soap
Definitions
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WordNet 3.6
- v soap rub soap all over, usually with the purpose of cleaning
- n soap a cleansing agent made from the salts of vegetable or animal fats
- n soap street names for gamma hydroxybutyrate
- n soap money offered as a bribe
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Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary
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Interesting fact: The fat that comes from sheep, which is called tallow, can also be used to produce soap and candles
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- n Soap A substance which dissolves in water, thus forming a lather, and is used as a cleansing agent. Soap is produced by combining fats or oils with alkalies or alkaline earths, usually by boiling, and consists of salts of sodium, potassium, etc., with the fatty acids (oleic, stearic, palmitic, etc.). See the Note below, and cf. Saponification. By extension, any compound of similar composition or properties, whether used as a cleaning agent or not.☞ In general, soaps are of two classes,
hard andsoft . Calcium, magnesium, lead, etc., form soaps, but they are insoluble and useless. "The purifying action of soap depends upon the fact that it is decomposed by a large quantity of water into free alkali and an insoluble acid salt. The first of these takes away the fatty dirt on washing, and the latter forms the soap lather which envelops the greasy matter and thus tends to remove it." - Soap To flatter; to wheedle. "Some slavish, glavering , flattering parasite."
- Soap To rub or wash over with soap.
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- n Soap A substance which dissolves in water, thus forming a lather, and is used as a cleansing agent. Soap is produced by combining fats or oils with alkalies or alkaline earths, usually by boiling, and consists of salts of sodium, potassium, etc., with the fatty acids (oleic, stearic, palmitic, etc.). See the Note below, and cf. Saponification. By extension, any compound of similar composition or properties, whether used as a cleaning agent or not.☞ In general, soaps are of two classes,
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
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Interesting fact: Murphy's oil soap is the chemical most commonly used to clean elephants.
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- n soap A chemical compound in common domestic use for washing and cleansing, made by the union of certain fatty acids with a salifiable base. Fats and fixed oils consist of fatty acids combined with glycerin. On treating them with a strong base, like potash or soda, glycerin is set free, and the fatty acid combines with the strong base and forms a soap. Soap is of two kinds—soluble soap, in which the base is potash, soda, or ammonia, and insoluble soap, whose base is an earth or a metallic oxid. Only the soluble soaps dissolve readily in water and have detergent qualities. Insoluble soaps are used only in pharmacy for liniments or plasters. Of the fats, stearates make the hardest, oleates the softest soaps; and of the bases, soda makes the hardest and least soluble, and potash the softest and most soluble. Perfumes are occasionally added, or various coloring matters are stirred in while the soap is semi-fluid. White soaps are generally made of olive-oil and soda. Common household soaps are made chiefly of soda and tallow. Yellow soap is composed of tallow, rosin, and soda, to which some palm-oil is occasionally added. (See rosin-soap.) Mottled soap is made by simply adding mineral and other colors during the manufacture of ordinary hard soap. Marine soap, known as salt-water soap, which has the property of dissolving as well in salt water as in fresh, is made of palm- or cocoanut-oil and soda. Soft soaps are made with potash, instead of soda, and whale-, seal-, or olive-oil, or the oils of linseed, hemp-seed, rape-seed, etc., with the addition of a little tallow. Excellent soaps are made from palm-oil and soda. A solution of soap in alcohol, with camphor and a little essential oil added to scent it, forms a soft ointment called opodeldoc, now superseded by soap-liniment, a similar preparation, which is liquid. Medicinal soap, when pure, is prepared from caustic soda and either olive- or almond-oil. It is chiefiy employed to form pills of a gently aperient antacid action.
- n soap A kind of pomade for coloring the hair.
- n soap Smooth words; persuasion; flattery: more often called soft soap.
- n soap Money secretly used for political purposes.
- n soap white Castile soap, which contains 21 per cent of water, is of a pale grayish-white color, giving no oily stains to paper, free from rancid odor, and entirely soluble in alcohol or water; and.
- n soap marbled Castile soap, which is harder and more alkaline, contains 14 per cent. of water, and has veins or streaks of ferruginous matter running through it. Formerly also, erroneously, castle-soap; also Spanish soap.
- n soap See def. 3.
- soap To rub or treat with soap; apply soap to.
- soap To use smooth words to; flatter.
- n soap The fatty matter obtained by adding just enough acid to a soap solution to cause the separation of the fatty acids.
- soap In calico-printing, to remove, by means of soap, impurities from (cloth) before bleaching; also, after printing, to remove the thickening used in the color.
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Chambers's Twentieth Century Dictionary
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Interesting fact: Proctor & Gamble originally manufactured candles before moving on to soap.
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- n Soap sōp a compound of oils or fats with soda (hard soaps) or potash (soft soaps), used in washing: :
- v.t Soap to rub or wash with soap: to flatter
- n Soap sōp (slang) soft words, flattery
- n Soap sōp (U.S. slang) money used for bribery and other secret political purposes
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Quotations
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“If you have to be in a soap opera try not to get the worst role.” -
“What soap is for the body, tears are for the soul.”
Idioms
Soft soap someone - If you soft soap someone, you flatter them.
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Etymology
Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary
OE. sope, AS. sāpe,; akin to D. zeep, G. seife, OHG. seifa, Icel. sāpa, Sw. spa, Dan. sbe, and perhaps to AS. sīpan, to drip, MHG. sīfen, and L. sebum, tallow. Cf. Saponaceous
Chambers's Twentieth Century Dictionary
A.S. sápe; Dut. zeep, Ger. seife.
Usage
In literature:
I recalled, with a smile, that Burke had smelled of laundry soap, and that on the wash-stand in Maillot's room there had been no soap at all.
"The Paternoster Ruby" by Charles Edmonds Walk
I used soap and water as a lubricant, and the work was satisfactory.
"On Laboratory Arts" by Richard Threlfall
No nothing, except good soap at three cents a cake, plus postage.
"Subversive" by Dallas McCord Reynolds
In many years' use of arsenic, dry, in wet solution, and in soap, I have received nothing more serious than an occasional sore finger.
"Home Taxidermy for Pleasure and Profit" by Albert B. Farnham
Afterwards the leg may be dried with a woolen cloth and bathed with camphorated soap liniment.
"Special Report on Diseases of the Horse" by United States Department of Agriculture
Her eyes at once fell upon the bowl full of soap-suds Meg had placed on a chair.
"Hatty and Marcus" by Aunt Friendly
When sufficiently fulled, the length of cloth is scoured to free it from soap.
"Textiles" by William H. Dooley
Do not rub soap directly on the woollen material, but use soap solutions.
"Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Household Management" by Ministry of Education
These days, Johnnie again wore the apron, and neglected the soap and the comb and the brushing.
"The Rich Little Poor Boy" by Eleanor Gates
He's never touched taller or soap in his life, I'll bet.
"The Golden Magnet" by George Manville Fenn
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In poetry:
"But tell me, dear, before you go
Unto your daily work,
Shall I use Ivory soap on him,
Or Colgate, Pears' or Kirk?"
Unto your daily work,
Shall I use Ivory soap on him,
Or Colgate, Pears' or Kirk?"
"The Ballad Of The Taylor Pup" by Eugene Field
And so my Pete was taken home—
My pretty piccaninny!
And, not to speak of soap or comb,
His cleansing cost a guinea.
My pretty piccaninny!
And, not to speak of soap or comb,
His cleansing cost a guinea.
"Peter the Piccaninny" by Henry Kendall
Still, seeing that a little soap
Would soften an excess of tint,
You’ll pardon my advance, I hope,
In giving you a gentle hint.
Would soften an excess of tint,
You’ll pardon my advance, I hope,
In giving you a gentle hint.
"Black Lizzie" by Henry Kendall
But what can careless Molly hope
When she destroys two drams of soap?
Left in the sink while water pours
A text he'd handle full two hours.
When she destroys two drams of soap?
Left in the sink while water pours
A text he'd handle full two hours.
"The Parson In Pickle" by William Hutton
The mother turned round for the soap from the rack
She weren't gone a minute, but when she got back
Her baby had gone, and in anguish she cried
"Oh, where is my baby?", and the angels replied
She weren't gone a minute, but when she got back
Her baby had gone, and in anguish she cried
"Oh, where is my baby?", and the angels replied
"Biby's Epitaph" by Anonymous British
You think you're right handy with gun and with rope,
But I've noticed you're bashful when usin' the soap:
When you're rollin' your Bull for your brown cigarette
I' been rollin' the dough for them biscuits you et.
But I've noticed you're bashful when usin' the soap:
When you're rollin' your Bull for your brown cigarette
I' been rollin' the dough for them biscuits you et.
"Punchin' Dough" by Henry Herbert Knibbs
In news:
The game is called 'Soap Soccer' and it features hot ladies that are all soaped up and ready for some soccer action.
At a time when all software looks more and more alike, Kai's Photo Soap from MetaCreations (800 472-9025) certainly stands out.
Lynne O'Hara, right, a visitor from England, smells some of the bar soaps at Naples Soap Co.
Take the soap opera at HP, for instance .
Some words just leave a bad taste, and the notion of washing your mouth out with soap simply isn't going to do the trick.
James Franco's Soap-Opera Stint Is a Genius Move.
Today, however, I could write a laundry list of reasons — including "get laundry soap".
Open problems in soap bubble geometry .
A Space Opera Soap Opera.
So the situation in beautiful downtown Plano, Texas continues to get ever more interesting, the recent departure of Mike Francis being only the latest chapter in the soap opera that J.C. Penney has very quickly become.
Dad's Secret Stash — Soaping Up the Gremlin .
As he sat, tail wagging, she rinsed him with warm water and soaped.
The ballad of soap creek saloon.
Fox Searchlight might have to wash its mouth out with soap.
You turn on the TV, but old reruns and soaps and trash-talk shows only make you more aware of how lousy you feel.
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In science:
As we shall demonstrate below, friction causes the contact line to move downstream, and in the limiting case imposes the required contact angle on the soap film.
Deformation of a free interface pierced by a tilted cylinder
Consider the way in which soap bubbles arise from a statistical physics model of molecular forces.
Event-Symmetric Physics
The forces are functions of the relative positions and orientations of the soap and water molecules.
Event-Symmetric Physics
The system is consistent with the definition of event-symmetry since it is invariant under exchange of any two water or soap molecules and therefore has an S (N ) ⊗ S (M ) symmetry where N and M are the number of water and soap molecules.
Event-Symmetric Physics
Events in the soap bubble model correspond to molecules rather than space-time points.
Event-Symmetric Physics
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