Deadnettle

Note Profile

Botanical

About

Deadnettle is the whole-herb oil of Lamium, a mint-family plant that is not a nettle. It smells woody and piney rather than floral, with hay, damp earth and a green husk edge. Which species the perfume term means is not recorded, and the two candidates smell different.

Scent Profile

Green leads and dry_woody follows. Both come from the same measurement: beta-pinene is the largest headspace component at 47.7 percent and is described as "dry woody resinous pine hay green". Amber_resinous is the resinous half of that pinene. Earthy is germacrene D, described as "woody earthy spicy", supported by 1-octen-3-ol at 3.5-8.0 percent, which is the mushroom alcohol. Tobacco_hay is named twice, once in the pinene descriptor and once in the term's own recorded profile. Aromatic_herbal is the Lamiaceae background. Fruity is (E)-3-hexenyl acetate at 7.9 percent, "sharp fruity green banana pear", and it is also the best fit for the reported "freshly husked corn" impression. Sour and sulphurous are the White Deadnettle evidence, held small and given the widest spreads in the vector: Herbal Reality calls the fresh plant "strong, pungent, foetid" and the dried material "sour, sharp, rich, savoury, salty and reminiscent of cooked spinach". That is a real published observation about a real deadnettle, so it is not zeroed, but it is a different species from the one whose chemistry matches the term's recorded vocabulary.

ScentWheel

Breadthbroad

EnvelopeHeart · ~5h lasting

Family Green & Aromatic, Woody & Earthy

Read off the wheel, not a label applied to the note.

Origin

Lamium, family Lamiaceae. Despite the name it is unrelated to stinging nettle (Urtica, family Urticaceae) and does not sting. A chemical-ecology paper reports the oil is dominated by sesquiterpene hydrocarbons, chiefly germacrene D at 18.5-46.3 percent, with (E)-caryophyllene, alpha- and beta-pinene, and 1-octen-3-ol at 3.5-8.0 percent. A headspace table posted to Basenotes for L. purpureum puts beta-pinene at 47.7 percent.

Usage in Perfumery

Attested in one perfume brand's note list. No essential-oil supplier or aroma house was found selling a commercial deadnettle material, so this is a named botanical rather than a traded ingredient.