Trials and Tribulations

Over the past 1000 years or so, the lowly bar of handmade artisan soap has been much maligned.  Early medieval church leaders, in their quest for humility, decided that cleanliness was a sin and banned it altogether.  They may have had a point.  Thirty or forty years without bathing might make anyone rather humble.

Other great leaders of the time, realizing handmade artisan soap’s power, taxed it nearly out of existence.  Add the scarcity of fresh water and it appears that most common folks in the Middle Ages never formally bathed once in their entire short lives.  Shines a new light on medieval love stories doesn’t it?  Heavy perfumes, spices and garlic were needed to tolerate the robust aroma coming from the neighbors and even as late as the 1700’s, handmade artisan soap was still a conversation piece.

Finally, little more than 150 years ago, handcrafted artisan cold process soap for bathing not only became legal and affordable, but even fashionable.  Nowadays, bars of cold process soap are being perfumed, colored, built, filled, milled, beveled, reformulated, molded, melted, sliced, gelled, liquefied, creamed, boiled, whipped, enriched, medicated, stuffed with oatmeal, superfatted, salted, swirled, felted, forced to float, stamped into little animals, sprinkled with glitter, shrink wrapped, hung on a rope and generally exploited as usual.

Honestly, such drama over a few bubbles…….