The History of Aromatherapy

What is the history of aromatherapy?

Since the beginning of mankind, plants have been used for medicinal healing.  How did aromatherapy come about?

By Kathy Sadowski, MS in Aromatherapy, Registered Aromatherapist, LMT

Ancient Times

Extracts of yarrow were found in a Neanderthal burial and the French caves of Lascaux show the paintings from 18,000 BC in which people were using medicinal plants.  While Rene-Maurice Gattefosse (1881 – 1950) is credited as the Father of aromatherapy, the ancient use of aromatic plants dates back nearly 5000 years ago to the Chinese and Egyptian people via incense, embalming, perfumery, and healing. The Ebers manuscript from around 2800 BC listed the Egyptian use of aromatic medicines (Buckle, 2003). In China around the same time, The Great Herbal was written and listed some 350 plant medicinal properties (Buckle, 2003). In India, some of the earliest medical Sanskrits dating back to 2000 BC listed Ayurvedic aromatic recipes still being used today (Buckle, 2003). Around 2000 years ago in Greece, Hippocrates became known as the father of medicine (460 BC), Theophrastus wrote Enquiry into plants (300 BC), Dioscorides wrote the famous De Materia Medica (100 AD) on herbal medicine, and Galen, physician to Emperor Marcus (130 – 200 AD), developed a system of diagnosing and treating with herbs (Buckle, 2003).

The first distiller

Around 1000 AD, Ibn Sina, later known as Avicenna, wrote the Arabian Canon of Medicine which listed 760 medicinal plants and has since been used for centuries (Buckle, 2003). He also laid the groundwork for clinical drug trials and invented an essential oil distiller called an alembic. In the same century, Saint Hildegard (1098 – 1179) was a German nun and healer credited with developing lavender water (ACHS, 2013).

Deadly Plague

In the 14^th Century, the Black Plague hit and herbs where used to ward off the deadly disease. In the 1500’s, the French continued to advance the distillation process with oils of rosemary, frankincense, juniper, rose, and sage (ACHS, 2013).   Paracelcus, an alchemist and doctor, coined the term “essence,” and the use of plants as medicine (ACHS, 2013). By the 16^th and 17^th century, over 60 essential oils had been created (ACHS, 2013).

Perfumery

As perfumes became popular in the 19^th century, the process of isolating essential oil constituents was also developed (ACHS, 2013). In the 1900’s Gattefosse, of a prominent perfume family in France, was responsible for the idea of synergy of essential oils and using them for medicinal purposes (Rhind, 2012).  In 1969, Maurice Girault developed the aromatogram, a lab technique that shows antimicrobial properties of essential oils against specific pathogens (Rhind, 2014).

Modern Aromatherapy

Robert Tisserand, considered the founder of modern aromatherapy, wrote the book The Art of Aromatherapy in 1977 and founded the International Journal of Aromatherapy. Today, the process of distillation is still used for retrieving the essential oils from plant material and involves converting the volatile liquid into a vapor, and then condensing the vapor into a usable liquid (ACHS, 2013).

References

ACHS (2013). Module 2: Aromatherapy 503. Retrieved on 5.18.15. Retrieved from www.achs.edu

Buckle, J. (2003). Clinical aromatherapy: Essential oils in practice (2nd ed.). Philadelphia: Churchill Livingstone.

Rhind, J. (2012). Essential oils: A handbook for aromatherapy practice. London and Philadelphia: Singing Dragon.