Galbanum Essential Oil

An unusual, bright and glittering oil-with metal and green notes. For more information please see below

Product Information

Ferula galbanifera

Harvested in Iran, from organically grown plant material.

Steam/water distilled in France from oleo-resin.

This oil is quite unusual--he is full of bright, glittering metallic flashes in a green leafy body with more earthy, dirty undertones--all of which make him entirely well-rounded. I imagine this is how the Steppes of Central Asia must smell, in the late spring.

But let’s see what Arctander says

First, he says galbanum is not collected from just one species, but from different Ferula trees. Bear in mind this book was published in 1960….

Here is the aromatic description of the oleo-resins.

Soft galbanum is a dark amber-colored to yellowish-brown or grrayish-green, olive-brown, very viscous liquid whose consistency is like fresh honey. The odor is powerful, green-woody, almost balsamic-resinous, reminiscent of oleoresins from conifers. The leafy-earthy green note is often referred to in terms like this: “like green peppers” or “tossed green salad” and there is distinct resemblance to the odor of hyacinth leaves.

There is also a “hard galbanum” which is not used in perfumery; only for industrial uses and I believe this is one of the resins we can see for sale in the aromatic stalls in Oman. It’s a dry, solid, gravel-like material with a faint odor and variable color; it consists of yellow, orange, red, tears or drops, and is somewhat less hard and brittle than frankincense (assuming he’s talking about fully dried frankincense used for burning and commercially available as an end product.)

Here is a description of the oil, which is made from the soft galbanum only. Both hard and soft varieties are found in Iran.

Galbanum oil is a colorless to pale yellow, or pale olive-yellow, mobile liquid which possesses an intensely green, fresh-leafy odor with a dry-woody undertone of balsamic, bark-like character. Sometimes described as “green leafy salad or green peppers,” the oil has a pine-like topnote.

Galbanum has many uses, at least as of 1960, in compositions of chypre, fougère, pine, forest, moss, and it will introduce interesting notes in many florals where its leafy character is necessary in the completion of a true naturalness: hyacinth, violet, narcissus, lavender, gardenia, etc.

Not used too much in aromatherapy, used more in perfumery.