Dictionary:

perfume

  (pûr)

1. A substance that emits and diffuses a fragrant odor, especially a volatile liquid distilled from flowers or prepared synthetically.
2. A pleasing, agreeable scent or odor. See synonyms at fragrance.

To fill or permeate with fragrance; impart a pleasant odor to.

[French parfum, from Old Italian parfumo, from parfumare, to fill with smoke : par-, intensive pref. (from Latin per-, per-) + fumare, to smoke (from Latin fūmāre, from fūmus, smoke).]

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Background

Since the beginning of recorded history, humans have attempted to mask or enhance their own odor by using perfume, which emulates nature's pleasant smells. Many natural and man-made materials have been used to make perfume to apply to the skin and clothing, to put in cleaners and cosmetics, or to scent the air. Because of differences in body chemistry, temperature, and body odors, no perfume will smell exactly the same on any two people.

Perfume comes from the Latin "per" meaning "through" and "fumum," or "smoke." Many ancient perfumes were made by extracting natural oils from plants through pressing and steaming. The oil was then burned to scent the air. Today, most perfume is used to scent bar soaps. Some products are even perfumed with industrial odorants to mask unpleasant smells or to appear "unscented."

While fragrant liquids used for the body are often considered perfume, true perfumes are defined as extracts or essences and contain a percentage of oil distilled in alcohol. Water is also used. The United States is the world's largest perfume market with annual sales totalling several billions of dollars.

History

According to the Bible, Three Wise Men visited the baby Jesus carrying myrrh and frankincense. Ancient Egyptians burned incense called kyphi—made of henna, myrrh, cinnamon, and juniper—as religious offerings. They soaked aromatic wood, gum, and resins in water and oil and used the liquid as a fragrant body lotion. The early Egyptians also perfumed their dead and often assigned specific fragrances to deities. Their word for perfume has been translated as "fragrance of the gods." It is said that the Moslem prophet Mohammed wrote, "Perfumes are foods that reawaken the spirit."

Eventually Egyptian perfumery influenced the Greeks and the Romans. For hundreds of years after the fall of Rome, perfume was primarily an Oriental art. It spread to Europe when 13th century Crusaders brought back samples from Palestine to England, France, and Italy. Europeans discovered the healing properties of fragrance during the 17th century. Doctors treating plague victims covered their mouths and noses with leather pouches holding pungent cloves, cinnamon, and spices which they thought would protect them from disease.

Perfume then came into widespread use among the monarchy. France's King Louis XIV used it so much that he was called the "perfume king." His court contained a floral pavilion filled with fragrances, and dried flowers were placed in bowls throughout the palace to freshen the air. Royal guests bathed in goat's milk and rose petals. Visitors were often doused with perfume, which also was sprayed on clothing, furniture, walls, and tableware. It was at this time that Grasse, a region of southern France where many flowering plant varieties grow, became a leading producer of perfumes.

Meanwhile, in England, aromatics were contained in lockets and the hollow heads of canes to be sniffed by the owner. It was not until the late 1800s, when synthetic chemicals were used, that perfumes could be mass marketed. The first synthetic perfume was nitrobenzene, made from nitric acid and benzene. This synthetic mixture gave off an almond smell and was often used to scent soaps. In 1868, Englishman William Perkin synthesized coumarin from the South American tonka bean to create a fragrance that smelled like freshly sown hay. Ferdinand Tiemann of the University of Berlin created synthetic violet and vanilla. In the United States, Francis Despard Dodge created citronellol—an alcohol with rose-like odor—by experimenting with citronella, which is derived from citronella oil and has a lemon-like odor. In different variations, this synthetic compound gives off the scents of sweet pea, lily of the valley, narcissus, and hyacinth.

Just as the art of perfumery progressed through the centuries, so did the art of the perfume bottle. Perfume bottles were often as elaborate and exotic as the oils they contained. The earliest specimens date back to about 1000 B.C. In ancient Egypt, newly invented glass bottles were made largely to hold perfumes. The crafting of perfume bottles spread into Europe and reached its peak in Venice in the 18th century, when glass containers assumed the shape of small animals or had pastoral scenes painted on them. Today perfume bottles are designed by the manufacturer to reflect the character of the fragrance inside, whether light and flowery or dark and musky.

Raw Materials

Natural ingredients—flowers, grasses, spices, fruit, wood, roots, resins, balsams, leaves, gums, and animal secretions—as well as resources like alcohol, petrochemicals, coal, and coal tars are used in the manufacture of perfumes. Some plants, such as lily of the valley, do not produce oils naturally. In fact, only about 2,000 of the 250,000 known flowering plant species contain these essential oils. Therefore, synthetic chemicals must be used to re-create the smells of non-oily substances. Synthetics also create original scents not found in nature.

Some perfume ingredients are animal products. For example, castor comes from beavers, musk from male deer, and ambergris from the sperm whale. Animal substances are often used as fixatives that enable perfume to evaporate slowly and emit odors longer. Other fixatives include coal tar, mosses, resins, or synthetic chemicals. Alcohol and sometimes water are used to dilute ingredients in perfumes. It is the ratio of alcohol to scent that determines whether the perfume is "eau de toilette" (toilet water) or cologne.

The Manufacturing
Process

Collection

• Before the manufacturing process begins, the initial ingredients must be brought to the manufacturing center. Plant substances are harvested from around the world, often hand-picked for their fragrance. Animal products are obtained by extracting the fatty substances directly from the animal. Aromatic chemicals used in synthetic perfumes are created in the laboratory by perfume chemists.

Extraction

Oils are extracted from plant substances by several methods: steam distillation, solvent extraction, enfleurage, maceration, and expression.

• In steam distillation, steam is passed through plant material held in a still, whereby the essential oil turns to gas. This gas is then passed through tubes, cooled, and liquified. Oils can also be extracted by boiling plant substances like flower petals in water instead of steaming them.
• Under solvent extraction, flowers are put into large rotating tanks or drums and benzene or a petroleum ether is poured over the flowers, extracting the essential oils. The flower parts dissolve in the solvents and leave a waxy material that contains the oil, which is then placed in ethyl alcohol. The oil dissolves in the alcohol and rises. Heat is used to evaporate the alcohol, which once fully burned off, leaves a higher concentration of the perfume oil on the bottom.
• During enfleurage, flowers are spread on glass sheets coated with grease. The glass sheets are placed between wooden frames in tiers. Then the flowers are removed by hand and changed until the grease has absorbed their fragrance.
• Maceration is similar to enfleurage except that warmed fats are used to soak up the flower smell. As in solvent extraction, the grease and fats are dissolved in alcohol to obtain the essential oils.
• Expression is the oldest and least complex method of extraction. By this process, now used in obtaining citrus oils from the rind, the fruit or plant is manually or mechanically pressed until all the oil is squeezed out.

Blending

• Once the perfume oils are collected, they are ready to be blended together according to a formula determined by a master in the field, known as a "nose." It may take as many as 800 different ingredients and several years to develop the special formula for a scent.

  After the scent has been created, it is mixed with alcohol. The amount of alcohol in a scent can vary greatly. Most full perfumes are made of about 10-20% perfume oils dissolved in alcohol and a trace of water. Colognes contain approximately 3-5% oil diluted in 80-90% alcohol, with water making up about 10%. Toilet water has the least amount—2% oil in 60-80% alcohol and 20% water.

Aging

• Fine perfume is often aged for several months or even years after it is blended. Following this, a "nose" will once again test the perfume to ensure that the correct scent has been achieved. Each essential oil and perfume has three notes: "Notes de tete," or top notes, "notes de coeur," central or heart notes, and "notes de fond," base notes. Top notes have tangy or citrus-like smells; central notes (aromatic flowers like rose and jasmine) provide body, and base notes (woody fragrances) provide an enduring fragrance. More "notes," of various smells, may be further blended.

Quality Control

Because perfumes depend heavily on harvests of plant substances and the availability of animal products, perfumery can often turn risky. Thousands of flowers are needed to obtain just one pound of essential oils, and if the season's crop is destroyed by disease or adverse weather, perfumeries could be in jeopardy. In addition, consistency is hard to maintain in natural oils. The same species of plant raised in several different areas with slightly different growing conditions may not yield oils with exactly the same scent.

Problems are also encountered in collecting natural animal oils. Many animals once killed for the value of their oils are on the endangered species list and now cannot be hunted. For example, sperm whale products like ambergris have been outlawed since 1977. Also, most animal oils in general are difficult and expensive to extract. Deer musk must come from deer found in Tibet and China; civet cats, bred in Ethiopia, are kept for their fatty gland secretions; beavers from Canada and the former Soviet Union are harvested for their castor.

Synthetic perfumes have allowed perfumers more freedom and stability in their craft, even though natural ingredients are considered more desirable in the very finest perfumes. The use of synthetic perfumes and oils eliminates the need to extract oils from animals and removes the risk of a bad plant harvest, saving much expense and the lives of many animals.

The Future

Perfumes today are being made and used in different ways than in previous centuries. Perfumes are being manufactured more and more frequently with synthetic chemicals rather than natural oils. Less concentrated forms of perfume are also becoming increasingly popular. Combined, these factors decrease the cost of the scents, encouraging more widespread and frequent, often daily, use.

Using perfume to heal, make people feel good, and improve relationships between the sexes are the new frontiers being explored by the industry. The sense of smell is considered a right brain activity, which rules emotions, memory, and creativity. Aromatherapy—smelling oils and fragrances to cure physical and emotional problems—is being revived to help balance hormonal and body energy. The theory behind aromatherapy states that using essential oils helps bolster the immune system when inhaled or applied topically. Smelling sweet smells also affects one's mood and can be used as a form of psychotherapy.

Like aromatherapy, more research is being conducted to synthesize human perfume—that is, the body scents we produce to attract or repel other humans. Humans, like other mammals, release pheromones to attract the opposite sex. New perfumes are being created to duplicate the effect of pheromones and stimulate sexual arousal receptors in the brain. Not only may the perfumes of the future help people cover up "bad" smells, they could improve their physical and emotional well-being as well as their sex lives.

Where To Learn More

Periodicals

Bylinsky, Gene. "Finally, A Good Aphrodisiac?" Fortune, October 21, 1991, p. 18.

Green, Timothy. "Making Scents Is More Complicated Than You Think." Smithsonian, June 1991, pp. 52-60.

Iverson, Annemarie. "Ozone." Harper's Bazaar, November 1993, pp. 208-40.

Lord, Shirley. "Message In a Bottle." Vogue, May 1992, p. 220.

Raphael, Anna. "Ahh! Aromatherapy." Delicious!, December 1994, pp. 47-48.

[Article by: Evelyn S. Dorman]

Perfume is used for a wide variety of purposes: aesthetic, religious, culinary, and medicinal, among others. Traditionally perfumes were made from plant and animal substances and prepared in the form of waters, oils, unguents, powders, and incense. This last method of fragrancing gives us our word ‘perfume’ which means ‘to smoke through’. Most modern perfumes are alcohol-based and contain synthetic scents. While the term ‘perfume’ usually refers to fragrances in general, in the more technical language of the perfumer, a perfume must contain over 15% of fragrance oils in alcohol. Eau de parfum, eau de toilette, and cologne contain lesser amounts of fragrance oils in alcohol diluted with water.

The preferred fragrances for perfumes are by no means universal, but differ according to cultural dictates and fashions. In the sixteenth century, for example, pungent animal scents such as musk and civet were very popular. In the nineteenth century, by contrast, such animal scents were generally considered too crude, and light floral fragrances were favoured.

Perfumes were held in high esteem and widely employed in the ancient world. The wealthy would perfume not only their own bodies, but their furnishings and their favourite horses and dogs. On ancient altars perfumes were offered to the gods, while in the kitchens of antiquity the same scents — saffron, cinnamon, rose, myrrh — might be used to flavour food and wine.

With the rise of Christianity, perfumes became associated with a decadent lifestyle which catered to bodily desires rather than to spiritual necessities. Many of the early Church Fathers condemned the use of perfume as ‘a bait which draws us into sensual lusts’. While disdaining the use of perfumes, however, the Church employed metaphors of fragrance to refer to the spiritual life. Prayer, for example, was presented as a symbolic form of incense, while the Christian soul was a ‘perfumed garden’ of grace. Such metaphors acquired a certain physical reality in the phenomenon of the ‘odour of sanctity’, whereby holy persons were believed to exhale a divine fragrance.

By the end of the Middle Ages, perfumes were once again enormously popular in social life. Those who could afford it perfumed their clothes, as well as their bodies, and wore gloves and shoes made out of perfumed leather. Even jewellery might be perfumed, or else fashioned of beads of hardened perfume. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the Puritans and other Protestant reformers, following the ascetic doctrines of the early Christians, denounced this indulgence in scent as contributing to an immoral lifestyle and disguising an underlying stench of sin.

Along with offering pleasing scents, perfumes had many practical uses in premodernity. Perfumes were believed to play a role both in preserving health and curing disease. Thus the ancient poet Alexis decreed that ‘the best recipe for health is to apply sweet scents unto the brain.’ The ancients employed a variety of herbal scents to treat different ailments. The fragrance of mint, for example, was thought to ease a stomach ache. Perfumes might also be applied directly to a wound to relieve inflamation and counter the ill odour of decay.

In the Middle Ages and later perfumes played a particularly important role during periods of plague. According to contemporary theories, plagues were caused by corrupt air, and transmitted from person to person through smell. The best ways to prevent such olfactory contagion were to avoid coming into contact with infectious odours and to counter the odours of disease with other pungent smells, such as perfumes and incense. The pomander — a small perforated container filled with spices and herbs and worn on the body — was meant to provide a continuous fragrant shield against disease.

In the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, however, many of the hitherto practical uses of perfume fell out of favour. As bathing became more popular, perfumes were no longer needed to mask stale body odours. The medicinal value of perfume was also questioned. Perfumes, in fact, were sometimes decried by physicians as actually leading to disease by clogging pores, or by enfeebling the mind and body through their vapours. The development of germ theory in the late 1800s largely put to rest the age-old idea of corrupt odours as agents of infection. Perfumes, consequently, were no longer considered by the medical profession to either prevent or cure disease.

The aesthetic use of perfume also declined during the same period. This was due in part to a backlash prompted by the French Revolution against the perfumed, luxurious lifestyle of the aristocracy. Furthermore, the rise of industrial capitalism encouraged the accumulation and display of tangible goods. In this culture of the concrete, the evanescent nature of perfumes made them a ‘bad buy’. Countering this materialist trend were various nineteenth-century artistic and literary movements, notably that of the Symbolists, which lauded perfumes as stimuli to the imagination.

During the nineteenth century, perfumes, which had previously been worn by both sexes, became increasingly restricted to women. The supposedly frivolous nature of perfume was deemed to make fragrance more suitable for ‘frivolous’ women than for ‘serious’ men. Sweet floral scents, in particular, were considered appropriate for women, while men, if they wore any scent at all, were offered woodsy or spicy fragrances.

In the late twentieth century a number of developments have influenced the cultural role of perfumes. The growth of ‘consumer capitalism’, with its emphasis on enjoyment, rather than mere accumulation, of goods, has led to a surge in perfume use. While perfumes are still considered primarily the domain of women, the market for men's perfumes is continually expanding. Research is also being undertaken on how the selective employment of fragrances may influence behaviour, stimulating office workers to work more effectively or shoppers to buy more products. Finally, the medicinal use of perfume has made a comeback in the contemporary practice of aromatherapy, which utilizes fragrant essential oils to treat a range of physical and psychological ailments. These trends towards increased perfume use, however, are currently being combatted by an anti-perfume movement, which argues that many people find perfumes irritating and allergenic, and agitates for an ‘odour-free’ environment.

— Constance Classen

Bibliography

• Classen, C., Howes, D., and Synnott, A. (1994). Aroma: the cultural history of smell. Routledge, London

noun

A sweet or pleasant odor: aroma, bouquet, fragrance, redolence, scent. See smells/good smells/bad smells/smell.

verb

To fill with a pleasant odor: aromatize, scent. See smells/good smells/bad smells/smell.

Definition: scent, often packaged
Antonyms: odor, stench, stink

For more information on perfume, visit Britannica.com.

The perfume of a wine is simply its smell. See also bouquet Glossary of Wine Tasting Terms (perfumed), page 613.

Perfumes are substances, generally made by blending plant oils, selected animal secretions, and synthetic chemicals, to produce a pleasant odor. Such substances were highly valued and sought after throughout human history, especially before regular bathing and the widespread use of deodorants altered the significance of human body odors. During earlier centuries, for a body to smell of a pleasant odor was noteworthy. Modern medicine has observed that in certain illnesses the skin gives out a scent of violets, pineapple, and musk, among others.

Whatever the explanation may be, this observation helps one understand the perfumes produced by mediums and makes the phrase "the odor of sanctity " appear in a new light. Christian saints are said to exhale a sweet perfume which increases at death and may remain for weeks, months, or even years afterwards. When the body of St. Casimir, Patron of Poland, was exhumed in 1603, 120 years after his death, it was found entire and exhaled a sweet smell. St. Cajetan emitted the scent of orange blossoms, St. Francis that of musk. Other saints stated to have given forth fragrance include St. Clare of Ferriol (660 C.E.), St. Hermann of Britanny (714 C.E.) and St. Patrick (461 C.E.).

Some Hindu yogis are credited with the ability to create perfumes by miraculous means. In his famous book Bengal Lancer (1930), F. Yeats-Brown described his encounter with a Mahatma named Babu Bisudhanan Dhan at Puri, Calcutta. With nothing more than a magnifying-glass and a piece of cotton-wool, the Mahatma conjured perfumes out of the air by focusing light on the cotton-wool through the glass. Each scent was waved away with the hand, to be succeeded by the next request. He produced in quick succession the scents of violets, musk, sandalwood, opium, heliotrope, flowering bamboo, nicotine plant, jasmine, and even cow-dung. A later book, Naked Ascetic by Victor Dane (1933), described a Tantric yogi in Bhawanipore who produced on request the smell of violets on Dane's handkerchief without it leaving Dane's hand; the perfume lasted for twelve hours.

In the records of William Stainton Moses, we find highly illustrative experiences recorded. For example, at the closing of a séance, scents were often found to be issuing out of his head. The more they were wiped away, the stronger and more plentiful they became. The most common scents were musk, verbena, new-mown hay and an unfamiliar odor which was assumed to be a "spirit scent." During the séance it usually came down in showers. On Dr. Stanhope Templeman Speer's request a good tablespoonful was once poured into a glass. Moses was fully aware that his body played an important part in the production of scents. He wrote on July 4, 1874: "While in the garden, before we began to sit, I was conscious of scent all round me, especially on my hair. When I rubbed my hair my hand was scented strongly. I tried the experiment many times. When the peppermint came I was conscious of its presence first near my head, and it seemed, as it were, to be evolved out of the hair. I have before noticed the same thing, but not so markedly on this occasion."

He suspected that the process was remedial, as the scent from his scalp was most marked when he was suffering pain. He believed that scents were employed to harmonize conditions. As he noted, "If a new sitter is present, he or she is sensed, and so initiated. The chair which the stranger occupies is surrounded by luminous haze, from which issues the perfume; and very frequently wet scent, more or less pungent, according to conditions, is sprinkled from the ceiling at the same time. If a new intelligence is to communicate, or special honour to be paid to a chief, the room is pervaded by perfume which grows stronger as the spirit enters. This scenting of the room in which we are about to meet will sometimes commence many hours before we begin. There is a subtle odour in it which is perpetually being changed. Sometimes the aroma of a flower from the garden is drawn out, intensified, and insinuated throughout the house. Sometimes the odour is like nothing of this earth's production, ethereal, delicate, and infinitely delightful. Sandal-wood used to be a favourite, and rose, verbena, and odours of other flowers have been plentifully used.

"I find it difficult to convey any idea of the subtle odours that have been diffused throughout the room, or of the permanence of the scent. It is usually the first manifestation and the last. The perfume is sprinkled in showers from the ceiling, and borne in waves of cool air round the circle, especially when the atmosphere is close and the air oppressive. Its presence in a particular place is shown to me by the luminous haze which accompanies it. I can trace its progress round the circle by the light … and can frequently say to a certain sitter: 'You will smell the scent directly. I see the luminous form going to you.' My vision has always been confirmed by the exclamations of delight which follow.

"When we first observed this manifestation, it was attended by a great peculiarity. The odour was circumscribed in space, confined to a belt or band, beyond which it did not penetrate. It surrounded the circle to a few feet, and outside of that belt was not perceptible; or it was drawn across the room as a cordon, so that it was possible to walk into it and out of it again— the presence and absence of the odour and the temperature of the air which accompanied it being most marked…. Within it the temperature was cool and the scent strong, outside of it the air was decidedly warmer, and no trace of the perfume was perceptible. It was no question of fancy. The scent was too strong for that.

"I have known the same phenomenon to occur in the open air. I have been walking with a friend, for instance, and we have walked into air laden with scent, and through it again into the natural atmosphere … I have even known cases where wet scent has been produced and showered down in the open air. On one special occasion, in the Isle of Wight, my attention was attracted by the patter of some fine spray on a lady's [Mrs. Speer's] silk dress, as we were walking along a road. One side of the dress was plentifully besprinkled with fine spray, which gave forth a delicious odour, very clearly perceptible for some distance round.

"During a séance the scent is either carried, as it seems, round the circle, and is then accompanied by cool air, or it is sprinkled down from the ceiling of the room in liquid form. In the clairvoyant state I am able to see and describe the process before the scent is sprinkled, and can warn a special sitter not to look upwards. For, on certain occasions, when conditions are not favourable, the scent is pungent and most painful if it gets into my eye, and it has caused no more pain than water would. On the contrary, I have seen the effect caused on another [Mrs. Speer] by a similar occurrence. The pain caused was excruciating, the inflammation was most severe, and the effects did not pass off for 24 hours or more. In fact, whatever the liquid was, it caused severe conjunctivitis.

"This variety in the pungency and potency of perfume I attribute to variety in the attendant circumstances. The illness of one of the sitters will cause the scent to become coarse and pungent. Harmonious conditions, physical and mental, are signalised by the presence of delicate subtle odours which are infinitely charming. I have said that sometimes the odour of flowers, either in the house or garden, will be intensified. A vase of fresh flowers put on the table causes the natural perfume in this way. We used frequently to gather fresh flowers, and watch the process. Flowers which had a very slight smell when gathered would, by degrees, throw off such a perfume as to fill the room and strike anyone who came into it most forcibly. In this case the natural odour of the flower was intensified and the bloom received no harm. At other times, however, some liquid was apparently put upon the blossom, and an odour, not its own given to it. In that case it invariably withered and died very rapidly. I have frequently had flowers in my buttonhole scented in this way.

"Great quantities of dry musk have been from time to time thrown about in the house where our circle meets. On a late occasion it fell in very considerable quantities over a writing-desk at which a lady was sitting in the act of writing letters. It was mid-day, and no one was near at the time, yet the particles of musk were so numerous as to pervade the whole contents of the desk. They were placed, for no throwing would have produced such a result, at the very bottom of the desk, and between the papers which it contained. The odour was most pronounced; and the particles, when gathered together, made up a considerable packet. Some time after this when at a séance, I saw something which looked like luminous dust on the table. No odour was perceptible, but in my clairvoyant state I saw a heap of luminous particles which appeared to be extremely brilliant. I described it, and putting out my hand I found that there was really a heap on the table. I inquired what it was and musk was rapped out. We demurred, for no odour was perceptible, but the statement was reiterated. After the séance we gathered up the dust, which looked like musk, but had no smell whatsoever. The next morning, however, the odour was powerful enough; and the powder still exists, and is indubitably a very good powdered musk. By what imaginable process can that phenomenon have been accomplished?"

The scents were not always welcome. In his note of July 4, 1874, Moses referred to a pungent odor of peppermint which was very unpleasant. Stanhope Speer described this happening more outspokenly: "The other evening a newcomer slipped in, and stank us out of the room by throwing down from the ceiling a large quantity of Sp. Pulegii. Everything that it touched was impregnated for 24 hours. The dining-room cloth and my own nether habiliments had to be exposed to view in the back garden; and on the following morning our dining-room floor and passage had to be freely fumigated with pastilles. That spirit has not been invited to join us again."

The experience suggests that the stench observed in some curious cases of haunting have a similar cause. Dr. Justinus Kerner recorded the case of Frau Eslinger who, in 1835, in the prison of Weinberg, was visited and talked to by a ghost that emitted an intolerable stench, felt by many others, as well.

The sickening stench of a charnel house was reported in a house near London (Daily Chronicle, April 15, 1908). On examination it was revealed that a body had been left unburied in the house until advanced putrefaction had occurred.

Florence Marryat wrote about the phantom "Lenore" of Mary Showers: "On one occasion … there was a charnel house smell about her, as if she had been buried a few weeks and dug up again…. One evening at Mrs. Gregory's … I nearly fainted from the smell. It resembled nothing but that of a putrid corpse, and when she returned to the cabinet, I was compelled to leave the room and retch from the nausea it had caused me."

The medium Carlos Mirabelli of São Paolo once produced a skeleton via materialization. An odor as that of a cadaver was emitted from his body.

The withdrawal of the scents of flowers of which Moses wrote was the only physical phenomenon known in Leonora Piper 's mediumship. "Mrs. Piper's fingers," wrote Richard Hodgson, "moved near the flower, as if withdrawing something from it; and in a few hours it had withered."

Lord Adare witnessed the famous medium D. D. Home extending his hand towards the flowers on a small table, the fingers pointing towards them. "His hand remained there for few seconds, and was then brought round, and with a motion like sprinkling, cast the perfume of the flowers towards each of us in turn; the perfume was so strong that there could be no mistake about it. This was done twice. Home then made some very curious experiments with flowers; he separated the scent into two portions—one odor smelling exactly like earth; the other being sweet.

Essences were also similarly withdrawn, "I am going to take the strength from the brandy—and he began to make passes over the glass and flipping his fingers, sending a strong smell of spirit through the room; in about five minutes he had made the brandy as weak as very weak brandy and water, it scarcely tasted at all of spirit; both Lindsay and I tasted it, at the moment, and also some time after the séance was over.

"He withdrew the acid flavour from a half a lemon, freshly cut and tasted. He held it up above his head; a yellowish light came over it, and when offered to taste again the lemon was found most disagreeable, the flavour was like magnesia or washing soda. He then restored the acid. Holding it up, a rose coloured flame came over it. After a little while, he offered it and it was found all right." (See Experiences in Spiritualism with D. D. Home by Viscount Adare [1870]).

The psychical researcher Dr. Joseph Maxwell found the luminous phenomena of the medium Eusapia Palladino at the sittings of Choisy not very convincing because a strong aroma of phosphorus permeated the room. Later, however, he found this odor characteristic and discovered that it was more like the odor of ozone than that of phosphorus. It was like the odor perceptible in the vicinity of frictional electrical machines when in activity.

It is curious to note that this smell often disturbed clairvoyants during their visions. Emanuel Swedonborg was one of the first to record his annoyance over it. In the poltergeist disturbance of the Drummer of Tedworth in 1661, the manifestations were sometimes accompanied by "a bloomy noisome smell" as of sulphur.

There are early records of paranormal scents in the correspondence of Dr. G. P. Billot with J. P. F. Deleuze in 1839. Billot stated that superior intelligences presented themselves through his somnambules, presided at séances, and manifested themselves by the delicious odors which they diffused around them.

In the séances of the medium David Duguid, perfumes were administered to one sitter at a time, and the recipient felt the cooling odors gently blown over his face. The manifestation was not confined to the séance room; it was sometimes experienced in the open air.

Among later mediums in whose séances the phenomenon was often recorded the Marquis Centurione Scotto and Mina Crandon ("Margery") stand foremost.

Sources:

Dane, Victor. Naked Ascetic. N.p., 1933.

Dunraven, Windham Thomas Wyndham Quin. Experiences in Spiritualism with D. D. Home. 1871. Reprint, New York: Arno Press, 1976.

Kennett, Frances. History of Perfume. London: Harrap, 1975.

Thompson, C. J. S. The Mystery and Lure of Perfume. London: J. Lane; Detroit: Singing Tree Press, 1969.

Yeats-Brown, F. Bengal Lancer. London: V. Gollancz Ltd., 1930. Reprinted as The Life of a Bengal Lancer. New York: Viking Press: 1931.