History of soap
It is known that the fleet of the commander of a ship is called a captain. The captain is also an officer's rank in the army. But what does "captains of indoor dogs" mean? Insulting nickname? No, an honorary post, which in France at the time of Louis XIV could only be occupied by the highest aristocrats. There were other honorary "posts" at the court, for example: "an ordinary keeper of king's ties".It was necessary to do something to occupy 4 thousand people who served the monarch. There was a special cult of the king: his morning ascent, dressing, combing, breakfast, lunch, supper, etc., were performed in front of the entire court suite. To be present at these actions, and even more so to serve - to serve a shirt or to carry a candle before the king, seeing off in the evening in the bedchamber, was considered a special honor, which was given only to the chosen ones.
The king's morning, of course, began with dressing and toilet. The dressing lasted a very long time, but washing. .. The King was brought a large gorgeous bowl, at the bottom of which splashed water. The king moistened the tips of his fingers, touched them lightly to the eyelids, and this ended the procedure. To wash entirely in those days was not accepted. In order to drown out the unpleasant smell of a dirty body, people, even the richest, used different perfumes. Soap "king-sun", as he flatteringly called courtiers, enjoyed very reluctantly, however, like everyone else. Only at the end of the XVIII century, that is, in 50-60 years, soap came into use. The "age of hygiene" has come. However, soap existed long before this. ..
The need to maintain the purity of the body arose from a person, probably, when he realized himself as a person. This is very accurately noted in one modern poem called "First soap":
Perhaps the detergent properties of ordinary ash were discovered by primitive people. In any case, archaeologists have established that already 6 thousand years ago there was a fairly well-established production of soap. And in different parts of the world the raw materials were different: natural alkaline salts, plants, ashes, animal fats.
In the ancient world, soap was made from goat, mutton and bovine fat with an admixture of beech ash. There were three varieties: solid, soft and liquid. And soap was used not only for washing, but also for coloring the hair in yellow, pink or red. The Romans learned this from the Gauls - the people who inhabited the territory of modern France, Northern Italy, Belgium, Luxembourg, part of the Netherlands and Switzerland. The Gauls wore long hair, and to lie well they were greased with vegetable oil, to which red earth paint was added. It was worth it to get to the water, how thick foam formed, thanks to which the hair became clean and fluffy. Perhaps, the ancient mods improved the recipe by adding ash to sea plants or charcoal to the mixture. So one of the ways of producing soap was discovered.
Greek baths. Painting.
However, many tribes and peoples in those days, according to the ancient Greek historian Herodotus, did not know the soap. Scythian women, for example, made a powder from the wood of cypress and cedar and mixed it with water and incense. Received ointment, which issued a delicate, pleasant aroma, they rubbed the entire body. Then the ointment was removed with scrapers, and the skin became clean and smooth. And although the soap, we will remind, had already been invented, many people up to the Middle Ages continued to use liquor, bean flour, glue, pumice, barley leaven, clay. Even the famous Arab physician Ibn Sina, who lived in the XI century, recommended using soap only for the removal of dandruff, with skin diseases and for washing leprosy. Healthy people, in his opinion, should use clay, which perfectly cleanses the body. By the way, people use modern tools instead of soap in our days. The land of one of the islands in the Aegean Sea contains a substance that, from time immemorial, has helped people to fight mud. With the help of this land, they wash and wash clothes. It is said that when it rains, the island is literally covered with soap foam.
But back to history of soap .In the Middle Ages, its main suppliers in Europe were the cities of Naples and Marseilles. Gradually the craft of soap cooking has been learned in other places. Attitude to this product, as well as to the profession of soap, was the most serious. In 1399 in England, King Henry IV founded the Order, whose special privilege of members was. .. washing in a bath with soap. In this country, for a long time under the fear of death, a member of the soap guild guild was forbidden to spend the night under the same roof with representatives of other crafts( feared that he could give out his professional secrets).In Germany, the Emperor Charlemagne himself became the patron of the soaps, and in France in the second half of the 17th century a royal decree was issued, according to which soap was allowed only in the summer, and it should be prepared only from ashes, potash and olive oil and "take nothing else".
In Russia, soap began to make during the time of Peter I, but until the middle of the last century it used to mostly know. Peasants washed and washed with lye - wood ash poured with boiling water and steamed in the stove. The main center of soap making was the city of Shuya, its coat of arms even depicts a piece of soap. The high-quality toilet soap was also famous for the Moscow factory Ladygin. The advertisement said: "Our soap is strong. .. the core for washing and washing is recognized as the second under Italian and Ishpan."Toilet, "soap" soap cooked in a factory of cow's butter and fat poods, pounds in bars, seals and balls. The buyer was offered a choice of white and colored soaps, prepared on almond, poppy and other oils, on cow oil with perfume and without perfume, essence soap and tar soap from "brutish twigs". ..
In 1843 the Frenchman Alphonse Ralle founded in Moscowfactory "Ralle and Co.", which began to produce soap, lipstick and powder. This factory is the "great-grandmother" of the present perfume factory "Freedom".
Soap of another and very famous perfume factory, more precisely, even a company owned by Henry Afanasievich Brokar, was very popular. This "uncrowned king" of perfume has been very successful in Russia. Initially, all the equipment of the factory consisted of three boilers, a wood-burning stove and a stone mortar, and the staff of the staff was from Brokar himself, the soap-maker Alexey and the worker Gerasim. The undoubted merit of Brokar and the key to his success was that he was the first perfumer to make a cheap, cheap soap. High demand ensured and high incomes, thanks to which Brokar then began to produce expensive perfumes, colognes, expensive soap. He equipped the production with steam engines, iron boilers, tried to make the cheapest goods seemingly attractive. For example, his soap "cucumber" was like a real vegetable that was bought from one curiosity.
In pre-revolutionary Russia, soap, called "my grandmother's bouquet", was very popular. So strange for the cleansing piece of the name came from the name of the French comedy, popular at the beginning of the century. The name of the creator of this wonderful soap is also known - Augustus Michel.
Nowadays soap is necessary for washing, and for small washes. It has a huge advantage over synthetic detergent powders - it dissolves in water, is easily digested and processed by microorganisms. It is easy to precipitate it from sewage. And silk and wool soap erases better than any synthetic agent. True, it "is afraid" of hard water. But now additives are developed that form soluble compounds with salts that impart rigidity to water.
In the first half of this century there was a soap that was kept on the water thanks to the air cavity inside the piece. But it had a flaw - as soon as it wiped to the cavity - it became the most common.
Do you know? How to make a floating soap?
It's best to make such soap out of foamed mass. It does not fade to a thin plate. In addition, the area of its surface is larger than a piece of ordinary soap of the same size. Hence, the time required for soaping is reduced.