Kyphi was a temple incense, burned in ritual; Plutarch says at nightfall. Two recipes for it are cut into the walls of the small laboratory room at Edfu, naming ingredients whose modern identifications are still argued over.
You blend a version of it from raw materials, knowing it is an interpretation, and then go and look at the room where the instructions were written.
An incense workshop could be run anywhere. This one ends in the room where the recipe is written on the wall.
How it could run
A proposed shape, confirmed with you when it is arranged.
- Begin at a bench with resins, spices and honey, and the two Edfu recipes in translation.
- Weigh and blend a version, noting where each identification is still uncertain.
- Walk into the temple and stand in the laboratory room where the recipes are cut.
- Burn a little of your blend at nightfall, the hour Plutarch gives for kyphi.
