Not many of us use soap anymore, and when we do, we usually buy it at the supermarket. Our ancestors, instead, had to make it themselves. When the recipes weren’t passed down from generation to generation, they could be easily found in most magazines. Here are a few taken from the 1840 edition of The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction:
Soap a la Rose
This is made of the following ingredients: —30 pounds of olive-oil soap; 20 of good tallow-soap. When the mass is sufficiently liquefied, 1 1/2 ounces of finely-ground vermillion are to be introduced, and thoroughly mixed; and when the heat is taken off the pan, the following perfumes are added with due trituration: —3 ounces ofC essence of rose; 1 ditto cloves; I ditto cinnamon; 2 1/2 ditto bergamot; =74.
By judicious admixture of these, a soap is obtained, perfect in every point of view; possessing a delicious fragrance, equally rich and agreeable, a beautiful roseate hue, and the softest detergent qualities, which keeping cannot impair.
Soap au Bouquet
30 pounds of good tallow soap; 4 ounces of essence of bergamot; oil of cloves, sassafras, and thyme, 1 ounce each; neroli, 4 ounce. The colour is given with 7 ounces of brown ochre.
Cinnamon Soap
30 pounds of good tallow-soap; 20 ditto of palm-oil soap. Perfumes: —7 ounces of essence of cinnamon; 1 1/2 ditto sassafras; 1 1/2 ditto bergamot. Colour: —1 pound of yellow ochre.
Orange-flower Soap
30 pounds of good tallow-soap; 20 ditto palm-oil soap. Perfumes: —74 ounces essence of Portugal; 74 ditto amber. Colour: —9 1/2 ounces, consisting of 8 1/4 of a yellow-green pigment, and 1 1/4 of red lead.
Musk Soap
30 pounds of good tallow-soap; 20 ditto of palm-oil soap. Perfumes: —Powder of cloves, of pale roses, gilliflower, each 44 ounces; essence of bergamot, and essence of musk, each 34 ounces. Colour: — 4 ounces of brown ochre, or Spanish brown.
Bitter-almond Soap
Is made by compounding with 5O pounds of the best white soap, 10 ounces of the essence of bitter almonds.
Which of these perfumed soaps would you have made?
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4 comments
I would go for the rose one and musk one 🙂
Anubhuti, rose and musk smell so nice, don’t they?
Probably – back then – the cinnamon one. The smell always brings fresh baked apple pie and fall/winter holidays to mind. But now that I know that those recipes all contained lye, I wouldn’t touch any of them (to my skin). Fun post 😀
Jean, I agree, better not put lye on our skin. But that’s pretty much all they had back then, and it’s nice to see how they created their own soaps at home. I love cinnamon scents, especially at this time of year. It’s quite festive.