3000-year-old Iron Age purple dye factory found in Israel operated for 500 years
For the first time, archaeologists discovered an industrial purple-dye factory that remained in business for 500 years between 1100 and 600 BCE in Israel, highlighting a famous and mysterious color in textile history.
The color purple had long symbolized political and spiritual authority and wealth. However, until now, little evidence has surfaced of a physical location where extraction and processing took place.
A team from the Zinman Institute of Archaeology at Tel Aviv University and the University of Chicago recently uncovered the first site in “the entire world” at the fishing village of Tel Shiqmona on Israel’s Carmel coast. And the number and diversity of artifacts discovered were “unparalleled,” according to a study published in PLOS.
The groundbreaking discovery serves as a first benchmark for the future; Tel Shiqmona might assist archaeologists in locating more purple-dye production sites, as demand was high in Biblical times.
Large-scale dyeing facility
The ancient luxury production house first surfaced in crushed shells. The raw material was green, then purple when exposed to the air. The process for dyeing fleeces and fibers involved a complex system of harvesting mollusks, their storage, dye extraction, preparation of the dyeing solution, and the actual dyeing, the study explains.
The organization divided the extraction and application of the coveted dye into two separate production processes. That clarified a muddled understanding in this area of research. Both industries were present at the site.
Using chemical, mineralogical, and contextual analyses, researchers connected several categories of artifacts. They provided the first direct evidence of the instruments used in purple-dye production in the Iron Age Levant, a period spanning the biblical Kingdom of Israel to the First Temple of Jerusalem.
The team identified 176 artifacts associated with the dye production or involved in the dyeing process. They divided the instruments into six categories.
Purple was popular
The first three sets of artifacts concern the same type of vat. It could hold up to 350 liters of dye, confirming the industrial size of the textile facility. Some shards were stained purple, others were devoid of color. They also found fragments that once belonged to the uppermost part of the rim. The vats would have been sunk into the ground. Smaller and thinner fragments of potsherds speckled in purple revealed they had been stained in refuse contexts. Basalt grinding stones, bowls, and hammerstones indicate that workers used these as extraction tools.
“This is the largest such assemblage ever uncovered around the Mediterranean in any period, by two orders of magnitude.” And the industry, much like today, “was a messy business” that left behind waste.
And where there is one, there is usually more; the hunt for more purple-dye production houses continues. The study authors concluded with advice from real estate: “location, location, location.” Most likely, organizations, big and small, would have set up shop near thriving marine ecosystems.
Source: Interesting Engineering
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3000-year-old Iron Age purple dye factory found in Israel operated for 500 years