Chapter II

Review of Related Literature

This chapter states some theories, principles, facts, and certain studies that will serve as a basis of the research process. Relevant and Fundamental information can be gathered and obtains in this chapter to provide a foundation for the outcome of this research.

A. Research Literature

Abracia pointed that people have invented new materials to take place or improve those found in nature to have more food and much better preparation of that food.

Many household products contain lye, the chemical sodium hydroxide. Lye is a caustic, alkaline chemical, which means it dissolves sticky substances like fat, and has a high degree of reactivity with other materials. Lye, in a flake, granular, or liquid form, is very dangerous and can cause damage to surfaces and people.

Lye is created out of a chemical reaction between soda, known as sodium carbonate, and calcium hydroxide, or lime. In raw form, it's made into solid flakes, chips, or grains. Chemical suppliers provide lye to manufacturers to make a wide variety of products, such as fabric, paper, personal soap, laundry detergent, pool-cleaning supplies, metal polishers, and drain de-cloggers. Since households utilize so many poisonous products, they must take care to keep cleaners out of the reach of children and only use them as directed. For instance, carefully follow the directions to clean a sterling silver gravy boat with lye-based polish, because even the fumes can be dangerous. Never uses products like drain de-clogger or paint stripper without enough air circulation.

Caustic lye products pose other dangers to surfaces. They can dissolve substances to your advantage, like hair clogs in a shower drain, as well as to your detriment, such as the adjacent shower curtain. In fact, lye can damage and corrode paint, metal, cloth, plastic, and especially skin. Lye can be so reactive that, in its solid form, it should be kept away from metals, such as aluminum, and the open air. It's usually non-combustible when dry, but could ignite when mixed with water and cause a fire.

Before the modern manufacture of lye, people were able to make it out of raw materials. For thousands of years, people have used lye for soap making and tanning hides. They burned certain hardwoods at a very high temperature to make white, not gray, ashes. Apple trees, oak, and seaweed kelp make ideal fuels. Then water, mixed with a bit of baking soda, penetrates the ashes and removes the lye they contain. When the ashes are filtered out, the water holds enough lye to dissolve fat left on animal furs, or to mix with other ingredients to make strong body soap.
Amaranthus, collectively known as amaranth or pigweed, is a cosmopolitan genus of herbs. Approximately 60 species are presently recognized, with inflorescences and foliage ranging from purple and red to gold. Members of this genus share many characteristics and uses with members of the closely related genus Celosia.

Although several species are often considered weeds, people around the world value amaranths as leaf vegetables, cereals and ornamentals.

The word comes from the Greek amarantos (Αμάρανθος or Αμάραντος) the "one that does not wither", or the never-fading (flower).

Amaranthus shows a wide variety of morphological diversity among and even within certain species. Although the family (Amaranthaceae) is distinctive, the genus has few distinguishing characters among the 70 species included.[1] This complicates taxonomy and Amaranthus has generally been considered among systematists as a “difficult” genus.[2]

Formerly, Sauer (1955) classified the genus into 2 sub-genera, differentiating only between monoecious and dioecious species: Acnida (L.) Aellen ex K.R. Robertson and Amaranthus. [2] Although this classification was widely accepted, further infrageneric classification was (and still is) needed to differentiate this widely diverse group.

Currently, Amaranthus includes 3 recognized sub-genera and 70 species, although species numbers are questionable due to hybridization and species concepts.[3] Infrageneric classification focuses on inflorescence, flower characters and whether a species is monoecious/dioecious, as in the Sauer (1955) suggested classification.[1] A modified infrageneric classification of Amaranthus was published by Mosyakin & Robertson (1996) and includes 3 subgenera: Acnida, Amaranthus and Albersia. The taxonomy is further differentiated by sections within each of the sub-genera.[4]

In some cultures it was known as a mythical flower that never fades.
Amaranth, or Amarant (from the Greek amarantos, unwithering), a name chiefly used in poetry, and applied to Amaranth and other plants which, from not soon fading, typified immortality.
Aesop's Fables (6th century BC) compares the Rose to the Amaranth to illustrate the difference in fleeting and everlasting beauty.

A Rose and an Amaranth blossomed side by side in a garden,
and the Amaranth said to her neighbour,
"How I envy you your beauty and your sweet scent!
No wonder you are such a universal favourite."
But the Rose replied with a shade of sadness in her voice,
"Ah, my dear friend, I bloom but for a time:
my petals soon wither and fall, and then I die.
But your flowers never fade, even if they are cut;
for they are everlasting."
Thus, in John Milton's Paradise Lost (1667), iii. 353:
"Immortal amarant, a flower which once
In paradise, fast by the tree of life,
Began to bloom; but soon for man's offence
To heaven removed, where first it grew, there grows,
And flowers aloft, shading the fount of life,
And where the river of bliss through midst of heaven
Rolls o'er elysian flowers her amber stream:
With these that never fade the spirits elect
Bind their resplendent locks."
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, in Work without Hope (1825), also references the herb, likely referencing Milton's earlier work. (ll 7-10 excerpted):
Yet well I ken the banks where Amaranths blow,
Have traced the fount whence streams of nectar flow.
Bloom, O ye Amaranths! bloom for whom ye may,
For me ye bloom not! Glide, rich streams, away!

The original spelling is amarant; the more common spelling amaranth seems to have come from a folk etymology assuming that the final syllable derives from the Greek word anthos ("flower"), common in botanical names.

In ancient Greece the amaranth (also called chrusanthemon and elichrusos) was sacred to Ephesian Artemis. It was supposed to have special healing properties, and as a symbol of immortality was used to decorate images of the gods and tombs. In legend, Amarynthus (a form of Amarantus) was a hunter of Artemis and king of Euboea; in a village of Amarynthus, of which he was the eponymous hero, there was a famous temple of Artemis Amarynthia or Amarysia (Strabo x. 448; Pausan. i. 31, p. 5). It was also widely used by the Chinese for its healing chemicals, curing illnesses such as infections, rashes, and migraines. The "Amarantos" is the name a several-century-old popular Greek folk song:

Look at the amaranth:
on tall mountains it grows,
on the very stones and rocks
and places inaccessible.

Finnish symphonic metal band Nightwish featured a song titled Amaranth on their 2007 album Dark Passion Play.
The Swedish doom/gothic band Draconian (band) have released a song called The Amaranth, where the plant is used as a symbol for the dark side of Venus.
Orson Scott Card's novel Speaker for the Dead features a plant called amaranth native to the planet Lusitania, where the majority of the story takes place.