# Proto-Germanic *saipo "soap" and Akkadian sapu "to bathe"



## CyrusSH

Latin _sapo_ "soap" relates to the proto-Germanic word or Akkadian one?


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## berndf

Because of time and contex of the first occurrences in Latin (mid 1st century AD in connection with cultic substances used by Germans or Celts), it is common wisdom that Latin _sapo, saponis_ is a Germanic loan. At least I didn't find any source that contradicts this assumption.


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## fdb

Beekes writes:

"The word σαπων is usually seen as a borrowing from Lat. sapo 'id.' (since Plin.), ultimately from Gm. (OHG seifa, OE sape, etc.; see WH s.v.). Also worth considering is the alternative proposal by André, Ét. celt. 7 (1955-1956): 348ff., who argues that it was borrowed from Asia Minor Celtic instead."

Akkadian sâbu means “to draw water”, not “to bathe”.


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## CyrusSH

berndf said:


> Because of time and contex of the first occurrences in Latin (mid 1st century AD in connection with cultic substances used by Germans or Celts), it is common wisdom that Latin _sapo, saponis_ is a Germanic loan. At least I didn't find any source that contradicts this assumption.



It is believed that soap was invented in 2800 BC by Akkadian-speaking people, so it can't be related to the Germanic people, unless you believe this word reached Rome through Germanic.


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## berndf

CyrusSH said:


> It is believed that soap was invented in 2800 BC by Akkadian-speaking people, so it can't be related to the Germanic people, unless you believe this word reached Rome through Germanic.


It did not have the same meaning it has today in the 1st century AD. Soap was not known to the Romans, nor to the Germans for that matter.


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## CyrusSH

berndf said:


> It did not have the same meaning it has today in the 1st century AD. Soap was not known to the Romans, nor to the Germans for that matter.



What did it mean in the 1st century AD?


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## berndf

CyrusSH said:


> What did it mean in the 1st century AD?


In Germanic it meant resin or something of similar consistent and maybe also amber.

In Latin, Pliny the Elder used the word in the description of a paste Gaulish warriors used to colour their faces before battle.


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## sotos

Somewhere I red the unsourced claim that name Sapfo (Σαπφώ) is related to sapon (σάπων). If this is true, then the origin must be closer to Asia Minor than Europe.


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## CyrusSH

berndf said:


> In Germanic it meant resin or something of similar consistent and maybe also amber.



And fdb said Akkadian sâbu means “to draw water”, I see a relation.



berndf said:


> In Latin, Pliny the Elder used the word in the description of a paste Gaulish warriors used to colour their faces before battle.



And fdb can confirm that Akkadian _sapu_ also means "dyed": Search Entry


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## Parmenid

CyrusSH said:


> What did it mean in the 1st century AD?


This is the passage in Pliny


Spoiler: Pliny



Soap is also good, an invention of the Gallic provinces for making the hair red. It is made from suet and ash, the best from beech ash and goat suet, in two kinds, thick and liquid, both being used among the Germans, more by men than by women.





CyrusSH said:


> And fdb said Akkadian sâbu means “to draw water”, I see a relation.
> 
> 
> 
> And fdb can confirm that Akkadian _sapu_ also means "dyed": Search Entry



The word is attested in Theocritus (2 BC) under the form of "saponion",the greeks had colonies in southern France,but also in Italy and Spain.


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## fdb

CyrusSH said:


> Akkadian _sapu_



ṣabû (with ṣ) means “to soak, to irrigate a field”, and cannot be connected with sâbu “to draw water”. It is cognate with Arabic ṣabaγa “to dye”.


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## fdb

Parmenid said:


> The word is attested in Theocritus (2 BC) under the form of "saponion"


 
No. σαπώνιον is attested in a Byzantine scholion to Theocritus.


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## CyrusSH

fdb said:


> ṣabû (with ṣ) means “to soak, to irrigate a field”, and cannot be connected with sâbu “to draw water”. It is cognate with Arabic ṣabaγa “to dye”.



And the Arabic word for soap is ṣabun (with ṣ), does it mean it can't be related to Latin _sapo_?


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## fdb

Borrowed, not cognate.


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## Parmenid

fdb said:


> Beekes writes:
> 
> Also worth considering is the alternative proposal by André, Ét. celt. 7 (1955-1956): 348ff., who argues that it was borrowed from Asia Minor Celtic instead.


On what is based this alternative proposal?


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## CyrusSH

etymonline says soap was originally a reddish hair dye used by Germanic warriors to give a frightening appearance, and we see Akkadian _ṣabû_/_ṣapû_ means "dyer": Search Entry and Arabic _ṣabun_ means "soap". It is difficult to deny there are relations between these words.


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## Parmenid

CyrusSH said:


> etymonline says soap was originally a reddish hair dye used by Germanic warriors to give a frightening appearance



Pliny the Elder ,Naturalis Historia,Book 28, Chapter 47.
Maybe these other links could stimulate a refexion.
Galatians (people) - Wikipedia
Celtic settlement of Eastern Europe - Wikipedia
Galatia - Wikipedia


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## berndf

CyrusSH said:


> It is difficult to deny there are relations between these words.


Relationship and semantic overlap are different things.

If the Latin word should be ultimately from Akkadian than it would be unrelated to the Germanic word.


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## CyrusSH

berndf said:


> Relationship and semantic overlap are different things.
> 
> If the Latin word should be ultimately from Akkadian than it would be unrelated to the Germanic word.



As Parmenid also mentioned, ancient Roman historians say that _sapo_ was used by the Germanic people, the Latin word seems to be clearly a loanword from Germanic but it seems Germanic people themselves got this word from Akkadian.


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## berndf

CyrusSH said:


> As Parmenid also mentioned, ancient Roman historians say that _sapo_ was used by the Germanic people, the Latin word seems to be clearly a loanword from Germanic but it seems Germanic people themselves got this word from Akkadian.


No, you have to decide. An Akkadian loan into Latin might have some plausibility. But the Germanic word has no plausible relation with the Akkadian word, neither formally nor semantically nor is there a plausible explanation how this loan should have arrived in Germanic.


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## Treaty

CyrusSH said:


> etymonline says soap was originally a reddish hair dye used by Germanic warriors to give a frightening appearance


No. The time difference between Pliny the Elder and the rest (Aretaeus, Galen, etc.) is not that much to consider his account as defining the original. Neither his expertise is authoritative. Others, the earliest being Aretaeus (roughly contemporary to Pliny), considered soap for sanitary use:


> ... of the Celts, which are men called Gauls, those alkaline substances made into balls, with which they cleanse their clothes, called soap (σάπων) ...


Or Galen, possibly citing Asclepiades Jr.:


> Soap (_sapo_) is made from ox, goat or sheep’s tallow, and lye with lime; the best we think is the German [soap]; for it is the purest and almost the fattest, then the Gallic [soap]. Indeed soap can quickly loosen everything, and wipe away all muck from the body, or from clothes


Even considering Pliny's own account:


> It is made from suet and ash, the best from beech ash and goat suet


There is not much here to suggest redness, but it is the common recipe for making the washing soap (i.e. fat + alkaline lye).

Probably, the scope of the word's application in Germanic was broader. Considering that the Germanic descendants of *_saip(j)ō_ share the idea of dripping viscous material (resin, amber, soap made of grease), it is possible that it was not a term exclusive to "soap" but any material with or made with such quality. The Greeks and Romans apparently ended up only borrowing the "soap" sense of the word because only this sense was new or interesting for them (considering the materials, not the soap itself). It is common that borrowing languages only use a limited sense of the original word.


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## Parmenid

CyrusSH said:


> it seems Germanic people themselves got this word from Akkadian.


This,appears to me,  hard to demonstrate,but there is a Cognate - Wikipedia (read) cognate word ,*sebum*, which seems to be strongly linked with the German .Also here there is a piece of the literature who thinks the derivation is from  the Greek compare with the Sanskrit stiya,the linking Greek word should be *στεαρ* (it sounds weak).

The sources for Sebum ,i found, are:Caesar,Pliny (?),Columella,Plautus (this is the oldest).
The sources for *στεαρ*,i found, are:Odyssey 21,178;Anabasis (Xenophon)4,5,28;Septuagint Leviticus 9,20;Hippocrates 570,610;Aristotle Problemata 4,21;Theophrastus Historia Plantarum 2,9,20;


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## Perseas

fdb said:


> Also worth considering is the alternative proposal by André, Ét. celt. 7 (1955-1956): 348ff., who argues that it was borrowed from Asia Minor Celtic instead."


Babiniotis agrees with this statement. He argues that from the Celtic (Asia Minor) *sapo came the Greek σάπων and the Latin sapo, onis. Αlso the anc. German _seifa_ and *saipôn.
Liddell-Scott says the etymology is either Celtic or German.


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## CyrusSH

Parmenid said:


> This,appears to me,  hard to demonstrate,but there is a Cognate - Wikipedia (read) cognate word ,*sebum*, which seems to be strongly linked with the German .Also here there is a piece of the literature who thinks the derivation is from  the Greek compare with the Sanskrit stiya,the linking Greek word should be *στεαρ* (it sounds weak).
> 
> The sources for Sebum ,i found, are:Caesar,Pliny (?),Columella,Plautus (this is the oldest).
> The sources for *στεαρ*,i found, are:Odyssey 21,178;Anabasis (Xenophon)4,5,28;Septuagint Leviticus 9,20;Hippocrates 570,610;Aristotle Problemata 4,21;Theophrastus Historia Plantarum 2,9,20;



As berndf said in the post #7, the Germanic word means "resin, amber", I can't understand how it can be related to Latin _sebum_ "tallow", the Latin word seems to be from proto-IE *_selb-_/*_selp-_, cognate with Persian _čarb_ "fatty" and English _salve_.


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## Parmenid

CyrusSH said:


> I can't understand how it can be related to Latin _sebum_ "tallow"


Neither i,but my etymological dictionary says they are cognate.


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## berndf

Parmenid said:


> The word is attested in Theocritus (2 BC) under the form of "saponion"





fdb said:


> No. σαπώνιον is attested in a Byzantine scholion to Theocritus.


I think he is referring to this passage in Idyll 15, where Praxione says:
_Πώς νοιώθει, αλήθεια το μικρό! — Καλός είν' ο παπάκης.
Εκείνος ο κρεμανταλάς (ας λέμε πάντα εκείνος)
πήγε να πάρη κάποτε *σαπούνι και φκυασίδι*,
κ' ενώ ξεκίνησε γι' αυτά, μου γύρισε μ' αλάτι._​
It must refer to some kind of make-up and/or hair powder.


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## Perseas

berndf said:


> I think he is referring to this passage in Idyll 15, where Praxione says:
> _Πώς νοιώθει, αλήθεια το μικρό! — Καλός είν' ο παπάκης.
> Εκείνος ο κρεμανταλάς (ας λέμε πάντα εκείνος)
> πήγε να πάρη κάποτε *σαπούνι και φκυασίδι*,
> κ' ενώ ξεκίνησε γι' αυτά, μου γύρισε μ' αλάτι._​
> It must refer to some kind of make-up and/or hair powder.


This is the rendering in Modern Greek. The original text is:

αἰσθάνεται τὸ βρέφος, ναὶ τὰν πότνιαν. ―καλὸς ἀπφῦς.
ἀπφῦς μὰν τῆνός γα πρόαν—λέγομες δὲ πρόαν θην
βάντα *νίτρον καὶ φῦκος *ἀπὸ σκανᾶς ἀγοράσδειν—
ἦνθε φέρων ἅλας ἄμμιν, ἀνὴρ τρισκαιδεκάπαχυς.
ΘΕΟΚΡΙΤΟΣ: Εἰδύλλια


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## berndf

Perseas said:


> This is the rendering in Modern Greek.


That must explain it. Thank you.


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## Parmenid

CyrusSH said:


> As berndf said in the post #7, the Germanic word means "resin, amber", I can't understand how it can be related to Latin _sebum_ "tallow", the Latin word seems to be from proto-IE *_selb-_/*_selp-_, cognate with Persian _čarb_ "fatty" and English _salve_.


It can mean also also Juice ,Berndf could confirm this.Pliny says that the soap was under liquid and thick form.This Sebum/Tallow it was heated and then used in a liquid form to perfume.I cant answer completly,wait for other answers.


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## fdb

CyrusSH said:


> As berndf said in the post #7, the Germanic word means "resin, amber", I can't understand how it can be related to Latin _sebum_ "tallow", the Latin word seems to be from proto-IE *_selb-_/*_selp-_,



What happened to the *l?



CyrusSH said:


> cognate with Persian _čarb_ "fatty" and English _salve_.



IE *s cannot result in Iranian _č._


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## Parmenid

Although not linked to the etymology, the Germanic area of the Rhine seems to have specialized in the production of soaps (it could be an indication...). There were products like Spumae Batavae (Holland), Pilae Mattiacae (balls soap from Wiesbaden).
ACCONCIATURE ROMANE |  romanoimpero.com
In this others pages you can see how a Sebum look like  and some of the usages 
CURE DI BELLEZZA |  romanoimpero.com
I PROFUMI DEI ROMANI |  romanoimpero.com


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## CyrusSH

fdb said:


> What happened to the *l?



The _l_ sound has been probably lost in Latin.



> IE *s cannot result in Iranian _č._



According to Wiktionary, it is of native Iranian origin, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *_selp-_. I don't know, it may be wrong.


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## CyrusSH

fdb said:


> Beekes writes:
> 
> "The word σαπων is usually seen as a borrowing from Lat. sapo 'id.' (since Plin.), ultimately from Gm.



Why proto-Germanic _ai_ was changed to _a_ in Latin?


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## berndf

Depends on the the dialect it is taken from if it is a Germanic loan.


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## CyrusSH

berndf said:


> Depends on the the dialect it is taken from if it is a Germanic loan.



Were there different Germanic dialects in the 1st century AD?


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## Treaty

It is not clear from what language (Celtic or Germanic) Latin borrowed it. But anyway, there were East, North and West Germanic dialects by then, with the last one possibly (being) divided into Istvaeonic, Ingvaeonic and Irminonic dialects. There might have been extinct Germanic dialects.


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## CyrusSH

But in the thread about Latin words in proto-Germanic, berndf said: Germanic remained a connected dialect continuum until at least the 1st century AD through which new words could freely travel.


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## Treaty

CyrusSH said:


> But in the thread about Latin words in proto-Germanic, berndf said: Germanic remained a connected *dialect continuum* until at least the 1st century AD through which new words could freely travel.


The definition of dialect continuum:
_A dialect continuum or dialect chain is a spread of language varieties spoken across some geographical area such that neighbouring varieties differ only slightly, but *the differences accumulate* over distance so that widely separated varieties are *not mutually intelligible.*_​


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## CyrusSH

We have two similar threads:

Proto-Germanic *saipo "soap" and Akkadian sapu "to bathe"

And

Proto-Germanic *gaito "goat" and Akkadian gadu "young goat, kid" 

Here we can also see the role of ancient Phoenicians about the Latin word: soapyhistory


> The earliest known records of soap are from 600 BC, when, according to Pliny the Elder, Phoenicians made it from goat's tallow and wood ashes.  They sometimes also used soap as an article to trade and barter with the Gauls.


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## Treaty

> The earliest known records of soap are from 600 BC, when, according to Pliny the Elder, Phoenicians made it from goat's tallow and wood ashes. They sometimes also used soap as an article to trade and barter with the Gauls.


This is a myth propagated recently, apparently from a misinterpretation of Brannt's treatise in 1888. The original statement is:


> From this statement by Pliny it has been generally concluded that the invention of soap was due either to the Gauls or the Germans. E. Moride, however, contests the correctness of this conclusion. He is of the opinion that Pliny's statement simply refers to the application of soap as a cosmetic and hair-dye, and *believes *the Phoenicians, who settled in Gaul 600 B. C., to have been the actual inventors of soap.


The word "believes" refers to Moride, not Pliny. However, someone had mistakenly associated it with Pliny and invented the myth, which has become so widespread that even has fooled Britannica.

Anyway, I couldn't find the exact cited work of Edouard Moride. Based on what I found (_Histoire de la Savonnerie _pp. 14-17, published a year prior to Brannt's), he doesn't apparently provide any evidence for this claim other than the Phoenicians being awesome (this is though based on my limited French).


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## CyrusSH

Treaty said:


> This is a myth propagated recently, apparently from a misinterpretation of Brannt's treatise in 1888. The original statement is:
> ​The word "believes" refers to Moride, not Pliny. However, someone had mistakenly associated it with Pliny and invented the myth, which has become so widespread that even has fooled Britannica.
> 
> Anyway, I couldn't find the exact cited work of Edouard Moride. Based on what I found (_Histoire de la Savonnerie _pp. 14-17, published a year prior to Brannt's), he doesn't apparently provide any evidence for this claim other than the Phoenicians being awesome (this is though based on my limited French).



Without considering the etymology of this word, I think that is really a good interpretation of Pliny's words, Pliny says that soap was invented in the Gallic provinces, not by the Gauls, and we know about the Phoenician presence in this region in the 1st millennium BC, other than it we read in the ancient Mesopotamian sources from at least 2200 BC that soap is made from suet and ash, so it can't be strange that soap reached to the western Europe by ancient Phoenicians.


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## Parmenid

CyrusSH said:


> Without considering the etymology of this word, I think that is really a good interpretation of Pliny's words, Pliny says that soap was invented in the Gallic provinces, not by the Gauls, and we know about the Phoenician presence in this region in the 1st millennium BC, other than it we read in the ancient Mesopotamian sources from at least 2200 BC that soap is made from suet and ash, so it can't be strange that soap reached to the western Europe by ancient Phoenicians.


Did the Phoenicians trade soap with other peoples in the East? Did they have soap production centers? Where were the production centers in the east?
Why did other peoples stop producing soap? Why the only soap production centers,from what i remember, were in the Rhine area? 

The Roman Empire had a commercial area bigger than the Empire itself 
Indo-Roman trade relations - Wikipedia
Sino-Roman relations - Wikipedia


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## Treaty

CyrusSH said:


> we read in the ancient Mesopotamian sources from at least 2200 BC that soap is made from suet and ash


No, we don't read that because you apparently just made it up by pretending to have read the sources (like always). I couldn't find the 2200BC tablet, but every source on the web says the ingredient was cassia oil not suet.


CyrusSH said:


> a good interpretation of Pliny's words


That was not supposed to be an interpretation of Pliny to begin with, but a refutation of his account (by Moride). But anyway, it doesn't make sense. First, it was based on two wrong assumptions: there was a meaningful Punic colony in Gaul, and the Punics taught mine work to Gauls (so that he implies that Gauls were too primitive to have invented soap). Secondly, it totally disregards that the whole territory of the Punic civilization was under the control of Rome before the time of Pliny. This means if "soap" was a Phoenician/Punic invention or introduction to Europe, he or earlier Romans would have noticed its use in Punic lands before Gallic campaigns and would have not associated it with the Gauls/Germanics. Thirdly, as Parmenid noted, Punics were trading extensively with Rome and Greece for hundreds of years. It's beyond ridiculous to consider they traded the valuable soap only with one of the least financially important partners - the Gauls.


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## Parmenid

CyrusSH said:


> It is believed that soap was invented in 2800 BC by Akkadian-speaking people, so it can't be related to the Germanic people, unless you believe this word reached Rome through Germanic.





berndf said:


> It did not have the same meaning it has today in the 1st century AD. Soap was not known to the Romans, nor to the Germans for that matter.


At this point I think two things may have happened. Or the production has been delocalized from the Middle East, somehow, into the Rhine area, but there is no evidences of this progressive delocalization, or they invented it there.Free to make comments on this.


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## CyrusSH

Parmenid said:


> Did the Phoenicians trade soap with other peoples in the East? Did they have soap production centers? Where were the production centers in the east?
> Why did other peoples stop producing soap? Why the only soap production centers,from what i remember, were in the Rhine area?
> 
> The Roman Empire had a commercial area bigger than the Empire itself
> Indo-Roman trade relations - Wikipedia
> Sino-Roman relations - Wikipedia



As you yourself mentioned, by "soap" Pliny means "red dye", you probably know that Phoenicia means "land of the red dye merchants" in Greek.


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## berndf

Parmenid said:


> At this point I think two things may have happened. Or the production has been delocalized from the Middle East, somehow, into the Rhine area, but there is no evidences of this progressive delocalization, or they invented it there.Free to make comments on this.


They could have known North African "soap" in theory. But Romans took little interest in this creamy substance it was back then, even after Pliny. For cleaning cloths, Romans use ash lye water (which remained in use in Europe until the early 20th century) or ammonia lye made from urine and for cleaning the body they used oil (mostly olive oil), which was then scraped off with _stigilis_. Soap became popular in the early Middle Ages when the modern process was invented.



CyrusSH said:


> As you yourself mentioned, by "soap" Pliny means "red dye", you probably know that Phoenicia means "land of the red dye merchants" in Greek.


That refers to purple dye for cloths.


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## CyrusSH

Treaty said:


> That was not supposed to be an interpretation of Pliny to begin with, but a refutation of his account (by Moride). But anyway, it doesn't make sense. First, it was based on two wrong assumptions: there was a meaningful Punic colony in Gaul, and the Punics taught mine work to Gauls (so that he implies that Gauls were too primitive to have invented soap). Secondly, it totally disregards that the whole territory of the Punic civilization was under the control of Rome before the time of Pliny. This means if "soap" was a Phoenician/Punic invention or introduction to Europe, he or earlier Romans would have noticed its use in Punic lands before Gallic campaigns and would have not associated it with the Gauls/Germanics. Thirdly, as Parmenid noted, Punics were trading extensively with Rome and Greece for hundreds of years. It's beyond ridiculous to consider they traded the valuable soap only with one of the least financially important partners - the Gauls.





berndf said:


> That refers to purple dye for cloths.



berndf mentioned a good point, it is possible that the purple/red dye originally was just for cloths but the Gauls developed this product to a new one which could be used for hairs too, it could be considered as a new invention, of course I think henna has also a very long history.


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## berndf

Gaulish warriors dying their hairs with purple? You have an interesting sense of humour.


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## CyrusSH

berndf said:


> Gaulish warriors dying their hairs with purple? You have an interesting sense of humour.



Greek φοινός (phoinós) means "blood-red", not "purple".


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## Perseas

CyrusSH said:


> Greek φοινός (phoinós) means "blood-red", not "purple".


But *φοινίκεος* (phoiniceos) means purple red.
Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott,  A Greek-English Lexicon, Φ φ, , φοιν-ήεις , φοινίκεος
phoeniceus - Wiktionary


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## berndf

CyrusSH said:


> Greek φοινός (phoinós) means "blood-red", not "purple".


The name by which the Greek called them was about purple as they were the only suppliers of that dye. There is absolutely no question.


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## Parmenid

berndf said:


> They could have known North African "soap" in theory.


So this means that the Akkadian "Soap",the North African "Soap" and the Rhine "Soap" could be the ""same"" in theory or did i misunderstand?


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## CyrusSH

Perseas said:


> But *φοινίκεος* (phoiniceos) means purple red.
> Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott,  A Greek-English Lexicon, Φ φ, , φοιν-ήεις , φοινίκεος
> phoeniceus - Wiktionary



Yes, this is purple red which is usually considered as a frightening color:

Oracal 651 - 026 Purple Red - 12


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## berndf

Parmenid said:


> So this means that the Akkadian "Soap",the North African "Soap" and the Rhine "Soap" could be the ""same"" in theory or did i misunderstand?


I have no idea where the Gauls and Germans got their soap from but the Germanic word is quite obviously related to consistency  (a think, creamy, "dripping" substance). That should rule out a Semitic loan. Concerning the Latin word, my point was that a Semitic loan is also unlikely because they had no need to use a word for something they did not use. The fact that the oldest Latin attestations are references to Gauls and Germans makes the Germanic loan hypothesis the most plausible one.


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## berndf

CyrusSH said:


> Yes, this is purple red which is usually considered as a frightening color:
> 
> Oracal 651 - 026 Purple Red - 12


This is the dye that gave the Phoenicians their Greek name ("Tyran purple"). It is not about any colour in general but about this specific substance.





Today we can produce it synthetically but at the time it was probably the most expensive substance of all.


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## Parmenid

berndf said:


> I have no idea where the Gauls and Germans got their soap from but the Germanic word is quite obviously related to consistency  (a think, creamy, "dripping" substance). That should rule out a Semitic loan. Concerning the Latin word, my point was that a Semitic loan is also unlikely because they had no need to use a word for something they did not use. The fact that the oldest Latin attestations are references to Gauls and Germans makes the Germanic loan hypothesis the most plausible one.


I agree ,but from a non linguistic point of view ,it is strange that no one else was able to produce it inside the border of the empire or in the "commercial area" of the empire ,netiher there are evidences that could link them.


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## berndf

Parmenid said:


> I agree ,but from a non linguistic point of view ,it is strange that no one else was able to produce it inside the border of the empire or in the "commercial area" of the empire ,netiher there are evidences that could link them.


The point was not that they were "unable", just not interested.


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## CyrusSH

berndf said:


> This is the dye that gave the Phoenicians their Greek name ("Tyran purple"). It is not about any colour in general but about this specific substance.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Today we can produce it synthetically but at the time it was probably the most expensive substance of all.



Pliny himself talks about this color (Tyrian purple), he says: "The tint that inclines to red is looked upon as inferior to that which is of a blackish hue."


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