The Phoenicians were the first people to color clothes with a purple dye derived from the Murex sea snail, and this Tyrian Purple became synonymous with royalty and enormous wealth.

10:47snails known as the Murex, or rock snail. These snails produce their dye as a defense mechanism against predators, and depending on the species, can produce a vivid red or purple color quite unlike anything else available in the ancient world. From the moment these dyes were first used by Phoenicians around the 16th century BC, their colors became immediately sought after. But the process of producing these dyes was difficult and costly.

11:20It could take more than 50 kilograms of these snails to make a single gram of dye, and so, these fabrics were extremely expensive. The color purple would soon become associated with enormous wealth, and as a consequence, with royalty. This color would be known as Tyrian Purple, after the Phoenician city of Tyre, and later, Imperial Purple. It would dye the robes of the emperors of Assyria, Rome, and later, Byzantium.

11:54The first-century Roman writer, Pliny the Elder, writes about the effect this color had on anyone who saw it. For purple, the rods and axes of Rome clear a path, and it likewise marks the dignity of boyhood. It distinguishes senator from noble, and it is summoned to secure the favor of the gods. It illuminates every garment, and on the triumphal robe, it is blended with gold. But why the price?

12:25It's possible then that the term Phoinike came to be used by the Greeks to describe these traders from the rocky coast of Lebanon as the makers of purple, or the purple people. The name of the mythical creature, the phoenix, an immortal bird with red feathers, also seems to derive from the same word. With their dye industry booming, the Phoenicians began to set out on ever longer voyages out into the