from Hacker News

Purple dye extracted from sea snails made the Phoenicians rich traders (2020)

by Ballu on 4/7/22, 3:35 PM with 31 comments

  • by petercooper on 4/7/22, 5:38 PM

    You know when people ask hypotheticals like "if you were transported to medieval times, had to live there, and can take one thing with you" and you realize how useless computers, phones, or light bulbs would be? I think my new answer is a bottle of exotically colored dye!

  • by texan on 4/8/22, 12:32 AM

    While this article focuses on Nouira’s rediscovery of this process, much research has been done on how to consistently create specific colors long before his quest began. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tekhelet

    https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/ancient-cultures/w...

  • by anonu on 4/7/22, 8:06 PM

    There is speculation that the Phoenicians made it to present day USA thanks to their advanced seafaring capabilities. [1]

    Nonetheless, the same Phonenician explorer spirit contributed to the shaping of what is modern day Lebanon today. The Lebanese, as early as the 1500s and 1600s had strong ties to the regions of Italy and France. This is why Lebanon has been more on the West-leaning side than other Middle Eastern countries.

    [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_Phoenician_discovery...

  • by JunkEmu on 4/7/22, 10:42 PM

  • by EricE on 4/7/22, 5:25 PM

    I love articles like this - it's easy to think of ancient peoples as being dumb, but I'm always amused when you come across stuff like this and find there is more in common with them than we often think.

  • by wara23arish on 4/8/22, 3:13 AM

    I’m from where the Phonecians originated.

    It makes me sad to see the state Lebanon is today, but ironically part of the reason of the Phonecians’ demise was they didn’t have a strong enough army, relied on mercenaries and ultimately the major city states were not unified.

    Funny (sadly) enough, all of the conditions above remain true.

    Damn you Alexander

  • by egberts1 on 4/7/22, 5:06 PM

    A good read about how a conquered civilization can lose their trade secrets.

  • by Ballu on 4/8/22, 1:49 AM

    The prohibitive cost was one of the reason purple is used only in 2 countries flags, Its even once banned by British royalty except royals to reduce expenditure by commoners.

    https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/country-flags-with-purpl...

  • by throwaway6734 on 4/7/22, 11:21 PM

    https://www.libertarianism.org/podcasts/free-thoughts/how-te...

    A really interesting podcast about this! Apparently the dye absolutely STUNK,