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On the Plane of Self Consciousness- V

Another recently acquired faculty is the sense of fragrance .It is not mentioned in the Vedic hymns and only once in the Zend Avesta. Geiger [91. 58] tells us that the custom of offering incense with the sacrifice is not yet met with in the Rig Veda, though it is found in the more recent Yadshurveda.

Among the Biblical books the sense of fragrance of flowers first makes its appearance in the "Song of Songs."
According to the description in Genesis there were in Paradise all kinds of trees "that were pleasant to the sight and good for food," no mention being made of pleasant odors.

The Apochrypha book of Henoch ( of the first century B. C., or even later), extant in Ethiopian, likewise describes Paradise, but does not omit to extol the delightful fragrance of the Tree of Knowledge, as well as other trees, in the Garden of Eden.

Besides this evidence it is said to be capable of proof from language that n such sense as that of fragrance existed in the early times of the Indo-Europeans. And it is also worth mentioning in this connection that no animal (although many of these so greatly surpass us in recognition by scent) possesses, so far as we know or can discover, any sense of fragrance, and that children do not acquire it until they are several years old-not, indeed, for several years after they have acquired, more or less perfectly, the sense of color; thus corresponding in their mental development (as pointed out above) with the evolution of the general human mind, for the color sense probably came into existence in the race many thousand years before the sense of fragrance.

Reference: Cosmic Consciousness: A Study in the Evolution of the Human Mind: Richard Maurice Bucke