James Helfner/Getty Images Daylily Blooms . Perkin’s purple, otherwise known as aniline purple, or mauveine, was the first synthetic dye. Gather the blooms (fresh or dried) and use an alum mordant to achieve the dark bluish-purple dye.

This dye was very special for all the civilisations around the Mediterranean and its use spanned whole centuries. The synthesis transformed purple’s elite status, and probably saved the lives of a great many snails. Dye History from 2600 BC to the 20th Century by Susan C. Druding Originally written for a Seminar presented in Seattle, Washington at Convergence 1982, a bi-annual gathering of weavers, dyers and spinners .

As early as 3000 years ago, the ancient Phoenicians made three major discoveries: They gave us the alphabet we are using today. They also extracted another dye, Royal Blue, from a closely related species. The surprising role of the color purple in history. The most famous purple dye in the ancient world was Tyrian purple, made from a type of sea snail called the murex, found around the Mediterranean. Purple, a shade varying between crimson and violet. 2600 BC Earliest written record of the use of dyestuffs in China 715 BC Wool dyeing established as craft in Rome 331 BC Alexander finds 190 year old purple robes when he conquers …

Created from the desiccated glands of sea snails, the colour purple has nevertheless come to define royalty. As with iris, you will need the darker red blooms of daylily varieties to extract a purple dye. Cloth dyed with Tyrian purple was a hugely successful export and brought the Phoenicians fame throughout the ancient world. They discovered that by heating silicon oxide, found in unlimited quantities in the sands of the Mediterranean beaches, they could make glass. The deep crimson colour was called in Latin purpura, from the name of a shellfish which yielded the famous Tyrian dye.

The first historical record of the dye is in texts from Ugarit and Hittite sources, which indicate that the manufacture of Tyrian purple began in the 14th century BCE in the eastern Mediterranean. The History of Purple. One variety is even called "nearly black". (See history section above). In human color psychology, purple is associated with royalty and nobility because Tyrian purple was only affordable to the elite. The dye initially used to make purple came from the Phoenician trading city of Tyre, which is now in modern-day Lebanon. A dye that did not fade with time but instead increased in brilliance with exposure to air and sunlight. And, by extracting the secretions of the seashell Bolinus brandaris … During many ages Tyrian purple was the most celebrated of all dye colors, and it was possibly the … In western Polynesia, residents of the islands made a purple dye similar to Tyrian purple from the sea urchin. The word “purple” comes from the Old English word “purpul,” which is from the Latin “purpura” and from the ancient Greek “porphyra.” This was the name of the Tyrian purple dye manufactured in classical antiquity.

For centuries, the purple dye trade was centered in the ancient Phoenician city of Tyre in modern day Lebanon. The most well-known shellfish dye was the Tyrian purple, royal purple or imperial purple as it was called, which came from sea snails in the Eastern Mediterranean in the ancient city of Tyre. The dye was called Tyrian Purple, after the Phoenician port city of Tyre. Kelly Grovier looks at how the hue shook off its unexpected source.