The Success of Swee
Smells
We tend to think of the early modern city as one beset by foul, dangerous air and dank odours. Yet it also inspired a golden age of perfumery, explains William Tullett
WHAT DID AN EARLY modern perfumer’s shop smell like? Despite valiant attempts by those in charge of certain historical attractions, such as the scratch and sni¬ cards of Jorvik Viking Centre and Hampton Court Palace, we can never truly smell the scents of the past. However, Nicolas Bonnart’s engraving of the Habit de Parfumeur gives us a visual representation of the mingled concoction of odours that emanated from early modern perfumers’ shops. Bottles of essences and oils, perfumed lozenges for the breath, pomatums for the hair, fragrant fans and scented handkerchiefs comprise the perfumer’s costume. A perfume-burner rests upon his head and disperses fragrant smoke with its religious, luxurious and medicinal e¬ects around him. The powerful scents of the perfumer’s trade meant that in early modern England overly odorous men and women were regularly accused of smelling ‘like a perfumer’s shop’. Abel Boyer’s 1702 English Theophrastus described the start of the fashionable fop’s day thus: When his Eyes are set to a languishing Air, his Motions all prepar’d according to Art, his Wig and his Coat abundantly Powder’d, his Handkerchief Perfum’d, and all the rest of his Beauetry rightly adjusted … ‘tis time to launch, and down he comes, scented like a Perfumer’s Shop, and looks like a Vessel with all her Rigging without Balast. Perfumers and their shops represented important physical and imaginative spaces in early modern England. Yet they have often been ignored by historians in favour of the stinking streets on which they lay. And so a picture is summoned of a pre-modern world of dirt and disgust, supplying the foul foil to modernity’s clean and pleasant land.
In early modern England overly odorous men and women were regularly accused of smelling like a ‘perfumer’s shop’
Western modernity, the French historian Alain Corbin has argued, is ‘founded on a vast deterioration project’, which had its roots in the 18th century. The Victorian sanitarian Edwin Chadwick’s dictum – ‘all smell … is disease’ – has come to represent, for many historians, a distinctly modern fear of odors, both good and bad. This distinction between a stench-ridden past and a clean modernity is often further encouraged by programmed such as the BBC Television’s Filthy Cities. What histories often do is to take the upturned nose of the bourgeois sanitarian as indicative of society’s collective attitude to smell. THE STREETS OF EARLY modern England may perhaps have been dirtier, smellier and noisier than today. The sources used to demonstrate these facts, so often authored by medical writers and government ocials who were charged with seeking out stench, naturally foster the conclusion that early modern towns would have stunk to modern noses. However the noses of Londoners in the period from the 16th to the 18th century were rather di¬erently attuned. Modern neuroscience and neurobiology suggest that frequent exposure to the same smell renders the nose less able to perceive it: constant stench will eventually fall into the olfactory background. In diaries, correspondence and print culture, early modern individuals frequently foreground a whole range of other smells, particularly those associated with the proliferating world of luxury and exotic goods. Perfume therefore points to a di¬erent, more pleasant, way of examining odour in the past. We – that is to say the 21st-century western world – have inherited a view, born from the rise of synthetics and the atomiser in the late 19th century, that perfumery is evanescent and immaterial. By contrast, medical understandings and processes of production gave early modern perfumery di¬erent material resonances. In early modern medical literature scents themselves were believed to be invisible but not immaterial. Odours were thought to be tiny parts of the object from which they came. These ‘corpuscles’, ‘atoms’ or ‘euvia’ floated through the air and touched the organ of smelling. It was not until the 1690s that the nose was widely accepted as the olfactory organ. Instead it was understood to be the brain, the nose merely being ‘the pathe or walke of odoriferous things’. This medical interpretation of olfactory objects and organs lent smells great power: the act of smelling involved material substances, which quite literally ‘touched’ the brain. The category of early modern perfumery also encompassed a materially diverse range of compositions including powders, pomanders, pastilles and pomatums alongside perfumed gloves, scented waters and wash balls. The mortars, pestles and stills and the accompanying practices of grinding, mixing and distilling used in perfumery, were shared with the making of medicine and simple enough for many to practice at home. While, by the end of the 18th century, the market in ready-made perfumery had expanded significantly, printed recipe books still recommended themselves as guides for the weary consumer. T HE MAKING OF PERFUMERY also involved an engagement with raw natural materials, a fact that has been obscured in the modern perfume industry, with its chemical compounds and synthetic sprays. Hundreds of di¬erent ingredients were used in perfumery across the early modern period, ranging from the obvious ones, such as roses, to the downright dangerous, such as white lead. A multitude of herbs, flower petals, fruit rinds, animal excretions, aromatic gums, fragrant roots, exotic barks, oils and essences were all used in the manufacturing of odoriferous goods and determined the final scent, texture and colour of the product. Civet, for example, was an eminently popular ingredient in 16th- and 17th-century England. Some 17th-century English texts described raw civet, collected from the secretions of the civet cat’s perineal glands, as ‘sweet’. Although synthetic civet continues to be used in modern perfumery, many now identify its fecal qualities on first sni¬. While some early modern writers reflected on civet’s sweet odours, others made great play of its brownish colour and pasty texture. In his 1698 London Spy, the Grub Street satirist Ned Ward told the story of a bathhouse owner who, while washing a gentleman, found a stool left by the previous visitor (a high class prostitute) among the water and herbs. Theowner successfully convinced his patron that this was in fact ‘nothing but an italian paste’ and, ‘incapable of distinguishing a fair lady’s sirreverence, from the excrement of a civet cat’, the gentleman rose ‘out of his Bath extremely pleas’d, and gave him that attended him Half a Crown for his extraordinary Care and Trouble, so march’d away with great Satisfaction’. The look and feel of civet was just as important as smell in appreciating the material qualities of perfumery. One of the most important uses of civet was in the perfuming of gloves, a process which appears in many 17th-century household recipe books. Perfumed gloves, in the ‘Spanish style’, became popular in 16th-century England due to the taste exhibited for them by Elizabeth I. They subsequently became desirable commodities, dispersing from the court outwards. A later recipe book, compiled by one ‘Madam Carrs’ between 1681-2, contains a simple recipe ‘To perfume gloves’: Take benjamin Civet Musk Ambergrease grind all these exceeding well on a painters stone with the oyle of sweet balsam and a little water, wash your gloves with sponges, putt them on litle sticks to dry … Printed recipe books give similar insights into the types of perfumery available and how they were composed. As in manuscript recipe books, these might be included alongside other medicinal, cosmetic or culinary receipts. One hugely popular book, which included guidance on producing perfume, was Delights for Ladies (1602), by the inventoragriculturalist Sir Hugh Plat. A recipe for pomander asks the reader to: Take two ounces of Labdanum, of Benjamin and Storax one ounce, muske sixe graines, civet sixe graines, Amber greece sixe graines, of Calamus Aromaticus and Lignum Aloes, of each the waight of a groat, beat all these in a hote mortar, and with an hote pestell till they come to paste, then wet your hand with rose water, & roll vp the paste soddenly. Pomanders were scented balls of paste that were to be worn, once dry, in spherical metal pomanders or, once pricked with a needle, on necklaces and bracelets. Elaborate 16th-century pomanders, made from gold and pearl, were hollow spheres in which such balls of perfume might be secured. By the 17th century, smaller pomanders developed, Some times in the shapes of skulls or female heads. These had between four and six compartments into which strongly scented materials, such as ambergris, cloves, lavender, roses, musk, mace and marjoram, might be inserted. Pomanders were not just luxury items, they were also used as odorous amulets to defend urbanites against the plague when out in the city. Leaky pomanders created an aromatic atmosphere around the individual, defending against foul air and disease.
ความสำเร็จของผลงานกลิ่นเรามักจะคิดว่า การเมืองสมัยแรก ๆ เป็นหนึ่งรุมเร้า โดยอากาศเหม็น อันตรายและ dank odours ยัง มันยังแรงบันดาลใจจากยุคทองของ perfumery อธิบาย William Tullettต้องการกลิ่นอะไรได้อันแรกสมัย perfumer ของร้าน แม้ มีความพยายามที่กล้าหาญโดยผู้รับผิดชอบบางประวัติศาสตร์ท่อง บัตรรอยขีดข่วนและ sni¬ ของศูนย์ยอร์วิไวกิ้งและแฮมป์ตันคอร์ทพาเลซ เราไม่เคยอย่างแท้จริงสามารถกลิ่นกลิ่นอดีต อย่างไรก็ตาม แกะสลัก Nicolas Bonnart ของ Parfumeur เดอนิสัยช่วยให้เราให้ภาพของ concoction mingled ของ odours ที่ emanated จากร้านค้าทันสมัยของ perfumers ต้น ขวด essences และน้ำมัน lozenges ระเหยในลมหายใจ pomatums สำหรับผม แฟนหอม และผ้าเช็ดหน้าหอมประกอบด้วยเครื่องแต่งกายของ perfumer น้ำหอมเครื่องเขียนอยู่ตามศีรษะ และ disperses ควันหอมกับ e¬ects ของศาสนา หรูหรา และยารอบเขา กลิ่นมีประสิทธิภาพของ perfumer ค้าหมายความ ว่า ในอังกฤษสมัยก่อน มากเกินไป odorous ชายและหญิงถูกประจำถูกกล่าวร้าย 'เช่น perfumer ที่ร้าน' Theophrastus อังกฤษค.ศ. 1702 Abel Boyer อธิบายจุดเริ่มต้นของวันของ fop แฟชั่นดัง: เมื่อตาตั้งอากาศ languishing จะดังของ prepar ทั้งหมดจะตามศิลปะ วิกผมของเขา และตราของเขาอุดมสมบูรณ์ผง Perfum ผ้าเช็ดหน้าของเขามี และเหลือของเขา Beauetry เรื่องการปรับปรุง... ' มอก.เวลาเปิด และลงเขา มา หอมเหมือนเป็น Perfumer ของร้าน และมีลักษณะเหมือนเรือมีทั้งหมดของเธอ rigging บริษัทโดย Balast Perfumers และร้านค้าตัวแทนพื้นที่สำคัญทางกายภาพ และจินตนาการในอังกฤษสมัยก่อน ยัง จะมีมักจะถูกละเว้น โดยนักประวัติศาสตร์ลงถนน stinking ที่พวกเขาวาง และเพื่อให้ เรียกภาพของสิ่งสกปรกและความขยะแขยง ขายฟอยล์เหม็นเพื่อแผ่นดิน และความทันสมัยของโลกสมัยก่อน In early modern England overly odorous men and women were regularly accused of smelling like a ‘perfumer’s shop’Western modernity, the French historian Alain Corbin has argued, is ‘founded on a vast deterioration project’, which had its roots in the 18th century. The Victorian sanitarian Edwin Chadwick’s dictum – ‘all smell … is disease’ – has come to represent, for many historians, a distinctly modern fear of odors, both good and bad. This distinction between a stench-ridden past and a clean modernity is often further encouraged by programmed such as the BBC Television’s Filthy Cities. What histories often do is to take the upturned nose of the bourgeois sanitarian as indicative of society’s collective attitude to smell. THE STREETS OF EARLY modern England may perhaps have been dirtier, smellier and noisier than today. The sources used to demonstrate these facts, so often authored by medical writers and government ocials who were charged with seeking out stench, naturally foster the conclusion that early modern towns would have stunk to modern noses. However the noses of Londoners in the period from the 16th to the 18th century were rather di¬erently attuned. Modern neuroscience and neurobiology suggest that frequent exposure to the same smell renders the nose less able to perceive it: constant stench will eventually fall into the olfactory background. In diaries, correspondence and print culture, early modern individuals frequently foreground a whole range of other smells, particularly those associated with the proliferating world of luxury and exotic goods. Perfume therefore points to a di¬erent, more pleasant, way of examining odour in the past. We – that is to say the 21st-century western world – have inherited a view, born from the rise of synthetics and the atomiser in the late 19th century, that perfumery is evanescent and immaterial. By contrast, medical understandings and processes of production gave early modern perfumery di¬erent material resonances. In early modern medical literature scents themselves were believed to be invisible but not immaterial. Odours were thought to be tiny parts of the object from which they came. These ‘corpuscles’, ‘atoms’ or ‘euvia’ floated through the air and touched the organ of smelling. It was not until the 1690s that the nose was widely accepted as the olfactory organ. Instead it was understood to be the brain, the nose merely being ‘the pathe or walke of odoriferous things’. This medical interpretation of olfactory objects and organs lent smells great power: the act of smelling involved material substances, which quite literally ‘touched’ the brain. The category of early modern perfumery also encompassed a materially diverse range of compositions including powders, pomanders, pastilles and pomatums alongside perfumed gloves, scented waters and wash balls. The mortars, pestles and stills and the accompanying practices of grinding, mixing and distilling used in perfumery, were shared with the making of medicine and simple enough for many to practice at home. While, by the end of the 18th century, the market in ready-made perfumery had expanded significantly, printed recipe books still recommended themselves as guides for the weary consumer. T HE MAKING OF PERFUMERY also involved an engagement with raw natural materials, a fact that has been obscured in the modern perfume industry, with its chemical compounds and synthetic sprays. Hundreds of di¬erent ingredients were used in perfumery across the early modern period, ranging from the obvious ones, such as roses, to the downright dangerous, such as white lead. A multitude of herbs, flower petals, fruit rinds, animal excretions, aromatic gums, fragrant roots, exotic barks, oils and essences were all used in the manufacturing of odoriferous goods and determined the final scent, texture and colour of the product. Civet, for example, was an eminently popular ingredient in 16th- and 17th-century England. Some 17th-century English texts described raw civet, collected from the secretions of the civet cat’s perineal glands, as ‘sweet’. Although synthetic civet continues to be used in modern perfumery, many now identify its fecal qualities on first sni¬. While some early modern writers reflected on civet’s sweet odours, others made great play of its brownish colour and pasty texture. In his 1698 London Spy, the Grub Street satirist Ned Ward told the story of a bathhouse owner who, while washing a gentleman, found a stool left by the previous visitor (a high class prostitute) among the water and herbs. Theowner successfully convinced his patron that this was in fact ‘nothing but an italian paste’ and, ‘incapable of distinguishing a fair lady’s sirreverence, from the excrement of a civet cat’, the gentleman rose ‘out of his Bath extremely pleas’d, and gave him that attended him Half a Crown for his extraordinary Care and Trouble, so march’d away with great Satisfaction’. The look and feel of civet was just as important as smell in appreciating the material qualities of perfumery. One of the most important uses of civet was in the perfuming of gloves, a process which appears in many 17th-century household recipe books. Perfumed gloves, in the ‘Spanish style’, became popular in 16th-century England due to the taste exhibited for them by Elizabeth I. They subsequently became desirable commodities, dispersing from the court outwards. A later recipe book, compiled by one ‘Madam Carrs’ between 1681-2, contains a simple recipe ‘To perfume gloves’: Take benjamin Civet Musk Ambergrease grind all these exceeding well on a painters stone with the oyle of sweet balsam and a little water, wash your gloves with sponges, putt them on litle sticks to dry … Printed recipe books give similar insights into the types of perfumery available and how they were composed. As in manuscript recipe books, these might be included alongside other medicinal, cosmetic or culinary receipts. One hugely popular book, which included guidance on producing perfume, was Delights for Ladies (1602), by the inventoragriculturalist Sir Hugh Plat. A recipe for pomander asks the reader to: Take two ounces of Labdanum, of Benjamin and Storax one ounce, muske sixe graines, civet sixe graines, Amber greece sixe graines, of Calamus Aromaticus and Lignum Aloes, of each the waight of a groat, beat all these in a hote mortar, and with an hote pestell till they come to paste, then wet your hand with rose water, & roll vp the paste soddenly. Pomanders were scented balls of paste that were to be worn, once dry, in spherical metal pomanders or, once pricked with a needle, on necklaces and bracelets. Elaborate 16th-century pomanders, made from gold and pearl, were hollow spheres in which such balls of perfume might be secured. By the 17th century, smaller pomanders developed, Some times in the shapes of skulls or female heads. These had between four and six compartments into which strongly scented materials, such as ambergris, cloves, lavender, roses, musk, mace and marjoram, might be inserted. Pomanders were not just luxury items, they were also used as odorous amulets to defend urbanites against the plague when out in the city. Leaky pomanders created an aromatic atmosphere around the individual, defending against foul air and disease.
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