Essential Oils for Lovers by Maggie Tisserand

Author:Maggie Tisserand
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2017-10-20T04:00:00+00:00

chapter five

BEAUTY CARE

Here first she bathes, and round her body pours

Soft oils of fragrance, and ambrosial showers

the perfumed winds, the balmy gale conveys

through heaven, through earth, and all the aerial ways,

spirit divine! whose exhalation greets

the sense of gods with more than mortal sweets.

HOMER, The Odyssey

A BRIEF HISTORY OF BATHING

Aromatic baths and body preparations have been used extensively in many ancient civilizations – the beautifying of the female body made almost an art form.

Scrupulous attention to cleanliness, followed by anointing, shaving and massaging were of utmost importance to the women of the Arabian harems. These women were renowned for their luminous complexions and satiny skin. Washing and purifying was not only a social necessity but a religious obligation.

The bathing ritual took several hours, often lasting well into the evening. The fashion was for a woman to be smooth-skinned and hairless, so the women would use a depilatory wax made from sugar and lemon juice. After bathing in fragrant waters their skin would be scented with fragrant oils. Rose was frequently used but other popular oils, diluted first in sesame oil, were also in regular use.

To harem women, deprived of so many freedoms, the baths became an all-consuming passion and a most luxurious pastime. The sultan and his wives had private bathrooms, but the other women of the harem shared a large bath house. These women of lower rank, who were not wives of the sultan, were known as odalisques. Odalisque means ‘woman of the room’ which neatly sums up her very limited lifestyle, for when a woman passed through the ‘Gates of Felicity’ into the harem there was no turning back.

Today’s Turkish baths are an adaptation of the large bath houses of the harem, which themselves derived from the Roman ‘thermae’. The shower has of course crept into more and more homes, and the pace of modern living has caused it to take over in popularity. But let’s set the record straight: showering is fine for a quick clean-up, but will never take the place of bathing as a therapeutic and meditative occupation. A bath scented with essential oils has two purposes – to cleanse the body, ridding it of impurities, and to relax both mind and body.

Japanese bathing rituals have changed little over the centuries, and still remain very much a family affair. The head of the household takes the first and hottest bath of the day and the water is then recycled and reheated until each member of the family has bathed.

Liza Dalby’s book Geisha explains, ‘Unless extremely pressed for space, Japanese homes do not have the toilet and bath in the same room. The toilet is given as little space as physically feasible, whereas the luxurious bath is given as much as money and space will allow. Shower attachments off to one side are popular as aids in the process of soaping, scrubbing, and rinsing before getting into the bath itself, but an American-style shower instead of a tub is unthinkable.’ So important is a relaxing bath after

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