The Dead Sea has attracted visitors from around the Mediterranean basin for thousands of years. In the Bible, it is a place of refuge forKing David. It was one of the world's first health resorts (for Herod the Great), and it has been the supplier of a wide variety of products, from balms for Egyptian mummification to potash for fertilizers. People also use the salt and the minerals from the Dead Sea to createcosmetics and herbal sachets.
The Dead Sea seawater has a density of 1,240 kg/m3, which makes swimming similar to floating.