Earwax Earwax Earwax, also known by the medical term cerumen, is a gray, orange, or yellowish waxy substance secreted in the ear canal of humans and other mammals. It protects the skin of the human ear canal, assists in cleaning and lubrication, and also provides some protection against bacteria, fungi, insects, and water. Earwax consists of shed skin cells, hair, and the secretions of the ceruminous and sebaceous glands of the outside ear canal. Major components of earwax are long chain fatty acids, both saturated and unsaturated, alcohols, squalene, and cholesterol. Excess or compacted cerumen can press against the eardrum or
Soul and Body poem" (246). Furthermore, the language of the poem is West Saxon in nature, and lends itself to an "Irish-influenced Mercian literary school" of thought, or the common thought found in the kingdom of Mercia, one of the ancient, Anglo-Saxon kingdoms found in what is now Great Britain (Lapidge 426). Based on language patterns and thematic elements, "Soul and Body" was most likely copied in the late 9th or early 10th century, "plausibly during the reign of Æthelstan." "Soul and Body" is a poem in which the soul addresses its body. It is clear, as Moffat notes, that there is an