Oudh

Life in the natural world is combat: Organization willing itself to be for a small moment in the landscape of eternity, chaos reclaiming it. Deep in the wet tropics of Asia, the battle rages on with new allies, new enemies, plot-twists, evolving complexes. Since before human history, the regal Aquilaria has had to fight for its life against a particularly malicious threat: Phialophora parasitica. Having survived the sapling years by luck, evading grazing predators, reaching out of the undergrowth for a share of sun, the Aquilaria must, in its mature years, fend off the fungus that attacks from within.

The effects of Phialophora parasitica are anthropomorphically gruesome, but the tree’s response is no less than miraculous. To ward off this fungal decay, Aquilaria produces a precious aromatic resin. Tragically, the amber panacea is only enough to slow the infection’s progress; once Phialophora has taken its hold, the tree will die. But the resin–sometimes formed in the tree over hundreds of years–remains in the heartwood, is very valuable (c. $50,000 per kilo), is thought to have myriad medicinal qualities, and most importantly smells, in the words of others, honey, ambergris, earth, woodnotes, fresh tobacco, jasmine, cream. It is a fragrance that is eccentric, acquired, sophisticated. Or so I have heard. Few city-dwelling Westerners have had the pleasure of experiencing pure aromatic oudh. Instead, we must sniff it out in composition: take a fragrance and learn to parse out oudh’s singular qualities juxtaposed against kumquat, leather, spices, rose.

For a sniff tutorial in oudh, I recommend trying Arabian-inspired French perfume house Montale’s Aoud collection. Fragrances range from desert market to ionized atmosphere, with oudh at the heart of all. According to some afficionados, the smell of oudh takes a full 12 hours to ripen on the skin and can linger for days; on clothes and textiles it can last for months. Alas, to know oudh, allow time.