Djedi

Having just come back from Paris after a fabulous weekend of pure olfactive indulgence; the highlight of which was the workshop at Guerlain HQ to sniff 32 discontinued masterpieces spanning from the beginning starting with Pois Des Senteur 1840 ending with Parure 1975. How five hours flew by I couldn't recollect but seemed like it was only two hours :-D Whilst trying out these thirtytwo masterpieces I was privileged enough to try the legendary Djedi! The composition I tried was however a reconstruction by Thierry Wasser and dated 2014 and according to Guerlain contained the following ingredients which is also reflective of the what was in the original 1926 version. Aldehydes, muguet, bergamot,Jasmine, rose, Iris Vetiver, animalics, musk, Amber, oakmoss I've waited with baited breath for this moment for the last five years and when it came I was not dissapointed! When the strip with the scent was handed to me by the lovely Françoise I quickly applied it on my skin before the alcohol dried.......It was what I expected and more! From the very start to the very end I've got to say this composition was totally austere and sombre. If a dictator were to wear a fragrance this would be it! I literally felt like Napoleon! It starts of with sharp aldehydes and clean muguet florals with spikes of sharp animalics and dryness poking through. It's an amazing juxtaposition between cleanliness and decaying filth and totally avant garde for the period when it was released. Even for today's standards this would be considered strange but I love it with my whole being! Once this sharpness subsides one is left with a fuzzy warm Amber cushioned on a foundation of super dry oakmoss and civet .......the whole composition is still veiled with a light ethereal mix of muguet, Jasmine and rose. After 8-9 hours everything is a whisper but the telltale signature of oakmoss and other acrid dusty components could be felt for another ten hours. For the first eight hours this was a sillage bomb and the little spot that I applied could be smelt from an arms length however understandably so becomes a skin scent which lasts a very long time. I forgot to add although Vero's Onda is absolutely amazing and one of my favourites, to me it bears no resemblance to the Djedi I smelt at Guerlain HQ. It's just totally unique

Djedi has long since accrued a kind of legendary status as one of Perfume History's lost masterpieces, and smelling it from my (likely 1997 rerelease) 0.5ml vial, it is completely deserved. Rare is the occasion when perfection of a perfume genre occurs so early in that genre's history, but given it's Jacques Guerlain, is it so surprising that this is likely the greatest of all leather chypres to have ever been made? Djedi, for its part, is somewhat monotonous and lacks the pyramidal structure of many old classics - I find I can smell all its essential components immediately when I apply it, though I use it in incredibly small quantities and I assume it could give a different experience if (somehow) worn with abandon. Its core is composed of animalics, leather, vetiver and oakmoss, but balanced in a very beautiful way, giving a forest floor + leather effect. It is the quintessence of the comfort of the scent that can be found in old things, from the polished wood of a church pew to a beaten-up leather glove, or even a set of ivy-clad ruins in an ancient moorland. It is somehow evocative of stone, to my mind more a Mediaeval castle than anything Egyptian, with a softly smouldering fire in the corner and a heap of animal furs warming the bed in the cold, dark and damp room. Austere though it sounds, Djedi compensates for its dryness with a VERY well-judged dose of cinnamon and possibly also vanilla, which gives just the faintest impression of warmth and sweetness to this otherwise blisteringly cold-dry core. Therein lies the totality of its beauty, as the base notes create this enormous litho-crypt in which the tiniest dose of sweetened spice smoulders, not unlike the structure of an atom with its miniscule nucleus and far-flung electron orbitals (or, as perhaps was intended, a kind soul gently haunting a hypogeal tomb). Though gorgeous, Djedi's ongoing disappearance into the mists of time does not upset me too much, as in Vero Profumo's Onda (VdE or extrait) or Sultan Pasha's Thebes extrait we have two extant perfumes that cleave very close indeed. Djedi may have passed on, but her beautiful children still inhabit the world.

This perfume was created in the 1920s and reissued for a brief time in 1996. What I have is a tiny sample of the original 1926 version. The opening is strongly animalic and musty with just enough residue of spicy and floral top notes to keep it from being fecal-smelling. There’s real civet in enormous quantity, there’s earthy, dusty vetiver, and there’s just the slightest hint of cinnamon and spices. If I’m not mistaken, the note that so many people smell and comment on as odd, unfamiliar, mineral, death-like, dry, sinister and the like is an unusually fine calamus, which would be perfectly in keeping with the Egyptian theme. Combine it with real, high-quality orris root, and you have the genie in the tomb. I would not want to debunk anyone else’s magical and spiritual experience by overthinking, but I suspect that the strange and other-worldly opening of vintage Djedi is due to the fact that it’s so old that it’s lost most of its top notes and what we smell initially is a premature and unintended peek at the base. Whether intended or not, it certainly works its magic. About an hour into the drydown, the sweeter, slightly powdery, slightly spicy, floral chypre notes start to appear. There are dried roses, iris, a touch of real sandalwood (foreshadowing Samsara), a touch of patchouli, a touch of real oakmoss, and, of course, the powerful vetiver-calamus-civet base underlying it all. I can see how people perceive Djedi as containing leather, since there’s the right combination of powdery and animalic notes to produce the illusion of leather if you’re looking for it. A reviewer on Basenotes observed that most people describe Djedi in terms of an experience, not a fragrance, and I would concur that it is highly evocative of the unknown. Although a very different scent, my experience of Djedi was in some ways similar to that evoked by Judith Muller’s Bat-Sheba, another vintage perfume that seemed to have lost its top notes and produced the impression of a tomb-like environment or archaeological dig. If you ever get a chance to try Djedi, do so!

Djedi review, part two: Who Djedi Is Djedi was born in a different time, daughter of a different way of life. She is part of a generation putting itself together in the aftermath of total war, a lost generation of men, and women who rejected the Victorian conventions of dress and morality that had stunted their lives and their social and physical freedoms. These women cut off their hair. Bobby pin factories went bankrupt overnight! They wore short, loose dresses and cloche hats. They drank and smoked in public and they demanded and mostly received the right to vote. They took their places in institutions of higher learning. They stopped wanting to smell like flowers. How could any soliflore express who these women were? 1919, Tabac Blond. 1921, Chanel #5. 1924, My Sin. And 1927, Djedi. Djedi is thrilling and powerful and so strange, something new under the sun that was inspired by something the sun had not seen in millenia: the tomb of Tutankhamun, opened in 1922; and as such, Djedi is escapism and endurance together, made for a generation of women who knew in their hearts that the fighting was not over-that it had just begun. And so they made hay while the sun shined. They marshalled their stregnth, and in cultivating their persons they fortified their souls for what was to come. If I am not mistaken, Djedi was discontinued in the 1950s, a time when people embraced the bomb, and better living through chemistry, and plastic, with all its implications. They tried so hard for normalcy and enforced it so fiercely. They kept different secrets. Djedi is courage with the stregnth to back it up, raw, determined, unbowed.

I consider myself incredibly lucky for having managed to get a tiny sample of this from a very dear friend who has a whole host of unicorns in his collection, this is a skanky beauty, it is what I expected and more... The leather in this is very reminiscent of what often times comes off as uncured leather as was prevalent in most 'Cuir de Russie' perfumes (I can only imagine what Guerlain's Cuir de Russie might've been like), this feels like the bodily scent of a fairly unwashed warm-blooded mammal... There is a gentle lift thanks to the vetiver in this when it opens a bit dry, earthy, but the civet and whatever is used to make the 'leather/raw hide' accord slowly take centre stage... This could in high doses be perceived as rather urinous and somewhat faecal as someone mentioned in a review. The idea for this though is sort of a tribute to Egypt, and it is a homage to embalming and also the idea of decay. If there are florals in this they're pretty hard to discern... This is 'stinky' and I love it. It is a testament to a style of perfumery that is no longer, perhaps in the world of niche fragrances, even then only a handful at best. If you use perfume to mask your natural odour, prize a certain kind of sterility or have never ripped off the clothes of your significant other, this is not for you, you will not understand this, this is primal, voiced hunger, throes of passion, forbidden secrets, animal virility and the arousing scent of your lover's intimate regions... It is what it is, and I'll end quoting Sappho, “In the crooks of your body, I find my religion”.

Djedi starts with a pleasantly bitter herbal top, opening within seconds into an amazing, lush, dry leather chypre. No sweetness at all; tons of civet, musks, and vetiver in soft furry layers, just the way I like it. A little bit of wine-dark rose in the background. There’s a surprise in the drydown: a sweet-hot cinnamon note, like Red Hots. Odd, but delightful. My reference point for animalic leathers is Aramis, which is maybe a bit louder and punchier than Djedi. Leather and civet always take me to my happy place, but Djedi is more of a contented purr than Aramis’ joyful growl. Djedi’s beauty is in texture. It’s like overlapping layers of silks and velvets and furs and wool knits, in shades of brown. in that, it’s a lot like the Papillon perfumes, though the closest match (Anubis) is more of a labdanum-sweetened leather than Djedi’s drier vetiver-leather. I love the Big Three leather chypres (Bandit, Cabochard, Azuree), but Djedi is maybe the purest and most understated of them all. Bandit spikes the leather-chypre core with bitter green artemisia and a golden, lusty jasmine heart; Cabochard lightens it with flinty aldehydes and complicated florals; Azuree brightens it with that broad, sunny citrus-herbal top. Djedi goes straight for the brown stuff, no distractions.

Djedi review, part one: How It Smells This is another vintage perfume that went on to my skin oily; again I assume that it is so old that much of the alcohol has evaporated. Fine with me. Down to business! I wore my precious sample for several days, during the course of a few weeks, to take the best notes I could, and finally decided that the civet is the winner when it comes to opening notes. It's a near thing: the other way I could describe it is as a deeply and darkly honeyed rose. Rose there certainly is, in abundance, and the divide between honey and civet seems to be a single breath one way or the other. So imagine that bees are mammals in all their scruffy, musky, raunchy glory, and picture a worker bee, hot and tired from its day's labor, crawling along a rose in the perfection of its blooming, and you have not only the opening of Djedi but its heart and soul. There's musk and oakmoss and powder in the dry down, but for as long as you can still smell Djedi (and how I wish it was longer), the dominant impression is of earth and rose and civet. It is glorious. I would wear this for every anniversary, every night out if I could. You can be a different woman when you wear Djedi. Which brings me to part two of my review.

Doc Elly's review for Djedi is perfect. I have about half left of a 5 ml decant I nabbed on ebay a couple of years ago. Still wondering how THAT happened. Because it's so rare, I don't wear it that often, but I also don't want to let it sit until it eventually evaporates, so I wear it on occasion, like today. It opens with a kind of cold, strange medicinal note which is eventually softened by a note of dried roses. Shortly after the big vetiver note takes over and I start to see some similarities between Djedi and Guerlain's vintage Vetiver, but also Vero Profomo's Onda. But where Onda has a sunny/meaty vetiver, Djedi's vetiver is slightly powdery and dry. Both Djedi and Onda are scents that are difficult to articulate. I don't get leather at all or anything animalic, and like Doc said, Djedi is one of those scents that's more about describing an "experience". Personally, I experience a sense of melancholy as if I'm longing for something, like a time or a person from the past that I can't quite put my finger on, but the feeling is deep in my gut and whatever it is stays just outside of my peripheral vision. A weird, recurring experience that happens everytime I wear Djedi and I love it even though it's unsettling.

I've sampled lots animalic perfumes including MKK, Yatagan, CB Musk reinvention, Musc Tonkin, and the infamous Untitled No. 8, and Djedi is the only one I'd describe as smelling somewhat fecal, just for the duration of the opening, though. Djedi's opening is unlike any other perfume I've smelled, probably because of the presence of real civet and musk in its composition. It's dry, animalic, woody, musty, sweaty, raw, and almost mouldy smelling. It's a scent somewhere between "fecal" and "fungal". After the unpleasant opening it dries down into a sweet and spicy, woodsy fragrance with a "dirty" animalic base. There's a persistent butter/caramel note in here too that reminds me a bit of maple syrup. To be honest, it smells like a pecan pie or pumpkin spice Yankee Candle to me, just woodier and dirtier.

I decided I needed to try Djedi: I have L'Heure Bleue on regular rotation, I adore Mitsouko, and my dream scent is L'apres L'ondee, so I thought it about time. I ordered a tiny sample from The Perfumed Court-it was advertised as the vintage version, not the anniversary release. I tried the tiniest smear on the side of my wrist, not even a drop, just the smear from the plastic cap of the decant bottle. I'm pretty bad at picking up notes, but overall this fragrance creates a tableau in your imagination. In my tableau: you're in the woods trekking through dark, damp undergrowth. It starts to rain, and you come across an old tumbled down stone ruin. You take shelter from the rain, noting as you do that other animals have been there, going by the vaguely urinous and faecal scents wafting. You build a fire: the wood crackles and burns, filling the ruin with dry smoke. Some of the wood you found must have been from a fence, because you can smell chemicals, pitch, tar, creosote. After about an hour, you no longer notice the urine smell. The cold stone is starting to warm up releasing a powdery granite hint. There is a window without glass in the ruin, and outside there is an old rambling rose bush with a few late blossoms. As the sun comes out, you catch the merest wisp of rose fragrance rising from the fading petals, just about peeking through the ash and cold smoke. Cold, sad, melancholy fragrance. Different. Unique. Not pleasant.

Most people think the Jedi order of Star Wars was a fictional order created by George Lucas from his fertile imagination. Actually, Lucas based it on the Djedi, an ancient order of Egyptian priest/warriors who wore hooded robes, carried a staff of power and guarded the pharaoh. The secret techniques and knowledge of the "Force" taught to these Egyptian Djedi were passed down from Atlantis by Thoth (aka Hermes and Mercury)- one of the priest-kings of Atlantis who sailed to colonies in Egypt, Peru and and elsewhere before the sinking of Atlantis in order to preserve the accumulated knowledge and wisdom of that great society. But in order to ensure that it would not be misused again, it was kept secret and only revealed to select initiates. The name Djed contains the root word "Dj" meaning Serpent. this root word can be found in Dj-huti (Thoth/Hermes), Dj-inn (better known in the west as a Genie) and Djedi (An Egyptian Magician). Thoth taught divine alchemy, which wasn't a technique to change lead into gold, but a means of turning the dense human consciousness into the golden consciousness of an enlightened master. The symbol of alchemy is the caduceus, which Mercury is shown holding in statues and paintings. It consists of a staff with two intertwining serpents, crowned with wings. The staff is the spinal column, the two serpents are the balanced masculine and feminine energies of the kundalini, and the wings symbolize the higher consciousness that frees the mind once the kundalini is raised from the base of the spine chakra to the crown chakra. Through this alchemy, a Djedi could awaken the sleeping kundalini power (Force) and raise it to the head where it would manifest as supernatural powers and intuitive gnostic wisdom. Since the Dj in Djedi means "serpent, a Djedi master was one who had mastered the serpent power.

My 3ml decant just came in, and I couldn't have been more excited to gingerly tear the package open! I was terrified, because today is the hottest day I've experienced in my city so far this year, and the thought of having such a precious vial of fluid traveling all this way in this heat.. But rest assured, the fragrance is undamaged [as less as possible for such an old fragrance]. It's... interesting. It's not what I was expecting at all from the reviews, but then again, we're bound to experience different results depending on how our individual vials and flacons have been handled. We'll never experience Djedi as it was meant to be experience, since Guerlain only cares about smelling like candy and suntan lotion anymore. For me, this is truly nothing but unadulterated oak moss. There's a decent dose of vetiver and musk there as well, and an odd sweetness that I can't quite wrap my head around. I think it has something to do with the rose note, but it keeps making me think of some sort of syrup..like maple or cane syrup. It's most definitely dark, but not at all musty to me. It's a very beautiful, deep chypre that has quite a sensual edge to it. I'm slightly disappointed that it doesn't evoke any sort of Egyptian reference, but I'm still very pleased to have such an interesting, rare fragrance in my collection. The 3ml decant is small, but I intend on maintaining it and treasuring it for as long as possible! Judging by the longevity I'm getting, I'll be okay. It lasts about 1.5 to 3 hours on me. Understandable. Sillage is noticeable, but it's mostly that odd syrupy sweetness that manages to carry. This was most definitely the precursor to Mitsouko. Mitsouko is basically a more full-bodied version of Djedi, to my nose.

Ok, while I think Marwa.qoura took this a bit too personally/culturally (and she looks young so may not have considered expecting people from 100 years ago to have conformed to today's ethical standards), I have to say, regarding the scent, I am on board. I love Guerlain, especially the vintage juice when I can get it, but yerk! Loving or hating a scent has some subjectivity, of course, and may depend on how it smells on you. I opened my itty bitty decant from the Perfumed Court and immediately thought, "what the heck?" It was awful. My mother has worn it so I had her smell and she said it was accurate, so I know it was not the sample. I tried it on. I lasted an hour before I had to scrub. It nauseated me. Given the historical context, I totally get why it was supposed to conjure thoughts of Egypt. On me it smells funereal--oils and spices and sand and time and decay. So much decay. I like the notes, so this should have been a slam dunk. This is something I strongly urge you get a small small sample of and wear for a bit before you hunt for a bigger (and pricier) score. For me, this is my second great Guerlain failure. I think I am one of 3 people in the world who can't wear Shalimar. I love it on others and in the bottle, so I know in that case the problem is me--maybe in this case as well :-(

I am from Egypt & it's my first time to hear about this perfume ...Well , I don't really understand why Guerlain used civet so intensly in such perfume ...First , it's not ethical & harsh ..Second Ancient Egyptians never used civet in their perfumes !! ..It's not a known animal in Egypt , it's exclusive to East Asia !...and they didn't like stinky or dusty smells , they usually used florals like lotus or roses , specially Taif rose which is very well known here as "Ward Baladi"...I understand why this perfume was a flop .. Judging from the notes & reviews ,it's dust & old tombs stink , not a perfume ...Please don't associate that with Egypt as it smells nothing like the real country I live in... A green sort of scent would have been more appropriate ...

Oh, man. I am fixated on this now that I realize it exists. I would love to watch Dr. Phibes Rises Again while wearing. The mixture of camp and ancient Egypt is an intoxicating theme. Ground mummy dust was apparently used in medicines for a long time...no doubt it was faked mostly but whatever authentic "salvatory of green mummy" mentioned in the Duchess of Malfi--I like to think it smelled how this is described. There was also brown mummy, a color of paint that apparently really did contain mummy and the possibly authentic mummy paper made from the wrapping. Looking at photos of the excavation of Tut's tomb, it's easy to form an idea of the odor, exciting but maybe not entirely pleasant. Still a lot of rhythm in those rockin' bones.

I'm sorry I cannot even test these old Guerlain where I live. I would like to sniff it maybe once for sniffing sake. Everything ancient Egyptian is very appealing for me. I like animalic notes in tiny amounts, not the style of heavy animalic from '20s. Nowadays they would smell too strong. Together with floral essential oils also animalic notes have became too expensive and not possible to use in perfumes on large scale. In these days only synthetical fixative are used. This is good for animals that often went through painful torture to make a perfume. This is very cruel. Less good for quality and projection of perfumes and probably for our health, too, because synthetical stuff is no better for our nervous system.

Honestly. This wasn't as doom and gloom as I expected it to be based on the reviews. It actually smells quite pleasant! It is not a happy scent...It's quite cold but also it wasn't the ultimate non sweet scent that people claimed it was. I quite like it and would definitely purchase it if it was a currently available fragrance. Coldish, dark, yet not too opaque nor transparent, a great balance of animalics, moss and woods...not just ordinary wood and moss but one from a dark mysterious, abandoned forest un-touched by man for centuries. Or to think of it as tomb air from the depths of a pyramid, that will do as well.

The venerated elder of every other civet+y scent that came after, all the more remarkable for having been released in the 1920s. It comes right to the edge of fecal, and then drops into rose and patchouli to balance it all out. It’s frankly sexual but not pushy about it, more like bypassing the rational mind to tap into a primal imperative that cannot be ignored. Every perfume lover owes themself a drop or two of this utterly unique scent—one glance at the notes tells why it will never be made again. I got a decant from The Perfumed Court for a steep price, and it’s worth every penny.

This might be the most unusual and interesting perfume I have ever smelled. It does have an intense animalic smell, also dry and dusty, but there is also a faint floral note. It's not pretty but it is majestic and a little brutal. The most amazingly long lasting fragrance I have ever tried. I can't stop sniffing it when I have it on. When I am not wearing it, I can't stop thinking about it. It smells like an ancient secret. It would probably smell great on a man as well. A masterpiece. What a shame it is discontinued. I will hoard my sample like the precious treasure it is.

very long lasting intense chypre, herbs, leather and moss - which transforms later in extremely aromatic and smooth scent of high quality natural amber. Its a remarkable unusual highest class fragrance - a unicorn in my collection which i treasure very much. The scent has very dark, mysterious personality. I cannot really describe it, but its truly beautiful.

This is Sultan's Pashas recreation of Djedi https://sultanpashaperfumes.com/products/thebes-extrait-de-parfum-spray He reports Djedi made him cry so he spent years toiling to recreate it. He also has it as an attar (on this attar website). I have sampled the attar, not Djedi and can confirm its wonderful

Mr Guerlain could have created his art as much as he wanted and calling it "Death " or something of the sort , but that wasn't nice associating it with the history of my country and its civilisation ..for the sake of "art" and making money as well ...Life is what creates art , not death ...

I have been trying to find Djedi for a very long time, and am sitting here with a huge smile on my face....self satisfied and happy that I am wearing a clone in the beautiful Onda from Vero Profumo so very well described above ...it could be Djedi!!

there is an unopened bottle of the 1996 version on ebay. 4 days to go. Up to $207 last time I looked. It's freaking me out.

Pasha78 I am amazed that you got to visit Guerlain smell the original parure - one of my favorites!