tions influenced by it, in which indeed both terms occur side by side. In all these, furtlier, the material is given as gold, and even ' perfect gold ' (2 Ch 4-"), while in the older and historical sources the material is bronze (cf. 1 K 7^').
A. R. S. Kennedy.
SO (king of Egypt [il/i"?mi;ii] ; d'Tjo -)-. k-c, LXX -rf/wp, Vulg. .Sua).— According toi 2 K 17'' (AV and RV), Slialmaneser, ' king of Assyria, found conspiracy in Hoshea (king of Israel) ; for he had sent messengers to So, king of ]'"gypt, and offered no present to the king of Assyri.i.' This was the cause of the invasion that ended in the captivity of Israel. Kings of the Ethiopian dj'nasty (2.5th) were reignin" at this time in Egypt, and it has been supposed that one of these, either Shabaka or Shaljataka, was intended by 'So.'
From cuneiform sources, however, we learn that there was at this time a certain Piru, king of Musri, and that in li.c. 720, shortly after the fall of Samaria in 722, Sib'i, iarton (commander-in- chief) of Musri, was sent by him to the help of Hanno, king of Gaza, against Sargon. It was formerly thought that ' Pir'u, king of Musri,' must he ' Pharaoh, king of Egypt,' Musri corresponding in general to the Hebrew Mi?raim ; but Wiucklcr has recently shown that this Musri nmst be distinct from Egypt, and belong rather to North Arabia, in the country of the Nabatoeans. He hnds the same Musri also in the Rible under the name Mizraim, and identifies the biblical 'So, king of Egypt' (Mi^fraim) with Sib'i, the tartan of the North Arabian Musri, proposing to read n:d sh' for kid .«o' (So) (see his art. ' Pir'u, king of Mu§ri,' in Mittheil. d. vorderas. Gcscllmh. IS'.IS, 5).
The identification of So with Sliabaka or Shab- ataka seems impossible. Shishak of the 22nd dynasty, who invaded Judah and Israel in the reign of Jerolioam, is indeed entitled in tlie Bible Dns? -^7 ' king of Mi?raim,' as were the later ' Pharaohs,' Necho and Hophra. But the position of the somewhat obscure 25th dynasty with regard to the throne of Egypt was peculiar. Tirhaka, who was the last important king of Shabaka's djmasty, is entitled to '^J'? ' king of Cush (Ethiopia)' in 2 K liV', and in the cuneiform 'king of Cusi'; we might expect, therefore, to find the other kings of that dynasty bearing the same title ' king of Cush,' rather than ' king of Egypt,' if referred to in any Helnew or As- syrian record. This is a .slight additional argu- ment in favour of Winckler's theory. To the Egyptians themselves every king of Egypt in these later times, whether the Persian Darius, the Macedonian Alexander, the Roman Augustus, or the Ethiopian Tirhaka, was known as the ' Pliaraoli,' and this is the title whicli they all boie in E'-yptian legal documents. To the rest of the world Sliabaka, the Ethiopian conqueror of Egypt and the founder of the 25th dynasty, presumal>ly would be known as ' king of Ethiopia.'
F. Ll. Griffith.
SOAP, SOPE (iS, nns ; to(o) is a "eneral name for tlie class of substnnces obtained by decompos- ing fats or oils by an alk.ili such as soda or potash. Fat.s and oils are comiiounds of certain 'fatty acids' with glycerine, and in the jnocess of 'saponification' the alkali combines with the acid to form a soap, while the glycerine is set free. Sonjis dissolve readily in water, imparting to it a peculiar slippery or greasy feeling, forming a lather easily, and adding greatly to its cleansing powers.
According to Pliny {II X xxviii. 51), soap was an invention of the Gauls, who prepared it from tallow and ashes. They had two kinds of it, the hard and the liquid. Soap-making is the chief industry of modern Palestine. It is carried on in Jaffa, N&blus, Jerusalem, and elsewhere, and the
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SOBER, SOBRIETY
SODOM
product is exported along the coast, and even to Egypt and Asia Jliiior. Olive oil is used, and tho poorer qualities of it especially are turned to account in this wav. The alliiili employed is potash, and is locally known as kulij. It is ob- tained by burning certain saliferous desert plants, the chief of which is Salsola kali. This alkali resembles cakes of coarse salt, and contains many impurities, and these accumulate to form great rubbish heaps in the places where soap is made. The potash obtained from the ashes is in the form of a carbonate. This is dissolved in water, and made caustic by treatment with lime. The solu- tion or ' lye ' is then boiled, the refuse from the oil-press being used as fuel. Olive oil is added, and after repeated boilings and additions of oil the solution is allowed to cool, when the soap sets in a solid mass.
'Soap' (AV 'sope') appears tmce in EV (Jer 2^, Mai 3-). In each case it is the translation of nnii, a word connected with the root t:? ' to cleanse.' The previous clause in Jer 2P refers to "inj or mineral alkali (see Nitre). LXX translates n'"!i) in both places by iroia ('grass'). These facts suggest that vegetable alkali is to be understood rather than soap in the strict sense. The carbonate of potash contained in the ashes of plants has detergent properties similar to those of washing- soda.