Today cleanliness is a common courtesy to those around us, and this makes soap a necessity. Even the earliest people knew that water would clean dirt off their bodies. Because of this, they not only lived near water for drinking purposes but for cleaning as well. Imagine what it smelled like to live in close proximity with no soap bar to scrub off your scent! Many people originally used just water to bathe, but artifacts in ancient Babylon suggest evidence of soap making that dates all the way back to 2800 B.C. Records from the Ebers Papyrus also suggest that Egyptians washed regularly with a soap-like material made out of vegetable and animal oils and salts. Grocery shelves today carry hundreds of soaps for your body, clothes and dishes in thousands of scents from fresh laundry to zesty lemon!