[MR] Soap Recipe - 14th century (Tractatus de Magnetate)

[Becky McEllistrem]

Several people have asked for the soap documentation I
had at 12th night so I thought I'd post it here.  I've
found some sheep fat from one butcher but am still
looking for more.

Rebecca

=========================================

SOAP FROM SHEEP’S TALLOW
(A 14th century recipe)
By Lady Rebecca the Contrary

The Reynolds Historical Library at the Univeristy of
Alabama at Birmingham is another source of recipes
besides Mappae Clavicula.  This special collections
section has:  The Tractatus de Magnetate et
Operationibus eius, a treatise on numbers and
proportions, and household and medical recipes 
written by Petrus Peregrinus.  It is a collection of a
variety of recipes in English and Latin and has the
oldest known English mead recipe.  It has been dated
to be from 14th century England.  

The transcription is clearly described as being an
absolute transcription with no changes from the
original calligraphy.

The Original Recipe

  Ffor to make whyt sope
Tak 1 busschel of cler clen asches mad of bene straw
and put per to half a busschel of quyk lym and put
pese in a vessel of tre as it were a kowle and loke
pat to be vessel have an hole in pe botme for to put
per in a staff and so make per of lye with hoot water
til it haue na more sauer of assches as pu may taste
be by tonge pan loke how many galons pu hast of lye
and tak so many pounds of clene schepis talgh./ thane
sethe by lye til it behalf wastid awey and kast per in
1 vnce or a lytil more of alum and pane kast in by
talgh & medle hem wel with by lye til it be thikke
anow and pane kast it owt into formes.  But in pe
kastynge out into by formes put vndernepe and aboue
smal bene floer but not to much also if pu se pat it
be not pikke anow kast in per to bene floer pat be
whyt and clene and pat schal make it pikke anow and so
kast it into formes.  and drey it upon a wyndy hows
and it schall be good.

 Also whyt sope may be maad in bis maner with owte any
feer.  Take 1 libra of blak sope and 1 libra of whyte
wode-assches smal poudred & medle hem wel togedre with
pyn handis & kast it into formes as aforesayd
 

 Rebecca's Translation

To make the lye: Take a pot with a hole in the bottom
plug the hole up with a stick.  Add a half a bushel of
lime first then add a bushel of powdery ashes on top
of that.  Boil water and pour it into the pot so that
the lye may drip out slowly through the small holes
left by the stick.  

To make the soap: Measure the amount of lye you have
and take a similar amount of clean sheep's tallow and
boil with the lye till it's reduced by half.  Add 1 oz
or more of alum and then add the tallow stirring
constantly until the mixture is thick.  Pour the mix
into molds.  To thicken the mix you can add a small
amount of bean flour.  Let soap set for a number of
days.

Also white soap may be made the following way:  Take 1
pound of black soap (soap made with unclean lye or
tallow) and 1 pound of white wood ash powder and mix
them together and then cast into molds.

Redaction – a modern recipe
12 oz water
32 oz tallow
4.5 oz lye

Carefully pour the lye into the water and stir slowly
till dissolved (using all appropriate safety
precautions of course).  Melt the tallow and raise
till appropriate temperature (There’s always a big
debate as to what the appropriate temps must be.  I
melt the tallow and heat it up till 150 degrees then
let the lye and the melted tallow cool till close to
100 degrees before mixing.)  Pour the lye slowly into
the melted tallow.  Some tell you to stir while
pouring but I refuse as I don’t like to encourage any
chances at splashing.  Stir until trace and pour into
molds.

Notes:

Since I was out of homemade lye at this point I used a
modern tallow recipe to make the soap.  I rendered my
own fat to and since I only had a few pounds of sheep
fat I actually scorched it a little trying to get as
much as possible.  I went ahead and made the soap as
it was difficult to find sheep fat at the time.  These
two particular bars seemed to have the least amount of
bad smell from it.  I actually used these two bars
once just to be sure.

Sheep fat seemed to make an unusually dense tallow but
since my experience has been mostly olive oil soap. I
have some more testing to do.  Sheep tallow doesn’t
seem to be as dense as deer tallow which seems to be
almost “waxy” however it seems to be as dense or even
a little more dense than beef tallow.  
Hopefully I’ll have more than one butcher to help with
supplies of sheep fat shortly.  This was a very
quick-drying soap.




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