The Fruit Explorer Ponders Frankincense and Myrrh, Part 1 of 3

The plant products that accompanied the first Christmas Day, according to traditional Christian belief, are described in in Matthew 2:9-11, which relates the story of the Three Wise Men.

... and, lo, the star, which they saw in the east, went before them, till it came and stood over where the young child was. When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy. And when they were come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down, and and worshipped him: and when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts; gold, and frankincense, and myrrh. [King James Version]

After encountering this passage, over the centuries perhaps millions of the perplexed have asked: What the hell are frankincense and myrrh? This is a question for the Fruit Explorer since frankincense and myrrh are both aromatic resins (this term is explained below) derived from trees in the family Burseraceae, variously called the torchwood family (since the resins burn well), the incense tree family, or the frankincense and myrrh family.

         

Frankincense

The Frankincense Plant

Frankincense comes from a number of trees in the genus Boswellia, but most of it comes from B. sacra, which is a small (up to 25 feet), scraggly tree that is so hardy that it can grow out of solid rock. The requirements of this tree are:

The trees require an arid climate where moisture is provided by morning mist. The few ideal environments in the world for this small prized tree are found in Southern Arabia (Oman and Yemen), India, and Northern Africa (Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Kenya). Further, frankincense trees require a limestone-rich soil and are mostly found growing on rocky hillsides and cliffs, or in the dried riverbeds below.

Below are pictures of the frankincense tree. Note the blasted environments where these trees grow, except for the last one, which is growing in Biosphere 2.

            

Below are pictures of the leaves and flowers.

            

Below is a range map for Boswellia sacra. As you see, this species of frankincense grows in patchy areas in southern Arabia and the Horn of Africa.

Production and Use of Frankincense

Resins are a thick, sticky exudate that oozes from a plant and protects it against herbivores and pathogens. While saps are often sticky, they should not be confused with resins since saps, unlike resins, transport nutrients. We have seen many cases in which plants produce substances to protect themselves from herbivores, e.g., chocolate (16 May 2015) and spices (9 Oct 2015), so resins are just another weapon in the defensive arsenal of plants. An unusual example is amber, which is a fossilized resin from prehistoric trees. Another example is pine resin, which gives rise to both turpentine and rosin, which is familiar to baseball fans. If you have ever hiked a steep trail, grabbed a pine sapling so you could pull yourself up, and gotten a sticky substance on your hand that you spent the rest of the day trying unsuccessfully to get off, then you have had an unpleasant encounter with a resin. The presence of resins explain why pine burns so well in a campfire. Also, retsina, a Greek wine, is flavored with resin from the Aleppo pine. Here are some pictures of resins.

• Pine resin.
• Resin from an Araucaria columnans. Recall that the monkey puzzle tree is in the genus Araucaria. (I can't put my hand on the e-mail that deals with the monkey puzzle tree.)
• Cretaceous wasp trapped in amber. Recall that is Jurassic Park dinosaurs were reconstructed from DNA found in insects that had fed on dinosaurs and then been trapped in amber.

      

The process of harvesting frankincense resin is described by this site.

Harvesting the resin requires a specially designed knife.  A week before the harvest begins, strategic slashes are made in the outer bark which allow the liquid resin to ooze out. Another harvesting method used is to simply scrape away portions of the bark without making deep incisions and allowing the resin to flow from this wound. When the resin hits the oxygen, it starts to crystallize and harden.

These hardened resins are called tears. The longer it is left on the tree, the harder it gets. It takes about a week for the resin to harden up enough to be cut it off as a hardened resin crystal.

Here is another description of the harvesting process with more details by the UN's Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO):

Most resin is obtained by making deliberate incisions into the bark of the tree. The milky liquid that exudes hardens on exposure to air into droplets or "tears" which are then easily detached by the collector. Occasionally, some tears are produced by accidental injury or from splits which occur in the stems or branches of the tree.

Details of the tapping, particularly the time of year it is undertaken, its duration and the interval between individual tappings, vary according to the species and the customs in the area of production. In Somalia, there are usually two periods when B. sacra (B. carteri) is tapped, each lasting 3-4 months and involving successive tappings at approximately 15-day intervals. B. frereana is tapped over a single 8-9 month period with a longer, but variable, tapping interval. In both cases the timing of the tapping periods depends on the onset and extent of the rains.

Tapping involves removing small areas of bark from the tree, sometimes using a specially designed tool, otherwise an ordinary axe. New tapping points are made at the same place as old ones after removing hardened resin from the previous cut. If the tapping interval is short then a light scratching of the wood is usually sufficient to cause the resin to flow again.

In short, you slash a tree, come back in a week or two, and gather your frankincense, which is in hardened lumps called tears. Not a bad racket. A rough estimate is that a tree will produce 2-6 pounds of frankincense per year, but this can vary greatly depending on whether there is a drought, how often the tree is tapped, and other factors. Here are some pictures of making an incision, oozing resin, and dried lumps of resin.

                  

Point of comparison: Pine resin is harvested differently. The resin does not form tears, so a cup-and-gutter system, similar to that used to tap rubber or maple syrup, must be used. 

The crystals of hardened resin can be sold as incense, which is burned to perfume a room (see pictures below). Alternatively, to process the harvested frankincense resin into the essential oil, "...the crystal resin goes into the distillery where it is crushed into powder, put into an oil bath, and steam distilled to extract the oil from the crystal resin."

   

Frankincense is used in aromatherapy, cosmetics, massage, healing, and religious rituals. The Roman Catholic Church purchases most of its frankincense from Somalia, which produces a high-grade product. Frankincense is also used in perfumery and skincare. You won't be surprised to hear that cranks claim all sorts of healing properties for frankincense. If you want to follow up on this, you can check Wikipedia's treatment, or you can examime WebMD's treatment of frankincense. Frankincense is edible. 

[Continued in Part 2]

The Fruit Explorer Ponders Frankincense and Myrrh, Part 2 of 3

[Continued from Part 1]

Myrrh

The Myrrh Plant

Myrrh comes from a number of small, thorny trees in the genus Commiphora, where the main species that provides myrrh is a C. myhrra, which grows to a height of about 13 feet. Here are pictures of the trees, leaves, thorns, and flowers. (The pictures are all of C. myrrha, except for the flowers, which are from an unknown species of Commiphora.)

               

Myrrh has much the same range as frankincense and grows in the area of the Horn of Africa and southern Arabia (see map above). Myrrh trees tend to grow on the lower slopes, while frankincense grows on the higher slopes.

Production and Use of Myrrh

Myrrh is harvested much like frankincense. The process is described by this site.

Tapping is the method to extract resins which is done twice a year. To extract resins, an incision is made in the trunk of the tree, which pierces gum resin reservoirs located in it. The incisions are made all the way up from the root to those of the branches that are strong enough to bear it. The sap slowly oozes from the incisions and drips down the bark, forming tear-shaped droplets that are left to harden on the side of the tree. These droplets flow as pale yellow liquid, but harden to reddish-brown masses of many sizes, the average being that of a walnut.

Below are pictures of myrrh resin oozing from the tree and of the hardened lumps of myrrh.

         

In Africa myrrh resin is used to treat infections because of its anti-microbial properties. This use goes back to at least 1100 B.C. 

Because the wood of the myrrh tree is extremely soft, it is the favored wood to use as the base when when it is necessary to start a fire with friction; see picture below.

The bulk of the world's supply of Frankincense and myrrh goes to China, where they are used in traditional medicine.

Frankincense and myrrh both have an incense-like aroma, which is dispersed by burning the lumps. Frankincense and myrrh are used in perfumes; the picture below shows a selection of myrrh perfumes. 

Other mundane uses of myrrh are in mouthwashes, massage oils, liniments, and tooth powders. Veterinarians use myrrh to heal wounds. Some think that myrrh can be used to treat schistosomiasis.

New Age types find many uses for myrrh, with skincare being one of the more credible uses. Also, it releases fears and helps us to be non-judgmental. In addition, burning it will clear your space of negativity. A 15 ml bottle of the essential oil of myrrh (pictured below) costs $85.20. (To get a sense of what a tiny amount this is, keep in mind that a one liter bottle of Coke contains 1000 ml.) WebMD provides a list of ailments, ranging from bad breath to hemorrhoids, for which myrrh is claimed to be effective, but it notes that there is insufficient evidence that myrrh is effective for any of them. Also, nail lacquers using myrrh are thought to be effective against nail fungus because of the anti-microbial properties of myrrh; for the surprisingly elaborate instructions, see this site. It is best if you begin your preparation of the tincture at the new moon; this is an application of the astrological approach to plant medicine.

Some think that the name "Mary" is derived from "myrrh."

Current and Future Status of Frankincense and Myrrh Trees

As you can tell from the pictures, frankincense and myrrh trees do not grow in orchards; since wild frankincense and myrrh trees apparently produce enough resin to meet demand, there is currently no pressure to domesticate these trees.. 

The FAO describes the effect of property rights on the conservation status of frankincense and myrrh trees:

In some cases, as in Somalia, the wild Boswellia stands belong to extended families who live in the resin-producing areas. There is therefore some incentive on the part of those who tap the trees not to do it in such a way as to damage the trees and jeopardise their livelihoods. On the other hand, it is impossible to prevent grazing of livestock and in times of drought nomads cut branches for fodder. Severe drought also affects the trees directly, slowing their growth and causing problems of regeneration. The more accessible trees are often tapped continuously through the year, with no rest periods, and this puts them under further stress.

There are no ownership rights over Commiphora species in Somalia and the trees are exploited by nomads on a less systematic basis, and with less concern for their state of health, than Boswellia.

With respect to frankincense, Wikipedia adds, "Recent studies have indicated that frankincense tree populations are declining due to overexploitation. Heavily tapped trees have been found to produce seeds that germinate at only 16% while seeds of trees that had not been tapped germinate at more than 80%." The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species says, "In Oman the tree [B. sacra] is so heavily browsed that it rarely flowers or sets seed. Trees appear to be dying and regeneration is poor." (If desired, you can find out more about the IUCN and its Red List.)

Here is a report on the implications of climate change for the production of frankincense and myrrh in Somalia, a major producer.

"The mist forests of the Golis Mountains of the northern regions are the only true forest areas of Somalia and are important centers of biological diversity and species endemism," according to a study of the area by the United Nations Environment Program.

But they are under threat from man-made changes both local and global, endangering the trees that have bled frankincense and myrrh for thousands of years.

The worldwide problem of climate change here thins the clouds of nourishing moisture that blow up from the Gulf of Aden, meaning there is less and less water to nourish the trees. Meanwhile deforestation is also taking its toll as trees are chopped down for charcoal to supply the growing fuel needs of a rapidly expanding population.

An Extremely Brief History of Frankincense and Myrrh

Frankincense was prized by the ancient Egyptians. Queen Hatshepsut in 1493 B.C. sent an expedition to Punt to bring back incense and incense trees. Punt is now thought to be the Horn of Africa, and this expedition is credited with opening the entire Red Sea to navigation and trade [Keay, pp. 34-35]. (Needless to say, these interpretations are controversial.) The Egyptians used frankincense as one of the ingredients in kohl eyeliner.

Frankincense and myrrh were common in Biblical times. For example, myrrh is mentioned 156 times in the Bible. There is elaborate Biblical scholarship that surrounds frankincense and myrrh, but I can't get interested and will skip over it, except to note that a temptress would perfume her bed with myrrh (Proverbs 7:17) and that in Old Testament times myrrh was used to purify a king's concubine (Esther 2:12).

Frankincense was known to the ancient Greeks. Herodotus [3.107] notes that frankincense came from Arabia but that it was hazardous to harvest since each tree was carefully guarded by great numbers of winged serpents.

For the ancient view of frankincense and myrrh, we can go to a little-known ancient writer, Agatharchides, who says at the end of the second century B.C., "For the fragrance appears as something divine and greater than the power of speech to describe since it strikes and stimulates the senses of everyone" [quoted in Keay, p. 51].

In the first century A.D. the export of incense from southern Arabia and the Horn of Africa is estimated to have been 1,675 tons per year, which for transport would have required about eleven thousand camels [Keay, p. 51]. The great value placed on frankincense at this time can be judged from the fact that clean-room techniques were developed for its processing, as described by Pliny the Elder (23-79 A.D.):

Great Hercules! At Alexandria, where the frankincense is prepared for sale, no amount of vigilance is sufficient to guard the factories. A seal is put upon the workmen's aprons, they have to wear a mask or a fine-mesh net over their heads, and before they are allowed to leave the premises they have to strip off all their clothes. [Quoted in Keay, p. 22]

Trade was greatly reduced after 300 A.D. due to the spread of Christianity, the desertification of the caravan routes, the depredations of the Parthians, and the fall of the Roman Empire. Though trade was disrupted, frankincense and myrrh retained their fashionable cachet through medieval times, but desire for these products eventually fell off in the 16th century and declined to the relatively modest level of the present day [Keay, pp. 100, 213-14].

Party Tip

At your Christmas party introduce your guests to the Three Wise Men cocktail, which is composed of Jim Beam, Jack Daniels, and Johnnie Walker. In this video a fun-loving blonde shows how to make it (see still below). To test if this cocktail really does make your guests wise, pose philosophical questions to them. Which is more important--Truth or Beauty? Are little white lies a sign or cultivation or moral degradation? What is justice? Can knowledge ever be secure? Can the ideal society exist? What separates Man from the Animals?

 

Gift Idea

I challenge you to think of a classier gift than frankincense and myrrh. You can buy half a pound of five-star Frankincense on Amazon for $10.15 and a pound of five-star myrrh on Amazon for $18.99. (The link in the previous sentence is to a highly rated myrrh. Watch out for cheap but low quality myrrh.) With these purchases, you will be in a position to give gifts that will take the recipients' breath away.

Here's another way to look at this. When you choose a role model, aim high. At the Christmas season, what loftier role model is there than the Three Wise Men? Follow in their footsteps and give frankincense and myrrh as gifts.

Alternate Party Tip

You can turn this gift idea into a party tip. Buy frankincense and myrrh in bulk. Imagine yourself handing out little plastic bags of frankincense and myrrh. You will be the life of the party. You will be lionized. The guests will never forget the party where they were given these precious substances.

[Continued in Part 3]

The Fruit Explorer Ponders Frankincense and Myrrh, Part 3 of 3

[Continued from Part 2]

The Fruit Explorer Puts Theory into Practice

Not content with merely providing gift ideas to others, I decided to follow my own advice and give out frankincense and myrrh as gifts this year. I bought frankincense and myrrh at Amazon as described above. Below are pictures of my package of frankincense and some tears from this package. On the label of the frankincense you can see the inscription "Does Not Expire," so frankincense joins vanilla extract (22 May 2015) and honey on the list of things that do not go bad. You can also see from the label that this frankincense is from the species Boswellia carteri. Here's the story. Splitters (see e-mail of 24 Jul 2104) have gotten hold of the traditional species B. sacra and split it into two species, B. sacra, which grows in southern Arabia, and B. carteri, which grows in Somalia. In short, my frankincense apparently grew in Somalia, though it was exported from Egypt. (As usual, the splitters have apparently gotten it wrong; this source considers this split to be invalid.)

 

 

Here are pictures of my package of myrrh and some tears from this package. As you see, the myrrh in the bag is rather dusty. To get free shipping, I ordered it along with a five pound container of protein powder, and the myrrh was jostled and crushed somewhat in shipment. The last picture compares my frankincense to my myrrh. (This was a five-star myrrh when I ordered it on 10 Dec 2015, but two negative reviews have since come in; both criticize the package for being less than the advertised pound, but they do not criticize the quality of the myrrh. My shipment of myrrh, including the plastic bag, weighed 15.25 ounces, so it was underweight.)

         

To make these resins gift-worthy, they were gaily wrapped in holiday colors and labeled. See below.

On 21 Dec 2015 I attended the annual Christmas dinner given by Anne and Corey. I gave out gifts of frankincense and myrrh. To my surprise, I was neither lionized nor acknowledged as the life of the party. I guess I should have picked a less jaded group.

The Fruit Explorer Learns How to Burn Incense

If I am going to play Johnny Appleseed and go around giving away frankincense and myrrh, I figured that I needed to know how to burn it. To dispel my ignorance, I went to YouTube and found a video that, starting at 2:56, illustrates the process, which can be summarized as follows.

• Light a piece of charcoal and set it on top of your incense burner.
• After the charcoal turns gray, place a piece of frankincense or myrrh on top of it.

Warning: The burning charcoal and the incense burner are hot. Do not touch them with your fingers. Use tongs to manipulate the charcoal and the incense. The Internet experts are even shriller on this warning than they are on avoiding pomegranate stains (27 May and 17 Nov 2014) and not letting melted caramel touch your skin (19 Dec 2015).

I needed to acquire more equipment before I could burn incense. I purchased an incense burner from Amazon for $6.28. It is rather small; the diameter of the bowl is 2.25 inches.

   

I also purchased a hundred pieces of charcoal from Amazon for $13.70 Here are pictures.

• The unopened box of charcoal.
• The opened box with ten cylinders that each contain ten pieces of charcoal.
• One of the cylinders removed from the box, and one piece of charcoal removed from the cylinder.
• Close-up of a piece of charcoal sitting on a silver dollar.

         

Fully equipped, I will now describe my initial stab on 22 Dec 2015 at trying to burn frankincense. Since this was going to take a while and I needed the kitchen table to eat lunch, I carried out the burning on the card table in the living room. The picture below shows the corner of the living room that served as the setting for this experiment. (The books behind the card table are on Spanish, Portuguese, and Dutch history, some of which were used in the e-mails on spices. The fluffy giant reed, Phragmites communis, which stretches diagonally across the picture, is my personal emblem; note how much its flower cluster looks like the flower cluster of sugar (19 Dec 2015), a fellow member of the grass family. The reed is sticking into the trash can next to the recliner, whose back you can partly see in the lower right corner.)

Here is the timeline.

• 11:50: I light the charcoal. (I used a match from a matchbook from Los Olivos, a Mexican restaurant in Scottsdate, AZ,  where Ken Howard and I once ended up while on a business trip.) For about the first minute, the charcoal sparkles as a line of red dances across it much like a wildfire sweeping across a prairie. I am supposed to let the charcoal turn fully gray before attempting to burn any frankincense. You can see the wooden coaster placed under the incense burner to protect the table from the overheated incense burner.

   

• 12:34: The charcoal is fully gray (first picture). I drop a piece of frankincense on it, and smoke immediately starts to rise (second picture). You can see the plume rising from the left edge of the frankincense.

   

• 12:39: There is a surprising amount of smoke (first picture). Several minutes later, the incense is glowing like a coal (second picture).

   

• 12:46: The first piece of frankincense is totally burnt out
• 12:47: I add three little pieces of incense. This is easy since there is still plenty of exposed charcoal. They immediately start smoking.
• 12:52: I add a fifth piece. It starts smoking.
• 1:00: The room is filled with scent. When I stood in the door to the kitchen and looked across the room, It was vaguely smoky, as if there had been a small wildfire in a remote corner of the living room. The smell was not overpowering; it was more of a background smell. It was a sweetish, pleasant smell, nice enough but not something to kill for. Perhaps we need a super-smeller like Mei-Mei to provide a satisfactory evaluation.
• 1:09: The five pieces of frankincense are completely consumed, and no more smoke issues from them. I let the incense burner cool for two hours (probably overly conservative) before I touched it.

It looks to me like this experiment was a success and that I have mastered the science of burning incense. I will now without hesitation dispense advice to those to whom I give frankincense and myrrh.

Rick

References

Food and Agricultural Organization, Flavours and Fragrances of Plant Origin, United Nations, 1995. This document is available at this site. Since it has no page numbers, I have used links to refer to it. Chapter 9 covers frankincense and myrrh.

Herodotus (edited by Robert B. Strassler), The Landmark Herodotus: The Histories, Pantheon Books, 2007. For a description of this book, see the e-mail of 5 Nov 2015.

Keay, John, The Spice Route: A History, University of California, 2006. For a description of this book, see the e-mail of 9 Oct 2015.