In September 2009 an international team of archaeologists searching for traces of ancient pollen discovered minute fragments of fibres on a cave floor in the Republic of Georgia. The small fibres were from flax plants growing wild in the area and were dyed pink, turquoise and black using natural dyes made from plants and roots. Samples were dated using radio carbon dating and appear to be over 30,000 years old. The fragments were so numerous they are evidence that stone age man would have taken strands of flax to the cave to weave into linen and thread. They are the oldest evidence for coloured clothing and dyeing.
There is written evidence that dye was used in China in 2600 BC. Tests on fragments of cloth found in the tomb of the Egyptian pharaoh, Tutankhamen reveal traces of alizarin, a pigment extracted from madder and used for dying. The Romans had established wool dying industries in their city by 715BC. Alexander the Great found 190 year old robes in the Persian treasury at Susa in 331BC and four years later mentions "beautiful printed cotton" in India. The Romans also found that the Gauls were dyeing blue designs on their skin using woad.
The process of colouring fibres, yarns or fabrics has been around for a long time. The dyes used have come from natural products and usually require some sort of 'fixative' to make the colour more permanent. One colour which was very desirable in the ancient world was purple. This came from a small shell fish which secreted a minute amount of a deep purple fluid. The colour was harvested by cracking the shell of the mollusc open and digging the colour from a vein near its head. It is estimated that it took eight and a half thousand shellfish to produce one gram of the dye. Hence the dye was extremely expensive and in most of the ancient cultures this meant that purple became a colour only worn by royalty.
One of the oldest dyes is that of kermes. This is mentioned in the Bible book of Genesis (38:28) as a scarlet or crimson and is made from the dried bodies of a female insect, the Kermes ilices. By the 4th century AD other dyes used included woad (blue from leavest), madder (red from roots), weld (yellow from seeds), brazilwood (red from the wood) and indigo (blue from leaves). Iron and copper salts were also used as a dye; red, yellows and brown ochres were obtained from iron oxides. The Aztec and Mayan Indians of Central America used a red dye made from the cochineal beetles which lived on cacti. Conquered Mayan cities were forced to pay a tribute which included decorated cotton blankets and bags of cochineal dye. Conchineal is still harvested today in the Canary Islands. In 1727 a method using kelp(seaweed) was developed in Scotland to bleach linen, and in 1766 a Dr. Cuthbert Gordon patented a dye called Cudbear (named after his mother) made from lichens.
Interestingly traditional British army uniform coats were red in colour. This was not selected as a colour because as has often been suggested that the red would not show up blood when a person was shot. It was selected because red dye was plentful and therefore cheaper. The eventual change to khaki came in a similar way. Sir harry Lumsden commanded a British army unit in India in 1846. He found the traditional pants didn't suit the hot conditions and so began wearing pyjama pants, which were baggier and made from a lighter material. To disguise this embarassing fact he died the pants with a local dye, mazari, made from plants. The Indians called these pants khakis from the Hindu word for 'dust'. Two years later the British adopted these pants for all infantry serving in India. During the American civil war the Confederate army wore a light grey uniform but because of blockades by the North material was hard to come by. Many soldiers took northern uniforms and dyed them using a dye made from acorns, walnut shells and lye. This produced a light tan colour called butternut and became a very common uniform for the south.
The colours produced from these natural dyes were inconsistent, unpredictable and would often fade or wash out. There were also only a limited range of colours which could be produced. This changed in 1856 when an 18 year-old chemistry student was experimenting with coal tar, trying to produce an artificial quinine as a cure for malaria. The student, William Perkins, found he had produced a grubby looking residue which exhibited "a strangely beautiful colour". He had accidentally made the world's first synthetic aniline dye, producing a colour which later came to be called mauviene (mauve). Perkins found his dye was always consistent in colour and drew considerable interest from the royal family. It was quickly found to have an industrial value and Perkins started his own factory in London to produce the dye.
Perkin's discovery revolutionized dye making allowing others to develop many other colours and dyes. Two years later the French patented a synthetic red dye called magenta or fushsine. Other synthetic colours quickly followed. In 1905 Adolf von Baeyer (inventer of the aspirin) discovered how to produce a synthetic indigo (one of the most popular dyes) and the natural dye was quickly replaced. Natural dyes very soon lost their popularity to the more consistent and brighter synthetic ones. By the outbreak of World War 1 very few manufacturers were using natural dyes. Natural dyes are today finding a resurgence as people seak 'natural', environmental friendly alternatives and organic handicrafts turn to 'natural' products.
