Scents of Arabia presents an innovative interdisciplinary exploration of the role of scents and incense in ancient Arabian societies. Bringing together leading experts in archaeology, biomolecular science, sensory studies, history, and ethnography, it reveals how aromatic substances were deeply embedded in social, ritual, and economic life across time. The book challenges traditional trade-focused narratives and instead highlights the complex, multisensory dimensions of scent - as a medium of communication, identity, and religious experience. Emphasizing the cultural agency of olfaction, the contributions of this book offer new frameworks for understanding how ancient societies perceived, used, and valued aromatic substances. This volume positions olfactory heritage as a key element of historical inquiry and advocates for its recognition within broader debates on intangible cultural heritage.
Guidelines and Transliteration
Preface
Titles of papers read at the Seminar for Arabian Studies special session
Scents of Arabia: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Ancient Olfactory Worlds
New dimensions of interdisciplinary research on ancient scents and incense in
Arabia Arnulf Hausleiter and Barbara Huber
Aur, accept! Aur, listen! Connecting Arabia and Assyria through
aromatics and olfaction Kiersten Neumann
Aurbanipals bdellium: revisiting Commiphora wightii in the Persian Gulf
Sureshkumar Muthukumaran
The identifications of incenses: lessons learned in the organic analyses in
the Mediterranean and the Levant Elisabeth Dodinet
Exploring the aromatic diversity of incense materials at the ancient oasis of
Taym using metabolic profiling Barbara Huber, Arnulf Hausleiter,
Michèle Dinies, Muhammad H. Al-Najem, Majed T.F. Alonazy, Ina Säumel,
Daniel Giddings Vassão, Ricardo Fernandes, Nicole Boivin, Patrick Roberts and
Thi Lam Huong Pham
The archaeological and ethnographic heritage of portable incense burner
production in Dhofar, the southern Arabian Peninsula William Gerard
Zimmerle
Outlook: the scents of Arabia a nose-on approach Sofia Collette Ehrich
List of contributors
Arnulf Hausleiter is a Near Eastern archaeologist and scientific officer for the archaeology of the Arabian Peninsula at the Orient Department of the German Archaeological Institute (DAI), Berlin, Germany. His scientific research focuses on the archaeology and environment of the oases in north-western Arabia, their networks and socio-cultural practices.
Barbara Huber is post-doctoral researcher at the Bonn Center for ArchaeoSciences, University of Bonn, and the Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology in Jena, Germany. She specializes in biomolecular archaeology and metabolomics, exploring the role of scents, plants, and organic residues in ancient cultural and environmental practices.
Lisainfo e-raamatute kohta