Traditional perfumery of Arabia - Quotes from old books

[Saudalhajri]

One extencive recipe on how to make Al-Muthallath (made of three ingredients), and how to use it, it (along with many other texts) describe the musk used as being dried and cleaned from hair and impurities, i highlight this because i saw on this form someone saying that the musk used back then wasnt cleaned from hair or skin:

I followed this recipe as closely as i could with the materials i had today.
i used triple super Manipur oud chips, dried siberian musk, and Maldives ambergris.
I first clipped the oud and pounded it, then ground it in a mortar as fine as i could, then sifted it, and ground it again. My strainer isnt as fine as i want it. FYI some material was lost in this step.
Then i clipped the ambergris, and put it in a new, non-stick pan on very low heat, removed it from the heat, and put in the ground oud and mixed it , then transferred it to parchment paper and kneaded the musk in.
some photos
Ambergris:

Musk:

Oud:

Amber melting

after kneading the musk in (2.92g final weight):

After final kneading and rolling (it was too clumpy to draw into cylinders):

Of course i washed everything with alcohol, and i'll soak some low grade chips in the tincture:

Lessons learned:
1.Use more of the initial materials than you need
2.use smaller containers and morters
3.Grind the oud and musk extra fine, and use a very fine seive.

I put a tiny amount on coals over a mica plate but my nose was bombarded by musk and amber while i was making the incense, so i couldnt smell the final scent very well. or distinguish seperate notes. So i'll try it later.

 

[Mr.P]

I followed this recipe as closely as i could with the materials i had today.
i used triple super Manipur oud chips, dried siberian musk, and Maldives ambergris.
I first clipped the oud and pounded it, then ground it in a mortar as fine as i could, then sifted it, and ground it again. My strainer isnt as fine as i want it. FYI some material was lost in this step.
Then i clipped the ambergris, and put it in a new, non-stick pan on very low heat, removed it from the heat, and put in the ground oud and mixed it , then transferred it to parchment paper and kneaded the musk in.
some photos
Ambergris:
View attachment 41616
Musk:
View attachment 41617

Oud:
View attachment 41618

Amber meltingView attachment 41619
after kneading the musk in (2.92g final weight):

View attachment 41620

After final kneading and rolling (it was too clumpy to draw into cylinders):
View attachment 41621

Of course i washed everything with alcohol, and i'll soak some low grade chips in the tincture:
View attachment 41622

Lessons learned:
1.Use more of the initial materials than you need
2.use smaller containers and morters
3.Grind the oud and musk extra fine, and use a very fine seive.

I put a tiny amount on coals over a mica plate but my nose was bombarded by musk and amber while i was making the incense, so i couldnt smell the final scent very well. or distinguish seperate notes. So i'll try it later.

It's great seeing you posting some of your experiments here. That must be one heck of a scent - pretty much the most fundamental badass bakhoor recipe you could ask for. Musk and resinous oud kneaded into molten ambergris...

I've smelled a little bit of ambergris on coals - smelled fantastic and better than I expected.

I find myself wondering what a secretion like musk would smell like if it was combusted - hard to imagine (beyond the bloom of familar musk scent from the volatiles evaporating adjacent to regions hot enough to combust).

I imagine this at high temperature on a subitism would be just unbelievable.

Nice work

 

[Saudalhajri]

It's great seeing you posting some of your experiments here. That must be one heck of a scent - pretty much the most fundamental badass bakhoor recipe you could ask for. Musk and resinous oud kneaded into molten ambergris...

I've smelled a little bit of ambergris on coals - smelled fantastic and better than I expected.

I find myself wondering what a secretion like musk would smell like if it was combusted - hard to imagine (beyond the bloom of familar musk scent from the volatiles evaporating adjacent to regions hot enough to combust).

I imagine this at high temperature on a subitism would be just unbelievable.

Nice work

Thanks, it was definitely a challenging experiment, the raw materials are quite pricey and very easy to ruin, even slow grinding with the mortar caused oud dust to fly everywhere.
I’ve tried pure musk on coal before and it actually smells quite different than you imagine, it’s a lot more earthy, leathery, raw. Like smelling a warriors leather armor after a campaign.

The musk here was dried and cleaned Siberian from @NinjaRobb but there were a few hairs and one piece of skin, around 0.5cm squared. I forgot to take out the hairs and I fear that it’ll affect the scent, as hair has a nasty sharp smell when burnt. But we’ll see.

I’ll give it a week to rest in the container then I’ll try it on a heater at say 200c and a mica plate, and illl report back.

 

[Bandar]

Masha Allah, Tabarak Allah, always creative, my brother Saud. What do you think of adding a gummy resin to diversify the scent and carry the aromatic notes? You have several options, including Greek mastic, Hojari frankincense, or frankincense amber. Melt any of them in a water bath, then add the previously made paste of oud, musk, and amber and mix them well until the gum is mixed with the ingredients. You can add raw aromatic ingredients, not oils, in small quantities for flavor, such as saffron or dried Damask rose petals when melting the gum.

 

[Saudalhajri]

Masha Allah, Tabarak Allah, always creative, my brother Saud. What do you think of adding a gummy resin to diversify the scent and carry the aromatic notes? You have several options, including Greek mastic, Hojari frankincense, or frankincense amber. Melt any of them in a water bath, then add the previously made paste of oud, musk, and amber and mix them well until the gum is mixed with the ingredients. You can add raw aromatic ingredients, not oils, in small quantities for flavor, such as saffron or dried Damask rose petals when melting the gum.

I do have two types of Omani frankincense and a big chunk of copal. The issue wasn’t the binding agent, it was how I prepared the ingredients. The oud wasn’t as fine as I wanted and neither was the musk. The oud should form a very good, sticky, and smooth base when mixed with the melted amber, and the musk would suck up the remaining moisture and leave you with a play dough like consistency.
The source says you should be able to draw it in to think cylinders then cut the cylinders into small balls, and he also says it’s not hard or durable enough to wear as beads and necklaces, and best burnt on coals.

I will try the addition of frankincense or even boiled date water next time inshallah.

 

[Saudalhajri]

We see a lot of odd and unused names like صنفي قماري قاقلي
These are the names of regions during the authors time. قماري oud for examples comes from قمار which is the Khmer empire, current Cambodia. And الصنف is Vietnam, considered to be a part of China sometimes, hence they say Alsinf oud from China.

Other information can be deduced from the authors description, so if an author describes an oud with the name of a region you don’t know, you can roughly know where that is by their description of how the oud looks, smells, wether it’s in the East or west or south etc. this however isn’t a 100% accurate method unless you’re an expert in all the knowledge surrounding this subject like geography, language, history, and oud.


A photo the Khmer empires map (from Wikipedia)

As you can see it covers parts Cambodia, Vietnam, thailand, Laos and even China. Which makes it a little hard to determine exactly what قماري is.

 

[Saudalhajri]

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[Saudalhajri]

"The Countries by Al-Ya'qubi" (p. 215):

"As for the Madinan bān (Moringa) oil, the people of Medina cook it with fine spices/flowers, etc. … However, this oil is not suitable for making ghalia because the scent of the spices and their sharpness overpower the fragrances of ambergris and musk. Thus, kings do not use it except to anoint their hands in winter, and women use it in their personal perfumes and hair treatments."

 

[Zyad]

We see a lot of odd and unused names like صنفي قماري قاقلي
These are the names of regions during the authors time. قماري oud for examples comes from قمار which is the Khmer empire, current Cambodia. And الصنف is Vietnam, considered to be a part of China sometimes, hence they say Alsinf oud from China.

Other information can be deduced from the authors description, so if an author describes an oud with the name of a region you don’t know, you can roughly know where that is by their description of how the oud looks, smells, wether it’s in the East or west or south etc. this however isn’t a 100% accurate method unless you’re an expert in all the knowledge surrounding this subject like geography, language, history, and oud.


A photo the Khmer empires map (from Wikipedia)
View attachment 42106
As you can see it covers parts Cambodia, Vietnam, thailand, Laos and even China. Which makes it a little hard to determine exactly what قماري is.

جزاك الله خيرا for all this beautiful thread. I enjoy so much seeing oud and perfumes references in our magnificient heritage.

For the record we still use the expression العود القماري in Morocco to speak about agarwood. If I am not mistaken the expression is either used to talk about agarwood in general (as a distinct category from other bakhour) or to talk about a top grade bakhur.
I recently got one sample (of « al-3oud al-qmari) through my family (it is a bakhour used in the Morocco king’s palace) but I am not trained enough to know if it is pure agarwood or any other wood that could have been soaked in some oud/dark oil mixture.

 

[Kabir Attars]

@Saudalhajri
I shift my Musk and ambergris through silk and get a very fine dust you should try this for your recipe.