Lavender History: Egypt, Rome and What the Evidence Shows

Ask where lavender's story begins and you will hear two answers: it perfumed the tomb of Tutankhamun, and it gave its name to the Roman baths. Both are wonderful stories. A 2025 review of the archaeology and ancient texts found that the first has no source behind it and the second rests on word origins. What is left is quieter, and in some ways more interesting.

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The tomb story has nothing under it

In their review, Civilyte, Karanikola and Kramer trace the popular claim to a single line: "It's said that the Egyptians used lavender in perfumes." The Egyptologist Lise Manniche's account of the tomb mentions a modest bowl of incense, thought to be frankincense, and lavender does not appear. The authors call the claim highly unlikely to be accurate.

A better test comes from Saqqara, where residue analysis of an embalming workshop from the 24th Dynasty found resins, oils, fats and wax, and the authors conclude lavender was not in the embalming recipes. Absence is weak evidence, since flowers decay quickly and rarely survive, but there is one tantalizing find. At Pyrgos Mavroraki in Cyprus, a site destroyed by an earthquake around 1900 to 1850 BCE, specialists interpreted residue in one vessel as lavender. That is an interpretation rather than a firm identification, but it suggests lavender may be older in human hands than the written record shows.

What the Greek and Roman writers did say

The written trail begins modestly. Theophrastus describes a plant he calls iphyon in only two plant lists. Dioscorides writes that stoichas "grows in the islands below Gaul, in front of Massalia," which is where the plant's name is said to come from, and Pliny the Elder mentions lavender in connection with melancholy. These are entries in medical and natural history works, and none of them says the plant was distilled.

There is also a naming puzzle. A 2026 review on culinary lavender describes Lavandula stoechas as a separate lavender, dominated by fenchone and camphor and used in Turkish and Moroccan teas (Uçuk and Spence). So when Dioscorides says stoichas, he may well mean a different species from the one in our angustifolia bottle.

The bath story is a word origin

The Civilyte review derives the English word from the Latin lavare, "to wash," and links it to Roman bathing. That is plausible, but a word that sounds like washing is not documentary proof that anyone scented a bath with lavender. Our reading is that "Roman baths" is a charming folk history we would happily repeat with a raised eyebrow.

The Middle Ages leave physical evidence

Medieval lavender is better documented, partly because some of it is archaeological. The same review reports lavender remains from both Christian and Islamic contexts in Iberia, and macro-remains of lavender in the body cavities of Saint Christina of Spoleto, dated to about 1432 to 1458. Hildegard of Bingen, writing in the 12th century, advises that lavender is not meant to be eaten as food, though its strong scent can help with lice. That is a long way from the modern habit of baking with it, a subject we cover in our post on cooking with lavender.

When lavender became a commodity

The biggest change came more recently. A 2023 review puts world production of true lavender oil at an estimated 300 to 500 tons a year, and notes that true lavender oil sells for roughly three to five times the price of lavandin oil (Crisan et al.). Another review of lavandin, a hybrid of true lavender and spike lavender, reports that France produced 1,439 metric tons of lavandin oil in 2016 against 109 metric tons of true lavender oil (Pokajewicz et al.). That price gap is the reason species labels matter today, and it explains why we sort our four lavender-family oils by species: true lavender, lavandin grosso, spike lavender and a trade-grade 40/42 whose species is not stated. Our guide to true, spike and lavandin and our lavandin comparison pick up that thread.

Why the legends stick

A good story travels farther than a footnote. Egypt and Rome make lavender feel timeless, and a scent that reminds many people of a linen cupboard or a grandparent's garden is easy to attach to something grand. We enjoy the legends too. The honest way to enjoy them is as stories, told with a smile, while keeping the thinner record of what was actually written down and dug up in its own separate pile.

The plant needs no legend

Rub a lavender leaf or flower between your fingers and the smell tells its own story without any help from history. It is green, floral and a little bit herbal, and it is easy to see why people in so many places and centuries wanted to keep it close.

Reading an "ancient times" claim

When a label says lavender has been used since Egyptian or Roman days, ask which source it means. Theophrastus, Dioscorides, Pliny and excavation reports are real; recycled claims usually are not. It also helps to separate three ideas that histories blur: the plant was known, the plant was used for something, and the use worked. History supports the first and sometimes the second, and our research overview looks at the third. If a term is unfamiliar, the glossary helps.

Old use is also not safety data. For skin, the Tisserand Institute gives 0.5% to 1.2% for facial products and 1% to 3% for body oils, with 0.2% to 1% for sensitive skin. Our dilution guidance is 0.5% to 2% in a carrier, and we start at the lower end.

So lavender is old, its early record is thin, and most of the colourful stories arrived later. The checked facts are less romantic, and they make a better guide when you are choosing a bottle.

Lavender Essential Oil bottle

Lavender Essential Oil

Lavender Essential Oil from our own shop, in sizes from 0.5 oz to bulk.

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Sources & Further Reading