Page:History of Art in Phœnicia and Its Dependencies Vol 2.djvu/465

TEXTILES. 425 dyes taken from them lay in the fact that they were rendered more brilliant by exposure to sunlight instead of being faded by it. 1 The colouring matter is a yellowish-white while still in the body of the animal ; to the materials upon which it is used it gives first a lemon-yellow tint, next a greenish-yellow, which finally passes under the influence of the sun into red or violet. 2 It is the violet tone that the Mediterranean fisherman or the experimenters of a laboratory obtain from the murex when a quite simple process is used, the other tints were the result of certain mixtures and manipulations which would, no doubt, be readily discovered, were dyers ever again to turn to the murex. 3 P"IG. 364. The Murex trunciilus. From Lortet. Such a return is not likely, however ; too many shells would be required. In these days rapidity of production and cheapness are of more importance than solidity and durability, and they can only be obtained by the use of baths so large that it would be difficult to fill them with the Syrian dye. Each murex furnished a very small quantity of the colouring matter, and the Phoenician dyeworks must have used millions every year. Thus, at Sidon, on the cliff 1 POLLUX, i. 49. 2 LACAZE-DUTHIERS, Mhnoire, 3 and 4. 3 Upon the way in which these molluscs were gathered, and their dyes prepared, the most important texts are those of PLINY (Nat. Hist. ix. 60-65) and POLLUX (i. 45-49). Upon the observed differences between the tints obtained, see LACAZE- DUTHIERS (Memoire, 12), and the specimens on paper bound up in his work, at page 83). VOL. II. 3 I