color

Kermes

Colors & materials

A Mediterranean crimson dye from kermes insects on oak. Not cochineal, and not scarlet as an English color word alone.

  • Kermes is used in Dye.

    Pliny’s Natural History treats the kermes/coccum insect scarlet among cloth dyes of the Mediterranean. A Roman-era dye use of the oak scale, not cochineal and not scarlet as an English color word alone.

    from Pliny the Elder · Natural History, c. 77 CE

    used in · sourced · documented

sources