant and is highly sought. However, it is difficult to get a consistent and reliable supply of high quality ambergris. Due to demand for ambergris and its high price, replacement compounds have been sought out by the fragrance industry and chemically synthesized. The most important of these are ambroxan, ambrox and its steroisomers, which has largely taken its place and is the most widely used ambergris-replacement odorant in perfume manufacturing ^[2]. The oldest and most commercially significant synthesis of ambrox is from sclareol (primarily extracted from clary sage), although syntheses have been devised from a variety of other natural products, including cis-abienol and thujone. Procedures for the microbial production of ambrox have also been devised.^[3]

As of 2006, raw ambergris fetched approximately US$10 per gram, with much higher prices possible for particularly high-quality samples.^[4][5] In the United States, importing, buying, or selling ambergris — including ambergris that had washed ashore — was considered a violation of the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972.^[6] In 2001 this ruling was overturned, and ambergris was deemed not to be a byproduct of the whaling industry, since the whale expels this substance naturally.^{[citation needed]}

Historical and cross-cultural uses

Ambergris has been mostly known for its use in creating perfume and fragrance much like musk. While perfumes can still be found with ambergris around the world, American perfumers usually avoid it due to legal ambiguities. Ancient Egyptians burned ambergris as incense, while in modern Egypt ambergris is used for scenting cigarettes.^[7]. The ancient Chinese called the substance "dragon's spittle fragrance."^[8]. During the Black Death in Europe, people believed that carrying a ball of ambergris could help prevent them from getting the plague. This was because the fragrance covered the smell of the air which was believed to be the cause of plague.^{[citation needed]}

This substance has also been used historically as a flavouring for food, and some people consider it an aphrodisiac. During the Middle Ages, Europeans used ambergris as a medication for headaches, colds, epilepsy, and other ailments.^[8]

Ambergris was also moulded, dried, decorated and worn as jewellery, particularly during the European Renaissance. It was often formed into beads.^{[citation needed]}

References in literature and film

• The writer Herman Melville devotes a chapter to ambergris in Moby-Dick. He discusses at length how ambergris was commonly found in dead whales floating in the South Pacific Ocean.
• Detailed description of the harvesting of ambergris in The Far Side of the World by Patrick O'Brian.
• Ambergris is also the object of interest during one mystery in the "Encyclopedia Brown" series.
• Cherry Ames, Cruise Nurse by Helen Wells is centered around a missing piece of ambergris and includes information about it.
• Jeff Vandermeer's collection of short stories, City of Saints and Madmen and his novel Shriek: An Afterword are both set in a city-state, founded by whalers, named Ambergris.
• In the book Hannibal by Thomas Harris (as well as the movie by the same name), ambergris is mentioned as an ingredient of a hand-engineered perfume Hannibal Lecter uses to scent a letter he sends to Clarice Starling.
• In One Thousand and One Nights, Sinbad the Sailor finds a valuable lot of ambergris on an island in one of his adventures.
• Asey Mayo, the Cape Cod Detective in the series by Phoebe Atwood Taylor, solves a murder around a found lump of ambergris.
• In Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (film), the character Beadle Bamford wears it as a perfume.
• In The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack, (Lead 'Em and Weep), The whale character Bubbie spits out a huge ball of ambergris onto Captain K'nuckles to wake him of his hypnotized state. At the end of the episode, Dr. Barber gives an explanation of ambergris.
• In the Futurama episode Three Hundred Big Boys, Kif Kroker becomes soaked in the "precious ambergris" when trying to rescue his gift to Amy Wong that was eaten by a Sperm Whale, and is arrested for stealing the waterpark's property. He thinks they want the watch, but the whale keeper explains with the help of Roseanne that he's coated with ambergris.
• In Matthew Barney's recent movie Drawing Restraint 9, a huge lump of ambergris is found floating in the ocean and dragged into the whaling vessel Nishin Maru.

References

External links

Look up ambergris in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Natural History Magazine Article: Floating Gold -- The Romance of Ambergris
• Ambergris - A Pathfinder and Annotated Bibliography
• On the chemistry and ethics of Ambergris
• Scientific American Strange but True: Whale Waste Is Extremely Valuable

This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.