Oregano vulgare compactum. A long olfaction and musical analysis.

Oregano is a Lamiacae, rich in essential oils, and with 38 species of oregano, 6 subspecies and 17 hybrids, it is one of the most important culinary and medicinal plants of the Mediterranean basin. 

Instead of writing the usual list of chemical components with the traditional and therapeutic uses of the plant and oil, I will use music as a metaphor to describe the action of oregano as I experience it through the sensorial approach. (A long olfaction with the 1 drop of oil on a perfume paper stick.)

As I emerged from meeting the genus of the plant, the music of Vivald’s Summer from the four seasons came to mind. What better music from the underworld to echo the intensity of this aroma! I will refer to this recording throughout:

In the baroque era, when this music was composed, the devil was depicted playing the violin and violinists virtuosity were stretched by ‘devilishly difficult’ passages that stretched musicians’ technical mastery. 

The opening of the violin concerto is of musical breaths entitled ‘languishing under the harsh season of the sun’, similar to the altered breathing needed to first approach oregano, difficult to inhale due to it’s intense burning. These first breaths are written ‘in thirds’,  the melody being strengthened by a second voice sounding three notes lower. This technique of enhancing a melody with a parallel line a  third below is extremely common, originated in the baroque period and we still hear it today in alot of pop music. Now, oregano has two phenol compounds, thymol, carvacrol and P – cymene  interact with each other, creating an additive effect, much like the second voice a third below adds to the emotional power of the melody. 

A great descent begins and we hear it in the creeping sinews lower into the lava shoot as Vivaldi’s orchestra depicts, the man, the flock languishes, the pine burns’; we almost hear the hissing of the wood as it catches alight. The  birds are melting, the whole landscape is being crushed in the heat. As we descend into this densifying, tight space, it’s like breathing underground with no fresh air shaft.

 “I am the spirit of the volcano.” Let’s skip to the final, third movement of the concerto (minute 7,36”) where the explosions sound. Let’s also refer back to those phenol compounds that have an ability to permeabilize and depolarize the plasma membrane of invading microbes, causing their ‘skins’ to explode, leaking out their vital energy. These phenols partition the lipid bilayer of the cell membrane, making it more permeable and so causing the leakage (or shall we say explosion) of cell contents. Oregano’s phenol compounds exert an antibacterial activity on the cell membrane by altering its structure and function, usually causing the death of the cell. Thymol and carvacrol (our melody in thirds) can bind to membrane proteins and lipopolysaccharides, reaching the innermost, most vulnerable membrane. The spirit of the volcano touches the bacteria and provokes it to behave in the same way, destabilizing its surface, and causing its destruction. 

This heat is tied tightly to the heat of rage, followed by the intense sadness and heaviness felt after a falling out with a loved one. The solitude of anger is depicted beautifully in the second, slow movement at minute 5,08”. We are hiding in the cave, licking our wounds with our ring of fire fiercely guarding the entrance. We are alone and the memory of the argument alive; the exchange, the release of furious words and physical energy rumbling closely next to us, heard in the orchestra’s tremellos. 

How many bacteria invade us after the frustration of not being heard, of expressing our rage, of not expressing our rage, our blind anger, resentment, even disgust? We are at our most vulnerable after an explosion, when our shadow, our dragon has woken from the deep, passed through the smoke and breathed fire! Ah, yes, it is then, afterwards, in the descent after the fury that we sink and are exposed, exhausted, spent, all the fight gone. A fertile ground for passing bacteria indeed. 

Treat like with like. Perhaps Oregano compact’s fire is perfect for treating illness and physical / emotional imbalance for people who want to explore their relationship with anger, rage and resentment, for those who express it too readily, who have ‘anger issues’, who are blocked to express themselves freely and others who have felt the desolate shame and tragedy of a relationship breaking down and are now suffering heaviness and physical weakness.

Let’s consider where oregano compact dwells, it’s dark chamber. There are textures, lights of minerals on the walls, there are secrets and mysteries here behind the veil of fire. Memories of smoke. Perhaps as we spend time with the spirit of the volcano, we get accustomed to the stillness between the explosions and our breath sinks into the abyss. We feel the compression and resist no more.

There is another ‘version’ of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, recomposed by Max Richter. Do have a listen to ‘Summer’ here: 

Intoxified leaping 

through midsummer shadows

through ring of fire

through wall of flames

through burning piles of memories.

Fury is consumed.

‘The Great Descent’ begins.

Concentric ripples ride in rounds,

breaths drop as stones into the darkness.

A memory of smoke, of arguments, of solitude after the fight echoes in this chamber.

Walls are studded in minerals I cannot name; lost dreams encrusted underground.

The veil of fire protects deep mystery here. 

You can purchase both Oregano vulgaris virens essential oil and hidrolates from us.