Cochineal

Cochineal

Cochineal is a natural red dyestuff obtained from the body of the female scale insect, Dactylopius coccus Costa (formerly Coccus cacti) native to the nopal cactus (Cactus oputia or C. coccinilifera) in Mexico, the Canary Islands, and in Central and South America. The dye is extracted using water or alcohol from sun- or oven-dried insects that are collected from the cacti.

While known and cultivated in Mexico and the Peruvian Andes, cochineal first entered Europe when Spain brought it in 1523. It spread quickly, a colorant more potent than any of the other Old World red dyes.

In Ms. Fr. 640:

Fol. 38v – “Scarlets”
Because one aulne costs seven or eight lb to dye, they use cloths worth seven or eight francs an aulne. But whoever wants something beautiful should buy white cloth worth fifteen francs an aulne & have it dyed with pure scarlet pastel woad & a little cochineal. Black cloth is thin so that the dyeing is inexpensive.

“Cochineal” The Conservation and Art Materials Encyclopedia (CAMEO), ed. Michele Derrick. http://cameo.mfa.org/wiki/Cochineal.

Elena Phipps, Cochineal Red: The Art History of a Color (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2010).

Jo Kirby, “Lake,” Grove Art Online. 2003; Accessed 17 Dec. 2021. https://www.oxfordartonline.com/groveart/view/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.001.0001/oao-9781884446054-e-7000048810.

Image: Illustrations of cochineal collection in José Antonio de Alzate y Ramírez, Memoria sobre la naturaleza, cultivo, y beneficio de la grana…, (Essay on the Nature, Cultivation, and Benefits of the Cochineal Insect), 1777. Colored pigment on vellum. Newberry Library, Edward E. Ayer Manuscript Collection, VAULT Ayer MS 1031.

Helena Seo, Columbia University