FULLER (כָּבַס, H3891, to trample or tread; γναφεύς, G1187). One who cleans, shrinks, and thickens newly shorn wool or cloth. Also in ancient times the fuller often dyed cloth. The root of the Heb. word כָּבַס, H3891, meaning “to tread,” suggests what was chiefly involved in the fuller’s art. Before material could be used for a garment, it was necessary first to free it from the oily and gummy substances that adhered to the raw fiber. This was done by first washing the material with some cleansing substance like white clay, putrid urine, or nitre which was made from the ashes of certain plants that grew in Egypt. Soap was unknown in ancient times. The material was then washed free from the alkali by many changes of clean water or by boys treading on it in a running stream. After that it was placed in the sun to dry and bleach. Because of the odors given forth in the process of fulling, the fuller’s shop was usually outside the city (2 Kings 18:17; Isa 7:3; 36:2).

In Malachi 3:2 God is compared to a refiner’s fire and to fullers’ soap. In the NT the word is used only once (Mark 9:3), where the garments of Jesus at the time of His transfiguration are described as being whiter than any fuller on earth could whiten them.

Bibliography R. J. Forbes, Studies in Ancient Technology (1956), IV, 81-89.