Perfumes

This represents the full table of contents from Hugh Plat's 1608 volume, Delights for Ladies. Here you will find the original table of contents as well as a text facsimile of the original table of contents of Hugh Plat's book. I have used a special font to present the recipes in as close a form to the original as possible as well as side-by-si de updates of the text to modern English orthograph y. I am also working on providing modern redactions for each and every recipe presented here.

This group hopes to explore perfume, cosmetics and soap from a historical perspective. Whether your interest lies in accurately reconstructing an early recipe, or interpreting period scents through the use of modern materials, this group allows a forum to discuss difficulties, swap recipes and suppliers and help educate about changing trends.

Botanicals played a part in a variety of customs used at courts all over the world during our period: handwashing; strewing herbs; after-dinner spices; fumigants; perfumes, pomanders and incense.

An herb pillow; a hand oil; anti-chafe body powder; sore-throat tincture; anti-gas tincture; scented water for handwashing; and a recipe for a simple lombard mustard.

English translation

Aspects of female beauty routine and cosmetics, as we find them in medieval sources (mainly the Trotula). Includes notes on daily wash, deodorant, hair care, hair removal, dental hygiene, nailcare, ear spoons, decorative cosmetics, and sun screen.

Links to extant pomanders.

Queen of Hungary water is a distillation that is mentioned repeatedly in general herb and perfume books as one of the first alcohol-based perfumes. These works generally date the water to the late 1300s. This delicious-smelling concoction presents a number of problems for the re-creator.

Medieval perfumes and pomanders. Recipes.

Links to related articles.

Philip Stubbes started writing around 1581 producing small tracts in which he sharply denounced the manners, pastimes, fashions and culture in England. His major work, The Anatomie of Abuses, was first published in 1583.

P hilip Stubbes had a gift for keen observatio n. Although his comments should not be considered to reveal mainstream thought or opinions of the time, (even his contempora ries thought him extreme) his virulent attacks on the abuses in fashion and English society provide us with a detailed, colorful and picturesqu e glimpse into the England of Shakespear e's youth.