Perfumes with Myrrh

Myrrh smells bitter, resinous, warm and slightly smoky, an ancient-feeling scent with mushroomy, licorice-like and faintly medicinal facets beneath its sweetness. It is the gum resin that seeps from Commiphora myrrha trees, produced mainly in Somalia, Ethiopia and Yemen.

Steam distillation of the resin yields an essential oil, while solvent extraction gives a resinoid. It is darker, more bitter and less lemony than frankincense. Myrrh mostly sits in the heart and base. It pairs well with frankincense, rose, labdanum, vanilla, benzoin, oud and patchouli, and it is a core material of incense-themed compositions.

Myrrh appears in 2,989 perfumes in the Fisfis catalogue and is used mostly as a heart note.