The red-blue conundrum: an archaeo-linguistic approach to red dyes and blue flowers in prehistory

Mikkel Johansen Nørtoft

The red-blue conundrum: an archaeo-linguistic approach to red dyes and blue flowers in prehistory

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Abstract

Plants from the Rubiaceae family (Rubia, Galium, and Asperula) are often grouped together as madder because they have
been used for dyeing red since at least the Bronze Age. The English plant name madder can be traced through the Germanic
language all the way back to Proto-Indo-European (PIE), as spoken by pastoralists on the Pontic-Caspian steppes c.
4500 to 2500 BC. The word can be reconstructed as PIE *modʰ-r- by the comparative linguistic method. However, there is a
difficulty with this. The other Indo-European language branches indicate an original meaning of ‘blue’ for this word, which
is hard to reconcile with the appearance and use of Rubiaceae. In the search for the missing link between madder-red and
the original PIE meaning of ”blue”, this paper widens the scope of dyeplants to others with pigmented roots. It suggests
that the missing link could be a blue-flowered plant species from the Boraginaceae family which has red-pigmented roots,
perhaps originally used for cosmetics.

Original language	English
Journal	Archaeological Textiles Review
Issue number	59
Pages (from-to)	44-66
Number of pages	22
ISSN	2245-7135
Publication status	Published - Dec 2017

Keywords

Faculty of Humanities

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Cite this

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title = "The red-blue conundrum: an archaeo-linguistic approach to red dyes and blue flowers in prehistory",

abstract = "Plants from the Rubiaceae family (Rubia, Galium, and Asperula) are often grouped together as madder because they havebeen used for dyeing red since at least the Bronze Age. The English plant name madder can be traced through the Germaniclanguage all the way back to Proto-Indo-European (PIE), as spoken by pastoralists on the Pontic-Caspian steppes c.4500 to 2500 BC. The word can be reconstructed as PIE *modʰ-r- by the comparative linguistic method. However, there is adifficulty with this. The other Indo-European language branches indicate an original meaning of {\textquoteleft}blue{\textquoteright} for this word, whichis hard to reconcile with the appearance and use of Rubiaceae. In the search for the missing link between madder-red andthe original PIE meaning of ”blue”, this paper widens the scope of dyeplants to others with pigmented roots. It suggeststhat the missing link could be a blue-flowered plant species from the Boraginaceae family which has red-pigmented roots,perhaps originally used for cosmetics.",

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N2 - Plants from the Rubiaceae family (Rubia, Galium, and Asperula) are often grouped together as madder because they havebeen used for dyeing red since at least the Bronze Age. The English plant name madder can be traced through the Germaniclanguage all the way back to Proto-Indo-European (PIE), as spoken by pastoralists on the Pontic-Caspian steppes c.4500 to 2500 BC. The word can be reconstructed as PIE *modʰ-r- by the comparative linguistic method. However, there is adifficulty with this. The other Indo-European language branches indicate an original meaning of ‘blue’ for this word, whichis hard to reconcile with the appearance and use of Rubiaceae. In the search for the missing link between madder-red andthe original PIE meaning of ”blue”, this paper widens the scope of dyeplants to others with pigmented roots. It suggeststhat the missing link could be a blue-flowered plant species from the Boraginaceae family which has red-pigmented roots,perhaps originally used for cosmetics.

AB - Plants from the Rubiaceae family (Rubia, Galium, and Asperula) are often grouped together as madder because they havebeen used for dyeing red since at least the Bronze Age. The English plant name madder can be traced through the Germaniclanguage all the way back to Proto-Indo-European (PIE), as spoken by pastoralists on the Pontic-Caspian steppes c.4500 to 2500 BC. The word can be reconstructed as PIE *modʰ-r- by the comparative linguistic method. However, there is adifficulty with this. The other Indo-European language branches indicate an original meaning of ‘blue’ for this word, whichis hard to reconcile with the appearance and use of Rubiaceae. In the search for the missing link between madder-red andthe original PIE meaning of ”blue”, this paper widens the scope of dyeplants to others with pigmented roots. It suggeststhat the missing link could be a blue-flowered plant species from the Boraginaceae family which has red-pigmented roots,perhaps originally used for cosmetics.

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