Song Dynasty there was a synthetic detergent, is the natural soap pods (also known as soap horn, hanging knife, soap pods, commonly known as soap horn) crushed and finely ground, coupled with spices and other things, made of orange-sized ball, designed to wash the face of the body, commonly known as the "Soap Dough". Song Zhou Mi, "Wulin old story" Volume VI "small brokerage" recorded that the Southern Song Dynasty capital of Lin'an has specialized in the operation of the "soap ball" businessman. Ming Li Shizhen "Compendium of Materia Medica" recorded the manufacturing method of "Soap Dough": "Soap pods are born in the mountains, the tree is tall, the leaves are like sandalwood and soap pods leaves, blossom in May and June, the pods are three or four inches, plump and fleshy, with a number of black seeds, as large as a fingertip, not round, with a white kernel, edible. October pick pods, boiled and mashed, and white flour and all the incense for pills, bath body and face, remove dirt and greasy moist, better than soap pods. The name of the plant is "Soapberry". In addition to natural soap pods, plants such as Sapindales have also been passed down in folklore as a good detergent. The "Taiwan Prefectural Records" has this record: "The Yellow Eye Tree is the Sapindus tree. Two or three feet high, solid as loquat, yellow color, skin crepe, used for clothing, pulp like soap." It has a history of at least a few hundred years, and its peel produces foam when rubbed with water, which has been used by Taiwanese people for laundry. Because it contains yellow pigment, clothes can be washed for a long time to be careful of being dyed yellow. It is also rumored that rubbing this into the hair can always keep the green silk black and shiny, both cleaning and moisturizing effects.

In the West, may be traced back to 4,000 years ago in ancient Greece, a small island called Lesbos. The locals sacrificed animals to the gods, and as the animals were burned with wood, the ashes of the wood and the animal fat mixed to produce a soap-like yellow substance. Heavy rains washed this into the rivers where the local women often washed their clothes, and they found that they washed their clothes cleaner as a result. Although traces of soap-like use can be found from ancient Greece, history records that a poetess named Sappho (Sappho, aponification) recorded these stories. Later people in her honor, the process is called saponification, the chemical name is soap making (Soap Making). In addition, in 3000 B.C., the Mesopotamians discovered that the alkaline substance from the ashes of burning plants, when mixed with oil, has the power to remove dirt, which is also one of the sources of soap. The Gauls, however, were probably the first to attempt to make soap and succeeded in doing so, calling it "sapo," which at the time was an ointment containing a mixture of animal fats and plant ashes. When the sapo method was gradually introduced to the Mediterranean region, the Arabs modified sapo into a hard soap made from olive oil and soda. At this time, soap began to be manufactured in large quantities. The use of soap became widespread in the 18th and 19th centuries. After the Industrial Revolution at the end of the 18th century, large quantities of inexpensive sodium carbonate became available, leading to new developments in the soap industry. But to the mid-20th century, the development of synthetic chemistry and petrochemical detergents provide cheap chemical raw materials, prompted the rise of synthetic detergents, making the development of the soap industry has undergone great changes, but in recent years, environmental awareness of the rise of handmade soap has been ignored only to rise again, due to the handmade soap has its own natural unique properties, a variety of components are very easy to be biodegradable and easy to be sewage treatment processes Microbial decomposition in the sewage treatment process, and therefore does not cause pollution problems in rivers, lakes and waterways.