Marjoram

Sweet Marjoram Essential Oil

Herbal powerhouse, this oil is useful as an aromatherapy addition, a flavor, and an interesting perfume ingredient

Product Information

Origanum marjorana, Marjorana hortensis

Labiatae family (lamiaceae)

Grown and distilled in Egypt from organically grown herbs. This herb is native to the Mediterranean and is commercially cultivated throughout the world. It’s used a lot in cooking, especially with chicken, and also in vinegars.

Let’s be clear about our nomenclature! Terms like oregano and marjoram get thrown about haphazardly! Thyme too.

Origanum marjorana is Sweet Marjoram—ignore the Origanum or at least try to deal.

Thymus mastichina is Spanish Marjoram—it’s related to thyme.                         

Origanum vulgare is Oregano—like oregano, oregano

There are others, and they are all related in the larger sense anyway—Labiatae family, and their actions have some similarities. Origanum comes from the Greek words oros (mountain) and ganos (joy) which could be a personal reflection of some very happy mountains, or the general happiness one feels when one’s fetlocks are grazing the oregano (marjoram) leaves, releasing their essential oils.

This is a really soft beautiful marjoram, strong, sweet and bright.

Normally, some of marjoram's constituents include terpinen-4-ol, terpineol, sabinene, terpinenes, cymene, linalool, linalyl acetate, sabinene-hydrate and terpinolene.

Marjoram Woman

There are men who prefer chile pequin women,
red-hot mommas whose kisses set their lips on fire
and burn all the way down; audacious women,
slim of waist and broad of hip, with spangly red
earrings - fingers and toes painted to match.

I prefer someone more subtle, in a gown of
silvery-green foliage with white-tufted buds,
whose delicate fragrance drives bees wild;
a woman whose earthy flavors are released

on the stove or when dried and tossed in a salad.

She'll be there, my marjoram woman,
in my garden or somewhere in the kitchen,
waiting for the caress of my fingers,
knowing that when her lips brush mine
I will be driven to ravenous distraction.

--Dr. Charles A Stone

Arctander says

Sweet marjoram oil is a pale yellow or pale amber colored, rather mobile liquid of a warm-spicy, aromatic-camphoraceous and woody odor, reminiscent of nutmeg and cardamom. The flavor is spicy-warm, aromatic, and somewhat bitter. He then likens the scent to tea tree (Melaleuca alternifolia)!

It’s used in perfumery to introduce a fresh, slightly medicinal aromatic warm note in fougères, colognes, oriental bases, etc. At the time of writing (1960) Arctander says there was a quite small production of this as there was not much demand for it.

Battaglia says

The Greeks referred to Marjoram as the Funeral Herb. It was planted on graves to give spiritual peace to the dead. Yet I noted above that the Latin binominal (Origanum marjorana) was named after the happy mountains…..I can’t explain this. Best not to dwell.

Anti-inflammatory

Anti-microbial

Anti-spasmodic

Anti-viral

Anti-fungal

Anti-septic

It’s worth noting that marjoram has a reputation of being an anaphrodisiac, meaning it can diminish the sex drive, but this may be associated with celibacy.

Tonic for the circulatory system

Digestive system

Musculoskeletal system

Nervous system