Preparation and Use of Perfumes and Perfumed Substances in Ancient Egypt

Abstract

Although the use of Perfume their back is attested from the Predynastic period on in pharaonic Egypt, we are relatively poorly informed about the process of manufacture, either through scenes or in texts and most of the surviving recipes concerning perfume date from the Graeco-Roman period. This lack of information suggests that the production of perfumed oils and ointments was a royal monopoly. Doubtless this is the reason that the perfume production in Alexandria during the Graeco-Roman period was apparently in the hands of government bureaucrats, whom some historians include among the imperial slaves.