India is the main incense producing country, and is a healthy exporter to other countries (though export sales have been troubled by increasing costs of the raw materials, and by other factors, such as Western countries buying unperfumed sticks, and by Indian companies producing fakes or imitations). Incense burning has taken place in India for thousands of years, and India exported the idea to China and Japan, and other Asian countries. A uniform and codified system of incense-making first began in India. Although Vedic texts mention the use of incense for masking odors and creating a pleasurable smell, the modern system of organized incense-making was likely created by the medicinal priests of the time. Thus, modern, organized incense-making is intrinsically linked to the Ayurvedic medical system in which it is rooted.
The oldest source on incense is the set of sacred Hindu texts, the Vedas, particularly the Atharva Veda and the Rig Veda, which set out and encouraged a uniform method of making incense. Although the texts mention the use of incense for masking odours and creating a pleasurable smell, the modern system of organized incense-making was likely created by the medicinal priests of the time. So, modern, organized incense-making is linked to the Ayurvedic medical system in which it is rooted. The method of incense making with a bamboo stick as a core originated in India at the end of the 19th century, largely replacing the rolled, extruded or shaped method which is still used in India for dhoops and cones, and for most shapes of incense in Nepal/Tibet and Japan. Other main forms of incense are cones and logs and benzoin resin (sambrani), which are incense paste formed into pyramid shapes or log shapes, and then dried.
Dhoop is the older form of incense making which spread to other Asian countries such as China, Nepal, and Japan where it remains as the principle incense making process. Dhoop incense doesn't use a bamboo stick. The wood paste, binders and fragrant ingredients are mixed together as a masala and allowed to dry, though some dhoops contain ingredients such as honey and ghee which keep them moist - these are known as wet dhoop, and such dhoops were traditionally made in the North of India.
Incense made with bamboo sticks was originally a Mysore tradition, that, under two Mysore businessmen, T.L. Upadyaya and Attar Khasim Saheb, became an organised industry which introduced the use of a central bamboo stick around 1900 as a way to simplify and speed up production as it could be taught easily to women who could make the sticks at home.. Mysore incense with a bamboo stick core was exhibited at the British Empire Exhibition of 1924, and distributed as gifts to influential people in the West. As such, incense with bamboo sticks became the most prominent form of incense in India, largely, though not completely, replacing the older dhoop style. Mysore incense has recently been granted geographical indication status by the Indian government after an application in 2005 by the All India Agarbathi Manufacturers Association.
The main method of burning incense in India is the incense stick or agarbathi. The basic ingredients of an incense stick are bamboo sticks, paste (generally made of charcoal dust or sawdust and joss/jiggit/gum/tabu powder – an adhesive made from the bark of litsea glutinosa and other trees), and the perfume ingredients – which traditionally would be a masala powder of ground ingredients, though more commonly is a solvent of perfumes and/or essential oils. After the base paste has been applied to the bamboo stick, it is either, in the traditional method, while still moist, immediately rolled into the masala, or, more commonly, left for several days to dry, and then dipped into the scented solvent.
Various resins, such as amber, myrrh, frankincense, and halmaddi are used in traditional masala incense, usually as a fragrant binding ingredient, and these will add their distinctive fragrance to the finished incense. Some resins, such as gum Arabic, may be used where it is desirable for the binding agent to have no fragrance of its own. Halmaddi has a particular interest to Western consumers, possibly through its association with the popular Satya Nag Champa. It is an earth coloured liquid resin drawn from the Ailanthus triphysa tree; as with other resins, it is a viscous semi-liquid when fresh, it hardens to a brittle solid as it evaporates and ages. Some incense makers mix it with honey in order to keep it pliable. Due to crude extraction methods which resulted in trees dying, by the 1990s the Forest Department in India had banned resin extraction; this forced up the price of halmaddi, so its usage in incense making declined. In 2011, extraction was allowed under leasing agreements, which increased in 2013, though production is still sufficiently limited for the resin to sometimes be stolen via improper extraction to be sold on the black market.
Companies:
* Satya: 37
* Goloka: 37
* Aromatika: 35The oldest source on incense is the set of sacred Hindu texts, the Vedas, particularly the Atharva Veda and the Rig Veda, which set out and encouraged a uniform method of making incense. Although the texts mention the use of incense for masking odours and creating a pleasurable smell, the modern system of organized incense-making was likely created by the medicinal priests of the time. So, modern, organized incense-making is linked to the Ayurvedic medical system in which it is rooted. The method of incense making with a bamboo stick as a core originated in India at the end of the 19th century, largely replacing the rolled, extruded or shaped method which is still used in India for dhoops and cones, and for most shapes of incense in Nepal/Tibet and Japan. Other main forms of incense are cones and logs and benzoin resin (sambrani), which are incense paste formed into pyramid shapes or log shapes, and then dried.
Dhoop is the older form of incense making which spread to other Asian countries such as China, Nepal, and Japan where it remains as the principle incense making process. Dhoop incense doesn't use a bamboo stick. The wood paste, binders and fragrant ingredients are mixed together as a masala and allowed to dry, though some dhoops contain ingredients such as honey and ghee which keep them moist - these are known as wet dhoop, and such dhoops were traditionally made in the North of India.
Incense made with bamboo sticks was originally a Mysore tradition, that, under two Mysore businessmen, T.L. Upadyaya and Attar Khasim Saheb, became an organised industry which introduced the use of a central bamboo stick around 1900 as a way to simplify and speed up production as it could be taught easily to women who could make the sticks at home.. Mysore incense with a bamboo stick core was exhibited at the British Empire Exhibition of 1924, and distributed as gifts to influential people in the West. As such, incense with bamboo sticks became the most prominent form of incense in India, largely, though not completely, replacing the older dhoop style. Mysore incense has recently been granted geographical indication status by the Indian government after an application in 2005 by the All India Agarbathi Manufacturers Association.
The main method of burning incense in India is the incense stick or agarbathi. The basic ingredients of an incense stick are bamboo sticks, paste (generally made of charcoal dust or sawdust and joss/jiggit/gum/tabu powder – an adhesive made from the bark of litsea glutinosa and other trees), and the perfume ingredients – which traditionally would be a masala powder of ground ingredients, though more commonly is a solvent of perfumes and/or essential oils. After the base paste has been applied to the bamboo stick, it is either, in the traditional method, while still moist, immediately rolled into the masala, or, more commonly, left for several days to dry, and then dipped into the scented solvent.
Various resins, such as amber, myrrh, frankincense, and halmaddi are used in traditional masala incense, usually as a fragrant binding ingredient, and these will add their distinctive fragrance to the finished incense. Some resins, such as gum Arabic, may be used where it is desirable for the binding agent to have no fragrance of its own. Halmaddi has a particular interest to Western consumers, possibly through its association with the popular Satya Nag Champa. It is an earth coloured liquid resin drawn from the Ailanthus triphysa tree; as with other resins, it is a viscous semi-liquid when fresh, it hardens to a brittle solid as it evaporates and ages. Some incense makers mix it with honey in order to keep it pliable. Due to crude extraction methods which resulted in trees dying, by the 1990s the Forest Department in India had banned resin extraction; this forced up the price of halmaddi, so its usage in incense making declined. In 2011, extraction was allowed under leasing agreements, which increased in 2013, though production is still sufficiently limited for the resin to sometimes be stolen via improper extraction to be sold on the black market.
Companies:
* Satya: 37
* Goloka: 37
* Aargee Incense: 32
* GR International: 29
* GR International: 29
* Mahendra Perfumery Works: 26
* Auroshika Incense: 24
* HEM Corporation: 23
* Gopal Joie incense: 22
Incense sticks, also known as agarbathi (or agarbatti) and joss sticks, in which an incense paste is rolled or moulded around a bamboo stick, is one of the main forms of incense in India. The method is believed to have started in India, and is distinct from the Nepal/Tibet and Japanese methods of stick making which don't use a bamboo core. Though the method is also used in the west, particularly in America, it is strongly associated with India.
The basic ingredients are the bamboo stick, the paste (generally made of charcoal dust and joss/jiggit/gum/tabu powder - an adhesive made from the bark of litsea glutinosa and other trees), and the perfume ingredients - which would be a masala powder of ground ingredients into which the stick would be rolled, or a perfume liquid sometimes consisting of synthetic ingredients into which the stick would be dipped. Stick machines are sometimes used, which coat the stick with paste and perfume, though the bulk of production is done by hand rolling at home. There are about 5,000 incense companies in India which take raw unperfumed sticks hand-rolled by approx 2000,000 women working part-time at home, and then apply their own brand of perfume, and package the sticks for sale. There are about 25 main companies who together account for up to 30% of the market, and around 500 of the companies, including a significant number of the main ones, are based in Bangalore.
Some ingredients
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