Italian Perfumery (1/4)
A few days ago I was preparing the lesson on " Italian Brands and Fragrances ". I was studying with special care because I liked the idea of highlighting the history of our perfumery, so I sinked into a three-day- full-immersion in Italian brands history which I really loved. First of all I liked to emphasize to my students a basic idea: perfumery was born in Italy, in the convents of friars and nuns scattered over a territory that, from Middle Ages throughout all Renaissance was subdivided into dozens of small kingdoms, independent towns, Republics which spent most of their resources at sea or fiercely fighting one another. The only thing characterizing the whole territory was the presence of hundreds of abbeys and monasteries with their "giardini dei semplici/orchards and botanical gardens" in which monks and nuns used to grew plants to be introduced in herbal decoctions, ointments, tablets, syrups, etc., that were used to treat the most common ailments.