Imagine that all the great discoveries of Ancient Egypt had happened in the last few years...and you will have some conception of the great excitement over recent finds in Peru Peru wears its ancient cultures wrapped around in layers, like one of the mummified bodies so well preserved by the nitrates of its deserts. After his acclaimed book on the Incas, The White Rock, Hugh Thomson unwraps those layers to show how civilisation emerged so early and so spectacularly in this toughest and most arid of terrains. Many of the extraordinary cultures of Ancient Peru, from the lines of Nasca to the temple-cult of Chavín, buried in the mountains, and the great pyramids of the coast, have only started to give up their secrets and antiquity in just the last few years. Hugh Thomson has been at the forefront of some of these discoveries himself, having made headlines with his work near Machu Picchu. Now he takes the reader on a journey back from the world of the Incas to the first dawn of Andean civilisation, to give an immensely personal and accessible guide to the wonders that have been revealed.

“You’ll finish [Greenfield’s] book with new respect for color, especially for red. With A Perfect Red, she does for it what Mark Kurlansky in Salt did for that common commodity.”—Houston Chronicle Interweaving mystery, empire, and adventure, Amy Butler Greenfield’s masterful popular history offers a window onto a world far different from our own: a world in which the color red was rare and precious—a source of wealth and power for those who could unlock its secrets. And in this world nothing was more prized than cochineal, a red dye that produced the brightest, strongest red the Old World had ever seen. A Perfect Red recounts the story of this legendary red dye, from its cultivation by the ancient Mexicans and discovery by 16th-century Spanish conquistadors to the European pirates, explorers, alchemists, scientists, and spies who joined in the chase to unlock its secrets, a chase that lasted more than three centuries. It evokes with style and verve this history of a grand obsession, of intrigue, empire, and adventure in pursuit of the most desirable color on earth.

This book reveals the fascinating history of how the natural red dyes came to various people and cultures centuries ago. Gosta Sandberg's narratives are filled with tension and drama. Historical events, tragic experiments, and amusing anecdotes are interspersed with well-informed descriptions of how the red dyes were developed and used on textile products of various kinds. Turkey red dyeing - the most complicated dyeing process ever invented by humans - is covered in depth. Gosta explores the fascinating history of Indian, Persian, and Turkey red calico prints, explaining how it is possible to find Javanese patterns on the red shawls of Dalecarleian women. The text is complemented with unique photographic material of pattern sketches, recipes, and test sample excerpts and original prints from manufacturers' archival treasures. Contemporary recipes for dyeing with madder and cochineal are also included.

Blood, rust, lava, wine—the flush of passion and the glow of approaching night—no color arrests our attention more than the color red. Today it is the flag of danger and seduction, of spirit and revolution, but throughout nearly all of human history it has held a special place in our aesthetics. In this book, Spike Bucklow brings us into the heart of this fiery hue to better understand the unique powers it has had over us. Bucklow takes us from a thirty-four-thousand-year-old shaman burial dress to the iPhone screen, exploring the myriad of purposes we have put red to as well as the materials from which we have looked to harvest it. And we have looked for it everywhere, from insects to tree resin to tar to excitable gasses. Bucklow also details how our pursuit of the color drove medieval alchemy and modern chemistry alike, and he shows us red’s many symbolic uses, its association with earth, blood, and fire, its coloring of caves and the throne rooms of goddesses, as well as national flags, fire trucks, power grids, and stoplights. The result is a material and cultural history that makes one see this color afresh, beating with vibrancy, a crucial part of the human visual world.

From antiquity to the present day, color has been embedded with cultural meaning. Associated with blood, fire, fertility, and life force, the color red has always been extremely difficult to achieve and thus highly prized." "This book discusses the origin of the red colorant derived from the insect cochineal, its early use in Precolumbian ritual textiles from Mexico and Peru, and the spread of the American dyestuff through cultural interchange following the Spanish discovery and conquest of the New World in the 16th century. Drawing on examples from the collections of the Metropolitan Museum, it documents the use of this red-colored treasure in several media and throughout the world.

This book is open access under a CC BY 4.0 license. Rethinking the ways global history is envisioned and conceptualized in diverse countries such as China, Japan, Mexico or Spain, this collections considers how global issues are connected with our local and national communities. It examines how the discipline had evolved in various historiographies, from Anglo Saxon to southern European, and its emergence in Asia with the rapid development of the Chinese economy motivation to legitimate the current uniqueness of the history and economy of the nation. It contributes to the revitalization of the field of global history in Chinese historiography, which have been dominated by national narratives and promotes a debate to open new venues in which important features such as scholarly mobility, diversity and internationalization are firmly rooted, putting aside national specificities. Dealing with new approaches on the use of empirical data by framing the proper questions and hypotheses and connecting western and eastern sources, this text opens a new forum of discussion on how global history has penetrated in western and eastern historiographies, moving the pivotal axis of analysis from national perspectives to open new venues of global history.

A Heritage of Colour explores the techniques that can be used to create a wealth of colours from 50 plants, including many that have been in constant use as dyes for over 2000 years. Inspired by the colours on textile fragments from the Iron Age and by the achievements of early dyers, the author describes some of the dyes and methods of the past and considers how they can be adapted for use by today's dyers. The book covers all the basics of natural dyeing and explains in detail how to experiment with local plants, wherever you may live, to produce a wide range of beautiful, rich colours on textile fibres. A Heritage of Colour also includes sections on dyeing with fungi, contact printing on cloth and dyeing multi-coloured fibres and fabrics. The emphasis throughout is on environmentally-friendly methods and on the thrill of personal discovery through practical experience. Follow Jenny's blog on http://www.jennydean.co.uk/