We are an international team of philosophers, historians and scientists exploring the complexity and chemistry of perfumery in Ancient Egypt and Ancient Greece.

Our project seeks to deepen our understanding of the olfactory heritage of the ancient Mediterranean world by exploring the connections between art, craft and science in ancient Egypt and ancient Greece. We focus on the time between the occupation of Egypt by Alexander the Great and the death of the last Ptolemaic ruler, Cleopatra VII (332–30 BCE).

The project’s team of historians, Egyptologists, philologists and organic chemists are experimentally replicating the recipes of five Greco-Egyptian perfumes. Through these experiments, we examine how the quest to extract, concentrate, compound and preserve the essences of plants influenced science, medicine, art and culture in the ancient world and today.