HyraceumTincture-Dark-10%-Perfume and Incense ingredient-Dassie-Musk-Pheromones’-Aphrodisiac

Description

This listing is for the Dark Hyraceum tincture. It is is a bit darker in colour than the Hyraceum Blonde tincture, but also has a much darker and intense fragrance profile with deeper notes of leather, tobacco, Castoreum and musk.

While the Blonde Hyraceum tincture has more sweet and floral notes, (especially during dry-down), and a lovely dryness that compliments floral and Fougere perfume compositions, the dark Hyraceum delivers more of the darker animalic notes that Hyraceum is known for.

I prepare the Blonde tincture from light coloured stone I collected from the higher outcroppings, while the dark tincture is prepared from the dark “Droppings” of mineralized material that collect in lumps at the foot of the stone walls. You can see the difference between the two materials and their tinctures in the photos above.

Hyraceum AKA African Stone is a traditional medicine and perfume ingredient.

Explaining exactly what Hyraceum is is always fun.
To be succinct, Hyraceum is the mineralized urine and feces of the Rock Hyrax which is the only other animal related to the elephant. (Even though it looks more like a Groundhog and doesn’t have a long nose.)

Rock Hyrax communities deposit their excrement in the same place for thousands of years. These smelly aggregates are called middens and also serve the function of social and territorial markers. These middens can be as old as 50.000 years.
Rock Hyrax are most often found basking on warm rocks in sunshiny places from South Africa all the way to Israel and Lebanon.

In traditional African medicine, the stone has been used as a remedy for epilepsy.

Hyraceum is better known for its use in perfumery where it can deliver notes of leather, Deer Musk, Civet, Castoreum and Cade.

Since I am always learning, I can now say that the light coloured stone is found on the rock walls above the black Hyraceum. As the centuries go by and this liquid makes it’s way to the ground, it builds up layers of mineralized material often forming stalactites that have developed their own scent profile distinct from the black deposits that form on the ground. (See a sample of light coloured Hyraceum stone in the comparative photo above).

Hyraceum tincture smells like something that has taken hundreds, if not thousands of years to develop, refine and mature.
The Blonde material was collected in Kenya and the dark stone in South Africa.

You can purchase dark Hyraceum stone in the shop and make your own tincture. I use a 1:10 ratio of stone to 95% alcohol, powder it finely and let it macerate for one year. Here is the listing-https://www.etsy.com/listing/811622815/hyraceum-stone-musk-africa-stone-dassie

Dan