When reading a book about Medieval times I discovered that it was also called a “strewing herb” because people in those times, well, “strewed” it on their floors along with pennyroyal, and lavender to help with insect problems.  I thought that was great and would be a terrific thing in modern times except for the fact that your floor would resemble that of a roadhouse.  Still, the next time I go camping I think I will toss a little of it on the floor of the tent.  It might not control mosquitoes, but it will smell wonderful.

Given that the scent is warm, spicy, woody and very much reminiscent of cinnamon, it works very well with the following ingredients. Cedar, Myrrh, Patchouli, Borneol Camphor and Benzoin.

Although complicated, here is a wonderful Kyphi recipe where Calmus is featured.

4 parts Frankincense

2 parts Mastic

1/2 part Juniper berries

1/4 part Calmus

1/4 part Galangal

1/2 part Cardamom

1 part Cinnamon bark

1 part Myrrh

1 part Lemon Grass

1/2 part Rose leaves (dried rose buds)

1 part Benzoin of Siam

1 1/2 part Sandalwood

Pinch of Aquillaria wood

1/2 part Honey

Tablespoon at a time of rich red wine

8 parts Sultana raisins, unsulfured.

Soak the raisins overnight in red wine and pulverize the frankincense, myrrh, mastic and benzoin with a mortar and pestle.  Pulverize individually the cinnamon, juniper berries, calmus, galangal, cardamom and sandalwood.  Mix all the ingredients together and cut the lemongrass and crumble the rose buds.  Use 1/2 teaspoon of aquillaria wood to 1 cup of this mixture.  You can do without the aquillaria wood if it is not available to you.

Remove the raisins from the wine and blend everything together with a blender so that it is pulverized then use the honey to add to the mixture so that you get a dough-like substance that you can knead well and easily.  You can either crumble it in your palms and allow it to dry (turning it often over 7 to 14 days) or you can roll it into pea-sized pellets as the Egyptians preferred and allow to dry as above.

Congratulations, it is one of the more complex and difficult recipes from antiquity but one that is well worth the effort.

Spruce pine, also called cedar-pine or bottom-white pine, is a member of the southern yellow pine group. It is the most shade-tolerant species of southern pine and is scattered throughout the southeast in mixed hardwood stands, rarely occurring in pure stands.

The wood from spruce pine is brittle and close-grained. It lacks durability and has little commercial value, except as a pulpwood. Occasionally, spruce pines are grown for Christmas trees because of their attractive coloring and spruce-like appearance.

The trees provide important resources for numerous wildlife species, including bobwhite quail and squirrels, who eat the seeds. Songbirds, owls, and hawks all use the trees for cover or nesting.

Burgundy pitch blends well with the following incense ingredients: benzoin, cedar,  juniper, lavender, oakmoss, rosemary or white sage.

A very pleasant incense recipe featuring burgundy pitch also features sage for a wonderfully refreshing outdoorsy scent.

2 parts Colophony Pine resin

1 part Burgundy Pitch resin

1/2 part Pine Needles

1/2 part Desert Sage

This species was one of the main sources of camphor and attracted early Arab traders to Borneo.  Camphor at that time was valued more highly than gold and was used extensively in incense and perfumes of the period.  This was during the time of Marco Polo, around 1269 or so, and he remarks on the trade of camphor for gold.

Camphor has a clean, clear scent and mixes will with aloeswood, clove, cinnamon and frankincense.  There is however a synthetic camphor called Borneolum syntheticum that should never be used for incense making as it has a pronounced turpentine-like scent.  So beware and purchase only natural ingredients for your incense creations.

A very pleasant recipe you can try that features camphor is:

2 parts Frankincense

1 part Camphor

1 part Cloves

1/2 part White Pine needles

1/2 part Juniper Tips

When burned, it produces a fresh, woody fragrance with a high clear note.  Personally, it reminds me of the smell of evergreen trees in the snow.

In any case, the scent is floral but not overpoweringly so.  It is slightly musky around the bottom notes and yet clear, sharp and a little spicy near the top.  Although the scent is a bit too “bright” to smell exactly like a forest with fallen trees and wildflowers dripping with rain, that is exactly what the scent manages to evoke in me.  If it had a bit of patchouli for a more earthy smell and to tone down the top notes just a but it would be a wonderfully sensual, warm, floral and yet clean scent with a touch of spice.  Of course, that is my personal preference and penchant for earthy notes talking.  Either way, this is a surprisingly good stick and one that I am certain will find its way into my rotation of incense scents in the near future.

On a more personal note, the memory that came to me in a flash when I lit this stick is one of being caught by an out of season thunderstorm while walking in Oak Mountain State Park.  The air was cool and leaves were falling and the last of the summer flowers were just about gone.  I huddled in the chilling rain underneath a granite outcropping and enjoyed an amazing barrage of scents released by the rain on the fallen leaves, the rocks and the few wildflowers hardy enough to have lasted this long.  It is that combination of cool air, florals, spice and the tiniest bit of a musky scent that this stick does so well.

Most commonly though dragons blood incense is made from either the Dracaena draco or Daemonorops draco trees.  The former being referred to as “true” dragons blood.  The scent is variously described as sultry, deep, penetrating and often, sweet.  Given those properties of scent it is no wonder that it is often included in rituals and spells by our Wiccan and Pagan friends as an aid to sexuality and desire.  I find the scent to be a bit “floral” on occasion depending on the manufacturer.  That may be just my nose and my penchant for earthy, warm notes like patchouli though.

Hem‘s Dragon Blood incense smells pretty much like a host of other dragons blood offerings from other manufacturers.  Note, this does not include the pure resin dragons blood.  That scent is far richer and altogether more alluring than any stick version I have ever experienced.  This stick is lightly spicy, sultry, sensual in a way and surprisingly rich.  In fact, this is one of the few times that I can think of that the “Hem Scent” that usually bothers me so much works with the scent instead of against it.  The oily and slightly bitter scent that I find to be characteristic of Hem incense sticks adds a mysterious bottom end to the scent that I actually find quite pleasant.

I sometimes arbitrarily assign incense scents to things that go on in everyday life and this is definitely a “the thunderstorm has knocked the power out tonight, so lets sit in the dark and talk” scent. It has that sort of sensual, mysterious yet lightly spicy scent that I think would go wonderfully with conversation in the dark.

The distinction is important because white sage plays a tremendous role in Native American rituals as well as various Wiccan and Pagan spells and rituals for cleansing everything from space to Athames, crystals and more.  The cleansing properties of white sage are well documented in hundreds of works and I am not about to argue with the wisdom of the ages.  So with that in mind, and a trip to the Native American festival in Fort Walton Florida where plenty of white sage was burned still fresh in my memory, lets see what Hem has to offer with this stick.

First, if you purchase this and expect it to smell just like a sage bundle or “smudge stick” burning, you will be disappointed.  On the other hand, the scent is pleasant and clear without too much of that “Hem Scent” that I have written about in the past.  I confess to not knowing a great deal about Hem’s manufacturing process, but I do know that their sticks are charcoal and by association I assume them to be dipped in oils rather than made from finely ground natural ingredients.  As such, that “Hem Scent” I mentioned is a slightly oily, mildly bitter undertone that I find gets in the way of the top notes all too often.

So in this stick you have a clear, bright and very pleasant version of white sage competing with that oily, bitter note.  I think it may be possible to learn to ignore or tune out that scent after a while, but I find it to be too distracting.  I have a stick of it burning while I write this review and the scent is pleasant and very sage-like most of the time.  Every now and then though it is almost as if a richer deposit of the fragrance oil burns and that distracting note springs to the forefront.

I would say that this is a good approximation of white sage, but if you want to truly enjoy the crisp, clean and high note scent of white sage you would be better served to buy an actual white sage bundle from any one of a dozen reputable vendors.  Especially if you are going to use sage for any sort of ritual work.  If you are a fan of Hem incense in general though, and many people are, then I think that you will be pleased with this stick overall.

Benzoin is highly prized in India for its soft, sensuous and warm properties. It mixes very well with most other incense ingredients and gives them fragrance. Mixed with sandalwood it is one of the most typical incense mixtures of Asia.

The people of India use it as a remedy for skin diseases and respiratory ailments. Believing that the smoke is particularly helpful for dry coughs. It is comparable to frankincense in that it occupies a place in worship as it is burned before statues and paintings that represent Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva.

Typically you can find it as Benzoin of Sumatra and Benzoin of Siam when you are shopping for it to make your own incense creations.