Soap, or 'sapo' in Latin, is an age-old cleansing agent that dates as far back as ancient Babylon. Throughout time, soap has been a core element of laundry, household, and personal cleansing routines for many civilizations and although soap-making methods have evolved over time, it is still essentially a mixture of fats and oils that have been combined with an alkali.
Origins
Historians aren't in complete agreement about exactly when soap was discovered, yet there is evidence that the Sumerians - an ancient civilization that resided in Southern Mesopotamia, now known as south Iraq - used a soap-like substance to strip grease from cloth and wool before dying them. The substance, which archaeologists discovered in inscribed clay vessels, was slippery and the inscriptions on the vessels described how the Sumerians boiled ashes and fats to form it. Excavated tablets also describe this early method of creating different types of soap-like substances, although their exact usage is
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A historical medical document called the Ebers Papyrus; details how ancient Egyptians combined oils with alkaline salts to create a soap-like substance they used not only for cleansing purposes, but to also treat skin diseases. Throughout the ages civilizations combined fats with alkali as a soap-making method, and soap manufacturing processes still do the very same thing today.
Soap Refinement
In the middle Ages, soap-making became an art that attracted a lot of interest. Craftsmen used trial and error to refine their recipes as they experimented with ashes from plants, animal and vegetable oils, and fragrances. Dedicated guilds were established to safeguard recipe secrets which were passed down amongst generations. With the advent of laundry, shampooing, and shaving soaps, soap became more than an agent for personal cleaning routines.
Product of
Imagine a world without the wheel. Picture a world without math. Now, without knowing time. Well, these are some of the many contributions that the Mesopotamians made to society.
Based on our observations during the separation techniques and some speculation, we were able to identify eight components of our mixture: graphite from the filtration residue, Epsom salt from crystallization, water and acetic acid through distillation, red and orange dye, iron metal, marble chips, and sand.
One tablet (ibuprofen) was crushed using mortar and pestle. It is then put into the flask. The content was stirred using a glass stirring rod.
Alchin, Linda. "Middle Ages Hygiene." Middle Ages Hygiene. 16 July 2012. Web. 09 Dec. 2013.
While researching Sumerian culture I learned many interesting things that I was not aware of before. Many little known facts about Sumer will change the way that people feel about other ancient societies. Many advances that are not attributed to Sumeria, often were pioneered by this advanced culture long before others. Most people don't even know much about the origan of the Sumerian culture.
The evolution of cosmetology can be easily traced back to early as civilization times. Back in 10,000 BCE, both men and women in Egypt used oils quite often to hide the bad smells from their body. In addition, ...
Sanitary conditions in the West were practically non-existent. In the cities, horse manure covered the streets. Housewives emptied garbage, dishwater, and chamber pots into the middle of the city streets where free-roaming pigs devoured the waste. The pigs left their urine and feces on the streets. It was not easy to wash clothes. Many people had clothes splattered with manure, mud, sweat, and tobacco juice. Privies, or necessary houses were often to close to the homes with a very noticeable odor on hot and/or windy days. If a family had a kitchen, all the members washed at the sink each day, without soap, rubbing the dirt off with a coarse towel. Eventually, many cold bedrooms had a basin, ewer (pitcher), cup, and cupboard chamber pot. Bed bugs and fleas covered many of the travelers’ beds. “Isaac Weld saw filthy beds swarming with bugs.” These insects followed the travelers, crawling on their clothes and skin.
The ancient Egyptians used a number of techniques to improve the look of their pottery. Decorations were incised, painted or stuck on and black coloring was the result of exposing the vessels to smoke. Slip, an often pigmented mixture of water and clay of the consistency of cream, was applied to smooth the surface and color the earthenware. Wash, a mixture of pigment, such as red ochre, and water changed or intensified the color of the pottery. Glazing began during the 4th millennium BCE, mostly blue mezzomaiolica, lead based glazing, until Roman times, when true tin-based faience began to appear. An example of the blue glaze is on the statue of a monkey to the right.
The exact results were; Type of water Soap solution required 1st attempt 2nd attempt Average Distilled 0.5 0.5 0.5 Tap 4.5 5.0 4.75 Tap with 1g. Na2CO3 3.5 3.0 3.25 This tells us that Na2CO3 softens hard water. However 1g Na2CO3 did not render it as soft as distilled water. Now our aim is to determine whether increasing the quantity of Na2CO3 added to the hard water softens it more effectively. We are measuring the hardness of the water by the volume of soap solution required to produce a lather.
Detergent comes from the Latin word detergere meaning to clean, it is defined as a cleansing agent. Therefore, water itself is a detergent. This essay looks at soap and soapless (or synthetic) detergents. Both substances we use everyday and have a big market commercially, they effect everyone. Soaps are made from natural products and soapless detergents are produced chemically, each having advantages and disadvantages.
Water alone can’t remove dirt. Soap allows oil and to mix so the dirt can be effectively removed. Surfactants lower the tension in water and help break down the oil and grease. Detergents have hydrophobic chemical chains which are repelled by water, whereas hydrophilic chains are attracted to water. In general, hydrophobic and hydrophilic chains work together to attack oil and water and break them down faster and easier.
These were all naturally occurring substances. No refinement had occurred, and isolation of specific compounds (drugs) had not taken place.
Rinse off the soap using clean water. In the event that you are not using running water from the tap, fetch another bucket/bowl of clean water to wash your hands with.
Make was around starting in the year 10,000 BC. Men and woman both used scented oils and ointments to clean, and get their skin softer. With the oils they would make they would make a type of mask to stop the bad body odors. In 10,000 BC they also used dyes and different type of paints to add color to their body, skin and hair. They would also rouge their lips and cheeks to make them look with more color. People use henna to paint their nail. They would also use a type sustains called kohl to cover/color/darken the eyes and eyebrows. Kohl was made up of crushed antimony, burnt almonds, lead, oxidized copper, ochre, ash, malachite, chrysocolla (a blue-green copper ore) or any combination thereof. The Kohl was applied with a stick and was put on to make almond effect to the eye. This also help to get to less glare from the sun. The most popular colors that the Egyptian used were green and black...
Long ago, washing clothes was done through the process of rubbing sand on clothes, or by smashing the article of clothing with hard rocks. Also, by dipping clothing in water which removed excess dirt. Another way to get clothes clean long ago was, boats used to carry clothes in bags and dragged the bags in the water to clean the clothes or whatever else was in the bag. Many tried to think of simpler ways to wash clothes, but there was no troubled principle to get clothes clean. For using water to remove dirt was the base principle. Some of the first washing machines were hand operated and were wash boards. Then, in 1858 was when mechanical washing machines became introduced. This was a big step, for soon people around the world would try to keep improving this marvelous invention. Shortly after, Alva Fisher was said to have made the worlds first electric washing machine around 1907. “It was not until the modern washing machine was invented that women were freed from this hard work” ( Field Enterprises Educational Corporation 45 ). However, many ...