Color of murex trunculus dye

[Mr. Genugshoin]

Is there any historical evidence of murex being used for blue? It seems to have only been used for purple.
 
 
 

[rhecht]

The color the Romans prized was bluish-purple, but the murex trunculus provides a much wider range of shades in the "blue" range including blueish purple and bluish green. Our tradition is sky blue (light or dark depending how it's read) and can also be produced as such, through either sunlight or heating.

[Mr. Genugshoin]

The question is is there evidence of murex trunculus being used historically for blue

[Nosson]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_the ... _Pieux.jpg

[Yitzchok Mickler]

I clicked the link and saw a picture but I don't see how that shows M. Trunculus was used to make a blue dye.

[Nosson]

A thousand years ago even royals didn’t have synthetic dyes! Of course, we could just point to the millions of murex shells EXACTLY where Chazal said Techeles was made, so “הרי שור שחוט לפניך”. By the way, isn’t this an interesting-sounding name for a place (in Haifa)? [credit: new Techeles book by Rav Avraham Re’em]

[Mr. Genugshoin]

A thousand years ago even royals didn’t have synthetic dyes! Of course, we could just point to the millions of murex shells EXACTLY where Chazal said Techeles was made, so “הרי שור שחוט לפניך”. By the way, isn’t this an interesting-sounding name for a place (in Haifa)? [credit: new Techeles book by Rav Avraham Re’em]

 

The question was if we have historical evidence of murex being used for blue- the shells are not proof of a blue industry as it could have been a purple industry only.

[Doorknob]

There is no historical evidence of the murex ever used for blue. It is all conjecture.

[rhecht]

There is no historical evidence of the murex ever used for blue. It is all conjecture.

 

If you go only based on the Roman sources you might be right, but we have evidence it was used for Techeiles:

1. We have a Girsa from the Raavya's Girsa in Talmud Yerushalmi Brachos Perek Alef Halacha Beis (https://bluefringes.com/textual_sources ... -prasinan/) that in Techeiles and Karti have Purphirin and Prisinan following. If Karti (hebrew) and Prisinan (greek) are the same thing, Techeiles and Purphirin must mean the same thing as well. Therefore Techeiles must have been derived from the purpura which as we know is the murex species. And the one that consistently yields the blueish shades is the trunculus.

2. Rabbi Herzog (https://porphyrology.com/view-doctorate/) didn't propose the murex trunculus out of the blue. He based it off an 1833 finding from Bartolomeo Bizio that trunculus produces blue. This was decades before Henri Lacasz-Duthier's claim (https://porphyrology.com/view-doctorate ... d-argaman/).

[Mr. Genugshoin]

There is no historical evidence of the murex ever used for blue. It is all conjecture.



 

If you go only based on the Roman sources you might be right, but we have evidence it was used for Techeiles:

1. We have a Girsa from the Raavya's Girsa in Talmud Yerushalmi Brachos Perek Alef Halacha Beis (https://bluefringes.com/textual_sources ... -prasinan/) that in Techeiles and Karti have Purphirin and Prisinan following. If Karti (hebrew) and Prisinan (greek) are the same thing, Techeiles and Purphirin must mean the same thing as well. Therefore Techeiles must have been derived from the purpura which as we know is the murex species. And the one that consistently yields the blueish shades is the trunculus.

2. Rabbi Herzog (https://porphyrology.com/view-doctorate/) didn't propose the murex trunculus out of the blue. He based it off an 1833 finding from Bartolomeo Bizio that trunculus produces blue. This was decades before Henri Lacasz-Duthier's claim (https://porphyrology.com/view-doctorate ... d-argaman/).


 

1. The Raavya there who is quoting the Sefer Yerushalmi (from the times of the geonim) says that techeiles is purple, not that is comes from the purple-fish. In other words, this Raavya is proof that techeiles is purple.

2. True, he proposed it out of the purple It's no secret that the reason he rejected it was because he thought it can't dye blue, which may be true