Whale oil - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Whale oil is the oil

Oil

An oil is any substance that is liquid at ambient temperatures and does not mix with water but may mix with other oils and organic solvents. This general definition includes vegetable oils, volatile essential oils, petrochemical oils, and synthetic oils....

obtained from the blubber

Blubber

Blubber is a thick layer of vascularized adipose tissue found under the skin of all cetaceans, pinnipeds and sirenians.-Description:Lipid-rich, collagen fiber–laced blubber comprises the hypodermis and covers the whole body, except for parts of the appendages, strongly attached to the musculature...

of various species of whale

Whale

Whale is the common name for various marine mammals of the order Cetacea. The term whale sometimes refers to all cetaceans, but more often it excludes dolphins and porpoises, which belong to suborder Odontoceti . This suborder also includes the sperm whale, killer whale, pilot whale, and beluga...

s, particularly the three species of right whale

Right whale

Right whales are three species of large baleen whales consisting of two genera in the family Balaenidae of order Cetacea. Their bodies are very dark gray or black and rotund....

(Eubalaena japonica
North Pacific Right Whale
The North Pacific right whale is a very large, robust baleen whale species that is now extremely rare and endangered. The Northeast Pacific subpopulation, that summers in the southeastern Bering Sea and Gulf of Alaska, may have no more than 50 animals...

, E. glacialis
North Atlantic Right Whale
The North Atlantic right whale which means "good, or true, whale of the ice") is a baleen whale, one of three right whale species belonging to the genus Eubalaena, formerly classified as a single species. With only 400 in existence, North Atlantic right whales are among the most endangered whales...

, and E. australis
Southern Right Whale
The southern right whale is a baleen whale, one of three species classified as right whales belonging to the genus Eubalaena. Like other right whales, the southern right whale is readily distinguished from others by the callosities on its head, a broad back without a dorsal fin, and a long arching...

) and the bowhead whale

Bowhead Whale

The bowhead whale is a baleen whale of the right whale family Balaenidae in suborder Mysticeti. A stocky dark-colored whale without a dorsal fin, it can grow to in length. This thick-bodied species can weigh to , second only to the blue whale, although the bowhead's maximum length is less than...

(Balaena mysicetus) prior to the modern era, as well as several other species of baleen whale. Train oil proper is right whale oil, but this term has been applied to all blubber oils and, in Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

and Sweden

Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

, to all marine animal oils: fish oil

Fish oil

Fish oil is oil derived from the tissues of oily fish. Fish oils contain the omega-3 fatty acids eicosapentaenoic acid , and docosahexaenoic acid , precursors of certain eicosanoids that are known to reduce inflammation throughout the body, and are thought to have many health benefits.Fish do not...

s, liver oils, and blubber oils. The most important whale oil was sperm oil, which comes from the head cavities (not blubber) of the sperm whale

Sperm Whale

The sperm whale, Physeter macrocephalus, is a marine mammal species, order Cetacea, a toothed whale having the largest brain of any animal. The name comes from the milky-white waxy substance, spermaceti, found in the animal's head. The sperm whale is the only living member of genus Physeter...

.

Whale oil flows readily, is clear, and varies in colour from a bright honey yellow to a dark brown, according to the condition of the blubber from which it has been extracted.

Sperm oil is the oil from the head cavity of the sperm whale. (The oil from the sperm whale's blubber is just a common whale oil.) Sperm oil is chemically a liquid wax

Wax

thumb|right|[[Cetyl palmitate]], a typical wax ester.Wax refers to a class of chemical compounds that are plastic near ambient temperatures. Characteristically, they melt above 45 °C to give a low viscosity liquid. Waxes are insoluble in water but soluble in organic, nonpolar solvents...

and not a true oil. A large sperm whale can hold as much as three tons. Stearin

Stearin

Stearin , or tristearin, or glyceryl tristearate is a triglyceride, a glyceryl ester of stearic acid, derived from animal fats created as a byproduct of processing beef. It can also be found in tropical plants such as palm. It is used as tallow in the manufacture of candles and soap. In the...

and spermaceti

Spermaceti

Spermaceti is a wax present in the head cavities of the sperm whale . Originally mistaken for the whales' sperm , spermaceti is created in the spermaceti organ inside the whale's head and connected to its nasal passage...

may be separated from sperm oil at low temperatures; at under 6 °C (42.8 °F) these constituents may be almost completely crystallized and filtered out. When removed and pressed, this deposit is known as whale tallow

Tallow

Tallow is a rendered form of beef or mutton fat, processed from suet. It is solid at room temperature. Unlike suet, tallow can be stored for extended periods without the need for refrigeration to prevent decomposition, provided it is kept in an airtight container to prevent oxidation.In industry,...

, and the oil from which it is removed is known as pressed whale oil, yet is sometimes passed as sperm oil.

The first principal use of whale oil was as an illuminant in lamps

Oil lamp

An oil lamp is an object used to produce light continuously for a period of time using an oil-based fuel source. The use of oil lamps began thousands of years ago and is continued to this day....

and as candle wax. It was a major food of the aboriginal peoples of the Pacific northwest

Pacific Northwest

The Pacific Northwest is a region in northwestern North America, bounded by the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains on the east. Definitions of the region vary and there is no commonly agreed upon boundary, even among Pacific Northwesterners. A common concept of the...

, such as the Nootka

Nootka

Nootka may refer to:* The Nuu-chah-nulth indigenous peoples and their Nuu-chah-nulth language* The place called Nootka Sound* The island known as Nootka Island* The three treaties signed in the 1790s, known as the Nootka Conventions...

. Whale oil later came to be used in oiling wools for combing and other uses. It was the first of any animal or mineral oil to achieve commercial viability. It was used to make margarine

Margarine

Margarine , as a generic term, can indicate any of a wide range of butter substitutes, typically composed of vegetable oils. In many parts of the world, the market share of margarine and spreads has overtaken that of butter...

and was the basis of very effective protective paint for steel, e.g. the original (but not current) Rust-Oleum

Rust-Oleum

Rust-Oleum is a maker of protective paints and coatings for home and industry use. It was founded in 1921 by Robert Fergusson after he noticed that raw fish oil spilled on rusty metal decks stopped corrosion from spreading....

.

Whale oil's predominant place in society was mostly eliminated with the development of kerosene

Kerosene

Kerosene, sometimes spelled kerosine in scientific and industrial usage, also known as paraffin or paraffin oil in the United Kingdom, Hong Kong, Ireland and South Africa, is a combustible hydrocarbon liquid. The name is derived from Greek keros...

from coal in 1846, and the advances in petroleum

Petroleum

Petroleum or crude oil is a naturally occurring, flammable liquid consisting of a complex mixture of hydrocarbons of various molecular weights and other liquid organic compounds, that are found in geologic formations beneath the Earth's surface. Petroleum is recovered mostly through oil drilling...

drilling in the late 19th century, which led to petroleum-based waxes and oils replacing whale oils in most nonfood applications. With the 1986 International Whaling Commission

International Whaling Commission

The International Whaling Commission is an international body set up by the terms of the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling , which was signed in Washington, D.C...

(IWC) moratorium on commercial whaling, whale oil has all but ceased to be viable, as substitutes have been found for most of its uses, notably jojoba oil

Jojoba oil

Jojoba oil is the liquid wax produced in the seed of the jojoba plant, a shrub native to southern Arizona, southern California, and northwestern Mexico. The oil makes up approximately 50% of the jojoba seed by weight....

In literature and memoirs

The pursuit and use of whale oil, along with many other aspects of whaling

History of whaling

The history of whaling is very extensive, stretching back for millennia. This article discusses the history of whaling up to the commencement of the International Whaling Commission moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986....

, are discussed in Herman Melville

Herman Melville

Herman Melville was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet. He is best known for his novel Moby-Dick and the posthumous novella Billy Budd....

's Moby-Dick
Moby-Dick
Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, was written by American author Herman Melville and first published in 1851. It is considered by some to be a Great American Novel and a treasure of world literature. The story tells the adventures of wandering sailor Ishmael, and his voyage on the whaleship Pequod,...

. In the novel, the preciousness of the substance to contemporary American society is emphasized when the fictional narrator notes that whale oil is "as rare as the milk of queens." John R. Jewitt

John R. Jewitt

John Rodgers Jewitt was an armourer who entered the historical record with his memoirs about the 28 months he spent as a captive of Maquinna of the Nuu-chah-nulth people on the Pacific Northwest Coast of what is now Canada...

, an Englishman who wrote a memoir about his years as a captive of the Nootka people on the Pacific Northwest

Pacific Northwest

Coast in 1802–1805, describes how what he calls train oil was used as a condiment with every dish, even strawberries.

Friedrich Ratzel

Friedrich Ratzel

Friedrich Ratzel was a German geographer and ethnographer, notable for first using the term Lebensraum in the sense that the National Socialists later would.-Life:...

in The History of Mankind (1896), when discussing food materials in Oceania, quoted James Cook's comment in relation to "the Maoris" saying "No Greenlander was ever so sharp set upon train-oil as our friends here, they greedily swallowed the stinking droppings when we were boiling down the fat of dog-fish."

In literature and memoirs

See also

Further reading