indigo [was Re: [Sca-cooks] Puritans, was: Canadian Friends]

[Pixel, Goddess and Queen]

On Mon, 8 Oct 2001, Philip & Susan Troy wrote:

> Pixel, Goddess and Queen wrote:
>
> > What he said. And I still haven't found any sources that tell me whether
> > it's safe to use inert indigo (the dyeing process involves oxidation) to
> > color one's pottage, as mentioned in the Anglo-Norman sources, or if they
> > just meant indigo-colored, ie, blue. And in that case, what are my options
> > for blue? I mean, I can very easily saunter over to the tackle box of joy
> > and find the blue icing color, but that doesn't tell me what my period
> > counterpart would have used.
>
> Tournesole ( a bugloss relative, apparently) can produce an allegedly
> edible blueish-purple, and it's mentioned fairly often in
> fourteenth-century English recipe sources. And there's at least one
> fifteenth-century recipe that calls for a green coloring to be mixing
> infusions of saffron with "ynde wawdeas", which could conceivably be an
> indigo reference, or perhaps woad. And then there's the simple expedient
> of making an almond-milk-based mawmenny with certain types of red wine,
> which, again, produces a somwhat more purple shade than a blue. It's
> also possible that the medieval color sense was slightly different from
> ours, and that some purples were regarded as blue.
>
> Adamantius

Hmmmm. There are recipes for dyeing leather (and I think fabric, but
maybe not) blue using elderberries or the skins of black grapes
(Piemount). I know from personal experience that elderberry syrup dyes
pancakes a dark bluish purple, but more purple than blue It also dyes
tablecloths, napkins, carpets, and clothing, although I never tried
leather or hair, and I don't remember if the (white) cat was in the line
of fire or not.

I've dyed with indigo, and it is definitely a blue, not a
blue-purple. OTOH, Tyrian purple, (Imperial purple, royal purple) is
almost a deep red rather than the bluer purples we are used to.

I may have to embark upon a study of the medieval color sense, in my
copious spare time.


Margaret