Don't turn the pages! Tell me right now, which plants can be used for dyeing?

"Remembering the green skirt, I pity the fragrant grass everywhere." This is a classic line from the famous poem "Shengchazi: Spring Mountain Mists Are About to Clear". Just because the person I miss is wearing a green skirt, I love the green skirt and the grass everywhere.

So the question is, what is the green silk skirt that makes people dream about dyed?

Part 1

Plant dyes: dyes from nature

The earliest dyeing materials obtained by humans came from nature, mainly including mineral dyes, animal dyes and plant dyes. As early as the Neolithic Age, our ancestors began to use hematite powder to dye red, but in the later continuous exploration, they found that plant dyeing had better coloring effect and fastness, with obvious advantages. After repeated practice, they mastered a set of dyeing techniques using plant dyes, so plant dyes gradually replaced mineral and animal dyes and were widely used by people.

People extract natural pigments from the roots, stems, leaves, flowers, fruits, skins and other parts of plants to make dyes, and dye them into corresponding patterns and colors according to their own needs. Plant dyeing occupies a very important position in the history of our country. The ancients divided colors into primary colors and intermediate colors. Primary colors refer to the three primary colors of red, yellow and blue and the two polar colors of black and white. The rest of the colors are intermediate colors. Except for white, other colors are mainly obtained by plant dyes. There are not many plants that can dye various intermediate colors alone. Usually, they are obtained by double dyeing with three primary colors. For example, the haunting green Luo skirt is dyed with yellow and blue.

Part 2

Red, yellow, blue and black all come together, who is holding the colorful ribbon dancing in the air

(1) Red

The red series includes red, vermilion, crimson, madder, and red. There are many plants for dyeing red, among which the most widely used are madder, safflower, and hematoxylin. In terms of the saturation and fastness of the dyed color, safflower has the highest, madder is the second, and hematoxylin has the lowest, which just meets people's demand for a variety of reds.

Rubia cordifolia L. is a herbaceous climbing vine of the Rubiaceae family, suitable for planting in most areas of my country. Its rhizomes and fibrous roots at the nodes contain alizarin, which can dye red. Rubia cordifolia is the earliest red plant dye used in my country, and is called "Ru Ru" in the Book of Songs. According to the Han Dynasty Official Rites, "The dyeing garden produces gardenia madder for dyeing imperial clothes, and this is the place." This shows the importance of madder as a dyeing plant.

When ancient people used madder to dye red, they would add alum as a mordant to make the color bright and washable. The dark red silk and longevity embroidered robe unearthed from Mawangdui Tomb No. 1 in Changsha were dyed with madder and alum.

Rubia cordifolia is easy to grow and can be harvested in spring and autumn. It can be used in all seasons after being dried and stored. It is also convenient and easy to dye, and can dye a variety of materials. It was a red dyeing plant commonly used by the ancients.

Rubia cordifolia

(Photography: Xu Wenbin)

Rubia root

(Photo source: Nitu.com)

Safflower (Carthamus tinctorius L.), also known as red and blue flower and thorny safflower, is an annual herbaceous plant of the genus Carthamus in the Asteraceae family. Its stem is upright, and the leaves in the middle and lower parts of the stem are serrated with thorns on the top of the teeth; the small yellow flowers gather into a head inflorescence, which gradually turns red; the achenes are milky white and can be used to extract oil.

The ancients used safflower for direct dyeing, especially when its petals were in the early stages of blooming, when the pigment content was relatively high. It could be used as a food pigment and also for dyeing fabrics.

Safflower contains two kinds of pigments, red and yellow. Yellow pigment is soluble in water and acidic solution. Although it has no dye value, it has medicinal value. Red pigment is easily soluble in alkaline solution, but insoluble in acidic solution. It will form red precipitate in medium or weak acidic solution. The red pigment in safflower is extracted with alkaline solution, and then excess acidic solution is added to neutralize it, so that the red pigment is precipitated. This operation is repeated many times, and the precipitated red pigment is twisted into small cakes, which are the rouge used by the ancients.

Thinking about it this way, perhaps it is because rouge in ancient times was made from plants that Jia Baoyu developed a liking for eating rouge.

When used as a red dye, the yellow pigment in safflower needs to be separated so that the dyed color will be brighter. Jia Sixie recorded this "killing flower method" in detail in "Qimin Yaoshu". In order to facilitate storage and transportation, the ancients made safflower into "safflower cakes". When using it, you only need to boil it with black plum water, and then clarify it with alkaline water or straw ash several times, and then you can dye it. Song Yingxing of the Ming Dynasty also recorded the method of preventing safflower cakes from mildewing and preparing dyes of different concentrations in "Tiangong Kaiwu". This shows that the ancients had mastered a very advanced dyeing process.

Freshly blooming red flowers

(Photography: Zhang Lijun)

Red flowers in bloom

(Photography: Xu Wenbin)

Caesalpinia sappan L., also known as Sufang, Sufang wood, and Sufang, is a small tree of the genus Caesalpinia in the Fabaceae family. Its branches have sparse thorns; the leaves are bipinnate, the pinnates are opposite, and the leaflets are papery; the flowers are gathered into panicles, and the petals are yellow when blooming, and the top one has a pink base, which is particularly conspicuous; the stamens are slightly extended, the lower part of the filaments is covered with dense pubescence, the style is slender and hairy, and the stigma is truncated; the fruit is an indehiscent reddish-brown woody pod with an outward-curved hard pointed corner, like a bird's beak; the seeds are oblong and light brown.

my country has a long history of using hematoxylin as a red dye. Ancient books such as the Southern Plants and Trees of the Jin Dynasty, and the Duoneng Bishi and Tiangong Kaiwu of the Ming Dynasty all have records of hematoxylin. Remove the bark and sapwood of hematoxylin, take the heartwood, and use it for dyeing after drying in the shade. The heartwood contains hematoxylin, and adding different mordants can produce a variety of colors such as red, crimson, and grape purple. It has always been an important raw material for dyeing by ancient people.

Sumac wood

(Photo source: Nitu.com)

(2) Yellow

"Heaven and Earth are Dark Yellow". In ancient times, yellow was considered the color of the earth and the color of the emperor's and empress's clothes. In ancient times, many plants were used to dye yellow, mainly gardenia and rutabaga.

Gardenia (Gardenia jasminoides Ellis), also known as water horizontal branch and mountain yellow branch, is an evergreen shrub of the genus Gardenia in the Rubiaceae family. Its flowers are fragrant and usually grow alone at the top of the branches; the fruit is yellow or orange-red with wing-like longitudinal ridges. Gardenia fruit contains gardenia yellow pigment, which can be used to make yellow dye. According to the "Flora of China", gardenia is widely distributed. Under different growing environments, gardenia will mutate and can be mainly divided into two types: one type is usually called "mountain gardenia", the fruit is oval or nearly spherical, smaller, and more suitable for medicinal use; the other type is usually called "water gardenia", the fruit is oval or oblong, larger, and more suitable for dyeing.

Since the Western Zhou Dynasty, gardenia has become the main material for dyeing yellow. After the ripe fruit is soaked and boiled, it can be directly dyed into a bright yellow color. It can be used as a natural food pigment additive and can also be used to dye textiles. Mordants can also be added to it to dye yellow of different shades, such as light yellow and dark yellow.

The "golden embroidery thread and khaki silk fabric" unearthed from the No. 1 Han Dynasty Tomb in Mawangdui, Changsha, was dyed with gardenia. However, although the color is good, it is not resistant to sunlight.

Gardenia fruit

(Photography: Zhang Lijun)

Maclura tricuspidata Carriere, also known as mulberry wood, is a deciduous shrub or small tree of the genus Cudrania in the Moraceae family. It is dioecious, with both male and female inflorescences in spherical capitula; the fruit is a fleshy spherical aggregate fruit, orange-red when ripe. The heart of the wood of Tuomu is yellow, and the color it dyes is reddish yellow, which is called Tuohuang.

The fabrics dyed by Tuomu are yellow with a red hue, and the color is dazzling. Since the Sui and Tang Dynasties, yellow has been the color of the emperor's clothes. The "Six Codes of the Tang Dynasty" records that "Emperor Wen of the Sui Dynasty wore a Tuo yellow robe and a scarf to attend court." During the reign of Emperor Gaozong of the Tang Dynasty, it was stipulated that "scholars were not allowed to use red and yellow as miscellaneous decorations on their clothes." In the Ming Dynasty, it was expressly forbidden for officials and civilians to wear yellow clothes, including turmeric yellow, willow yellow and other yellow series. In the Qing Dynasty, bright yellow became the exclusive color of emperors' clothing.

Cucurbita chinensis branches

(Photo: Cho Seung-e)

(3) Blue

"Blue comes from blue and is better than blue", both blue and blue come from indigo. "Blue cloth" is the color of clothes worn by ordinary people in ancient my country, so the demand for blue dye was particularly high in ancient times. Indigo does not refer to a specific plant, but a general term. Indigo can be dyed blue because it contains indigo. Indigo dyeing uses reduction oxidation technology, which has been used since the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. Depending on the dyeing time, number of times and dye concentration, different shades of blue can be dyed, including light blue, sky blue, dark blue, cyan and other colors. The indigo used in ancient times mainly included indigo and indigo.

According to the Flora of China and the Flora of Hainan, the indigo plant in ancient books is the "Isatis indigo" (Strobilanthes cusia (Nees) Kuntze) that we know today. It is a perennial herbaceous plant of the genus Strobilanthes in the family Acanthaceae and bears fruit once. Its stem is slightly woody, erect or with a base that bends outward; the purple flowers gather in spike-shaped inflorescences; the dried root is the medicinal material Isatis root, also known as southern Isatis root. Because the leaves of Strobilanthes contain blue indigo, Strobilanthes was used for indigo dyeing in ancient my country, and it is also the most widely used indigo dye.

Leaves of Isatis

(Photo source: Nitu.com)

Isatis root

(Photo source: Nitu.com)

Polygonum tinctorium Ait. is an annual herbaceous plant of the Polygonaceae family. Its stem is upright and usually branched; its leaves are ovate and dark blue-green when dry; its light red flowers gather in spikes. Polygonum tinctorium has been planted in my country since the Xia Dynasty, and its growth habits are well known. Polygonum tinctorium is used for dyeing because its leaves contain indigo glycosides, from which indigo can be extracted.

At first, the ancients could only dye fabrics with fresh indigo grass directly after soaking them in water, and the dyed colors were blue or green, but not cyan. Later, after continuous exploration and practice, the ancestors created indigo manufacturing technology, which could not only dye cyan, but also broke the seasonal restrictions, making the indigo dyeing method feasible in all seasons, greatly facilitating the transportation and storage of dyes.

Indigo leaf

(Image source: China Plant Image Library)

Indigo flower

(Photo source: Nitu.com)

(4) Black

In different dynasties in ancient my country, the status of black was different. The Qin Dynasty favored black, and everything from clothes to pennants and flags was considered superior. Black was also considered superior during the Wei and Jin Dynasties, and the aristocracy in the capital Jiankang (now Nanjing, Jiangsu) was famous for wearing black. The Wuyi Lane in the poem "The setting sun is slanting at the entrance of Wuyi Lane" by the Tang Dynasty poet Liu Yuxi was named because the aristocratic children living in this lane liked to wear black clothes (i.e. black silk clothes). In most periods after this, black was the color of clothes for the common people, also known as "black clothes".

The plants used by the ancients to dye black mainly include soapberry, gallnut, and Chinese tallow tree. The soapberry refers to the fruit of the Fagaceae plant; the gallnut is the gall formed on the young branches and leaves of the Rhus genus of the Anacardiaceae family. The dyed parts mostly contain tannins, also known as tannins. Tannins can dye plants black through the action of mordants.

Gallnut

(Photo source: Nitu.com)

Tallow Leaves

(Photography: Zhang Lijun)

Since plant dyes have relatively poor color fastness and depth when used to dye textiles, plant dyes have gradually withdrawn from the market. Today, with the development of society, the concepts of ecology, nature, and environmental protection have gradually gained popularity. Humans use modern scientific and technological means to optimize dye extraction and dyeing processes by adopting methods such as fiber pretreatment, ultrasonic vibration, and non-metallic mordant dyeing. Natural plant dyes have once again entered the public eye, and technology has made the living environment better.

References:

1. Tan Guangwan. Research on plant dyes in ancient China[D]. Northwest Agriculture and Forestry University, 2009.

2. Zhou Qi. Development of plant-based natural mordants and their application in wool fabric dyeing and functional finishing[D]. Southwest University, 2021.

3. Ding Yun. Study on the extraction of active ingredients and dyeing properties of walnut green peel[D]. Xinjiang University, 2016.

4. Wang Hui et al. Study on the black tone of tussah silk dyed with gallnut[J]. Knitting Industry, 2020(11):44-48.

5. Huang Baokang. The colorful world: Talking about plants and dyeing [J]. Life World, 2008, 44-47.

6. Liu Jixuan. Application of indigo dyeing technology in ancient cyan plant dyeing[J]. Theoretical Discussion, 2021(11):133-134.

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8. Flora of China http://www.iplant.cn

Produced by: Science Popularization China

Produced by: Cao Cheng'e, Wuhan Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Producer: Computer Network Information Center, Chinese Academy of Sciences

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