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Greek and Roman statues, best ogled at leisure on a Sunday afternoon in The Met’s Leon Levy and Shelby White Court, are blanched marvels. This is how we often encounter statues. Cold, carved hunks of white marble. That hasn’t always been the case: drawing on evidence dating from the second century B.C. to the fourth century A.D., classical archaeologist Cecilie Brøns found that statues may have once been doused in perfume. (The proto AI girlfriend?)
The ritual of kosmesis meant treating statues almost like living bodies—sponging them with perfumed oils and massaging in balms until the marble gleamed. They would have carried a sweetness in the air, redolent of roses, honey, olive oil, and other fragrant concoctions.
There’s no shortage of evidence that the ancients took perfume seriously. Workshops on the Greek island of Delos turned out scented oils by the amphora, while frescoes in Pompeii’s House of the Vettii show frolicking cupids pressing roses and violets into fragrance.
Brøns even draws on literary sources: the philosopher Proclus recalling statues anointed with scent, and Cicero describing how, in Segesta, the statue of Artemis was paraded through the streets, crowned with garlands, and lavishly perfumed. “This shows us how important scents must have been in this ritual, and gives us a sense of what it would have smelled like to attend these processions,” says Brøns.
While skin remains the most obvious destination for perfume, it’s fascinating to see how else fragrance has been applied throughout antiquity. Perhaps that’s why this brand is so drawn to the concept of scented textiles; an embroidered serviette is included in every purchase.
Why not try anointing your own marble bust with fragrance to see how the Ancient Greeks once lived?