Flowers, flowers everywhere,
But not a bite to eat.
A lot of the folklore in perfumery is inexorably linked to historic stigmas surrounding powerful women. Here at the IAO, we like to call it the Mata Hari effect in part because of the widow-maker reputation of the heroines, and in part because the most famous elements of these stories are also often the most mythologized. Did Marie Antoinette’s perfume subvert her disguise when she tried to escape revolutionary France, with tragic consequences? Did Cleopatra use “scent magic” to entrap the hapless Marc Antony, with tragic consequences? Did Marilyn Monroe really wear nothing but Chanel No. 5 to entrap the hapless president, with tragic consequences? Or are these stories part of a greater morality fable warning of the dangers of sensual power? Either way, the leasson is clear: Powerful women are often seducers, powerful women often smell damn good, and powerful women often die badly.
Consider as a point of contrast the fates of famously aromatic menfolk. Louis XIV died of illness and old age. Emperor Constantine died of illness and old age. Even Napoleon died of illness and old age, if his British captors are to be believed. These equally powerful, equally aromatic, equally seductive guys enjoyed peaceful – or at the very least heroic – deaths.
But… Then there’s Nero: A powerful, mythologized, male scent aficionado with an ending that is at least a level 8 on our internal Mata Hari Effect Tragic Consequences Scale (MHETCS).
Written accounts make some pretty grand claims about Nero. He had a special removable gold ceiling that would shower roses on his guests. He instructed his servants to release aromatic birds (literally doves dipped in rose oil) into the banquet halls. He used more aromatics than could be produced in a year in Arabia at his wife Poppaea Sabina’s funeral.
Whether these stories are facts or factual hearsay, one incontrovertible truth survives: Nero died a distinctly shitty death. Moreover, his exuberant use of scent cemented an existing cultural fascination with all things aromatic. Wealthy Romans used copious amounts of perfume, and aromatic banquets were so widespread – and became so over the top – that guests started to complain. To wit, a bitter epigram that Roman poet Martial directed at his appropriately named host Fabullus on the topic of a recent dinner party:
“Faith, your essence [scent] was excelling,
But you gave us nought to eat;
Nothing tasting, sweetly smelling
Is, Fabullus, scarce a treat.”
Fable? Historical gossip? True story? Who knows. But we’re willing to bet that Fabullus had a pretty chill death.
Alive, kicking and smelling fine,
– Your friends at the IAO
+ ALL THIS AND MORE IN OUR MARCH NEWSLETTER
