09-30-2013, 10:46 PM
For several years a friend of mine has been trying to dye fabrics using dyes that would have been available to the Romans, as an exercise to see just what would be possible. The results have been fascinating. Reds of just about any shade can be obtained using madder with various mordants and with different pH levels (acidity). Reds can also be obtained using Ladies Bedstraw (but the reds are much duller). The only blue colour that would be cheap enough for mass use would have been woad (actually indigo). Yellows can be done using either weld (which has a greenish tinge) or saffron (much more expensive, but a deeper colour, more like chrome yellow oil paint). Other colours can result from using two successive dye baths (e.g. black using iron tannate from oak galls over-dyed with woad and purple from a combination of red and blue - madder and woad).
From the point of view of this question, horse hair is relatively easy to dye using madder and again, several different shades can result from minor changes in the dye-bath conditions (see below). Feathers, however, were a different matter. Only very pale shades could be obtained and the colour would easily wash out. This really should not be a surprise as feathers are not fibrous in nature and (although a protean material) there is little that can be done chemically to attach the dyestuff. Indeed, in several instances in an effort to get the dye to 'stick', values of pH from each end of the scale (i.e. high values of acidity close to pH3 and alkalinity, pH9-10) caused the feathers to decompose.
One wonders how the yellow feathers that Arian mentions for the cavalry were dyed. The conclusion we came to was that the feathers were probably not 'feathers' at all - but could possibly have been strips of cloth, dyed yellow, and attached to a wire armature. The Romans we know could produce wire as the draw plates have been found at several sites.
I've attached pictures here to show the sort of results that were achieved, including those from the horse hair experiments.
Mike Thomas
(Caratacus).
[attachment=8065]Horsehairmaddervariousexperiments.jpg[/attachment] Horse hair dyed using madder root under various conditions.
[attachment=8066]indigo.jpg[/attachment] Indigo (woad) shades
[attachment=8067]madderwoadweld.jpg[/attachment] Wool dyed with madder, indigo (woad) and weld.
From the point of view of this question, horse hair is relatively easy to dye using madder and again, several different shades can result from minor changes in the dye-bath conditions (see below). Feathers, however, were a different matter. Only very pale shades could be obtained and the colour would easily wash out. This really should not be a surprise as feathers are not fibrous in nature and (although a protean material) there is little that can be done chemically to attach the dyestuff. Indeed, in several instances in an effort to get the dye to 'stick', values of pH from each end of the scale (i.e. high values of acidity close to pH3 and alkalinity, pH9-10) caused the feathers to decompose.
One wonders how the yellow feathers that Arian mentions for the cavalry were dyed. The conclusion we came to was that the feathers were probably not 'feathers' at all - but could possibly have been strips of cloth, dyed yellow, and attached to a wire armature. The Romans we know could produce wire as the draw plates have been found at several sites.
I've attached pictures here to show the sort of results that were achieved, including those from the horse hair experiments.
Mike Thomas
(Caratacus).
[attachment=8065]Horsehairmaddervariousexperiments.jpg[/attachment] Horse hair dyed using madder root under various conditions.
[attachment=8066]indigo.jpg[/attachment] Indigo (woad) shades
[attachment=8067]madderwoadweld.jpg[/attachment] Wool dyed with madder, indigo (woad) and weld.
visne scire quod credam? credo orbes volantes exstare.
