“Unveiling the Scented Secrets of Antiquity: How Ancient Statues Transformed the Air We Breathe”
Zde/Wikimedia CommonsA marble torso of Hera from Delos, Greece.
But perfuming ancient statues wasn’t limited to statues of deities. Rulers were often anointed with pleasant scents as well. For example, Brøns cited the poet Callimachus, who described a statue of Queen Berenice II of Egypt as being “moist with perfume.” Archaeologists have also found traces of beeswax on her portrait, which similarly suggests that it was scented.
Ancient people used a variety of techniques to apply these scents. One, called ganosis, involved mixing waxes and oils before spreading them on statues. Such a mixture not only smelled pleasant, but also helped maintain the vivid colors of the statues.
Another process, kosmesis, focused more on preserving the statue itself. According to ancient texts, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia was regularly anointed with olive oil to protect its ivory.
What’s more, these statues were also routinely draped with flowers, fabrics, and jewels, especially during rituals. They thus appeared much more vivid to ancient people than they do to museum-goers today.
Metropolitan Museum of ArtThe partial colorized reconstruction of a sphinx from the Greek funerary monument of Megakles.
“A white marble statue was not intended to be perceived as a statue in stone,” Brøns remarked to the Danish scientific website Videnskab. “It was supposed to resemble a real god or goddess.”
Indeed, her study encourages modern audiences to rethink the bone-white statues that they routinely see in museums. Thousands of years ago, these statues were blank canvases brightened with colors, flowers, jewels, fabrics, and indeed, perfumes. Seen as almost-living representations of rulers or deities, they were adorned with details that made them seem powerful — and alive.
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