Over the past 5 years I have been dabbling in DNA testing. I have found just recently I am related to Napoleon. In my quest for things from that timeperiod I found a company called Rance who make perfumes in France. They make a perfume for Napoleon and a perfume for his wife the same way today as they did in the early 1750's. So I thought, what the heck, I'll try to get a sample of them. They arrived today. Apparently Napoleons perfume and his wifes had 2 distict smells but when they where together it formed another smell. I will try it out and let you know. The Woman's perfume is "Josephine" the guys is Le Vainqueur.
I like Francois Charles, Triomphe, and Le Vainqueur. Though I find Le Vainquer to be a bit of an insipid citrus with a shade too much lavender. Francois Charles is fun to wear from time to time. The Rance fragrances are definitely niche products. The Le Vainqueur and Josephine (very classic smelling) when brought together make an unusual smelling perfume. I'm lucky, I've got a local connection that carries the entire line of Rance products.
The Le Vainqueur and the Josephine are great fragrances. My nose is unable to detect the difference when they are brought together most likely because I am wearing the Le Vainqueur at the time. The Rance line is very nice.
"Je reviens en trois jours, ne te laves pas" ("I will be arriving home in three days. Don't bathe...") not sure what scents Napoleon as into!
I'm with you there. That jumped out at me when I was reading the Rance literature online. I couldn't imagine what that time period smelled like!
Perfume was the scent of royalty. Only the noble class could afford fragrance. Chris Tsefalas told me that when the Tzar and Tzarina attended church the entire church was cleared out, so they had a private service. During the service, their perfumed scent would fill the church and when the "rabble" was allowed back into the church the scent would still remain for a while. ...Again, from Chris Tsefalas, When Rance was asked to make perfume for the Emperor, he refused. When asked why, he told Napolean that he could create a fragrance worthy of an emperor, but he would never live long enough to smell it. It would take at least 100 years to mature. Napolean persisted and Rance eventually produced a quick maturing version for the royal family. According to lore, the fragrance used in Rance's current offerings was not only based off of recipes, but from the perfume itself, his masterwork, over a hundred years old and just now reaching maturity. Yemanese perfumers spent a century trying to make a frankincense, myrrh and rose perfume. After many failures and attempts, they discovered that because the frankincense and myrrh were aged essences, the rose essence had to be aged as well, otherwise the scent of the perfume would sour and fail.
