12 America}! Seashells 



colonizers of that region as early as 1500 B.C., were largely due to their 

 monopoly of the Tyrian purple dye. The ancient cities of Tyre and Sidon 

 (now Souro and Saidi in Lebanon) became great banking centers and the 

 crossroads of commerce between Asia, Africa and western Europe. Although 

 archaeological findings indicate that purple dye from species of Murex was in 

 use in Crete as early as 1600 B.C. and in Egypt by 1400 B.C., these two 

 Phoenician cities had managed to monopolize the industry and to expand 

 their prosperous enterprises by 1000 B.C. The continual search for new beds 

 of Murex is probably one of the reasons for their later colonization of Malta, 

 Sicily, Utica, Carthage and Gades (now Cadiz). These ports served as trad- 

 ing stations and, as evidenced by the great piles of unearthed Murex shells, 

 as subsidiary purple dye factories. The imperial coins of grateful Tyre bore 

 for many years the imprint of the Murex shell. It is interesting to note that 

 the name Phoenicia comes from the Greek phoenix, "red," which may well 

 allude to the red or magenta color variations of the molluscan purple. 



It is now the general consensus that three species of marine snails were 

 used in the Mediterranean. Although all three were present in many areas, 

 the city of Tyre employed in the main Murex brandaris, while the great 

 banks of shells discovered near Sidon in recent times were almost exclusively 

 made up of Murex trunculus (see plate 10, figs, i and j). The "buccinum" 

 of the Roman naturalists probably was Thais haemastovm. 



The high cost of the purple dye was largely due to the long and arduous 

 process of manufacture. A recent experimenter used about 12,000 specimens 

 of Murex brajidaris before obtaining 1.5 grams of pure dye, and he estimated 

 that one pound of dye in ancient times was worth from $10,000 to $12,000. 



The dye-producing fluid is exuded from an elongate gland which is 

 situated on the inner wall of the mantle between the rectum and the gills. 

 The fluid is colorless to milky-white when first produced, but when exposed 

 to direct sunlight, it changes immediately to bright yellow, then passes 

 through shades of pale-green to bluish and finally red-purple. During this 

 photochemical process a strong odor is given off which resembles rotting 

 garlic. The Tyrians collected vast quantities of living snails and ground up 

 the smaller specimens in caldron-shaped holes in the rocky shore. Larger 

 specimens were cracked open and the gland-supporting mantle ripped off 

 and thrown into the holes. Salt was added to this juicy mass to prevent excess 

 rotting, and then the sun was allowed to act on it for two or three days. 

 This material was transferred to vessels of tin or lead and then diluted with 

 five or six times its bulk in water. A ten-day period of moderate boiling fol- 

 lowed, during which time the scum was constantly removed. Test pieces of 

 wool were allowed to soak for five hours to ascertain if the desired strength 

 of dye had been reached. 



Our modern concept of purple is quite different from that of the 



