The History of Salt. Boddy Evan Martlett
the relation which salt bears to food while it is going through the process of digestion.
Owing to the peculiar and incomprehensible prejudices of those who labour under the false impression that they are wiser and more discriminating than others, and who become proportionately obstinate in their notions, we shall endeavour to bring forward undeniable evidence in support of our arguments, though it is possible they may neither acknowledge that they are wrong, nor admit that their preconceived ideas prevent them from arriving at an unbiased conclusion. To such I have no hesitation in saying that they are much deceived if they imagine that the habit of abstaining from salt is contributive to health; such crabbed and confined views, however, are significant of the fact that human nature is frequently antagonistic to, and at cross purposes with, that which is ordained by the laws of nature to be beneficial.
I shall pass over the merits of salt as a seasoning to food, as it is my object to consider it solely in its relation to the animal economy, its operation in certain morbid conditions of the system, and its great importance as a health-preserver. But before proceeding, it will be as well to give a passing glance at its history and other attractive matter with which it is indirectly in relation; for though our investigations will be rather of a tentative character, and in a degree speculative, they may at least be interesting if not instructive. Perhaps others may be stimulated to penetrate deeper into the almost impenetrable obscurity with which the discovery of salt as a condiment is surrounded; and if they can bring to light who it was that primarily found out the chloride of sodium and utilised it as an adjunct to food, they will have solved a geological problem, and a long-standing historical enigma will be elucidated.
We possess no distinct and reliable data, and in fact no information of any kind, concerning salt in the early ages of the world as an article of diet, outside the pages of Scripture: all we really know, is, that in the infantile period of Europe, when the Indo-Germanic tribes entered it from Asia, though they were unacquainted with the sea, they were familiar with salt, as is proved by the recurrence of its name; yet whether they used it with their food we are by no means so sure of. The Kitchen-Middeners, who had their miserable dwellings on the wild shores of Jutland and similar inhospitable localities, might have been acquainted with it; but when we call to mind the nature of the food2 on which they lived, we may, I think, fairly conclude that they were ignorant of the use to which salt is now put; here again, however, we have only vague conjecture to fall back upon. The founder of Buddhism, Arddha Chiddi, a native of Capila near Nepaul, who subsequently changed his name to Gotama, and afterwards to Chakia Mouni, in his “Verbal Instructions,” when dealing with his inquiry into the nature of man, asks us to consider what becomes of a grain of salt when cast into the ocean. Of the epoch of Gotama, or Chakia Mouni, there is great diversity of opinion; the Chinese, Mongols, and Japanese fix it at B.C. 1000; the Cashmerians at B.C. 1332; and the Avars, Siamese, and Cingalese fix it at B.C. 600.
The reference which Gotama thus makes to salt shows us that he was familiarly acquainted with it, otherwise he would not have figuratively mentioned it.
We are completely in the dark regarding salt as a condiment till Moses, in the Book of Job, asks the pertinent question, “Can anything which is unsavoury be eaten without salt?” As this book was penned B.C. 1520, we may conclude with a tolerable degree of certainty that it was so used in the time of the great Jewish Law-giver, and as he was brought up in the court of Pharaoh, and was skilled in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, it would point to the probability that salt was in common use in that ancient country.
The first mention we possess of salt is when Moses refers to the Vale of Siddim, which is the Salt Sea. This vast reservoir was known as the Dead Sea,3 and is so to this day: so the Jews, who were commanded to use salt in their sacrifices, had a large natural depôt which afforded them a limitless supply of the necessary material for carrying on their worship, and likewise for individual consumption: they also mixed a certain amount of salt with their incense. The second reference is in relation to one of those extraordinary incidents with which the first five books of the Old Testament teem, and that is during the destruction of the “Cities of the Plain,” when Lot’s wife was turned into a pillar of salt for disobedience.
We also read of salt in the Iliad of Homer, and as he did not flourish till about B.C. 850,4 we must give the honour of marking it indelibly on the pages of history to Moses the Jew, who lived, if the above date is correct, 670 years anterior to the illustrious Father of epic poetry, and, if the Cashmerians are correct in their calculation, 188 years before Gotama gave to the world his eight hundred volumes, pointing out the path towards individual extinction or “Nirwana.”
We may likewise conclude that as it was known to the sagacious Hebrew, the æsthetic Greek, and the imaginative Asiatic, it was no doubt equally well known to the Egyptians, and probably amongst the neighbouring African tribes, long before the arrival of Joseph in the land of the Pharaohs, and centuries before the Oracle of Delphi was instituted.5
From the following lines we may justly conclude that the Greeks looked upon salt as sacred, and used it as a thank-offering, and that it even was an absolute necessity to go through the ceremony of washing their hands before touching it; such extreme care and scrupulous observance indicates that it was a substance held in the highest reverence:
“At this the Sire embraced the maid again,
So sadly lost, so lately sought in vain.
Then near the altar of the darting King,
Dispos’d in rank their hecatomb they bring;585
With water purify their hands, and take
The sacred off’ring of the salted cake;
While thus with arms devoutly rais’d in air,
And solemn voice, the Priest directs his pray’r.”
“And Menalaus came unbid, the last.485
The chiefs surround the destined beast, and take
The sacred off’ring of the salted cake:
When thus the King prefers his solemn pray’r.”
“Achilles at the genial feast presides,
The parts transfixes, and with skill divides.
Meanwhile Patroclus sweats the fire to raise;
The tent is bright’ned with the rising blaze:
Then, when the languid flames at length subside,
He strows a bed of glowing embers wide,280
Above the coals the smoking fragments turns,
And sprinkles sacred salt from lifted urns.”
At the time of the Exodus, Egypt was the great disseminator of knowledge, the centre of civilisation, and the emporium of trade, being then at its zenith of prosperity and power;6 and the countries which were conterminous no doubt regarded it with feelings of admiration and emulation, and were only too desirous to adopt its customs, as well as to avail themselves of the learning and culture which were only to be found in the land of obelisks and pyramids. Even the Greek philosophers were fain to acknowledge that Egypt7 was their storehouse of wisdom and æsthetic art; neither Athenian, Spartan, or Corinthian, ever disavowed his presumed Egyptian descent: and if history is to be relied on, the first King of Attica was a citizen of Sais; though this is a disputed point, for not only is the country of Cecrops a topic for controversy, but even his very existence is questioned, and by some altogether denied. This legend, if it is such, however, tends to show that the communication between the two countries (though of the two, Egypt was much more exclusive) was frequent; however, it is still a theme upon which classical commentators continue to exercise their controversial dexterity, some of whom affirm that there is no foundation for the myth.
Their food, according to geologists, consisted solely of shell-fish.
This sea is called by several names, viz., “The Dead Sea,” “The Sea of the Plain,” or “of the Arabah,” and “The East Sea.” In the 2nd Book of Esdras v. 7, it is called the “Sodomish Sea.” Josephus uses a similar name, ἡ Σοδομύτυς λίμνη – the Sodomite Lake; he also calls it by the same name as Diodorus Siculus, the “Asphaltic Lake” – ἡ Ἀσφαλτίτις λίμνη. It contains 26 per cent. of salt, including large quantities of magnesium compounds; its weight is of course great, a gallon weighing almost 12-1/2 lb.; and its buoyancy is proportionate to the weight, being such that the human body cannot sink in it. At the south side is a mass of crystallised salt, and in it is a very peculiar cavern, extending at least five miles, varying in height from 200 to 400 feet. This sea is 1312 feet below the level of the Mediterranean; the river Jordan, from the Sea of Galilee, flows into it, but no river flows from it.
According to C. Velleius Paterculus of Rome, Homer flourished B.C. 968; according to Herodotus, B.C. 884; the Arundelian Marbles fix his era B.C. 907.
To show how acute the Greek mind must have been, and how alive the philosophers of that classic country were to everything, whether beautiful or useful, we need only call to mind the quaint observation of Zeno, the founder of the Stoics, who was born about B.C. 300, and who says that “a soul was given to the hog instead of salt, to prevent his body from rotting;” by this we see he was quite cognisant of the preservative properties of salt.
Between the Nile and the Red Sea there are quarries of white marble, of porphyry, of basalt, and the beautiful green breccia, known as
A learned author states as follows: “We have seen, too, that the earliest state of Egypt, as seen in the pyramids, and in the tombs of the same age, reveals an orderly society and civilisation, of which the origin is unknown.”