HERB - dyes

[Kathleen Keeler]

Re: dyes
  Indigo makes a blue.  In the early Middle Ages they used woad, which produces
the same blue (same chemistry, differences in concentration, efficiency of
production.)  Woad isn't native to western Europe but was brought in long
before 600 AD.  Indigo is tropical:  production throughout the Middle Ages was
in India (and other tropical localities) but once reliable trade was
established, indigo replaced woad.  Both are fermented dyes--the plant parts
need to ferment in a mild acid.  Urine was the Period choice--readily available
(tho some urines are better than others) and not too strong.  And it stinks, so
its tough making blue dyes in modern urban or suburban settings.

By 1200 the dyers of England were a strong enough lobby that home-dyeing with
woad was illegal:  you had to buy from the dyers guild. Woad also "wore out the
soil" and there were ordinances forbidding people to grow in locally and for
one year's profit, exaust the soil.  By the 1300's the English were having to
protect the local dyers from indigo--a series of protective laws kept indigo
out for decades after it was readily available.  Eventually the woad lobby
lost.  (I don't know how it went on the Continent).

Indigo and woad both can make beautiful deep blues.  Not much else does.  And
this was important for making green.  Chlorophyll will make lots of yellow
greens and olive drabs, but to get "forest green" yellow over woad or indigo
blue is needed.

Top of the line, as you said, were the murex purples from the Mediterranean.
Huge numbers of animals were killed for very small amounts of these precious
dyes.  The technology was available from Roman times on, but apparently
strongly controlled due to its profitability, eventually ending up in the hands
of the Byzantines.  When Byzantium fell to the Turks in ?1480's?, this industry
and its technical secrets were lost (tho I think we can now recreate it).

Madder can make a decent red, and a number of American plants like brazilwood
(Brazil was named for the dyeplant, not vice versa) and bixa and the coccineal
beetles, added viable reds after 1492.

Logwood from the Americas made the first really good black.  The Spaniards were
showing off their dyestuffs by wearing black.

For earlier period: show your wealth by wearing purple, blue or forest green,
and red (in that order).  All of these were much tougher to produce than
browns, yellows, oranges and yellow- or olive-green.

I've had great fun creating dye-baths from whatever was abundant in the yard or
the kitchen.  If all you want is color, that's easy and very satisfying.
Getting a particular shade...ooh, that's much harder: talk to Lady Wyllow
(Wyllow, are you still reading this list?).

Agnes
Mag Mor, Calontir
PS. language is a real pain in this:  the names of colors aren't uniform.  Last
week, we had a speaker who works on bird camouflage mention in passing that the
color that North Americans (Canada and US) call scarlet is called "royal
purple" in the UK today (the color of the coats of guards at Buckingham
Palace).  So you can see how royal purple can be produced by madder (madder was
the historic dye for the British Red Coats), but madder doesn't make (American)
purple.  American purple, you know, the color of concord grapes,  purple. Wow,
its even hard to think what Thing I should refer to to be clear. How about
"Minnesota Vikings purple" ?

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