The Identity and Nature of ‘Sweet Hoof’

What exactly is ‘sweet hoof’? As noted above, this aromatic consists of the opercula of certain sea snails, that is to say it is the chitinous lids these animals use to close their shell-openings. It is still used in Indian perfumery today, and I have been informed on several occasions by incense makers that this ingredient is fried in clarified butter to remove any bad smell, and then ground and used in incense. A liquid preparation is also made from ‘sweet hoof’ in contemporary India that is used in making some blended itrs, such as the quite common itr called hīna. In my experience both the burnt shell and the liquid preparation smell rather unpleasant, or at least very harsh, somewhat like the odour of overheated electrical equipment with some marine notes, but apparently they act somewhat like a ‘fixative’ in scents, allowing the smells to linger in the air for longer.Footnote ⁶ Perfumer Christophe Laudamiel has commented to me that this material smells somewhat like certain pyrazines: molecules that are also found in coffee for example.Footnote ⁷ I might note in passing that, given the probable role of the squid (beak) in producing ambergris, and the ancient and widespread use of ‘sweet hoof’, we can certainly say that mollusks have played a rather significant, and overlooked, role in the history of perfumery.Footnote ⁸ Although ambergris and ‘sweet hoof’ are both found on the shores of parts of the Indian Ocean, the two products could not have more different histories and statuses as aromatics, and the reasons for these differences are something else that I shall discuss below.

‘Sweet hoof’ is most commonly called nakhī (and nakha) in Sanskrit, and it was a significant ingredient in many aromatic preparations described in Sanskrit from an early date. For example, it appears in several of the perfume formulae given by Varāhamihira writing in the sixth century ce.Footnote ⁹ In India today, ‘sweet hoof’ is still relatively easily available, and I have seen a variety of shapes and sizes for sale. I have investigated the possible identity of the shell from which these opercula came – the dealers who sold them to me were only able to tell me they come from South India and Sri Lanka. Professor Kenneth Boss of Harvard University has confirmed they are from an order of carnivorous marine snails called neogastropods, though it is not generally possible to identify the species from the operculum alone.Footnote ¹⁰ In an article on the chank shell industry in modern India David Heppell, the late mollusk expert from the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh noted that the operculum of the sacred chank/sacred conch is used in preparing incense.Footnote ¹¹ Writing in 1922, G. Petit sheds light on the trade and use of this material in Madagascar, noting “the opercula of certain marine gastropods. . .were sold by the Vezo fishermen to Hindus based in the Toliara region. Every year these Hindus export from two to three-hundred kilos of these opercula to Zanzibar and Bombay. . .which they use in the preparation of a perfumed essence that the Hindus call “Antar” [sic], and for the little sticks that give off a very fragrant smoke when burned”.Footnote ¹²

The scholar who has perhaps written the most about this substance is George Everhardus Rumphius, an important seventeenth-century botanist employed by the Dutch East India Company, who discussed ‘sweet hoof’ in The Ambonese Curiosity Cabinet (D'Amboinsche Rariteitkamer) of 1705.Footnote ¹³ Here, he describes the many varieties used in perfumery in Southeast Asia. With regard to their smell his description matches what I have found to be the case today: “if censed by itself it is not very pleasant, but when mixed with other incense, the same gives, so to speak, a manly power, and durability; for since most incenses consist of woods, resins, and saps, that have a sweet, flowery or cloying odor, one should mix the Sea Nail among them, in order to make them strong and durable. One can therefore compare this Unguis to a basse [sic] in Musick which, when heard alone has no comeliness, but which when mixed with other voices, makes for a sweet accord. . .”.Footnote ¹⁴ I might also point out that Rumphius’ comment here is a particularly early example of the musical metaphor as applied to the odour of blended perfumes.Footnote ¹⁵

Translating and Identifying the Sanskrit Term “Nakhī”

Before I discuss the history of ‘sweet hoof’ in pre-modern South Asia I want to pause and ask one very basic, yet important, question that I have taken for granted so far: how do we know that the thing(s) called by the term nakhī (and by several other terms) in Sanskrit is what I have described as “sweet hoof” above? How do we translate the word nakhī, and how do we translate terms for aromatic substances in general? How can we know what substances these words refer to and why should we care? This matter might seem rather obvious to some, and irresponsibly and naively positivistic to others, but it is important to reflect on whether we can translate these terms, and if so, how we do so. We must also theorise on both the nature and purposes of this process.

In the case of nakhī, in order to give us something to work with I will first give a brief and vague sketch of how I arrived at my translation. Let us start with a Sanskrit source, the commentary of Bhaṭṭotpala, composed in the tenth century ce, on a famous prognostication text called the Bṛhatsaṃhitā of Varāhamihira, which is an early South Asian perfumery text that, as I have already noted, mentions an ingredient called nakha.Footnote ¹⁶ In his commentary Bhaṭṭotpala explains the term nakha as a “skin/hide produced from a conch” (nakhaṃ śaṅkhodbhavaṃ carma).Footnote ¹⁷ Turning to the present day, an aromatic shell operculum is still available in India under the name nakhī/nakha,Footnote ¹⁸ and moreover this material resembles those varieties of unguis odoratus described by Rumphius both in terms of its properties and animal origin. Thus it might seem reasonable to understand nakha as something on the lines the fragrant operculum of a shell, which we might also translate as unguis odoratus or ‘sweet hoof’.

At this point, in reflecting on what I am doing with words and things here, it might help to adopt some terminology from the philosopher Gottlob Frege who famously made the useful distinction between the sense of a word and the referent (or denotation) of a term. Frege's most famous example is Phosphorus, “the morning star”, and Hesperus, “the evening star”, which are both words/terms for the planet Venus—these terms denote or refer to the same thing (Venus), but they have different senses. Now, this theory has been the subject of debate for over a century, and I do not wish to present it here as a philosophical theory, but rather as a useful terminology for making distinctions when reflecting on methods for studying pre-modern material culture as-described-in-texts.

In the case of nakhī, the precise referent, the object denoted by the word, and the exact species of mollusk from which the operculum was derived, no doubt varies, as it no doubt did in pre-modern South Asia. The other associations of the term—the sense—what else the term nakhī and its several synonyms implied in Sanskrit in various times and places—are of course not something we can necessarily translate from Sanskrit to other languages with just one word, but for this we need a lengthier, culturally ‘thick’ account. As we shall see below, however, in the case of nakhī we do not in fact lose all that much in translation, and nakhī and its synonyms remained relatively ‘thin’ terms in South Asia, less loaded with complexities of ‘sense’ than a term such as candana (sandalwood), which was associated with all sorts of people, places, practices and texts, not to mention many poetic and (polysemous) synonyms. Indeed it is precisely the nature and origins of the cultural ‘thinness’ of this aromatic that interest us here.

The problems encountered in translating the names of aromatics are not the same in every case, and it is important to note that the culturally ‘thinner’ the sense of a name for a material, the fewer the potential problems of translation. Translation of historical terms for aromatics is additionally greatly eased if the material in question is well described in our sources, and especially if the material was widely traded for a long time (as with musk), such that there are major and well-established interregional and temporal overlaps in discourses concerning the material, and also in usages of the material. For example, in this case I arrived at the translation by observing many overlaps of discourse.Footnote ¹⁹

To elucidate this method and to be clearer about what I mean by ‘overlaps’ of discourse, let us retrace more explicitly the steps by which we arrived at a translation of nakhī.

First, Rumphius uses both the terms “unguis odoratus” as well as “Murex ramosus” in his discussion of a certain aromatic, and this latter term overlaps with the name of a type of shell in contemporary scientific discourses. The uses of this material that Rumphius describes in Southeast Asia accord with what we see in pre-modern Indic texts. In pre-modern Indic texts we also see overlaps between Persian sources and Sanskrit ones, not to mention western classical ones, as I shall discuss below, allowing us ultimately to connect Persian aromatic terminology to Hindi. As already noted, one important pre-modern Sanskrit text calls this material “the skin of a conch”, which we might well understand in the circumstances to mean an operculum. Finally, a material sold to me a few years ago in India under the name nakhalā was called a “neogastropod operculum” in the terminology of an expert on mollusks at Harvard University. With so many overlaps, carefully considered, it seems reasonable to translate the term nakhī as ‘neogastropod operculum’ or ‘sweet hoof’ even when there is no single referent (i.e we cannot narrow down to the operculum from one specific species of mollusk).

In doing this sort of work, I am not privileging scientific discourses as providing some sort of God's eye view of reality, nor am I asserting that European languages are superior. Instead, bringing these scientific discourses and more recent European discourses into play in addition to the older Indic ones merely increases the connections we can make, helping us align older terms with more contemporary ones. Identifying nakhī, discovering the material thing(s) that the word would denote in our language with (relative) precision, is useful as it permits us to say more complex things about nakhī, where it came from, how common or rare it tends to be, how much this material was used in other neighbouring cultures and times, if this material is found in archaeological digs, amongst other things.

We now see that what appeared to be a separate endeavour—identification—is actually only translation, in this case translation of a Sanskrit term to one in another ancient language that is used to classify objects: scientific Latin. The whole process is admittedly open ended and complex, but I would argue that in some cases, at a certain point skepticism becomes unreasonable and thus in the present case it seems sensible to admit that nakhī was a fragrant mollusk operculum, also known as ‘sweet hoof’.

The possibilities for this sort of translation vary from case to case. To give two examples, words for a material that was not traded widely nor used for any length of time, but that had very rich local cultural connotations would be very hard to translate, especially if we have no archaeological evidence for the material referred to. Here finding any referent eludes us. On the other hand, sometimes a term for an aromatic is so enormously well-connected to many discourses and substances in multiple places over such a long period—so massively rich in sense and also in reference—that to try and find overlaps with single terms in contemporary sources is not wise. An example of this situation is the term ‘balsam’ which, as words go, is about as thick and complex as ‘wine’.Footnote ²⁰ In such cases we have a very rich body of pre-modern discourse but this cannot be usefully related to any single terms in contemporary discourses with a more restricted meaning, such as a scientific name.Footnote ²¹ Here the reference eludes us as there seem to be so many possible candidates. Perhaps the best thing to do here is possibly to compare the term to a similarly rich and complex term (such as ‘wine’) that we use, in order to get a sense of how this word was understood. Arguably, combinations of these sorts of problems are exactly what hinder attempts to identify the elusive soma of the Vedas—a plant/drug/god/concept that no doubt has as many, if not more, senses and referents as ‘balsam’. Nevertheless, the existence of these sorts of fascinatingly messy cases should not put us off translating simpler cases such as nakhī, and also some more complex ones (e.g. camphor), so long as we add all the necessary qualifications and accept the often provisional and incomplete nature of our results. The point is that not all ancient words for plants and perfumes present equal difficulties in translation.

Why do we want to do this sort of work? As noted, in these cases, translation is not merely a naïve, positivist exercise in obsessively trying to anchor the terminology of ancient texts to a privileged “scientific reality” just for the sake of it. Through this sort of translation into contemporary terms we are sometimes able tentatively to say that a certain aromatic material, broadly speaking, comes only from a certain part of the world (e.g. camphor in Sumatra and Borneo). Such observations might be strengthened and refined if our translation to a scientific name (or a modern term such as ‘camphor’) permits an overlap with the information presented in contemporary or recent maps of species distributions. If we find references to this material that were written in another part of the world, for example nutmegs in early medieval Kashmir, we might carefully infer the existence of certain trade networks. An understanding of trade networks might complicate our understanding of political history, and that in turn might change the way we read a text, such as a sumptuary manual that refers to a perfume made with the aromatic in question—we might be able to say with greater confidence that the material in question was not only represented as exotic, but that it actually was exotic and most likely also expensive and prestigious. The process of translating aromatics that I have outlined above might involve a complex process of deferment, but that does not mean that it is empty, arbitrary or useless. And far from obscuring the politics of naming and classifying the materials in the world, whether this be in medieval South Asia or in a modern laboratory, exploring these discursive overlaps also constitutes a process of comparison that allows us to see clearly historical differences in the way materials are named and categorised.

‘Sweet Hoof’ in Pre-modern South Asian Sources

I now turn to accounts of this material in South Asian sources, mainly medieval Sanskrit texts. By looking at what people did with this aromatic, and what they said about it, we will be in a stronger position to discover why, despite its evident importance in perfumery, ‘sweet hoof’ did not become one of the aromatics to be celebrated in poetry. We will also learn quite a lot about the complex and technical world of perfumery texts in medieval South Asia.

The sources that provide the most information on this material are medical, pharmacological and perfumery texts. ‘Sweet hoof’ seems to have been used from an early date, being mentioned in the medical text called the Carakasaṃhitā, which, in its present form, contains materials that are possibly dated from the third or second centuries bce to the fourth or fifth centuries ce.Footnote ²² The uncertain dating of this text, however, means we might do well to accept the earliest attestations to the material in perfumery as those references found in the sixth-century ce Bṛhatsaṃhitā of Varāhamihira, discussed above. For a very detailed account of the nature of nakhī and what people did with it, we need to turn to a later source, a text by Niścalakara called the Ratnaprabhā. This is a commentary on an important medical text called the Cikitsāsaṃgraha or Cakradatta by Cakrapāṇidatta. Niścalakara's commentary dates from the early second millennium ce and was probably composed in the Bengal region.Footnote ²³ Not only does this text tell us a lot about the varieties and purification of nakhī, but in discussing this substance Niścalakara quotes a number of perfumery texts that are lost today, thus offering what is, as far as I know, a unique insight into how many such perfumery texts might have been available to a scholar in Bengal in the early second millennium ce, and of the sorts of materials they contained.

In commenting on a passage in the Cakradatta which describes a certain medicinal oil (mahārājaprasāriṇītaila), Niścalakara explains what is meant by the prescription of “the three nakhīs” (nakhītrayam), a term that causes considerable confusion and discussion, since it appears that typically five types of nakhī are described in texts. In order to resolve this discrepancy Niścalakara therefore turns to several authorities on the matter:

Thus Niścalakara resolves this problem by showing that several authoritative texts on perfumery differentiate between the five types of ‘sweet hoof’: one variety is never to be used for perfume or incenseFootnote ²⁶ and amongst the others some are better for perfumes (i.e. perfumed pastes and oils that are not burned), and some are good for incense. The three ‘sweet hoofs’ are to be chosen from amongst the four that are suitable for aromatic preparations. We also see that ‘sweet hoof’ is classified here in terms of its resemblance in shape to other familiar objects, not according to its geographical origin or odour. The passage, like the other parts of this commentary, also shows us just how many sources Niścalakara had at his disposal. Here, for example, we see that he could refer to three authorities on perfumery in discussing ‘sweet hoof’: two of these texts have named authors and one is characterised as being “from the Bengal region”.Footnote ²⁷ None of these texts on perfumery have survived—indeed we now only possess three Sanskrit texts entirely concerned with perfumery (in just two manuscripts).Footnote ²⁸ This passage gives us a glimpse of what we might be missing, and thus we can try to imagine the background in which the surviving perfumery texts were produced and circulated. As we see here, these texts varied in style, some being terser in style than others, and they also varied in terms of the opinions they presented on the exact nature and uses of aromatics.

Later in the commentary on this same passage Niścalakara turns to the question of the purification of this material. As I noted above, in more recent periods, ‘sweet hoof’ in India is heated in clarified butter (or sometimes in hot sand) prior to being used in order to remove the fishy smell. It appears that the purification of ‘sweet hoof’ was likewise essential in pre-modern South Asia. First, Niścalakara explains the general purpose of purifying aromatics, referring again to one of the authorities on perfumery we saw above:

Then Niścalakara gives several accounts of the purification of ‘sweet hoof’ of which the most extensive is the following from Bhavadeva,Footnote ³⁰ who we saw above as the author of a “perfumery manual” (gandhaśāstra):

The resulting preparation would have already been quite perfumed, having undergone several treatments with precious aromatics as well as with flowers. Given the extent of the accounts of ‘sweet hoof’ in the perfumery texts and the lengths one had to go to in order to purify it, it seems that ‘sweet hoof’ was an important and valued perfumery ingredient. In elucidating a reference to ‘sweet hoof’ in a medical text, Niścalakara had recourse to several texts on perfumery – evidently these were in his opinion the best authorities on this topic.

Accounts of ‘sweet hoof’ in pharmacological literature, specifically in pharmacological glossaries (nighaṇṭus), also survive and it is to these that I will now briefly turn. These texts provide only lists of synonyms of aromatics, along with their pharmacological properties according to the categories of traditional South Asian medicine, āyurveda. The famous pharmacological glossary of Dhanvantari lists twelve synonyms for ‘sweet hoof’ (here under the heading of nakhaḥ) many of which mean ‘fingernail’, and also ‘hoof’. The text also gives seashell related synonyms, along with terms meaning ‘jaw’ and ‘snake jaw’ and two terms whose relevance in this case are less clear (śilpī, kośī).Footnote ³⁴ As for the qualities of ‘sweet hoof’, they are said to be as follows in this text:

A later pharmacological glossary, the fifteenth or sixteenth century ce Rājanighaṇṭu, expands the number of synonyms to make a total of eighteen. Notable additions to the list of synonyms include ‘badarī leaf’ (badarīpatra), which would seem to correlate to the badara flower shape seen in the Ratnaprabhā commentary of Niścalakara.Footnote ³⁶ Another term (dhūpya) refers to the use of this material in incense, and finally there is a very interesting term paṇyavilāsinī whose primary sense is ‘prostitute’ (i.e. ‘commodity coquette’). I have no idea why this latter term refers to this material, unless there is some association between the ‘fingernail’ and the erotic culture of scratching in early and medieval South Asia, something we will see below in a certain playful riddle/incense formula involving nakhī. However, another famous Sanskrit lexicon (not pharmacological), the Nāmaliṅgānuśāsana of Amarasiṃha contains a very similar term for this aromatic material that likewise means ‘prostitute’ (haṭṭavilāsinī) which is explained by the commentator Kṣīrasvāmin as follows “it charms in the marketplace so is a ‘marketplace charmer’, or it is like a prostitute”, though this comment does not really make things all that much clearer.Footnote ³⁷

Finally I will now turn to another source, the longest and most detailed of the three surviving Sanskrit texts on perfumery, the early-mid second millennium ce Essence of Perfume, or Gandhasāra.Footnote ³⁸ This text is divided into three sections, one on perfumery processes, one containing recipes, and a final section that is a glossary of aromatics together with instructions on how to examine them for quality. Here, the extensive perfumery ingredient glossary contains a whole section devoted to animal derived aromatics (jīvavarga). This section is interesting as it shows just how many of these were available at that time in South Asia, and also that people (at least specialists) were well aware that they were animal products. These materials are as follows (I have selected the better known Sanskrit terms for them here): musk (kastūrī), civet (pūti), ‘sweet hoof’ (nakhī), ‘tiger claw’ (vyāghranakha), ghee (ghṛta), honey (madhu), wax (siktha), lac (lākṣā), and bamboo silica/tabashir (vaṃśalocana).Footnote ³⁹

In the section on ‘sweet hoof’ in the glossary of the Essence of Perfume, we see the usual synonyms for ‘shell’ and ‘hoof’ and for ‘jaw’. Quite notably there are no synonyms for ‘fingernail’ apart from the term nakha itself. There is also a term that suggests a lotus petal and one that means ‘pig's ear’, terms that we saw describing varieties of this material in terms of its shape. One other term sunāda (‘with a good sound’) could well imply ‘conch’ and therefore the term nāda (‘sound’) might also be an abbreviated version of that term.Footnote ⁴⁰ Turning to the examination (parīkṣā) of this material, the Essence of Perfume notes the following:

So, in the Essence of Perfume, the Gandhasāra we see two types of text about ‘sweet hoof’. One passage lists the many synonyms for nakhī in the same manner as the pharmacological glossaries, nighaṇṭus, something that would be useful in simply understanding perfumery recipes. The other type of text gives a classification of the shapes (or standardised names for shapes) in the manner of the extracts from perfumery texts given in the commentary of Niścalakara, something that would be useful in buying ‘sweet hoof’, or in choosing which type of ‘sweet hoof’ to use in a recipe.

From this we can learn two important things. First, those passages we saw above from the lost perfumery texts that described the shapes of ‘sweet hoof’ were probably taken from parts of those texts that dealt with the examination (parīkṣā) of aromatics—it would seem that all three of these lost perfumery texts contained such sections. Secondly, we see that the verses on ‘sweet hoof’ in the extant perfumery text called the Gandhasāra somewhat resemble, but are not exactly the same as, those in the lost perfumery texts. This points to a textual culture of perfumery in which a body of similar ideas circulated but in which individual authors nevertheless modified and rewrote these materials for new compositions, adding a touch of diversity, and no doubt also allowing for innovation, new products, new materials, as well as regional variety.Footnote ⁴²

Practical Perfumery and Literary Perfumery

A survey of the formulae for perfumes and incenses in a text such as the Bṛhatsaṃhitā of Varāhamihira or in the Essence of Perfume shows that ‘sweet hoof’ was a relatively common ingredient in perfumes and especially in incenses. If, on the other hand, we read literary texts from any period, we find that this material is never mentioned and one would never notice that this was an important aromatic in pre-modern India. This is a contrast with sandalwood, agarwood, musk, camphor and saffron—materials that are all very frequently mentioned and described in all manner of literary texts in Sanskrit. Why did certain aromatics become important components of the perfumery culture described in literary texts and others not? Let us first compare ‘sweet hoof’ with some other aromatics to see what qualities it shares with them as perfumery ingredient and what it lacks. I shall not provide a detailed account of literary sources on perfumery here, as this corpus is far too extensive to cover in this context.Footnote ⁴³

An aromatic in a work of literature, such as camphor in a poem is, to state the obvious, an odorous material named and described in words. Thus in Sanskrit literature the name of an aromatic can be of some importance. As with ‘sweet hoof’, most aromatics had a number of synonyms. Some of these terms for aromatics could evoke other concepts and sensations, evoking and constructing the complexities of the cultural ‘sense’ of descriptions of the aromatic. Camphor, for example, has a number of synonyms that suggest its whiteness and coolness, and the poet could refer to camphor with words that mean ‘moon’, and ‘snow’.Footnote ⁴⁴ Sanskrit literature quite frequently contains passages that are bi-textual, that is to say the words in a passage can be read in two senses, being a complex pun. If the common name (or even a synonym) of an aromatic has different meanings, i.e. possesses homonyms, it can be used in such bi-textual passages. For example, in one medieval text there is a description of the houses of aromatics merchants. In punning prose-style their abundance of aromatics is described. The aromatics here are camphor, sandalwood, agarwood, musk, yellow sandalwood, and nutmegs. Their abundance of musk is described as follows: “like the Ganges’ stream they have many paths” (or “. . .they possess much musk”) (gaṅgāpravāhair iva bahumārgaiḥ).Footnote ⁴⁵ This phrase makes a pun using one (rather obscure) term for musk meaning ‘deer-related-thing’ (mārga), a word that most commonly means ‘path’ or “way”.

Now, the various synonyms of ‘sweet hoof’ would appear to lend themselves quite well to both evocative and punning usages: ‘fingernail’, ‘hoof’, ‘conch’, and even ‘prostitute’. Such synonyms for ‘sweet hoof’ are indeed commonly used in the recipes in the Essence of Perfume, lending that text at times a quite suggestive tone. This is especially the case given that scratching with fingernails was an activity associated with sex in texts on erotics. One very curious incense formula even relies on the reader solving riddles that can then be read as puns in order to discover the ingredients required for the incense. This formula is found in both the Essence of Perfume and in another text, the Lore of Perfume (Gandhavāda). An old Marathi commentary in the latter text explains how to solve the riddle. The term in the riddle that can be transformed into “sweet hoof” is “the shame of a respectable woman” (kulavadhūlajjā). The fingernail scratches of illicit lovemaking would be shameful to such a woman, and thus her shame is produced by fingernails (nakha), which also means ‘sweet hoof’.Footnote ⁴⁶

Despite the striking exploitation of the name of ‘sweet hoof’ in this text on perfumery, no such references are, to my knowledge, found in literary texts. Thus while the terms for ‘sweet hoof’ in Sanskrit were eminently suited to a literary context, they were never so used. Evidently a playful and evocative name was not enough to allow an aromatic to be included in the literary canon redolent with musk, camphor, and other major aromatics.

Another factor that seems to have influenced whether an aromatic could be included in literary texts was the date at which it became commonly available in South Asia. All the major aromatics mentioned above, musk etc., were available to perfumers at the latest by the early to mid first millennium ce, a period when many of the conventions of classical Sanskrit poetics were also being formed. In that early period, it seems that a new material such as musk could still be incorporated into the classical perfumery world of literature. A material that appeared much later, such as ambergris, which is first mentioned in texts that date most probably from around the beginning of the second millennium ce, was not able to join the classical canon of literary aromatics. ‘Sweet hoof’, however, was evidently a feature of South Asian perfumery at an early enough date to have been incorporated into poetic conventions. Age is no problem for ‘sweet hoof’, and therefore the literary aromatics must possess still other qualities that ‘sweet hoof’ lacks.

An important aspect of all the major aromatics mentioned in literature is their colour as well as their hotness and coolness according to the conventions of the traditional pharmacological system. Camphor and sandalwood were white or light in colour, musk and agarwood were celebrated for being black, and saffron is red in Sanskrit literature. The two white aromatics were thought to be cooling, and the black and red aromatics were thought to be warming. We saw above that ‘sweet hoof’ is classified as warm, but in terms of its visual appearance the colour is not noted so much as the shape, which would be effaced on its being ground up to use. Although to us the colour of a piece of agarwood and that of an operculum might not seem all that different, it was not the colour of ‘sweet hoof’ that people noted in medieval South Asia. Possibly the dull pigmentation of ‘sweet hoof’ played a role in its poetic obscurity?

But this seems a bit of a weak argument – there are plenty of strikingly brown and white aromatics that were never mentioned in poetry in Sanskrit despite their colours. One might also argue that the dark colour of agarwood was celebrated on account of the already-established importance of this material. What else can we say about the literary aromatics? Two other aspects of these aromatics stand out, their exotic origins and their high value, factors that I have discussed elsewhere.Footnote ⁴⁷ These qualities are connected of course, since the exotic material is by definition hard to come by, and, being rare, it is costly, assuming there is a demand from consumers. Not only were materials such as musk and camphor actually exotic, being brought from far northern regions and Southeast Asia respectively, but their strange and remote origins were also celebrated in literature. ‘Sweet hoof’, however, was no doubt available relatively locally in many coastal regions. The conch and other sea snails were not exotic animals, and although we do not know the price of this material apart from in one later context, we can assume its price was not so high as that of a material such as camphor that was brought from so far away.Footnote ⁴⁸ As noted above, in some respects, such as being found on seashores, ‘sweet hoof’ resembles ambergris, yet the production of ‘sweet hoof’ was easy and predictable, assuring a regular plentiful supply. Ambergris is washed ashore infrequently and sporadically, and requires many hours of scouring the coast to locate.Footnote ⁴⁹ Thus the supply of ambergris is unpredictable, and the substance itself is very rare and expensive. One might even speculate that it was the extreme spatial and temporal unpredictability of ambergris that slowed its arrival on the scene as a global aromatic. As I have argued elsewhere, it appears that musk paved the way for the later popularity of civet. Footnote ⁵⁰ When ambergris was finally adopted, might ‘sweet hoof’, with its unusual toasty marine odours, have partly paved the way for its acceptance? Does ambergris perhaps simultaneously furnish all the qualities of precious and mysterious yellow amber, pungent, fixative ‘sweet hoof’, and rare, imported animal musk, whilst being conveniently (if somewhat irregularly) found in many places around the Indian Ocean and beyond?

It seems that it was the cheap and less exotic nature of ‘sweet hoof’ that excluded it (and many other aromatics) from being included in literature. Although this material was called by terms ‘ripe for literary exploitation’ and although it was an ancient and established aromatic, it was just too commonplace and affordable to include in the idealised luxurious worlds described in literary texts. Thus economic concerns, above all else, dictated what it took to become a famous literary perfume in medieval South Asia, and these were closely tied to the availability of the product and the difficulty of production. On the other hand, the practical world of perfumery was far more inclusive, and perfumery texts present a different picture of what actual perfumes would (or should) have been like. In texts on perfumery ‘sweet hoof’ is very common and its striking fingernail-related synonyms were deliberately exploited in lending the Essence of Perfume a rather interesting, poetic and playful texture. The qualities an aromatic needed to play a role in the poetics of perfumery texts were quite different to the qualities an aromatic required in order to play a role in perfumery as described in courtly literary texts. The ideal perfumes of poetry are costly, rare, and unchanging, but not very complicated affairs. The somewhat pragmatic world of perfumery is far more varied and less conservative. As we have seen, texts on perfumery are by no means devoid of their own ‘in-house’ poetic touches. Yet, such texts do not play with the names of aromatics in order to mark distinctions in terms of wealth and literary prowess, but rather they play on the name of ‘sweet hoof’ in order to invite readers to display their command of perfumery expertise.Footnote ⁵¹