Incense

What the source describes

Chapter X separates sweet odours from foul ones according to the character of the intended spirit, then gives prayers over the perfume and over the fire. The manuscript families preserve different ingredient lists: some are brief—frankincense, aloes, and fragrant spices—while others add myrrh, saffron, musk, costus, nard, benzoin, or galbanum. There is no single formula common to every witness.

Historical setting

The Key of Solomon survives as a family of manuscripts rather than one authorial master copy. Instrument names, drawings, preparation details and even which tools appear can differ between witnesses, so this page follows the cited edition and records its variants.

Common uses

The prepared perfume is burned for suffumigation, used when instruments are consecrated, and carried through the ritual place. In the circle chapter sweet odours burn on charcoal at the outer corners. The prayers frame fragrance as attraction and purification, but those effects remain claims made by the text.

Form, materials and reconstruction

After the prayer, the spices are sprinkled with the water of the art and stored in silk or in a dedicated box until required. The text also mentions evil-smelling fumigations, a historical category that should not be confused with the modern idea that all ritual incense must smell pleasant. Ingredient safety and ventilation matter in any material study; historical inclusion does not establish safe use.

Element: No fixed element

This source does not assign this particular instrument a fixed element. Its materials or effects should not be turned into an elemental correspondence without a named source.

Sources and variations

Lists differ sharply by witness, so a modern 'Solomonic incense recipe' needs a manuscript citation. The Golden Dawn's placing of incense with Air is a later ritual arrangement, not an elemental label supplied by the Key.

Primary account used here

Key of Solomon, Book II, Book II, chapter X ↗

Further references

• Key of Solomon: introduction and contents ↗Editorial history and an overview of the manuscript-based edition.
• Hebrew Key of Solomon ↗A different witness with its own section on magical instruments and requisites.