The Incense Route
The earliest trade route may have been the so-called Incense Route which linked the Mediterranean region with Saudi Arabia (and across the Red Sea, Egypt) in the first two millennia BCE.
Frankincense, myrrh and other aromatics were used in ritual as incense, as perfumes and in medicines in the Mediterranean societies. Resin finds in Egypt date to 2000 BCE at Deir El-Bahari, but use may be much older.44 The route extended from Sabbatha in the south through capitals of the other kingdoms to Petra, Gaza and the north, and products were carried by caravan, a hard sixty-five-day journey (to Gaza) according to Pliny. The Red Sea was also much utilised in the northward transport of aromatics. Strabo described the rich trade in south Arabian aromatics:The country of the Sab?i,[Sabaeans] a very populous nation, is contiguous, and is the most fertile of all, producing myrrh, frankincense, and cinnamon. On the coast is found balsamum and another kind of herb of a very fragrant smell, but which is soon dissipated. There are also sweet-smelling palms and the calamus … The people who live near each other receive, in continued succession, the loads [of perfumes] and deliver them to others, who convey them as far as Syria and Mesopotamia. When the carriers become drowsy by the odour of the aromatics, the drowsiness is removed by the fumes of asphaltus and of goat’s beard.45
Pliny said that ‘the chief productions of Arabia are frankincense and myrrh’.46 Miller described five species of Boswellia (the genus that yields frankincense) native to Arabia, of which one is native to the mainland and four others are native to the island of Socotra.47 The best frankincense sold for 6 denarii per lb (Pliny) and the finest myrrh up to 50 (200 sesterces) – or fifty days’ pay for a first-century CE skilled worker.48 Miller also described fourteen species of Commiphora (myrrh), most of which are native to Africa. The Sabaeans traded for this and exported northwards along the same route.
Vast quantities reached the West – in the first century BCE Rome imported 3,000 tons of frankincense and 600 tons of myrrh annually.49In addition to these indigenous aromatics, there would have been imported galbanum, bdellium, mastic, sweet flag, sweet rush, cinnamon, spikenard, styrax and costum, aloe wood and sandalwood, among others recognised by Theophrastus in the fourth century BCE, many of which would have found their way to Arabian ports.
Besides their main uses as incense and perfumes, resins had other ancient uses: in recent years tree resin has been detected in analysis of residues from jars, alongside biomarkers for wine.50 The oldest jars were from around 5400 BCE and the youngest from the Byzantine era. The jars came from several different locations in the Middle East and Greece, but many were from Ancient Egypt. In addition to resins, traces of several Mediterranean herbs were also detected, leading to the conclusion that wines were resinated, flavoured and spiced from very early times.
The Levantine–Aegean spice trade was a logical extension of the Incense Route as it delivered aromatics to the Mediterranean customers. Frankincense and myrrh from Arabia or north-east Africa were, naturally, of prime importance.51 In addition to myrrh, other species/derivatives of Commiphora were traded – balm, balsam, bdellium and stakte. The works of Theophrastus and Hippocrates document the end use of many of the products (see Table 3).