An ethically sourced Kinam which makes no compromises in quality.
This Kinam is oil is sourced from Older Vietnamese people who are living at the border of Cambodia and they termed this oud oil as the finest Kinam made from the finest Agarwood chips from the 70s Aquilaria Crassna Pierre ex Lecomte in Vietnam and Cambodia. They sell to make money for their family during natural disasters situation.
This fine oud oil has notes of balanced barnyard, mint, and fruit and floral tones, with slight hints of honey and leather.
PLEASE NOTE:
This Kinam Vintage is from a very old/aged batch kept in a dark and cool place environment.
There was a popular ancient saying: “The nidanas from performing good deeds in three life-spans are rewarded with smelling the fragrance of Kinam in the present life”. Renowned as “the King of Agarwood”, Kinam is the best of all agarwood species and is known by numerous appellations – “Qinan”, “Kynam” and “Kannam”, while the Japanese refer to it as “Kyara”. The ancients used the saying, “Good agarwood is particularly hard to obtain” to describe Kinam owing to the rare probability of its formation, which makes it all the more precious. Until today, a scientific account of the real factors for Kinam formation is not yet available.. However, deducing from ancient Chinese incense literature, it is likely to be related to parasitic and nesting activities of insects and bees, which subject the scented wood to prolonged absorption of honey and milky substances that gradually blend with the resin produced from the tree, resulting in a lengthy process of transformation. In addition, some modern scholars hold the views that it is caused by fungal stimulation that transforms the nature of the scented wood or by genetic changes in the fragrant trees.
Places of Origin of Kinam
Chinese incense literature provides varying interpretations regarding the places of origin of Kinam. Among ancient incense literatures such as Bencao Yanyi (Augmented Materia Medica) from the Song Dynasty, Xin Cha Shen Lan (Description of the Starry Raft) from the Ming Dynasty, and Huan You Biji (Travel Notes of a Bureaucrat) from the Qing Dynasty, some suggest that Kinam originated from Champa (Vietnam), while others suggest that the mountains near East China Sea in Guangdong (Hainan) are its original birthplaces, proving that the origins sources of Kinam were not confined to a single region. Though recorded in ancient times, from the point of view of modern botany, it is a new species of agarwood as discovered by a French botanist in regions around Vietnam and Cambodia, formally named Aquilaria crassna Pierre and listed under the genus Aquilaria of Thymelaeaceae family. Its resin content is rich, with its uncluttered resin glands clearly arrayed on the wood surface. The ancients so described its texture: “It rolls up when skived and it is pliable but tough to chew”, and also: “Its texture is as soft as mud” and “Its texture is as tough as jade”. Hence, the texture of Kinam varies. Another superior characteristic of Kinam lies in its unique and multi-layered fragrance, whose composition is so complex that it cannot be reproduced even using advanced modern technology. Compared to the fragrance of agarwood in general, which is relatively monotonous, stable and differentiated primarily by the degree of intensity, Kinam stands out with its complexity, mutability and unpredictability: it smells fresh and endearing at normal temperature, oozing an intense and mellow aroma when burned.