Investigator: Dr. Sean Coughlin
Provider: Czech Science Foundation
Programme: Junior Star
Duration: 2021–2026
The project Alchemies of Scent explores how techniques of extracting, blending, and preserving plant essences shaped natural philosophy, medicine, and culture in the ancient world. It focuses on the interaction between Greek philosophy and Egyptian perfumery from the time of Alexander the Great to Cleopatra VII.
Through experimental replication of Greco-Egyptian recipes, the project reconstructs ancient practices and their underlying concepts. Its outputs include a lexicon of Egyptian, Greek, and Latin perfumery, a corpus of recipes, and studies of perfume-making in the history of science and culture. It also promotes education and citizen science through public engagement.
