Cairo

[karengypsy]

The essence of holy Kyphi, beloved incense of the Egyptian Gods.

In the vial: Sweet/orangey/incensey

On me: It's definitely incensey, and I do smell the orange that I smelled in the vial, but I don't know if that citrus note really fits. The scent stays strong for a number of hours after it's applied.

Verdict: I do like it, and it does remind me of Egypt, but there's just something about it that I'm not sure I like.

Rating: 3/5

[edenssixthday]

Cairo - This is the nicest incense oil blend I’ve ever encountered. Not only is it smooth, fragrant, warm, golden, and slightly smoky, it has a touch of something bright and citrus-like – strong enough that I was very surprised when I checked the scent description and didn’t see anything in it about orange, lemon, lime, etc. It has an absolutely lovely throw – it’s faint, but it definitely catch it wafting in the air, and it’s like a warm, bright ray of sunlight. Gorgeous, just gorgeous.

[sofiaviolet]

Simultaneously sweet and spicy. Mostly sweet. It kind of smells like I would expect a bag of gummy bears with a couple of red hots tossed in to smell. It's really cool, but it's making me nauseated like eating that candy concoction would. Into the swaps with it.

[juniperus]

Bottle: sweet, heady, and somehow familiar. But otherwise inscrutable.

Wet: same, with a dark undercurrent of some spice I can't yet name.

Dry: this has a candy quality...wait I think I have it - horehound! those horehound sticks I'd get from the old country store during field trips to Greenfield Village!

Later: sweet spice candy, yes. how very odd. under that a bitter herbal..this doesn't work on me, not at all.

[Emma]

Well, for once the lab's description of a scent gave me no guideposts on what to expect. What in the world is "the essence of holy Kyphi" supposed to mean, I wondered? I had a negative impression of this scent on first sniff. It just seemed sweet and muddy, some how. I ordered a few unscented creams and such from The Body Perfumery ahead of time for the sole purpose of mixing with my Bpal imps and so I dumped my imp of Cairo into a 4 oz jar of TBP's Olive body creme. It scented the creme to *perfection*!!! I'm so, so thrilled. My skin feels lovely and smells fantastic with all the golden lemony-incensy sweetness that is Cairo. I feel like prancing around asking people to feel and sniff my skin, it's that good.

[Eunice]

Cairo is a very bright incense scent. I was expecting something heavier but there is a lemongrass scent that really makes this refreshing. Much nicer than I had anticipated. The addition of the lemongrass note is perfect!

[hologhost]

Golden. Okay - that's a crappy description, but this one is tricky. Like The Lion it's smoothly blended with no notes sticking out. It is a tad citrisy, but mostly it's insesnse and resin.

[Meg]

In the bottle: spicy resin, with as slightly citrusy sharp note.

 

Wet: A slightly nutty resin, some very light smoke, and the citrus note peaking out again.

 

Drydown: A soft, citrusy incense, rather fresh, with some underlying spice, possibly nutmeg. Then I get a bit of myrrh, it becomes rather perfumy, dusty and a bit misty.

 

Overall: I have to admit, I really don't get incense blends. While it's pretty and smoky, it doesn't really strike me as anything I'd like to wear. It's one of the nicer incense blends I've smelled, but it always gives me a bit of a sore nose, and it's a bit sharp. Not something I'd wear, but it does smell of the Middle East, quite mysterious and solemn.

Edited August 14, 2006 by Meg

[Caltha]

Cairo

Khyphi, this? I love DSH's Khyphi but Cairo is just bubblegum sweet to me. A plasticky childish sweetness, like candy scented incense or candy scented soap.

[Victory]

Lemon! Lemon! Lemon! Gone!

 

Amazing. No incense to be found!

[Eros]

This is beautiful!!!

 

In the imp it's almost a clone of Urd, which I LOVE. On skin it quickly morphs into a thick, almost sticky, amber and nag champa =) None of the lemon/citrus, etc., others have picked up, this is straight up, sweet smoky incense. Exactly what I'd imagined and hoped it'd be Exotic, sexy...great throw and longlasting. I adore it!

[absinthetics]

Cairo.... mystefies me. It's this deep and somehow dark incense, that has a bite of citrous. The first time I smelled it though, I could have sworn I got a dusty feel, like pyramids.... but then it returned to this cloying...incense. It's a keeper if only because it shows the artistry of the lab.

[kunoichi]

Kapet (kyphi), meaning ‘incense’, is a combination of frankincense, mastic, sweet flag, pine, camel grass and cinnamon in a honey base. Raisins and wine were added as a base in later ingredients, and ingredients were changed through time, such as the addition of myrrh, juniper and so forth. Mention of kapet happens as far back as the time of the pyramids in the Old Kingdom.

 

Kyphi is a mixture composed of sixteen ingredients; of honey and wine, raisins and galingale, (pine) resin and myrrh, aspalathos and seseli; moreover, of mastic and bitumen, bulrush and sorrel, together with the two kinds of juniper berries (of which one is called major and the other minor), cardamom and sweet flag. And these ingredients are not mixed by chance, but according to instructions cited in holy books, that are read to the incense makers while they mix them.

 

-- Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride

 

The Ebers (1500 BC) and Harris (1200 BC) Papyri both list the ingredients, as does Plutarch, supposedly from the works of Manetho, as does the walls of the temples of Horus and Isis at Djeba (Utes-Hor, Behde, Edfu) and Iat-Rek (Philae), and Dioscorides and Claudius Galen, Greek physicians of the 1st and 2nd Century AD, also have their own versions. Sadly, many of the ingredients cannot be identified with certainty.

 

This is one of the versions of the incense listed at Djeba:

 

[Take 273 g each of mastic, pine resin, sweet flag, aspalathos, camel grass, mint and cinnamon.] Place the items in a mortar and grind them. Two-fifths of this will {turn out to} be in the form of liquid to be discarded. There remain three-fifths in the form of ground powder. [Take 1.5 lb each of cyperus, juniper berries, pine kernels and peker (unidentified)] Reduce the ingredients to powder. Moisten all these dry ingredients with [2.5 lb] wine in a copper vessel. Half of this wine will be absorbed by the powder [the rest is to be discarded].

 

Leave overnight. Moisten the [3.3 lb] raisins with [2.5 lb] oasis wine. Mix everything in a vessel and leave for five days. Boil to reduce by one-fifth. Place [3.3 lb] honey and [1,213 g] frankincense in a cauldron and reduce volume by one-fifth. Add to the honey and frankincense the kyphi macerated in wine. Leave overnight. Grind the [1,155 g] myrrh and add to the kyphi.

 

-- Lise Manniche, Sacred Luxuries

 

Dioscorides’ version is listed as:

 

Kyphi is a mixture of incenses dedicated to the Gods. Egyptian priests use it very often. It is also mixed with antidotes and is given in beverages to the asthmatic. There are many methods of preparation, one of which is the following: half a xestes (0.137 lt) of galingale; the same quantity of the major juniper berries; twelve mnai (5,239.2 g) of big stoned raisins; five mnai (2,183 g) of cleansed resin; one mna (436.6 g) each of sweet flag, aspalathos and lemon grass; twelve drachmai (48 g) of myrrh; nine xestes (2.466 lt) of old wine; two mnai (873.2 g) of honey.

 

Stone the raisins and chop them, and grind with wine and myrrh. Then grind and sieve the other ingredients and mix them with the aforementioned mixture. Let steep for one day. Then boil the honey until it thickens and mix thoroughly with the melted resin. Mix thoroughly with the other ingredients and store in an earthenware pot.

 

-- Dioscorides, De Materia Medica

 

As for my review:

 

This smells of a spicy blend that is sweet with fruit, with a clean citrus-like breath of freshness through it. On my skin this becomes a very citrus-scented blend – it is very light, tangy and bright – on perhaps a base that may be honey with sweet fruit, though the base is very faint in the background of the strong citrus scent. After a few hours on my skin, this is a soft citrusy-honey-incense fragrance as it fades.

 

The citrus was certainly a very unexpected note!!

[fiddledragon]

Interesting! Before reading the reviews I had no idea what was traditionally in Kyphi. In Beth's blend, there appears to be cardamom. Lots and lots of cardamom. Which also appears to love me and almost nobody else. Well, the cardamom and I can have our own special little love affair :-) There are some other spices and resins in there making it more complex, but mostly it's "hi, I just dumped cardamom on my wrist!" But despite the associations of cardamom with various foods, this isn't at all a foody spice-scent. It smells a bit sultry, a bit ritual. Beautiful.

 

Edit: on my boyfriend, it goes to a wonderful dry cinnamon with honey. It's warm without being candy-like, and perfect for snuggling in cold weather. Must get more of this!

Edited December 4, 2006 by fiddledragon

[mooncityminx]

In the imp: I have no idea what that smell is. It might be an herb or a wood.

 

Wet: Citrus herby spice, ooo that's cardamon. I do like cardamon. Just like the green cardamon pods you buy at an Indian grocery store and clove. With sweet orange peel. Interesting and good.

 

Dry: I am starting to learn that these citrus notes do not work on my skin at all. They always seem to turn sickenly sweet. It did smell quite nice until my body chemistry turned it. Swaps it is.

[corvidae]

Hmm. I really needed to like this scent - I'm Kemetic.

 

However... let me just say that I've smelled Kapet (Kyphi) burning and it was AMAZING. It was a cold, winter day and the warm smell was perfect.

 

Unfortunately, that's not what Cairo smells like on me. It smells like candy. The smell is pleasant but it's just TOO sweet. I can't really distinguish individual scents, because all I'm getting is candy.

 

On the drydown I start getting what might be incense notes, but I don't know if it's enough for me to really like the scent.

 

Too bad - this is almost one of those heart-breaking scents.

[theseagrows]

my friend had this one and i hadn't tried it so i figured i'd give it a try. and i wish i hadn't. it just smelled bad on me, kind of like the parmesan cheese someone else mentioned. kind of resiny and musky but with a bad kind of turning to it. i didnt get any sweetness or citrus, and i generally like citrus. oh well im glad i got to try it anyway, it sounded so intriguing on other people

[Gardenia]

This smelled like bubble gum with a small hint of red wine for a very long time. Over the last three hours, the bubble gum smell was being replaced by sweet incense. That wore off into a sort of generic "walked into an incense store" smell.

 

I like it, though. Especially in its middle stages of "sweet incense".

Nice enough to use the imp up, but I don't think I'd be getting anymore.

[tempestteapot]

I first put this one on with a little bit of nervousness. Cairo....just WHAT would that city smell like?

 

I put it on and my husband could smell it 5 feet away. I hadn't even asked if he could smell it.

 

It's a lovely warm rich scent. Almost foodie, but not quite. Definatly incense afterscent. I'm liking it a lot.

[oh_the_horror]

In bottle: Fruity, juicy, exotic, intoxicating.

 

Wet and Drying: Buttery, fruity, incense, Rose? Blueberries? Dates? This is incredible. I have tears in my eyes. It smells like an Egyptian grocery store that sells incense and hookah tobacco. I love it.

 

Dry: Pretty much the same as wet, except more mellow and a little warmer and sweeter. Soo good.

 

I need more of this. The imp I have has an older label on it, so maybe aging it a bit helps.

 

I keep catching whiffs of this and wondering what smells so fantastic. It makes me think of being out with friends on a summer evening, while the sun is setting and the weather is going from uncomfortably hot to perfect.

Edited December 4, 2006 by oh_the_horror

[supremegoddessofall]

Lemon and saffron. If it were more saffron and less lemon, I could deal with it, and it's such a lovely color! Unfortunately, lemon and I still aren't friends, even when it's sweetened up a bit. On to the swap pile.

[Voleuse]

On first application, this blend reminds me of grapes, sweet and intoxicating. As it dries, the grapes ripen to wine and honey, with the slightest hint of citrus. It's a rich, thirsting scent. I also smell the incense, but it's a background note, a constant and light smokiness that enhances the dominant wine. After I while, I get hints of spices, but I can't identify them. This is gorgeous. I want to compare Cairo to Athens, actually, but the tone is more common than their notes, if that makes sense.

[girl_android]

I think I picked Cairo because it mentioned incense. I have no idea what kyphi should smell like, although with the help of some judicious googling, and information in kunoichi's review (haven't yet read through all the reviews for Cairo!), I've got a little mental picture...

 

In the imp it smells kind of like bruised lemon rind, and honey and something alcoholic-ish, along with something resiny.

 

Wet on skin, there's something at once familiar about Cairo. Weirdly it reminds me of Aeroplane Lemon Jelly crystals.

 

DH walked out of the computer room and noted that this was strong! He picked that whatever was wafting about was Cairo, rather than Miss Mina, both of whom have been swiped on my arm this evening, after having a sniffie at the little patches of my skin that have seen scent.

 

Once it's dry, there's a little smokiness, but still there's the lemon rind thing. The alcoholic bit goes away, and there's a bit of green in amongst the incense waft. It's also kind of reminding me of those candles you burn outside (citronella?) to keep mozzies and other biting insects away from you ... I don't particularly mind that, but I don't think DH is a fan...

 

It took me a long while to get to testing this imp; every time I took a sniff to see whether I wanted to give the imp a go, it just wouldn't smell like something I wanted to wear that day. It's turning out to be a warm and dry-ish summer where I am, and this scent just seemed to suit the mood... I might just keep this imp around a little longer, I'm still a little undecided. Maybe just the imp is enough for me?

[Concupiscentia]

It smells sweet, almost like candy in the imp.

 

On my arm it is a mix of bubble gum, sweet wines and incense. It does cheer me up and I will keep the imp for when I'm in a sweet mood.

[The_Merf]

In the imp: A shot of incense (perhaps even the ozone from Nyarlathotep?) and citrus

 

Wet: Citrus explosion! This is very orange creamsicle, and yet there is an incense edge to it.

 

Drydown and wear: The orange dries down (thank goodness, as it's not a favorite scent of mine) and what is left is incense with a surprisingly heavy waft of cedar. I'm going to have to mull this imp over. It's an unusual take on incense blends, which I like, since I like unusual and I like incense, but I have to see what the average time for evaporation is on the heavy orange scent.