Macassar oil  From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to:
navigation, search A young man at Herne Bay, Kent, England,
dated 1903-1914 (his hair is plastered down with macassar oil)
Macassar oil is a compounded oil used primarily by men in
Victorian and Edwardian times as a hair conditioner to groom and
style the hair.[1]  Macassar oil is often made with coconut oil
or palm oil or that of Schleichera oleosa,[2] combined with
ylang-ylang oil (obtained by processing the flowers of the
ylang-ylang tree, Cananga odorata) and other fragrant oils.[3]
Macassar oil was so named because it was reputed to have been
manufactured from ingredients purchased in the port of Makassar
in Indonesia.[4] The poet Byron called it "thine incomparable
oil, Macassar" in the first canto of Don Juan, and Lewis Carroll
also mentions "Rowland's Macassar Oil" in the poem "Haddocks'
Eyes" from Through the Looking-Glass.  Due to the tendency for
the oil to transfer from a gentleman's hair to the back of his
chair, the antimacassar was