Odor
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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"THE IDEA OF writing a book about the perception of odors came to me as I was reading the memoirs of Jean-Noel Halle, a member of the Societe Royale de Medecine under the ancien regime and the first incumbent of the chair of public hygiene established in Paris in 1794."--incipit The Foul and the Fragrant (1982) by Alain Corbin |
Illustration: Napoleon III nose caricatures from Schneegans's History of Grotesque Satire
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An odor or odour (commonly referred to as a smell) is caused by one or more volatilized chemical compounds, generally at a very low concentration, that humans or other animals perceive by the sense of olfaction. Odors are also commonly called scents, which can refer to both pleasant and unpleasant odors. The terms fragrance and aroma are used primarily by the food and cosmetic industry to describe a pleasant odor, and are sometimes used to refer to perfumes. In contrast, malodor, stench, reek, and stink are used specifically to describe unpleasant odors.
Further reading
- Die sexuelle Osphresiologie (1901) by Albert Hagen
- Odoratus Sexualis: A Scientific and Literary Study of Sexual Scents and Erotic Perfumes (1933) by Iwan Bloch
See also
- Body odor
- Olfaction
- Odor di femina
- Aroma compound
- Olfactory art
- Olfactory fatigue
- Machine olfaction
- Scented water
- Olfactometer
- Zola and olfaction
