Salt remains an indispensable and essential element to our life. We have been using it since the dawn of time. For our health, it helps maintain correct blood pressure and prevents disorders linked to an insufficient concentration of salt in the blood as seen in certain cases of dehydration. The minimum physiological requirement is around 2g/day. The iodine in sea salt is also vital for our metabolism. Iodine deficiency is associated with severe disorders; inhibiting growth to the point of causing mental disorders. The term moron was first a medical term in the 19th century for people affected by these disorders. Cretinism disappeared from 1920 when iodine was systematically added to cooking salts. We are now left with the term moron used for stupidity.
History of salt
Paleolithic & Neolithic:
Since the dawn of time or more scientifically, since the beginning of prehistory (Paleolithic) around 3 million years ago, man was a hunter-gatherer. He found the salt necessary for his diet in the game and fish that he hunted.
With the sedentarization of man during the Neolithic (-8000 years ago) man profoundly modified his diet. By learning to cultivate wild plants, this was the beginning of agriculture accompanied by the domestication of animals (necessary for hard work). In order to meet food needs in times of scarcity, salt was necessary for food preservation but also for tanning. The first processed products then appeared which were preserved in salt (meat and fish were thus preserved). Salt helps reduce water activity, water necessary for the development of microorganisms. At more than 10-15% salt, the bacteria responsible for fermentation and rotting of the food are stopped.
The main means of salt extraction during this period was simply the evaporation of salt water on a hearth.
Bronze and Iron Age:
From -2000 to the Roman conquest (bringing together the bronze and iron ages), salt production was organized and developed massively. New trade flows appear and salt becomes a symbol of prosperity for a society. The salt then enters a “food industry” making it possible to carry out all kinds of curing and benefiting a flourishing trade. (the conservation stages no longer being a concern, the transport of these foodstuffs becomes easy).
Numerous operating sites bear witness to the dynamism of salt extraction. In France there are numerous sites on the Atlantic coast (including those of Guérande) and on the Languedoc coast.
Gallo-Roman Period:
Thanks to the construction of numerous Roman communications routes, commercial salt exchanges experienced a further intensification.
The Romans used salt to preserve different vegetables. Herba Salata (Salted Herbs) was a typical dish of Ancient Rome. This dish later gave birth to the word Salad. Salad has salt as its root.
They also gave us another well-known word: Salary. The word salary comes from the Latin salarium, derived from sal, salt. “Payment for work or service rendered”, it initially designated the salt ration provided to Roman soldiers (salarium), then designated the monetary compensation paid to buy salt and other provisions (salarium). (Source Wikipedia)
Middle Ages:
During the 5th and 6th centuries, the salt marshes began to be structured, irrigation canals, eyelets and drainage systems were built. Until the 13th century, salt nevertheless remained exploited only in monasteries, the monks perfectly mastered the extraction techniques. It should be noted that in 945 the monks of Landevennec Abbey (abbey located on the Crozon peninsula) designed and built the Batz salt marshes, which would give birth much later to the famous Guérande Salt.
During the Middle Ages, techniques for producing ignigenic salt (heated by fire, “ignis” fire) were improved. Large pans are then used to heat the salt. The last one still visible can be seen in Salins les Bains (Jura).
Salt in the Middle Ages also refers to a tax: the Gabelle. This was first temporarily established by Saint Louis to finance his crusades, and was definitively imposed by Philippe VI of Valois in 1341. The monopoly on the sale of salt returned unwaveringly to the Royal power.
Rebirth:
During the Renaissance, the need for salt exploded due to the significant development of the population. The techniques are becoming more and more sophisticated. “Saumoducts” were invented to transport brine, as in Hallstatt (16th century) or at the Royal Saltworks of Arc et Senans (Doubs). In the 18th century, graduated buildings made it possible to concentrate the salt in the brine by evaporation (Arc-et-Senans).
Finally, Gabelle is the genesis of more and more popular uprisings: The most important of them is probably that, known as Jacquerie des Pitauds, between 1542 and 1548, following the attempt at unification by François I of the regimes of the gabelle: Bordeaux, Angoumois and Saintonge revolt. Notables and the governor general of Guyenne were massacred. Constable Anne de Montmorency restored bloody order, but Henry II had to relent and let the provinces return to their previous status. They will then be described as “redeemed”. Established in 1661 in Roussillon by Louis XIV, the salt tax was at the origin of the Angelets revolt (1667-1675).
In 1675, during the revolt of the Red Bonnets (who will be taken up in 2013 for another tax) which occurred in Brittany and triggered by tax measures on stamped paper, tobacco and pewter tableware, the simple mention of the salt tax can ignite the powder as at the end of July 1675 during the pardon of Saint-Urlo. It was suppressed on December 1, 1790.
Contemporary period :
The industrial revolution favored the exploitation of rock salt deposits (rock salts) both by created machines and modern communication routes. This is also the time when chemists make their entry. They develop soda and chlorine in particular (via salt). In 1789, the French chemist Nicolas Leblanc carried out a process to obtain sodium carbonate from sea salt and sulfuric acid. This is the birth of vitriol. In 1863, the Belgian chemist Ernest Solvay invented a new process for synthesizing sodium carbonate using ammonia, from salt and chalk. More profitable and less polluting, the Solvay process quickly supplanted its competitor and is still used today. Sodium carbonate is called in common language: Soda crystals or soda.
Today salt represents a global production of 280 million tonnes per year. In France, production amounts to 6 million tonnes.