

50 



Report of Schimmel § Co. April/ October 1917. 



even at 1000 to 1500 okas per donum or 14000 to 21000 kilos per hectare, figures which 

 hardly seem probable. In Brussa, one counts on an average yield, for this species, 

 of 400 okas per donum, equal to about 5600 kilos per hectare. The yield in oil of the 

 "hafis" roses exceeds that of the red Kazanlik roses: for 1 miskal of oil, only 8 okas 

 of "hafis* petals are required in ordinary years 1 ). 



The flowers are used exclusively for making otto of roses and rose water, the 

 manufacture of rose extract (with the aid of light petroleum) being unknown. The 

 farmers do not always distil their own roses, but frequently sell the whole crop to 

 distillers. Distilling is carried on in technically very backward plants, of which there 

 are a fair number. It is said that in the little place of Isparta and its immediate 

 neighbourhood there are 75 distilleries; in Burdur and surroundings, 40 to 50 distilleries 

 are working during the "season" and in the vilayet of Brussa, there are 35 distilling 

 plants and one "factory". 



The distilling apparatus are made in the country itself. Most of them are of a 

 medieval kind, and even the larger works are far from being somewhat up to date. 



All the distilling apparatus are made for 

 wood fires, but only in the vilayet of Brussa 

 the large forests of the Olympus supply plenty 

 of firewood. In the chief rose dictricts of 

 Burdur and* Isparta, however, which are very 

 scantily wooded as it is, the production of 

 rose oil, taking into consideration the well- 

 known indifference of the authorities and the 

 population, means utter deforestation of the 

 district, for during the distilling period con- 

 siderable quantities of firewood are used, the 

 fittest being that of pines, beeches, or willows. 

 Already now there is quite a pronounced fire 

 wood calamity there and the extraordinarily 

 high prices, which, it is true, have certainly 

 been caused in part by speculation, raise the 

 costs of distillation in quite an abnormal way. The Government recommends, and 

 encourages the farmers, to plant the fast growing willows, in order to meet this trouble 

 as soon as possible, but the fuel question will nevertheless continue to be one of the 

 most important for the whole rose industry and we shall have to deal with it specially 

 later on. 



One of the largest factories in Isparta, which I visited, is shown on the photograph 

 (fig. 2). It contains 10 small and 2 larger stills, placed in one row on brick fire-places. 

 All the stills are made of tinned copper. The condensation is as simple as possible: 

 open wooden boxes, arranged for running water, and through which the short, straight 

 tin condensing tube goes. The two large stills, put up only recently, were shown as 

 a modern installation. They are so arranged as to permit of withdrawing the whole 

 distillation residue through the lateral opening on to a sieve, on which the extracted 

 rose petals 'remain, whereas the hot liquid flows into a walled-in pit, from which it 



Fig. 3. 



Glass receiver for the 



rose water 



(as per official "Manual"). 



Fig. 4. 

 Glass receiver to hold 



the concentrated 

 rose water for separa- 

 ting the oil off (as per 

 official "Manual"). 



x ) In Bulgaria, it is said, one reckons as the yield of 1 hectare only 1400 to 2100 kilos of flowers. For 

 the production of 1 miskal of otto of roses, in Kazanlik and Shipka, 17 kilos of white flowers or 12 kilos of red 

 ones were necessary in 1914, which corresponds with the best years; in Brezovo, 10 to 11 kilos were required. 

 The Prince of Sayn Wittgenstein indicates about 15 kilos of rose petals for 1 miskal of oil (comp. Report 

 October 1916, 48). 



