Class Catalogue

Nuri has lectured in various circumstances, from university classrooms to sleepaway camps. All have provided a fantastic opportunity to explore and learn. Nuri tailors each engagement to the needs of her host and attendants.

Check which classes are currently on offer at Atropos Lectures.

If you would like to host a talk or schedule Nuri for a conference, please send an inquiry.

Lectures

Scent & Spirit Series

The Odour of Witches: Scent During the European Witch Hysteria

Details

Why did witches smell like sulphur? Why were women’s bodies linked to perfume, poison, and pestilence? And how did smell become evidence of witchcraft?

In this online lecture, historian and perfumer Nuri McBride examines the role of scent in the European witch hysterias between the 15th and 18th centuries. This period saw tens of thousands of people, mostly women, accused of witchcraft, with olfactory cues often cited in their condemnation. Fragrances were not neutral; they marked the difference between sanctity and sin, medicine and malice.

We’ll explore how olfactory language and the existing scent culture shaped legal, theological, and popular narratives about witches. From the sulphurous stench of Hell to the alluring perfumes of seductresses, we’ll trace the ways scent was weaponised in trials, sermons, and folklore. The lecture will also examine the changing certainty around the ways of knowing truth in early modern Europe.

Who Should Take This Class

You will love this class if you are…

  • Interested in the history and cultural significance of scent
  • Fascinated by the history of the witch trials
  • Curious about the intersection of fragrance, theology, and law
  • A writer, artist, or scent maker seeking dark historical inspiration
  • Drawn to sensory history and the politics of the body

Anointed with Ambrosia: Scent in Greek Myth

Details

Ancient Greek stories and myths are laced with odours, from divine to disgusting. In Anointed with Ambrosia: Scent in Greek Myth, Nuri McBride of Atropos Parfums will explore the ancient Greek sensorium through its stories. This exploration will focus on the sensory knowledge embedded in these tales and how olfaction was used as a tool of myth-making.

We will learn how to smell a god and how the gods used odour for benevolent, mischievous, and malevolent purposes. The session will approach Greece’s aromatic landscape from a mythopoetic perspective and examine how odours could create chaos or order in the Hellenistic world.

Finally, there will be a brief discussion on the use of fragrant materials and perfumes in ritual and magic as a means of divine persuasion.

*Two optional take-home exercises (writing and scent-making) are also included in the course to help ground the student’s senses in the material.

Who Should Take This Class

You will love this class if you are…

  • interested in the history and cultural impact of odours and fragrances
  • want to learn more about the Hellenistic mythos
  • a mythology fan who wants to learn how to explore myths through your senses
  • a perfume enthusiast who wishes to gain a deeper understanding of the impact of scent
  • a fragrance maker seeking inspiration.

The Putrid and the Divine: The Scent of Early Christians Saints

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There is a long tradition within Christianity, particularly in the early church, of framing miraculous events in a sensorial, even a sensual, way. Early Christian writers grounded these visitations in the senses so that magic seemed touchable, holiness could be tasted, and the divine had a smell.

This created a lush, dramatic, and delightfully odd world of reeking Pillar Saints, rose-scented stigmata wounds, and visitations by sentient smell clouds. Not everyone was a fan of this sensory approach, and it’s fallen out of fashion in theological circles, but its influence can still be felt across the spectrum of Christian belief.

In this class, we will:

  • Review sense perception and the olfactory landscape of the Early Christian World
  • Understand the role of aromatics as sacrificial objects, allegorical tools, and ritualised communication in the early church
  • Learn about the concept of the Christian Body and how odour played a part in the physical expression of holiness, both through otherworldly pleasant scents and earthly malodours
  • Examine four olfactive states in Christian cosmology: The Odour of Sanctity, The Holy Stench, The Scent of the Martyr, and the Aroma of God

The Scent of Gan Eden: Olfaction in Judaism

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“His cheeks are like beds of spices, Banks of perfume His lips are like lilies; They drip flowing myrrh.” (Song of Songs 5:13)

Scent plays an important role in most religions. Odour can reinforce our connection to a place and community. It can connect us to emotions and nostalgia, be used as a sacrifice and help create an environment of sacredness. While Judaism may not be the first religion most people think of when they think of religious scents, Judaism does, in fact, have a long history of religious aromatics. 

In this class, Nuri McBride will explore the Jewish spiritual understanding of breath, life, and scent. We will explore how scent was used both metaphorically and ritualistically in the Temple and post Temple periods, as well as ways in which aromatics are used today in contemporary Jewish communities all over the world.

Takeaways:

  • Learn about the significance of olfaction in Jewish text and liturgy 
  • Understand the ritual uses of aromatics from the Temple period to modern-day
  • Learn about the various Jewish cultural practices that incorporate scent

Scent Through Time Series

The Scented Stitch: Exploring Perfumed Garments Through History

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From the modern perspective, fragranced apparel seems a bit camp and reminiscent of the scented jelly shoes of the 1980s. Historically, however, fragrance has added immense value and luxury to textiles, from the practical masking of tannery odours to the elegant addition of perfume to goldwork embroidery.

In this class, we will explore the development of aromatic textiles from around the world and learn how to apply this knowledge practically. We will examine the techniques used to scent fabrics and investigate the cultural significance behind these redolent garments.

This class offers an optional take-home exercise for attendees to practice some of these scented textile techniques at their leisure.

Who Should Take This Class

You will love this class if you are…

  • interested in the history and cultural impact of fragrances
  • have a passion for the history of textiles and fashion
  • intrigued by historical techniques for fragrancing the body
  • curious about the diverse systems of perfuming in different cultures and communities
  • a fragrance or garment maker seeking inspiration

Perfumed Papers: The Evolution of the Perfume Formula

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The Formula! It is the most coveted and protected object in the fragrance trade. The formula is more than just a recipe; it is a conduit of knowledge. In this class, we will explore how, historically, the fragrance trade, a famously secretive business, shared knowledge.

We will explore how people shared trade knowledge before the concept of the formula. We will look at some of the oldest formulas found and what they say about the process of creating perfume at the time. We will examine how the printing press threatened the Early Modern guild system and discuss the changing contemporary views on formula transparency.

The Great Stink: How Smell Made the Modern City

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From the scent of cherry blossoms near the Washington Monument to the pong of urine behind your favourite bar, living in cities has always meant living with smells. Scent can be the most challenging of our senses in urban settings because we have little personal control over what we smell in the environment. Yet, the olfactory experiences of urban environments are not happenstance, they are as constructed as the architecture. However, we rarely consider how those olfactory choices get made or who makes them.

In this class, we will explore several cases of urban odours that historically changed the way we live in and build cities. We will also look at contemporary cases that challenge how we use urban space and share our olfactive environment in the future.

Precious Vessels: A Brief History of the Perfume Bottle

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For the vast majority of human history, perfume was a precious limited resource. Liquides of such rare beauty couldn’t be stored in any old jar…or could they?

In this class, we will survey the history and evolution of fragrance containers from the ancient to the modern, the humble to the hyper-luxurious, and look at examples from around the world. By exploring these physical objects, we will examine how different societies used and valued perfume over time.

The Colonial History of the Fragrance Trade

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As with culinary spices, the trade in aromatics is an ancient business and perhaps the first truly global trade. Humans have sailed into unknown waters, walked across deserts, and travelled across the steppes for thousands of miles on camelback in search of beautiful smells. The aromatic trade’s long history is often mythologised as an exciting adventure story of discovery and commerce. Yet, how can you discover something that has been known and used by another community for thousands of years?

Some of that trade was equitable, bringing wealth and beautiful scents to both communities, but much of it was far from fair.

In this class, we will:

  • Survey the history of the last 800 years of global trade in aromatics through three case studies.
  • Focus on the impact European Expansionism and colonisation had on the history and development of the modern fragrance trade.
  • Examine the colonial legacy that still haunts this industry.
  • Share this information with the hope that we can envision new modalities for the supply chain.

Cashmere Bouquet: Britain, India & Patchouli in the 19th-Century

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Today patchouli is strongly associated with the 1970s and hippie culture, but it was a scent well-known and well-loved in Britain a century earlier. The fragrance of patchouli in the 19th-century was associated with optimism for the future, an unprecedented abundance of consumer goods, and empire.

It also denoted a disquiet over rapidly changing social norms and a desire, for some, to escape into a fantasy of the East reimagined for the Western palate.

This class will follow the humble herb patchouli from its native range in India and Southeast Asia to the Second Empire Paris salons and London department stores.

Along the way, we will examine how significant events in the history of colonised India and its relationship with the United Kingdom shaped the path of patchouli and influenced its use in fragrance to this day.

The Scent of Grief: A Brief Survey of Aromatic Death Rituals

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Scent connects us to memory in an extraordinary way. It connects us to how an odour made us feel in the past, and more so, it makes us feel those emotions again. One whiff of grandma’s perfume doesn’t just help us remember her; we relive the experience of being in her presence. It is almost like she is with us again for a brief moment. Likewise, the day a loved one’s smell leaves their favourite sweater can be heartbreaking. The last remains of their living essence in your life is gone. You will never smell that smell again, which can induce an unfathomable sense of loss.

For these reasons, scent has played a prominent, but mostly silent, role in the mourning rituals of many cultures worldwide.

In this class:

+ We will briefly survey several aromatic death traditions from various times and cultures.

+ We will discuss scent’s role in creating sacred space and delineating liminal time.

+ We will show why there is a catharsis to using aromatics during mourning.

+ We will discuss how scent, memory, and grief interact together, for the positive and sometimes for the negative.

+ Finally, we will examine tools for olfactive mourning that can be adopted into your life.

The Black Death: from Plague Preservative to Perfume

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There is no history of humanity without a concurrent narrative of death and destruction. Indeed, the stories of survival from the Justinian Plague, the Black Death, and the Great Plagues of the 17th century are all testaments to humanity’s struggle with unprecedented and unexpected catastrophes.

Yet, where there is great fear, there is also great inventiveness. Many resourceful would-be Medieval healers made heavy use of aromatics as plague preservatives, triggering a societal obsession with scent. Nuri McBride joins us for a historical look at how scent has played into perceptions of wellness, in this exploration of smell and public health.

Takeaways:

  • Learn how Medieval Europe and the Middle East viewed the concepts of wellness, disease, and the power of olfaction
  • Understand the changing views on Miasma during the Medieval period and how it fueled an explosion of aromatic products meant to ward off illness
  • Learn what everyday perfumed items you have in your home that have their roots in plague preservatives
  • Identify the medical origins of aromatics associated with plague preservatives and how those scents became the olfactive reference point for physical and spiritual cleanliness in a European context.

Dangerous Women? Beauty, Perfume, and Poison

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Catherine de Medici, Lucrezia Borgia, Locasta, Agrippina,Tofana.

These women of both legend and history have inflamed the imaginations of writers for centuries. They proved so enticing because they embodied the trope of the Dangerous Woman, a character of immense skill, beguiling beauty, seduction, and dark machinations. These characters are deeply connected with cosmetics, particularly perfume, but also poison. In these tales, the lines blur between the artful application of a cosmetic or a fatal concoction.

There is an old saying that poison is a woman’s weapon, but is that true? Did Agrippina kill the emperor with poisoned figs? Did Tofana, the perfumer turned wife-avenging poisoner, even exist? Are these the accounts of real Femme Fatales or the fever dreams of a patriarchal society?

In this class:

Finally, we will examine why perfume has been compared to magic elixirs and dangerous poisons for so long.

We will explore the Dangerous Woman trope and how it applies to the histories of these women.

We will examine society’s anxiety around cosmetics and perfume, female sexuality, female-dominated trades, and women in power.

We will discuss the validity of some of these cases.

Tapputi-Beletekallim, The First Perfumer?

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Tapputi Beletekallim is the name of the first perfumer in the historical record. Her texts give us a glimpse into the earliest written history of perfume making and distillation. She was a woman important enough to have ancient scribes write down her name, which was no small feat. Yet, that name was lost to us until the 20th century, when a tablet was found that made the world re-examine everything it thought it knew about the roots of perfumery.

In this class, we will explore the life of the first performer in the historical record. We will look at what we know of her work, position, and the society that fostered her. Along the way, we will examine how history is transmitted and ask who writes our stories and who gets to preserve them.

In this class, we will discuss the following:

  • What is known about Mesopotamian perfumery and its impact on later studies of chemistry and fragrance
  • The social constructs that contributed to the development of perfumery in Mesopotamian
  • What we know about the life of the first recorded perfumer in history
  • How we know what we know about the past and who decides what gets researched

Bad Air: Smells, Miasma Theory, and Public Health

Details

Nuri McBride explores the history of pandemic controls through ideas of “bad air” and miasmas. With a particular emphasis on the historical and practical trajectory of miasma theory, Nuri provides an in-depth exploration into how this conception of malodor evolved post-plague, continuing on into the 19th century with the Great Stink of London, and even into the 20th century’s battle with the Spanish Flu.

Takeaways:

Learn how medicine based on Miasma Theory was used into the 20th century to ineffectively treat coronaviruses, ushering in a vastly improved approach to public health under evidence-based medicine.

Learn about the history of Miasma Theory, what preceded it and replaced it

Understand the origins of the fear of death or illness from smelling unpleasant odours

Learn how Miasma Theory has created and shaped public health policies from the Middle Ages to today; focusing on key events like the Black Death, The Great Plagues, The Great Stink of London, The Spanish Flu, and the Cholera outbreak of WWI

The Babylonian Roots to Early Middle Eastern Perfumery

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For centuries European Academia thought that once the knowledge to read cuneiform was lost, the technological advancements of Ancient Mesopotamia became utterly inaccessible. At the same time, the astronomic rise of chemical and alchemical education in the Arabic speaking work shortly after the rise of Islam was viewed as an anomaly. We will challenge these notions in this class and instead examine how specialised trades like perfumery preserved skills and techniques from antiquity into the Middle Ages. That collective trade knowledge served as the bedrock from which the great scholars of the Islamic Golden Age developed and explained the understanding of chemistry, which impacts us even today.

Takeaways:

  • Discuss Babylonian and Assyrian distillation technology.
  • Briefly examine the perfume trade in Southwest Asia and North Africa from Late Antiquity to the rise of Islam.
  • Examine the desire for alchemical/chemical knowledge in the educational capitals of early Islam such as Alexandria, Harran, Jundi-Shapur, and Baghdad.
  • Examine how among the noteworthy academies and scholars of this time, there was a fascination with distillation and perfumery that drove them to learn from skilled tradespeople and write extensively on the subject, which significantly advanced perfumery and chemistry.

Social Ecology of Fragrance Series

Agarwood & The Social Ecology of Fragrance

Details

I am daily worshipped with scents and flowers, with the incense of sandal and black aloe. – Krishna in The Mahabharata

Social ecology investigates how individuals interact with their environment and the effects of these interactions on both society and the natural world. Agarwood, also known as oud, is an intriguing ecological phenomenon that has become a cherished perfumery component.

This class will explore agarwood from a social-ecological perspective, tracing its significance from antiquity to the present day. We will examine humanity’s role in the ecological development of agarwood and the communal and cultural importance this botanical holds beyond its commercial use in perfumery. Additionally, we will view agarwood as a cultural artefact within a global sensory landscape and discuss its economic impact as a luxury good.

This class also has an optional take-home exercise for attendees.

Who Should Take This Class

You will love this class if you are…

  • interested in the relationship between aromatic plants and society
  • have a passion for plant wisdom and the history of cultivation
  • eager to explore the deeper history of the plants of the fragrance trade
  • a lover of agarwood perfumes and incense

Rose & The Social Ecology of Fragrance

Details

There is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Social ecology examines how individuals interact with their environments and how these interactions impact both society and the natural world. This class will explore the 5,000-year relationship between humanity and the rose through a social-ecological lens. Allegorical, mythical, magical and on occasion-deadly, no other flower has captivated the human imagination quite like the rose.

Yet, as the rose has influenced us, humanity has also profoundly influenced this hearty shrub. We will examine the rose as a beloved cultivar, fragrance, flavouring, medicine, and magical tool. Along the way, we will visit the rose in the Imperial Gardens of China, see her carried to new lands by Mesopotamian armies, and become a symbol of eternal love.

This class also has an optional take-home exercise for attendees.

Who Should Take This Class

You will love this class if you are…

  • interested in the relationship between aromatic plants and society
  • have a passion for plant wisdom and the history of cultivation
  • eager to explore the deeper history of the plants of the fragrance trade
  • a rose lover

Patchouli & The Social Ecology of Fragrance

Details

Get your patchouli stink – outta my store! – High Fidelity

Today, patchouli is widely associated with the 1970s and hippie culture, but its introduction to the West occurred a century earlier. Contrary to the image of burnouts, the fragrance of patchouli in 19th-century Western society was linked to optimism and imperialism. It also reflected concern over rapidly changing social norms and the desire, for some, to escape into a romanticized vision of the East tailored for Western tastes. In the East, the relationship with patchouli was much more complex.

This class will utilize the principles of social ecology to trace this humble herb from its native range and cultures to the salons of Second Empire Paris, 1970s love-ins, and suburban yoga studios. Social ecology allows us to explore how individuals interact with their environments and the effects of these interactions on both society and the natural world.

This class also has an optional take-home exercise for attendees.

Who Should Take This Class

You will love this class if you are…

  • interested in the relationship between aromatic plants and society
  • have a passion for plant wisdom and the history of cultivation
  • eager to explore the deeper history of the plants of the fragrance trade
  • interested in learning more about the colonial history of industrialised fragrance
  • a patchouli lover

Myrrh: & The Social Ecology of Fragrance

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“O Isis, giver of life, who dwells in the Pure Island, take to yourself the myrrh which comes from the Land of Punt…”

-Hymn to Isis carved on the walls of her temple at Philae

The bitter tears of Commiphora myrrha have fascinated and delighted humanity for aeons. These small lumps of gum resin may look unassuming but hold profound cultural and religious significance from Ancient Egypt to Modern China. We will follow this resin from its home range of East Africa, across communities and centuries, to the state of myrrh today.

In this class, we will survey the cultural history of myrrh as an aromatic, medicine, commodity, and ritual tool. We will examine myrrh’s importance in Near East religions, why it was worth its weight in gold, and what the future holds for myrrh in the face of over-harvesting and climate change.

Indole & The Social Ecology of Fragrance

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Science and everyday life can not and should not be separated.

-Roselind Franklin

Chemistry isn’t confined to a lab. Life is a chemical process, and chemistry significantly impacts our daily lives, but we rarely consider the social impact of those chemical reactions. You’ve probably never thought about an aromatic organic compound called indole before, but you’d know it if you smelt it. You smell it all the time, but it is more than just an odour.

This microscopic compound is an olfactive harbinger of death, a siren of desire, a quintessential building block to happiness, and the secret ingredient for creating realistic floral perfumes.

In this class, we will explore indole’s invisible but impactful role in our lives. We will examine how indole affects our bodies and sensory experiences. We will also apply an anthropological lens to explore how this compound influences society.

Scent Culture Series

Scent Culture Theory 101: Scent Culture & Olfactory Heritage

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The history of perfume is, in some manner, that of civilisation. – Eugène Rimmel

Scent matters, not just as a commodity in perfume but as a cultural artefact. What odours we value as a society, which ones disgust us, and how we use them are all formed and informed by our scent culture. But what is a scent culture? How do we spot one when we smell it? What is the difference between culture and heritage?

In this course, we will:

  • Explain what a scent culture is and how scent can be a cultural artefact
  • Examine the differences between the working definitions of scent culture
  • Introduce you to Sensory Historical Studies, its philosophy and methodology, focusing on inter-sensoriality.
  • Introduce you to the concept of olfactory heritage and the role it plays within a scent culture
  • Discuss the limitations of a sensory approach to history and anthropology.
  • Consider the importance of studying scent cultures from non-hegemonic communities.

Scent Culture Theory 202: Tools for Aromatic Auto-Ethnography 

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How does your nose help you collect data about your world? How do you record those sensations? What’s the value in recording such personal and ephemeral data? We will explore these questions in Scent Culture 202: Tools for Aromatic Auto-Ethnography.

While our course, Scent Culture 101, grounded attendees in theory, Scent Culture 202 will help give tools for applying those theories in real-world environments for data collection. We will explore how that data can be used and presented in both academic and artistic ways. These techniques are valuable skills for perfumers, scent artists, and academics, but most importantly, for those interested in exploring the world around them in new ways.

While it is recommended that students take both the 101 and 202 classes, the 101 class is not required to attend 202. This class also has a small optional project the attendees can complete after the course. If students submit their optional projects by July 31st, they can meet with the instructor for feedback and guidance on their work.

Smells like Xenophobia: An Olfactive History of Otherness

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or centuries people have used the language of olfaction to express their disgust and horror at the Other. Who The Other was has always been flexible, but the allusion to olfactive disgust remains eerily consistent in hate rhetoric from Roman to the modern day.

Today, immigrant children go to school primed to defend their food from classmates who mock it as “gross,” the same way Huguenots children, exiled in England in the 17th century, were taunted for their “smelly dishes.”

Jewish politicians still field questions like, “Why are you so smelly” while giving lectures at Ivy League schools, just as they had to defend themselves in the Middle Ages from accusations of “Smelling of the Devil.”

Nearly the same insults are used to mock and humiliate the bodies of Black people today as 400 years ago, often only lightly veneered under the respectability of hygiene and dress codes.

In this class, we will briefly explore olfactory imagery in the rhetoric of prejudice, focusing on major reoccurring themes. We will examine scent as a tool for creating ‘in-group’ space and otherness. Finally, we will discuss the science and growing philosophical discourse around why people blindly hate and the part olfaction may play.

Curation Archive

2023

2022

2021