incense stick

When we smell a particular fragrance, such as, say, clean laundry or a fresh peach, we instantly and unconsciously connect that smell to a portion of our memory. Smell can evoke feelings and bring back memories that we forgot we had. Perfume is, quite simply, a mastery of some of the most frequent scents, and the artful combination thereof to produce a unique smell for an individual person. To understand perfume, we would need to start at its inception, back in the time of the ancient Egyptians. Fragrance, from time immemorial, pleased living beings and supernatural spirits, and evoked emotional, spiritual, and intellectual inspiration within the human soul, fuelling the imagination in man to exceed and excel in his higher faculties towards achievement. With the growth of civilisations the world over, such as the Harappan civilisation of North-West India, of China and South-East Asia, the Sumerian civilisation, the ancient Middle East and Egypt, and of the South American Mayan civilisations and so on, emperors and kings patronised discovery and acquisition of myriad fragrances from far off lands and peoples. Courageous adventurers and pharmacists set sail and braved hostile territories and inclement weather. Valuables, precious stones, and even gold were traded and bartered by explorers and even pirates in expeditions over land, sea, mountain, and forest to seek and acquire the exotic scents. Spies were sent to acquire secrets of fragrances by any means. Fragrance is formulated as perfume for direct application on one’s person and garments, and also sourced as incense, pulverised, emulsified, kneaded and hand-rolled around sticks (Agarbatti; joss sticks) to burn and give off vapours of fragrance that suffuses the entire ambience of an enclosed chamber or hall. No wedding, inauguration, coronation, or religious ceremony etc is complete, especially in the East, without incense pervading the atmosphere. Today millions are spent on incense and perfume all over the world, and research and discovery continues with even greater gusto. Anant rides the same wave that discoverers once traversed on to compound exotic formulas. Centuries old proven formulas that are timeless have once again proved a hit with contemporary tastes. Close on the heels of tradition, continuous research brings new fragrances for the modern milieu and environment we are so familiar with, befitting the changing times and temperament.