Madder Red

A History of Luxury and Trade

Robert Chenciner

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2003
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• eBook ISBN:
  9781135796129
• Subtopic: Ethnic Studies
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Madder red is an ancient dyestuff, extracted from the root of the madder plant, growing in many countries around the world. The secret and devilishly complex Oriental dyeing process to obtain the lustrous colour known as Turkey Red was avidly sought by Europeans, from the time before the fall of Ancient Rome. It was finally cracked by the French about 1760, who were able to dye wool, silk and cotton bright red. After the lowlands of the Caspian Caucasus had been subdued by the Russians in the early 1800s, madder was cultivated there and rapidly became the main crop. The quest for Turkey Red went hand in hand with an avalanche of scientific research, which not only improved the yield of dyestuff from the roots but led to its chemical synthesis and in 1870 the collapse of the world-wide madder industry. Many of the nascent dye companies grew into chemical giants of our time. Further regional and cultural background may be found in Chenciner's Daghestan: Tradition and Survival, also published in the Caucasus World series.

1

Russian Dreams of the Bearded Root

Profitable Study

WE BELIEVE that there are excellent prospects for Derbent madder production, depending on the ability of madder production to satisfy demand while keeping prices sufficiently high… It is therefore of interest to study madder production in Europe.1 The French figures are of importance to Russia because the climates in Alsace and Avignon are similar to the climates in the Caucasus.

This version of the story of madder is based on the three Russian sources written about 1860. Naturally they do not entirely agree with each other, drawing from different informants and covering an encouragingly wide range of disciplines. Where possible, later sources are used to fill in the gaps and to update various discoveries in areas such as dye analysis, archaeology and history. For convenience the three sources are referred to as Shtorkh, Karpov and The Ministry. These were written against a background of a 40-year boom in the world and Russian textile industries and consequent demand for madder red dyestuff.

The longest account, some 270 octavo-sized pages in Russian, was written by P.A.Shtorkh, who was an active member of the Imperial Economists’ Society, the Imperial Russian Geographical Society and so on. He assembled an impressive amount of quantitative information about the 19th century, concentrated on the second 30-year period. His manual on the cultivation and economics of madder was written with a view to persuading the Russian reader—whether farmer, landowner, investor or banker—that it was a profitable enterprise.

In his foreword to the second account, Lt Karpov of the Ural Cossack Corps outlined his mission in terms of trade warfare against Central Asian madder:

The quantity of dried madder roots from the Derbent region and the rest of the Caucasus is not sufficient to supply the growing demand of the Russian textile industry. Proof of this is the amount of madder imported to Russia via Orenburg from the Bukhara region. Even though the quality of the Bukharan madder roots leave much to be desired, their price is relatively high. According to Orenburg statistics for 1857, 20,499 poods 10 pounds from Bukhara were sold for 57, 420 roubles 25 kopeks in silver. To save payment of 20,000 silver roubles a year to Bukhara, the Governor-General of the Orenburg and Samara region decided to start cultivating madder on vast tracts of the Urals and Syr. Accordingly, Governor A.A.Katenin has sent me to Derbent to research accurately about madder seeds and madder cultivation. The Governor-General has requested the Governor of the Caucasus to assist me in my research and indeed he has been most helpful. The following 37-page article about madder is the result of my journey to the Caucasus…

The third 63-page account made up of several anonymous extracts from the Kavkaz’ Gazet was published by the Ministry of Agriculture and Industry for the Caucasus and Zakavkaz, based in Tblisi. The self-evident purpose was to encourage economic development in the region. In 1850, as Prof Kh.-M. Khashaev pointed out, the governor of Derbent stated that madder had even overtaken the traditionally most important local manufacture of arms.2

The Caucasus was subdued by the Russians over a lengthy and hard-fought war against the Daghestanis and Chechens, who were led by Imam Shamil from 1831. The war lasted from 1800 to his final surrender in 1859. The madder rich regions of Daghestan near Derbent were under Russian control from the early 1800s and organised madder cultivation was the prize of stability from Russia’s new colony.

2

The Word & the Plant

A Worldwide Word

ONE WAY of finding out where something existed is to see which languages have a word for it. A refinement is to date the earliest occurrences of the word by its appearance in ancient languages. Words for madder appear in the Ancient Oriental languages, in Biblical period languages, in Classical and Old European languages, and in modern Oriental and European languages. There are also words for artist’s madder lake in several languages (see appendix 2.1, page 313).

The English word ‘madder’ is derived from Old English madere, which corresponds to Old High German matara and Old Norse ma’dra.1 ‘Madderise’ appears to be the only related English word, used to describe white wine which is brown or turning brown with the effect of oxygen with age.2 Gustav Schaefer, who wrote thoughtfully about madder, recognised “how closely the madder plant is linked with the idea of red is revealed by the names given to it in various languages.” The Greeks called it erythrodanon, ereuthedanon and teuthrion3 (erythros=red), and phenix, phoinix;4 the Romans rubia, rubidus, rubeo or rubia passiva;5 and the Germans rote, with Germanic Old English reeod, reead, rauudas. Names in other languages include: Arabic

fuwwa, Hebrew

pu’ah, Coptic απЄI apei, Ancient Egyptian

Chinese

qian. All these names are the commonest terms for red in their respective languages.6

A recent study of how ordinary English people, meaning ‘non-colour-specialists’, attach names to colours, received 10,000 responses: 200 different colours were classified in six main categories from ‘basic’ to ‘elaborate’ and ‘idiosyncratic’. It was found that the colour names of past centuries that would fall into their “elaborate” category, “such as madder,” “have not survived.”7 Perhaps this book will show that such popular judgement was premature.

“His bands are red with jp 3, as me who is smeared with his own blood”—Ancient Egytian hieroglyphs (Germer)

Dyer’s Madder

There is a difference between the botanist’s and the dyer’s meanings of the word ‘madder’. The botanical term refers to members of the Rubiaceae natural family, most of which grow wild. Dyers generally use cultivated madder and by far the most commonly used madder is Rubia tinctorum known as ‘dyer’s madder’. Diderot and Le Pileur referred to ‘Rubia tinctorum sativa’.8

Rubia sylvestris wild madder, by Theodore Zwinger, Basle, 1744 (Schaefer, CIBA Review)

Other madder dyes were also used to supply the world-conquering Indian printed cotton industry which flourished until the 1750s. For completeness I have listed all the other dye-containing members of the Rubaiceae family and all other plants which contain red dye in their roots, which are strictly speaking pseudomadders (see appendix 2.2, page 314).

With the exception of the Indian dyes, the other dyes appear in a far smaller number of textiles or other dyed objects in countries where Rubia tinctorum was not indigenous and was not planted. Small quantities of wild madder such as Rubia peregrina and Rubia sylvestris were used for dyeing, but the roots of the cultivated Rubia tinctorum traditionally contained the richest dyestuffs and the plant was an excellent propagator. These plants may be distinguished by analysis because cultivated Rubia tinctorum contains mainly alizarin and the wild varieties do not. They contain purpurin and other colourants (see Glossary).

Botanical Description of Rubia Tinctorum

The New Royal Horticultural Society Dictionary of Gardening states that the Rubiaceae or Madder family contains 630 genera and 10,400 species. Only a small proportion were used as dye plants. Madder is a native Rubiaceae evergreen of the eastern Mediterranean and Central Asia, where the Climatic Zone 6 of hardiness prevails—that is minimum temperatures of 0° to 10°F.9 It does not grow north of 52° longitude, though seeds have been reputedly found in Aberdeen. Madder belongs to the variety stellatae—star-leafed.10 It belongs to a class of plants which have an annual stalk but a perennial taproot.11 It is a hardy growth, reaching a height of between two and four feet.

Rubia tinctorum is the most common cultivated variety of madder. The long, weak, jointed stems are square and hairy. It has spear-shaped, elliptic leaves, 3 in long and lin at their widest, disposed in verticils in groups of four to six, hispid underneath the leaf, but smooth on the upper surface. The small yellowish flowers which appear in its second and third year of growth spring from loose branchy spikes, growing from opposing pairs of branches which proceed from the joints of the stem. The corollas of the flowers are divided into four parts and resemble stars. The flowers are succeeded by black shiny berries.12 The dried seeds have the appearance of peppercorns (see page 92).

Karpov’s more personal botanical comments breathed life into the plant: “When the spring weather was favourably wet and warm, the seeds produced their first shoots in two to three weeks. At first, two oblong fluffy leaves appeared with the empty seed husk and soon after the fragile stein with three leaves followed, which was why some people thought that the seed produced five leaves at the same time. During the first year, there was only one stem, but during the second and third years several stems appeared from a single root. The stem and leaves were covered with microscopic thorns wich gave the plant a sticky feel and caused it to grow along the ground. During the second year a few seeds could already be seen among the flowers.”

Dyer’s madder (Rubia tinctorum)—six botanical impressions (clockwise from top left): Reynath, La Botanique, 1774 (Harley; ack. Royal Harticultural Society); Culpeper’s Complete Herbal (ed. Kelly 1821 [1653]; ack. Anthony Ray); Gerard’s Herball, 1597, recut by Pomet (Adrosko); attr: to Mattioli,… Dioscorides de materia medica, 1562 (ack, Christopher Mendes & Paul Grinke, CIBA Review); Elisabeth Blackwell, Sammlung der Gewäscbse, 1754 (Schweppe); Theodore Zwinger, Herborium, 1596 (Sandberg)

Rhind was a ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Dedication
• Map of Madder in World History
• Acknowledgements
• Foreword: The Gifted Eye
• 1. Russian Dreams of the Bearded Root
• 2. The Word and the Plant
• 3. The 5000-Year-Old Root: History in the Old World
• 4. The Venturers’ Legacy
• 5. The Care of Madder from Seed to Sack
• 6. The Farmer’s Rewards, Banks and Bankruptcy
• 7. The Purer the Colour: Ground Krap and Garancine
• 8. Inside the Vat: the Hunt for the Dyestuff
• 9. Almond Husks, Brick Dust and ’Super-Fine-Fine’
• 10. Leonardo’s Choice Madder Lakes
• 11. The Secret Recipes of Turkey red
• 12. An Oriental Tradition
• 13. Fashionable Prices
• 14. The 19th-Century Madder Boom
• 15. Coal Tar Reds and the Death of Madder
• 16. William Morris: the Sumptuous Resurrection
• 17. The Dyer’s Grail: Alchemical Philosophies and Folklore
• Glossary
• Appendices
• Notes
• Select Bibliography
• Index