Chromatographic Investigations of Purple Archaeological Bio-Material Pigments Used as Biblical Dyes

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis article discusses recent scientific research performed by the author in understanding the composition of archaeological purple pigments and dyes from molluskan sources, which were primarily used for the dyeing of royal and priestly textiles, as also cited in the Bible. Towards this end, the high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) method has been applied to the qualitative and quantitative multi-component fingerprinting of purple pigments extracted from various Muricidae mollusks inhabiting the Mediterranean waters. The results show that the colorants in these purple pigments belong to three chemical groups: the indigoids (of major importance), the indirubinoids, and the isatinoids. Application of this analytical method to purple pigments and dyes on archaeological artifacts from the ancient Near and Middle East has lead to a number of breakthroughs and discoveries made by this laboratory. These include the following: decipherment of the optimal method by which the ancients practiced purple-dyeing by completely natural means; first HPLC analysis of a raw unprocessed purple archaeological snail pigment and the resulting identification of a dibrominated indirubin in this pigment; discovery of the purple pigment as the sole paint pigment on a 2,500 royal marble jar from the Persian King Darius I; and the discovery that a 2,000 year old miniscule fabric found atop the Judean Desert palatial fortress of Masada belonged to the royal purple mantle of King Herod I and is the first Biblical Argaman dye found in ancient Israel.