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Where did indigo come from?
When was indigo first used in South Carolina?
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When was Indigo made?
HowStuffWorks traces the history of indigo from its origins and use as a cash crop for blue dye to its replacement by synthetics in the 20th century.
Colonial planters in the Caribbean grew indigo and transplanted its cultivation when they settled in the colony of South Carolina and North Carolina where people of the Tuscarora confederacy adopted the dyeing process for head wraps and clothing. Exports of the crop did not expand until the mid-to late 18th century.
A variety of plants have provided indigo throughout history, but most natural indigo was obtained from those in the genus Indigofera, which are native to the tropics, notably the Indian Subcontinent.
The cultivation of indigo plants and the extraction of the dyestuff were an important industry in India up to the beginning of the 20th century. Synthetic indigo, developed about that time, gradually replaced natural indigo as a dyestuff.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
For 50 years, starting in the late 1740s, indigo was a major South Carolina cash crop, second only to rice. At one time, the extracted pigment, dried and shaped into circular cakes, was...
- Latria Graham
Nov 7, 2011 · Catherine McKinley traveled through nine West African countries a decade ago to track the history of indigo, the blue dye that was made very valuable by the African slave trade.
Dec 13, 2020 · Even until the 19th century, when synthetic indigo was discovered, the Indigofera plant was the only known source to achieve long-lasting blue.
