Salt - The white gold of the earth E-Book

Marco Müller

• Herausgeber: novum publishing
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Seitenzahl: 246

Beschreibung

Salt - white gold or white poison? Elixir of life or pathogen? How the primal element salt has ensured our survival and changed our lives is an exciting journey from the beginning of evolution to modern times. How could these white grains, which we hardly pay any attention to today, once be called "white gold"? The history of salt is extremely exciting; the extraction of salt brought us important technical achievements and changed landscapes. Cities and roads were built through mining and trade. Wars were fought over salt and it brought down colonial powers. Salt is thus closely interwoven with the history of mankind.

Leseprobe

Foreword

Why this book was written

My family worked in agriculture, viticulture and gastronomy for generations. Even as a child, I had a particularly close relationship with food and spent part of my childhood in vineyards, fields, stables and hotel kitchens. It was almost a matter of course that I chose to train as a chef.

I have a great passion for traveling, which has taken me to many countries around the world. My affinity for spices and my curiosity for all kinds of culinary delights has taken me to spice markets on four continents, allowed me to visit pepper and spice plantations, sea salt works, salt mines and spice factories and experience the vanilla harvest in Tahiti.

After 20 years in gastronomy, my health forced me to hang up my apron. This was followed by further training as an industrial clerk, part of which I completed in a catering wholesaler specializing in condiments. Seasonings later became the subject of my oral examination.

This was followed by a short stint in the food retail trade and another attempt as a chef before I found my fortune in the natural salt industry in 2007. I was quickly infected by the salt virus.

Fascinated by these white grains, I quickly realized the enormous importance of white gold for mankind, which still amazes and inspires me many years later.

Along the way, a new talent emerged - in product descriptions for various websites, flyers, brochures ...

In over 15 years in the natural salt industry, I have been able to visit and get to know numerous salt producers and importers and have learned exciting stories and histories. When visiting my customers, I was regularly surprised at how little they knew about salts, but how great their interest was. I often found myself in conversations about how fascinating the topic was and how quickly time passed. I was regularly encouraged by spellbound listeners and colleagues to put my knowledge into a book.

Small anecdotes in passing:

I was born in the city of Augusta Treverorum, better known today as Trier. The city attained its greatest importance in late antiquity under the name Treveris; the entire north-western part of the Roman Empire was ruled from Trier at that time. The presence of the Romans can still be felt all around Trier today. It was the Romans, in their long rule over large parts of Europe and the entire Mediterranean region, who were once leaders in the extraction of sea salt. The Roman influence on salt production, culture and language is often mentioned in this book. Some of the salt works established throughout Europe during their reign have survived the leap to modern times. They are still managed today according to the traditional methods of that time.

Divine salt

According to an old legend in Greek mythology, Neres, the Greek goddess of the sea, once gave Peleus, the king of the Myrmidons and father of Achilles, nothing less than salt as a wedding gift. Since then, salt has been regarded as a gift from the gods. The Greeks, but also the Egyptians, the Romans and many passages in the Old Testament attribute a very special significance to salt. For example, God once sealed a covenant with Aaron, Moses' older brother and the first high priest of the Israelites, with salt.

Once as valuable as gold, salt lost its value in the age of industrialization. A global trend towards healthy and natural foods has led to a renaissance of natural salts in recent years.

But let's start from the beginning ...

In the beginning was the sea ...

Photo: depositphotos / Marco Müller

All life on our planet originates from the salt-rich waters of our oceans. The story began around 4.5 billion years ago, when the Earth's core, mantle and crust began to form. Temperatures of several thousand degrees prevailed on the Earth's bubbling surface of hot magma, and the planet was frequently hit by meteorites. The surface cooled significantly over the next 200 million years and began to solidify into rock. Impacting comets brought ice with them to Earth, which had cooled to below 100 degrees in the meantime.

It was still bubbling everywhere on the surface. Lava and water vapor rose from volcanoes. Condensing water slowly formed the primordial ocean, later continents and the first water cycle of evaporation and precipitation. Around 3.8 billion years ago, the first simple life in the form of bacteria formed in the primordial oceans. As the earth's plates were constantly moving, they inevitably collided at some point and land masses piled up to form the first mountain formations. Around 2.5 billion years ago, the first supercontinent was formed and the Earth's climate changed completely. With the help of the sun, bacteria in the primordial ocean began to produce elemental oxygen through photosynthesis, which had not previously been present on Earth. The single-celled organisms began to form cell nuclei, joined together and the first multicellular organisms emerged. By 550 million years ago, a great diversity of species had developed, but until then only in the primordial oceans. Then life slowly began on land and the first plants grew.

Gradually, amphibians were also drawn to land, at least temporarily, and over the course of millions of years they evolved into reptiles. Ice ages and large meteorite impacts repeatedly halted and influenced development, as did earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and constant climate change. Around 150 million years ago, the last supercontinent broke apart into two parts. Over the next 100 million years, today's continents were formed. The earth's masses continued to move everywhere, both on land and in the depths of the oceans.

Changes in sea depth and constantly changing climatic conditions, together with tectonic plate shifts, led to sea areas separating from the oceans everywhere. If rainfall and freshwater inflows were less than the evaporation caused by the sun and wind, the minerals contained in the seawater began to crystallize as salts. Dust, lava flows and further plate shifts allowed the resulting enormous layers of salt to be stored deep underground for several hundred million years. Around 55 million years ago, what is now India collided with the Asian continent. Massive rock displacements gave rise to the mighty Himalayan mountain range. In many places around the world today, huge salt domes lie deep in the earth as so-called rock salts. In some places, the salt domes have been partially triggered by groundwater, creating salty springs.

The development of mankind began a few million years ago, again due to a change in the Earth's climatic conditions with a significant drop in temperatures. In the tropical rainforests of Africa, the tree population of the rainforests shrank significantly. Some of the great apes left the rainforest and began to roam the savannahs. The first early humans emerged, learned to walk upright and developed the first primitive tools.

They lived from what they gathered and hunted. Then, probably around 1.8 million years ago, they began to migrate to other regions. Thanks to their ability to evolve, the new species quickly managed to adapt to the new living conditions. They soon colonized large parts of the continents. Humans became sedentary and began to cultivate crops and breed livestock. Archaeological finds indicate that humans now began to use salt in a targeted manner. It is reasonable to assume that the change in lifestyle with a more plant-based diet instinctively forced humans to take up valuable minerals that were lacking. As long as meat was the most important part of the diet, humans were supplied with sufficient salt. The now largely plant-based diet led to a deficiency. Humans probably learned from the animals, who had always been drawn to salty springs. This phenomenon can still be observed in many parts of the world today. Herds of animals led people to salt domes in caves, where they mined the salt with primitive tools. By the sea, people were able to extract salt by evaporating the seawater. The first evaporation pools were created and were continuously developed and improved over the course of many centuries. Salt was also extracted from salty springs using similar methods.

Interestingly, salt production took place everywhere in the world where humans settled, possiblyrweise without this knowledge being shared. Salt quickly became the most important and most sought-after commodity, because salt could not only make food tastier and more digestible. Almost more importantly, salt was used as a preservative for meat, fish and other foods, thus ensuring the survival of entire peoples. The preservative ability of salt was possibly an important prerequisite for settling down at all, as the preservation of food no longer forced people to move across the land as nomads. Accordingly, people also settled at the salt mining sites of the time and settlements were established. The first paths and roads led to and from the salt mining sites to the newly emerging exchange markets. Trade in the coveted and vital white gold began, a trade sector of enormous economic importance and even a means of payment. In addition to seasoning and preservation, over the course of time natural salt also gained a firm place in ancient naturopathy, as its disinfecting, regenerating and healing effects were discovered for numerous illnesses. Have you ever thought about why we are often drawn to the sea and why images of a blue ocean awaken longings in us? Perhaps we instinctively want to return to where life once began. The sea has a calming, revitalizing and regenerating effect. In fact, the sea is still a part of us. The primordial sea once had a salt content of 0.97%, exactly the same salt concentration as in our blood, our tears and our sweat. We have the same vibration patterns and frequencies in the sea as in our bodies.

True to the motto "You can do without gold, but you can't do without salt", these white grains were intended to change the world in the long term and to change and shape it in many ways.

Marine saline Rio Formosa (Photo: M. Linke for Marisol)

History of salt mining and the salt trade

Salt mining has a special significance in human history and an ancient history of its own. This goes back at least as far as the Neolithic Age, and probably even further. In our modern age, in which industrialization has made it possible to mine and extract huge quantities of salt, salt is omnipresent and available in abundance. While around 240 to 250 million tons of salt are produced worldwide every year today, the situation was very different until the middle of the 20th century. It is hard to imagine today that salt, once rare and coveted, was once synonymous with prosperity, wealth and power.

Until the beginning of industrialization, there were only a few mining sites and salt was extracted by hard, physical work with the few tools available. There was always enough salt, but it was not readily available in all parts of the world. The different types of salt deposits, sea salt or rock salt, required different extraction and mining techniques. While sea salt has always been harvested by evaporation with the help of wind and sun in evaporation basins, mining has changed fundamentally over the millennia. The high value of salt across all cultures drove the consistent further development of mining techniques, and ever better tools quickly brought higher yields.

A third way of extracting salt is by boiling salt dissolved in water, the brine, using different heat sources.

Today, scientists benefit from the preservative properties of salt in their studies, research and evaluations. Numerous finds in old salt mines have been completely preserved by the salt. The climate prevailing in the salt mines prevents the decomposition of organic substances by microbes, so that numerous finds are excellent contemporary witnesses of past eras. Archaeology is otherwise only familiar with such fortunate situations in the case of ice or bog finds.

Hallstadt in the Upper Austrian Salzkammergut is one of the oldest known salt mining regions in Europe. The region has been known for its rich salt deposits for thousands of years. But how did people come to know about the importance of salt and salt mining? Presumably, the behavior of native red deer and wild boar species was observed thousands of years ago by wandering hunters who repeatedly went to the salty springs and salt veins in the region. It is possible that these places proved to be ideal hunting grounds, as the herds regularly came to the salt springs to instinctively supply themselves with the vital minerals. Curious, they adopted the animals' rituals and gradually discovered the positive properties of the salt. In order to be able to trade the new, valuable finds with other hunters, the salty-tasting stones were removed, and gradually the first salt trade in Europe came into being. Old stone axes used for salt mining and a deer antler used as a pick have been dated by archaeologists to be up to 7,000 years old. It is therefore safe to assume that the first salt was mined around Hallstadt at this time - probably the oldest salt mining site in Europe. Around the year 1,500 BC, the construction of the first larger mines began and thus the organized mining of salt. Great physical effort was required to obtain the valuable commodity. With the help of bronze picks, small lumps of salt were knocked out of the salt domes, packed into leather bags and laboriously carried up through narrow tunnels. The hard work seemed worthwhile even back then, and the spoils were exchanged for valuable furs, gold objects, amber jewelry and new tools. Today it is assumed that the treasure of the Alps found its way to large parts of Central Europe via traders. Over the centuries, Hallstadt developed into a lively economic center and brought great prosperity to the region. In addition to salt mining, a new branch of industry was discovered - thanks to the knowledge now gained about the preservative properties of salt, whole parts of pigs as well as cattle, sheep and goats were cured in brine pools and then brought to the salt mines. The unique microclimate prevailing there proved to be perfect for targeted stockpiling and thus ensured the workers' supplies.

In the 6th century BC, following further salt discoveries, salt mining also began in Dürrnberg, just a few kilometers away. Over the centuries, several mine shafts were created. Interestingly, there was a decisive difference in Dürrnberg compared to the mine in Hallein. The workers here were already using tools made of much harder iron, whereas in Hallein they were still using pickaxes made of bronze. In addition, mining technology had developed further, which was clearly reflected in the yields. The coveted and valuable salt from the Salzkammergut was now being transported to more and more parts of Europe via newly emerging trade routes. Working in the mines was not without its dangers; shaft collapses or water ingress after heavy rain brought salt mining to a standstill at times. Despite all the setbacks and dangers, mining continued undeterred, the harvest was too valuable and the yield too lucrative.

Around the same time, salt mining also began in the French region of Lorraine, south of the Moselle, near the present-day city of Nancy. There were several saline springs in the region. The climatic conditions for salt extraction through natural evaporation did not exist, so a new method had to be found. The use of large boiling pans was not yet known, but it was known that the water could be evaporated by using fire. So the brine was first concentrated and then poured into terracotta pots. These were then fired on fireplaces from below until all liquid had evaporated and the salt had completely crystallized. The vessels were carefully smashed and loaves of pure natural salt could be removed. The enormous effort seemed justified, as the salt was worth its weight in gold and precious stones at the time. Over the course of many years, excavations in the region have uncovered layers of terracotta remains, some of which were several meters thick. It is certain that the extraction method, known in technical jargon as "Briquetage de la Seille", was used until the 1st century BC, before being replaced by the first boiling pans.

Salt was also extracted from brine springs by boiling in clay pots in other regions around the world, as excavations today prove beyond doubt. The oldest finds come from China and are around 5,000 years old. This technique was used for around 2,500 years before improved salt extraction methods were developed. Salt boiling was also known over 3,500 years ago on the main Japanese island of Honshu, in the region that is now Tokyo, where the production of ceramics had been known for more than 10,000 years. At that time, salt was considered a means of payment in Japan and could be used to procure all kinds of goods and services. In Vietnam, briquetting was also used almost 3,000 years ago.

Even on the American continent, there are finds that prove that the Mayan culture knew how to cook salt. In the southern Yucatan Desert, for example, both ovens and vessels for producing salt loaves were found dating from the 7th to 10th centuries - long before Europeans discovered America.

Several places in Germany are also known where salt was boiled with the help of briquetage. This happened in Halle in Saxony around 1,000-300 BC, in what is now Schwäbisch Hall around 500-100 BC and in Bad Nauheim, in the Wetterau district of Hesse, from around 500 to 100 BC.

Today, Hall is part of many place names in German-speaking countries and is often a reference to the connection with salt. One reason for this could be the Germanic word "hal(l)", which translates as "salt works". It is also possible that the names refer to the Celtic term "Hall" for salt.

In the Polish village of Barycz, ten kilometers southeast of Krakow, numerous salt-boiling tools from the Neolithic period have been found. There are many salty springs here. When the springs slowly dried up in the early Middle Ages, the first salt wells were dug to extract the brine. In the process, large deposits of rock salt were discovered, from which the famous Wieliczka salt mine was created. Thanks to the enormous profits from the salt mines, the Polish King Casimir the Great founded the Krakow Academy in 1364, which is now known as the Jagiellonian University. It is the second oldest university in Europe after Charles University in Prague, which was founded 16 years earlier. In 1978, UNESCO even declared the salt mine to be one of the first world cultural assets worthy of special protection. In 1996, the decision was made to cease industrial salt production in the mines. However, the mines are now used as healing tunnels and the underground salt world quickly became a magnet for visitors, attracting around two million visitors from all over the world every year.

Salt also played a not insignificant role in Rome's rise to world power. The Romans had a strong interest in salt production, as it was important to secure supplies for the legions throughout the Roman Empire. The preservative effect of salt was of fundamental importance for this. If the legions had enough to eat, the morale of the troops was better. This also prevented plundering troops from helping themselves to the larders of the population of occupied territories. As a result, the population was more likely to accept the occupying troops. Part of the legions' salary was therefore paid in the form of a salt ration, the so-called salarium.

Due to the geographical and climatic conditions in Italy, the extraction of salt from sea salt pans was particularly popular. Sea water was allowed to evaporate in shallow pools located directly by the sea until salt crystallized. The Romans also brought their knowledge of salt production to large parts of the Europe they occupied, throughout the entire Mediterranean region as far as the Portuguese Atlantic coast and the Breton peninsula of Guérande. Existing sea salt works were further developed using the knowledge of the Roman occupiers or new sea salt works were created.

In the Roman Empire, the aristocratic families, known as patricians at the time, not only determined political events, but also social life. Salt was considered a valuable commodity and was a must at every festive occasion. Lavishly decorated salt pots were served with meals. If there was no salt at festive banquets, this was considered a sign of low esteem and was seen as an unfriendly, sometimes even hostile act.

The invasion of the Huns from Central Asia, the onset of the migration of peoples and the fall of the Roman Empire caused the previous structures to disappear, bringing salt mining and trade throughout Europe to a standstill. Arab peoples conquered North Africa and the Near East, and in some cases even present-day Spain. The kingdom of the Angles and Saxons emerged in Great Britain, the Visigothic kingdom formed in what is now France and Spain, while the Ostrogoths spread across Italy and the Balkan Peninsula. The Franks spread across Central Europe. It was a time of great change, both in political, social and cultural areas. It was not until the year 800 that Charlemagne became the first Western European ruler to succeed in reuniting the largest parts of Europe since the collapse of the Roman Empire. The economy and trade benefited significantly from the new Europe, and salt production also picked up again. The existing mines resumed operations, new salt works were built and salt was once again an important and sought-after commodity.

In the early Middle Ages, the era of salt boiling in large boiling pans began. Everywhere in Europe where salty springs could be found, new salt works were built and, as a result, settlements were established.

The extracted salt often had to be transported over long distances because large quantities of it were needed in other places, for example for preserving herring throughout the Baltic Sea region. The cities along the new salt routes, such as Lübeck, Magdeburg, Prague, Salzburg and Venice, enjoyed the enormous economic income from the coveted commodity, and some of them still do today. As salt was valuable and urgently needed, it brought wealth and power to the privileged few who mined or traded it. The extracted salt was transported over long distances by horse and ox cart or by ship. Increasingly larger merchant ships made it possible to transport huge quantities of salt, but this was associated with high risks. Sandbanks, rocks and dangerous rapids that were constantly forming were just as dangerous as fog banks, storms and sudden storms. In winter, sub-zero temperatures with ice and snow caused further difficulties or risks. Some salt cargoes fell into the hands of marauding hordes or pirates. High customs duties at various points along the way meant that traders were constantly looking for alternative routes, while customs officers and sovereigns sabotaged foreign routes in order to guide the trade caravans or merchant ships across their own lands and collect money. There were repeated bitter and bloody power struggles for trade monopolies. In 1157, for example, the then Duke of Bavaria and Saxony, Henry the XII, built a bridge over the Isar on the site of today's city of Munich. In order to enrich himself from the salt trade from the Salzkammergut, he then had the Isar bridge used by the salt traders destroyed by Bishop Otto von Freising in the middle of the nearby settlement of Feringa. Several attempts to rebuild this bridge, near today's Oberföhring, were skillfully thwarted. Only an arbitration ruling by Emperor Frederick Barbarossa in Augsburg in June 1158 was able to settle the dispute. Henry the Lion was granted market rights, but had to cede a third of the revenue he had thus gained to Freising. Today's city of Munich was first mentioned in a document on this day, June 14, 1158, and was granted city rights as early as 1214. One of today's largest German cities thus owes its origins to the salt trade. A few decades later, there was also open conflict in the Austrian Salzkammergut. The region was under Habsburg rule and salt was the most important economic factor at the time. Around 1290, new salt discoveries were made in the Goisern area near Lake Hallstatt, which were released for mining. Archbishop Konrad IV of Salzburg insisted on a salt monopoly, which the Habsburg Duke Albrecht I did not recognize. The ensuing conflict led to a bloody feud in which both the mining sites and the associated settlements were destroyed. Peace was only concluded in 1297 and salt mining in the region was expanded. In the meantime, fresh water had begun to be fed into the salt domes in Hallein. The salt contained there began to dissolve and once saturation was reached, the resulting brine was piped to boiling pans on the banks of the Salzach. This was probably mankind's first "pipeline". This new technique of salt extraction was a huge step forward and a real innovation.

In 1611, there was a further escalation between the Archbishopric of Salzburg and the Principality of Bavaria, which went down in history as the Salt War or Ox War. The reason for this was a massive increase in trade tariffs by Duke Maximilian I of Bavaria on all goods from Salzburg. Salt from the Hallein salt mine was particularly affected. Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau, who had ruled the archbishopric of Salzburg since 1587, then had the prince provost's office in Berchtesgaden, which was responsible for customs duties, occupied in the night of October 7-8. At this time, Berchtesgaden was an independent principality free of the empire, which was only subordinate to the emperor, but was nevertheless strongly under Bavarian influence.

Maximilian, as District Overseer of the Bavarian Imperial District authorized to maintain peace within the district, then gathered his troops and marched into Salzburg territory with 10,000 men. Tittmoning Castle was unable to withstand the brief siege, the castle captain capitulated and handed the damaged castle over to Duke Maximilian. On October 26, Maximilian marched into Salzburg, from which the archbishop had fled shortly before. The very next day, Archbishop Wolf Dietrich was captured by Bavarian soldiers in Carinthia and forced to abdicate in the spring of the following year.

In the early Middle Ages, a city emerged in the north of Germany that soon acquired great power and wealth thanks to its monopoly position as a supplier of salt throughout northern Germany.

According to an old legend, a hunter shot a white wild boar around the year 960 AD. The hide of the wild boar was covered with salt crystals and showed the hunter the way to a salt vein. Thanks to the white gold, the small town of Lüneburg quickly gained in importance, but at that time was still subordinate to the trading metropolis of Bardowick to the north. Bardowick, one of the oldest towns in Lower Saxony, was the center of long-distance trade with the Slavs and initially profited from the salt mined in Lüneburg, which was transshipped here. Just as in Munich, Henry the Lion also played a key role here. In 1158, he took over the Hanseatic city of Lübeck, which was important for the Baltic region, and granted it city rights. Salt mining also helped to make the Ilmenau from Lüneburg to the Elbe navigable, which made transshipment via Bardowick unnecessary. As quickly as Bardowick lost its importance as an economic center, Lüneburg's power grew. Lüneburg salt was a sought-after commodity and was needed throughout the entire Baltic region. Only with the valuable salt could the huge shoals of herring caught in the Baltic Sea be salted and preserved so that they could be transported as preserved merchandise even to distant regions. In addition to the waterway, Lüneburg salt was also transported to Lübeck and the herring market in Skåne in southern Sweden via the old salt route. The salt from Lüneburg was in such demand that at times more than 50 boiling huts each fired four boiling pans around the clock, seven days a week. In the year of our Lord 1465, Pope Paul II even allowed the operators of the Lüneburg boiling huts to boil salt on high holidays. Several hundred workers, including children, worked in two shifts (13 hours in the day shift, eleven hours in the night shift). The boiling pans were fired with wood from clay ovens, which meant that large quantities of wood were needed at all times. Various sources report that the famous Lüneburg Heath was created in the Middle Ages due to the immense demand for firewood from the Lüneburg salt works. This theory cannot be clearly proven, even though the Lüneburg salt works burned huge quantities of firewood to produce salt. However, it was clear that where numerous boiling pans were operated, a kind of wood industry was always created, which provided the essential fuel. At the peak of salt production, around 20,000 tons of evaporated salt were produced in Lüneburg every year. Most of the Lüneburg salt was transported directly to Lübeck and was on the road for several weeks.