A perfume recipe from the Dynameron of Nikolaos Myrepsos (“the Perfumer”), who seems to have been a Byzantine physician and perfumer of the 13th century. The Dynameron is one of those recipe books that was added to over time, so it’s anyone’s guess where the recipe comes from or what it might have been used to treat. The first edition of the massive Dynameron—it has around 3000 recipes—was completed in 2019 by Ilias Valiakos and published open access with Propylaeum. It is available here.

Note on weights and volumes: one ὅλκή weighs the same as one δραχμή, about 3.4 grams. A ξέστης is about 550 ml. A κύαθος is about 45ml.

“Perfume recipe, the one called ‘fragrant’.

It contains:

• 28 holkai terebinth resin

• 14 holkai clean wax

• 3 holkai each of:

  • juice of hyssop

  • Attic honey

  • deer marrow

  • ammoniac incense

  • galbanum

  • foam of soda

• 0.5 sextarios of old oil

• 1.5 holke of castorion

• 1 kyathon of fine wine.

Grind all these together and prepare it well. Give when needed, use.”

Μύρου σκευασία, τοῦ εὐώδους λεγομένου· ἔχει: Τερμεντίνης, ὁλκὰς κηʹ· κηροῦ καθαροῦ· ὁλκὰς ιδʹ· ὑσσώπου ὑγροῦ· μέλιτος Ἀττικοῦ· μυελοῦ ἐλαφείου· ἀμμωνιακοῦ θυμιάματος· χαλβάνης· ἀφρονίτρου, ἀνὰ ὁλκὰς γʹ· ἐλαίου παλαιοῦ, ξεστίου ἥμισυ· καστόριον, ὁλκὴν αʹ καὶ ἥμισυ· οἴνου καλοῦ, κύαθον αʹ· τρίψας ταῦτα πάντα καὶ σκευάσας καλῶς, δίδου ἐπὶ τῆς χρείας χρῶ.

Nicolas Myrepsos, Dynameron 34.25, 827,1–5 Valiakos