Page 31

31
the ancients as a colour.   The best kind was brought from    Pontus, near
the
river Hypanis.   In the country between the states of Magnesia and Ephesus
it was procured as a powder, and so fine that it required neither grinding
nor polishing.
   Other natural mineral substances are mentioned; but the information given
by the ancients as to the nature and properties of mineral bodies, is at
the
best scanty and unsatisfactory. We may, however, mention purple, now we
are speaking of the pigments obtained from natural substances. Of all colours
none were more highly prized than the purple; and certainly none had a
richer or more pleasing appearance.   It was procured, according to Vitruvius,
from a marine shell; but the method of collecting it was rude in the extreme.
A number of the fish being obtained, the shells were broken to pieces by
an iron bar, and the purple dye was drained into mortars prepared for that
purpose. The ancients entertained some singular notions concerning this shell;
one of which was that the quality ot the colour vane
situation of the place which the fish inhabited, in regar
" Thus, that which is obtained in Pontus and Galatia,
those countries to the north, is ]*own; in those betwee
it is pale; that which is found in the equinoctial regie
of a violet hue; lastly, that which comes from southe
a red quality: the red sort is also found in the island
places near the equator."
   A purple colour was also sometimes made by tinging
root and hysginum. Indigo was well known to the ane
of its costliness an imitation was made by preparing v
it with milk.* Vegetable dyes of great beauty were iii
from which circumstance we learn that they had cai
properties of plants, as we also know from their writing
that they were not inattentive to the products of the ir