Thirteen (13): May 2016

[DiesMali]

13 is significant, whether you consider it lucky, unlucky or just plain odd. Many believe it to be unfortunate…

…because there were 13 present at the Last Supper.
…Loki crashed a party of 12 at Valhalla, which ended in Baldur’s death.
…Oinomaos killed 13 of Hippodamia’s suitors before Pelops finally, in his own shady way, defeated the jealous king.
…In ancient Rome, Hecate’s witches gathered in groups of 12, the Goddess herself being the 13th in the coven.

Concern over the number thirteen echoes back beyond the Christian era. Line 13 was omitted from the Code of Hammurabi.

The shivers over Friday the 13th also have some interesting origins:

…Christ was allegedly crucified on Friday the 13th.
…On Friday, October 13, 1307, King Philip IV of France ordered the arrests of Jaques de Molay, Grand Master of the Knights Templar, and sixty of his senior knights.
…In British custom, hangings were held on Fridays, and there were 13 steps on the gallows leading to the noose.

To combat the superstition, Robert Ingersoll and the Thirteen Club held thirteen-men dinners during the 19th Century. Successful? Hardly. The number still invokes trepidation to this day. A recent whimsical little serial killer study showed that the following murderers all have names that total thirteen letters:

Theodore Bundy
Jeffrey Dahmer
Albert De Salvo
John Wayne Gacy

And, with a little stretch of the imagination, you can also fit “Jack the Ripper” and “Charles Manson” into that equation.

More current-era paranoia: modern schoolchildren stop their memorization of the multiplication tables at 12. There were 13 Plutonium slugs in the atomic bomb that was dropped on Nagasaki. Apollo 13 wasn’t exactly the most successful space mission. All of these are things that modern triskaidekaphobes point to when justifying their fears.

For some, 13 is an extremely fortuitous and auspicious number…

…In Jewish tradition, God has 13 Attributes of Mercy. Also, there were 13 tribes of Israel, 13 principles of Jewish faith, and 13 is considered the age of maturity.
…The ancient Egyptians believed that there were 12 stages of spiritual achievement in this lifetime, and a 13th beyond death.
…The word for thirteen, in Chinese, sounds much like the word which means “must be alive”.

Thirteen, whether you love it or loathe it, is a pretty cool number all around.

…In some theories of relativity, there are 13 dimensions.
…It is a prime number, lucky number, star number, Wilson Prime, and Fibonacci number.
…There are 13 Archimedean solids.

AND…
…There were 13 original colonies when the United States were founded.

Says a lot about the US, doesn’t it?

This 13 is a blend of blackened cacao and thirteen sacred oils: Siamese red benzoin, olibanum, black copal, fossilized amber oil, sweet myrrh, Coptic rose resin, guggul gum, dragon’s blood resin, Palo Santo, bdellium, dammar gum, and attar of onycha.

In the bottle: UH. Popcorn? Buttered popcorn?

Wet on my skin: While wet, and also while dry on the first 2 days after it arrived, this smells exactly like the contents of a gift popcorn tin on me. You know, the ones divided into 3 or 4 parts, and they've got butter, cheese, caramel, and sometimes chocolate-covered popcorn? This smells like that while wet.

Dry: I waited a few days to try this again, in hopes that it would calm down a bit. Thankfully, the popcorn tin fades after it's been on about 10 minutes. It's cocoa and then a whole lot of dry, almost salty/sharp resins. It's lighter and sharper than I would have expected - I was hoping for/expecting a deep cocoa-incense-resin, and while this has the distinct possibility of aging into something like that, it isn't there yet. Benzoin and sharp, smoky cacao are at the front of this scent, and aside from a bit of myrrh, the rest of the resins are all sort of blended together to form an indistinct mass of sharp, smoky, almost buttery incense. It really does smell salty/buttery, even after the popcorn fades.

This is one of the strangest blends I've tried thus far from BPAL, that's for sure. It isn't *bad*, but I think I'm going to put it away and age it in a box for a while to see if that deepens and un-salts the resins a little.

[Antoinette]

I love this 13!

 

Although there are many notes in this blend, first impression is dark chocolate. As it dries down, I get the resins - mostly the amber. The amber reminds me of Gelt. This is akin to a dark chocolate version of gelt, but with more depth from the added components. Overall, if you like dark chocolate, this is pretty stunning with great throw and lasting power.

[Joyleaf_]

First 13 purchase ever! And I am so glad I did. This oil is dark chocolate in the bottle, almost a single note. Wearing, the amber and the myrrh come forward to a dark resinous blend. It smells like a bar of dark chocolate left in the back of an incense store. I love it.

[Little Bird]

The Thirteens never smell the way that I imagine they will when I read their lists of notes. I expected this to be resin heaven, but it's mostly sugar and dark, rich chocolate with a sad whimper of dusty amber on my skin.

Dark chocolate with a black, burnt sugar edge and hints of dusty, warm amber. I really wanted and expected this to be more resinous. I enjoy the chocolate note and it smells delicious, but I wanted myrrh, copal, olibanum, benzoin and dragon's blood, and I don't smell any of those notes at all.

 

This lasted for over 6 hours (before I showered) and was strong, dark chocolate all the way through. I'm going to keep the two bottles I ordered, because I do like the chocolate, but I'm really going to hope that the resins take over with some aging.

[zankoku_zen]

Dark chocolate with a dark burnt sugar, amber, and myrrh. This is a very strong dark chocolate blend. Sugary, rich, foodie. Great throw and wear length.

 

If you're into chocolate, this 13 is for you.

[achildoftime]

I mostly get very deep, rich dark chocolate. There are some golden notes that I get out of this, but I can't pinpoint any of them. It does smell distinctly warm. I'm not the biggest fan of chocolate scents so it isn't for me, but I can see where someone looking for a warm, golden chocolate would hit the jackpot.

[doomsday_disco]

This smells like dark chocolate and burnt sugar and smells more like a dark chocolate bar with burnt sugar over time. I'm never able to pick out any resins from this, although I am sure they must be playing some role in the background, like contributing a light smokiness (mayyyybe the copal?). But it is a really nice sugary dark chocolate scent, kind of like 13 September 2013, but without the weirder notes.

 

Edited May 8, 2021 by doomsday_disco

[Lucchesa]

OK, I am having a very different experience with this than everyone else, and it was given to me by doomsday_disco, so it's the exact same thing tested above only four months ago.  If I hadn't known this was a 13, I would have struggled to find the chocolate at all.  This is not in the least foodie on my skin.  I get burnt sugar and all the resins.  Dragon's blood especially.  Myrrh.  Copal, amber.  Several in the list of ingredients I am unfamiliar with so I can't comment on, say, bdellium, but the overall impression on my skin is of dark sugary resins with just a whisper of cocoa, and it lasts for hours.