About soap

History of soap making

The first detergent was simple water. Although in streamless areas people used sand to wash away spots. The earliest soaps being mixes of oils with fire ash, clay or sand. Soap making was based around the same process: boiling oils and fats with an alkali to produce soap and glycerine. The earliest recorded evidence of the production of soap-like materials dates back to around 2800 BC in ancient Babylon. A formula for soap consisting of water, alkali, and cassia oil was written on a Babylonian clay tablet around 2200 BC.A popular belief says that soap takes its name from a supposed Mount Sapo, where animal sacrifices were supposed to have taken place; tallow from these sacrifices would then have mixed with ashes from fires associated with these sacrifices and with water to produce soap, Roman animal sacrifices usually burned only the bones and inedible entrails of the sacrificed animals; edible meat and fat from the sacrifices were taken by the humans rather than the gods.The word sapo appears in Pliny the Elder's Historia Naturalis, which discusses the manufacture of soap from tallow and ashes, he also mentions use for it is as a pomade for hair. The remains of what might have been a soap factory were discovered in Pompeii, which was overwhelmed by an eruption of Vesuvius in 79AD. From the 17th century soaps established in Europe. Significant role in the development of soap making has played a geographical factor. Ingredients for soap preparation was varied depending on the region. In the north was used animal fat, and in the south – olive oil, thanks to which the soap turned out excellent quality.Since IX century, a major supplier of soap in Europe became Marseille, thanks to the presence in the surrounding area of primary sources, olive oil and soda. The oil extracted after the first two pressings was used for food, and after the third was used for soap making.Only since the end of the XIV century Marseilles soap ceded its place in the international trade of the Venetian. As well soap-making actively developed in Italy, Greece and Spain.In the XV century, in Italy, in Sevan, for the first time started to produce a solid soap industrially. In this case fat is not connected with the ash and the natural soda. This significantly reduces the cost of soap, and therefore transferred from the category of soap-making craftsmanship in the manufacturing.From the XIV century, soap factories began to appear in Germany. For a soap boiling process were used fats of beef, lamb, pork, horse, bones, whale fish, and the waste fats of different industries.In Russia soap-making started at the times of Peter I, but up to the middle of XIX it was used by nobles only. Peasants used soap lye to wash and bath. Shuya was a major supplier of soap in Russia. Moscow manufacturers such as Ladygyn’s factory, factory of Alfons Rale and Brocar’s perfume factory were widely known. Brocar’s factory produced cheap soap for all social groups. Due to special economic circumstances, first soap manufacturers appeared in Russia in XVIII. Although there was a developed soap production chemical aspect weren’t clear. The science of modern soapmaking was born some in 1811 with the discovery by Michel Eugene Chevreul, French chemist, of the chemical nature and relationship of fats, glycerine and fatty acids. His studies established the basis for both fat and soap chemistry.