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Family: Citrus

Bergamot: the citrus at the heart of eau de Cologne

Bergamot is a Calabrian citrus whose peel gives a sweet, light, orange-like oil with a floral note. It has opened eau de Cologne since the early 18th century and remains a backbone of the citrus family.

Ripe bergamot, round and yellow-green, still hanging from its branch among the leaves

Where does bergamot come from?

Bergamot is the fruit of Citrus bergamia, a small tree that genetic research describes as a probable hybrid of lemon and bitter orange. As Wikipedia's entry on the bergamot orange explains, large-scale production sits on the Ionian coast of the province of Reggio Calabria, in southern Italy, where the oil carries a protected designation, Bergamotto di Reggio Calabria DOP.

Bergamot oil is cold-pressed from the rind. Machines took over the job in the 1840s, and today peelers scrape the fruit under running water before centrifuges separate the oil from the water. According to the article on bergamot essential oil, the rinds of 100 bergamots yield about 85 g of oil.

What does bergamot smell like?

Bergamot smells like a sweet, light orange peel with a floral note. Its aroma is described as citrus, floral, green and spicy, with hints of orange peel and ginger. The oil is built mainly on limonene, linalyl acetate and linalool.

What does bergamot do in a perfume?

Bergamot is a top note, the first impression when you spray, and one of the most commonly used ingredients in perfumery, valued for how easily it combines with other scents. It was a major component of the original Eau de Cologne made by Johann Maria Farina in the early 18th century, and the Farina archive in Cologne records its use in perfume in 1714. It anchors the citrus family, next to lemon, one of its probable parents, and to neroli and petitgrain, both drawn from the bitter orange tree.

What should you know about bergamot?

Expressed bergamot oil is phototoxic because it contains bergapten, a furocoumarin. A link between cologne, sunlight and skin pigmentation was observed in 1916, and the name berloque dermatitis appeared in 1925. The International Fragrance Association (IFRA) Standard for expressed bergamot oil caps it at 0.40% of the finished product in most product categories when the furocoumarin level is unknown; bergapten-free grades show no phototoxic effect in patch tests. Bergamot oil is also one of the allergens listed in EU Regulation 2023/1545 on fragrance allergen labelling: above 0.001% in a leave-on cosmetic, it must appear on the ingredient list. The class on allergens and IFRA standards explains how both systems work.

Often paired with

Neroli Lemon Lavender Oakmoss Patchouli

Further reading

Bergamot in the feed

joon.yuzuin Citrus & Fresh · Seattle ·

Reading

Where citrus sits: French families versus the wheel

TL;DR: citrus is a family of its own in the French classification but only a subfamily on the Fragrance Wheel. - the club's Class on the seven fragrance families follows the French perfumers' seven, citrus first - Wikipedia's article on the Fragrance Wheel…

Bergamot Lemon Tea

frankie.incense Fun fact: the wheel had ancestors. The same Fragrance Wheel article mentions Jellinek's Odor Effects Diagram, from 1949, among the earlier schemes [I…

6 comments

joon.yuzuin Citrus & Fresh · Seattle ·

Scent diary
Hills covered with tea plantations around a mountain lake in Kerala

Green, black and oolong tea side by side

TL;DR: green, black and oolong tea brewed side by side smell like three different materials. - green: cut grass, a bit of steamed spinach - black: dried fruit, honey, a little smoke - oolong: flowers, almost jasmine The club's tea page, on the molecules tea…

Tea Bergamot Jasmine

kasia.berlin I drink black tea with lemon, like at home in Poland. Now I will smell it before the lemon goes in.

5 comments

dario.bergamotin History, Bottles & Houses · London ·

Discovery
Bell tower of Notre-Dame-du-Puy cathedral in Grasse under a blue sky

Farina, an Italian making cologne in Cologne

My grandfather grew bergamot near Reggio and always said cologne was an Italian idea. I checked: the encyclopedia entry on eau de Cologne says it was created in 1709 in Cologne by an Italian perfumer, Giovanni Maria Farina, as a light citrus scent in diluted…

Bergamot Lemon

frankie.incense That same entry says 'cologne' is now a generic term, most often for men's fragrances in American English, which definately explains every aftershave…

4 comments

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