Marseille soap
Encyclopedia
Marseille soap or Savon de Marseille is a traditional soap
Soap
In chemistry, soap is a salt of a fatty acid.IUPAC. "" Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 2nd ed. . Compiled by A. D. McNaught and A. Wilkinson. Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford . XML on-line corrected version: created by M. Nic, J. Jirat, B. Kosata; updates compiled by A. Jenkins. ISBN...

 made from vegetable oils that has been made around Marseille
Marseille
Marseille , known in antiquity as Massalia , is the second largest city in France, after Paris, with a population of 852,395 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Marseille extends beyond the city limits with a population of over 1,420,000 on an area of...

, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, for about 600 years, the first documented soapmaker in the area being recorded in about 1370. By 1688, Louis XIV
Louis XIV of France
Louis XIV , known as Louis the Great or the Sun King , was a Bourbon monarch who ruled as King of France and Navarre. His reign, from 1643 to his death in 1715, began at the age of four and lasted seventy-two years, three months, and eighteen days...

introduced regulations (Edict of Colbert) limiting the use of the name savon de Marseille to soaps made in and around the Marseille area, and only from olive oil
Olive oil
Olive oil is an oil obtained from the olive , a traditional tree crop of the Mediterranean Basin. It is commonly used in cooking, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and soaps and as a fuel for traditional oil lamps...

. Today this law still applies, although the regulations now allow other vegetable oils to be used.

By 1913 production had reached 180,000 ton
Ton
The ton is a unit of measure. It has a long history and has acquired a number of meanings and uses over the years. It is used principally as a unit of weight, and as a unit of volume. It can also be used as a measure of energy, for truck classification, or as a colloquial term.It is derived from...

s and in 1924 there were 132 soapmaking companies in the Marseille
Marseille
Marseille , known in antiquity as Massalia , is the second largest city in France, after Paris, with a population of 852,395 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Marseille extends beyond the city limits with a population of over 1,420,000 on an area of...

 and Salon-de-Provence
Salon-de-Provence
Salon-de-Provence is a commune in the Bouches-du-Rhône department in southern France. It is the location of an important air base.-History:Salon was a Gallo-Roman oppidum well positioned on the salt trade routes between Adriatic, Atlantic and Mediterranean seas, hence its name...

 areas combined, but by 2000 only 5 remained. Only a few soap factories remain in and around Marseille still producing Marseille Soap.

Production

Traditionally, the soap is made by mixing sea water from the Mediterranean Sea
Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean surrounded by the Mediterranean region and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Anatolia and Europe, on the south by North Africa, and on the east by the Levant...

, olive oil, and the alkaline chemicals soda ash (sodium carbonate
Sodium carbonate
Sodium carbonate , Na2CO3 is a sodium salt of carbonic acid. It most commonly occurs as a crystalline heptahydrate, which readily effloresces to form a white powder, the monohydrate. Sodium carbonate is domestically well-known for its everyday use as a water softener. It can be extracted from the...

) and lye
Lye
Lye is a corrosive alkaline substance, commonly sodium hydroxide or historically potassium hydroxide . Previously, lye was among the many different alkalis leached from hardwood ashes...

 (sodium hydroxide) together in a large cauldron (usually making about 8 tons). This mixture is then heated for several days, stirred constantly. The mixture is then allowed to sit and, once ready, it is poured into the mold, and allowed to set slightly. Whilst still soft, it is cut into bars and stamped, and left to completely harden. The whole process can take up to a month from the start before the soap is ready to use.

Contemporary varieties

Today, there are two main varieties of this soap. The first is made with olive oil
Olive oil
Olive oil is an oil obtained from the olive , a traditional tree crop of the Mediterranean Basin. It is commonly used in cooking, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and soaps and as a fuel for traditional oil lamps...

; the second with palm oil
Palm oil
Palm oil, coconut oil and palm kernel oil are edible plant oils derived from the fruits of palm trees. Palm oil is extracted from the pulp of the fruit of the oil palm Elaeis guineensis; palm kernel oil is derived from the kernel of the oil palm and coconut oil is derived from the kernel of the...

 or a palm and copra oil
Copra
Copra is the dried meat, or kernel, of the coconut. Coconut oil extracted from it has made copra an important agricultural commodity for many coconut-producing countries. It also yields coconut cake which is mainly used as feed for livestock.-Production:...

 mixture, but by the same process. The olive oil variety is green and the palm oil variety is white in colour. The bars usually come in sizes between 300 g and 1 kg; however, larger sizes are often available, some up to 40 kg (originally, they only came in 5 kg and 20 kg blocks).

See also

  • Aleppo soap
    Aleppo soap
    Aleppo soap is a handmade, hard bar soap. Aleppo soap is also known as savon d'Alep, laurel soap, or ghar soap . It derives its English and French names from the city of Aleppo, Syria, where it is reputed to have been made for thousands of years...

  • Castile soap
    Castile soap
    Castile soap is a name used in English-speaking countries for olive oil based soap made in a style similar to that originating in the Castile region of Spain.-History:...

  • Hot process
  • Nabulsi soap
    Nabulsi soap
    Nabulsi soap is a type of castile soap produced only in Nablus in the West Bank, Palestine. An olive oil-based soap, it is made up of three primary ingredients: virgin olive oil, water, and a sodium compound...

  • Vegetarian soap
    Vegetarian soap
    -Olive oil soaps:*Aleppo soap, a Syrian style of soap noted for the inclusion of Laurel oil in its formulation*Castile soap, a wide ranging style of soap in English speaking countries, as originally made in the Castile region of Spain...

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