Makko

Makko is an incense powder made from the bark of Machilus thunbergii, the Japanese bay tree, also called red machilus or tabunoki. The tree is a sturdy evergreen of the laurel family, Lauraceae, usually ten to fifteen metres tall and sometimes twenty, native to Japan, the Korean Peninsula, Taiwan, south-eastern and north-central China and Vietnam. It favours the coast, copes with salty soil, and is grown for timber and planted along streets. Where the line falls between Machilus and the closely related avocado genus, Persea, has been disputed, and the tree is also known by the synonym Persea thunbergii. In incense making, makko is one of the natural plant binders. Wetted, its mucilage holds powdered aromatic materials together; once the incense has dried and is lit, the cellulose in the powder burns to form a stable ember. A water-soluble binder of this kind keeps the dried mixture from crumbling and dilutes it, and binding powders of this sort usually make up about a tenth of the dry weight of finished incense. The bark powder of this tree has also gone into incense made to keep mosquitoes away.