#Cuprorivaite

[deadstonemasonssociety]

In their temples and tombs, the Ancient Egyptians pose an interesting problem. A range of blue hues can be seen; more than if they just used lapis. So, where did it come from?

The earliest evidence for the use of Egyptian blue is in the Fourth Dynasty (c.2575-2467 BCE).

This blue pigment was one of the first synthetic pigments and is calcium copper silicate or cuprorivaite. In the Ancient Egyptian language it was known as hsbd-iryt, which means artificial lapis lazuli, indicative of the ancients’ obsession with this precious stone.

[hako-no-ko]

mine and @mahouneko ‘s  hnk ocs!! (mostly mine tho help me) 

[underthescopemineral]

Cuprorivaite

CaCuSi4O10

 Locality:

Nickenicher Weinberg (Nickenicher Sattelberg), Nickenich, Andernach, Eifel, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany

Cuprorivaite on glas-feldspar matrix, crystal tabular on (001) with additional bipyramidal faces.

Photo Marko Burkhardt  

Also known as “Egyptian blue”. Intimately mixed with quartz (Vesuvius, Italy); in a mudstone xenolith ejected from a scoria cone (Sattelberg volcanic cone, Germany).   Named for a high copper content and presumed similarity to rivaite.

[sumpix]

A brand-new blue may be the most eye-popping blue yet

Meet a spectacular new blue—the first inorganic new blue in some time.

Credit: Oregon State University

Combine yttrium, indium, and manganese, then heat and serve.

The new blue was synthesized by chemists at Oregon State University.

YInMn Blue is the latest character in the weird history of the color blue.

Yttrium, Indium, and Manganese, and the pigment was invented by a team of chemists led by Mas Subramanian at Oregon State University (OSU).

The color was invented in 2009, but it took until last spring for the EPA to approve it for general use — the agency refers to it as “Blue 10G513.” Before that, in 2016, the Shepherd Color Company had licensed it for exterior use, and knockoffs of the color popped up here and there in Etsy offerings. It even inspired a new Crayola color called “Bluetiful.” Appropriate.

YInMn Blue is the latest character in an odd story: humanity’s relationship with the color blue.

For a long time, humans apparently took no note of blue, which is weird. Though blue isn’t especially common in vegetation and stone, there’s no other color that so envelops us — in the sky above and on the face of the oceans that surround us. (BTW, the late George Carlin once lamented a paucity of blue foods.)

some African cave art. There’s no mention of it in the Bible. Though there are plenty of references in Homer’s Odyssey to white and black, and a few to red and yellow, there’s no blue. He refers to the color of the sea as “wine-dark.”

Some historians hypothesize that early humans might have been color-blind, capable only of seeing black, white, red, and eventually yellow and green. Perhaps they just weren’t very interested in the idea of color altogether.

Maybe, though, a more likely explanation is that lacking a concept and a word for blue, ancient people lacked a frame of reference for understanding what they were seeing. Radiolab did a fascinating episode about this possibility.

A BBC documentary found that people from a Namibian tribe with no separate words for green and blue couldn’t differentiate green from blue squares, though there’s some controversy about the experiment. What is true, though, is that Eskimos see more types of snow because they have 50 words for it. (The word “Eskimo” groups together the people of the Inuit and Yupik families.) We see just a few.

While Homer, et al., were stumbling around clueless, it seems that the first folks to get blue were the ancient Egyptians, who were entranced by the semiprecious Afghan stone lapis lazuli about 6,000 years ago. They gave the color a name—ḫsbḏ-ỉrjt—and used the stone liberally in jewelry and headdresses.

The Egyptians even attempted to make paint from the mineral, but failed. In 2,200 B.C. they finally succeeded at producing a light-blue paint, cuprorivaite or “Egyptian blue,” from heated limestone, sand, and azurite or malachite. Egypt’s precious blue pigments eventually became valued by royalty in Persia, Mesoamerica, and Rome.

The earliest successful lapis lazuli paint—and ultimately Europe’s first great blue—appeared in 6th century Buddhist paintings from Bamiyan, Afghanistan. Imported into Europe in the 14th and 15th centuries, ultramarine—from ultramarinus, or “beyond the sea”—was used only in expensive commissioned artwork until a French chemist developed a cheaper, synthetic version in 1826. True ultramarine was both so coveted and pricey that, according to the Metropolitan Museum, Vermeer impoverished his family to purchase it, and there’s a story that one of Michelangelo’s paintings, “The Entombment,” was left unfinished because he couldn’t afford the ultramarine it required. At the other end of the cost spectrum was the affordable blue dye indigo, made from the plant Indigofera tinctoria, and imported to Europe in the 16th-century.

Over time, more blues appeared. In 1706, German dye-maker Johann Jacob Diesbach came up with Berliner Blau, or Prussian blue, accidentally when potash he was using to make red pigment was contaminated with animal blood that paradoxically turned it blue. 1802 saw the invention of cobalt blue, based on the 8th- and 9th-century blue pigments used in Chinese porcelain, by French chemist Louis Jacques Thénard. Cerulean blue—from caerulum, meaning “heave” or “sky”—was the last major blue introduced before YInMn Blue. It was invented by Albrecht Höpfner in 1789.

The discovery of YInMn Blue occurred when chemistry grad student Andrew Smith was heating manganese oxide to approximately 1200 °C (~2000 °F) to investigate its electronic properties. To his surprise, what emerged from the heat was a brilliant blue compound. Recalls Subramanian: “If I hadn’t come from an industry research background — DuPont has a division that developed pigments, and obviously, they are used in paint and many other things — I would not have known this was highly unusual, a discovery with strong commercial potential.”

Subramanian knew, he told NPR in 2016, “People have been looking for a good, durable blue color for a couple of centuries.” OSU art students soon began experimenting with the new color, incorporating it in watercolors and printing. In 2012, Subramanian’s team received a patent for YInMn Blue.

Bonus: Previous blue pigments are prone to fading and are often toxic. These are problems that don’t afflict YInMn Blue. “The fact that this pigment was synthesized at such high temperatures signaled that this new compound was extremely stable, a property long sought in a blue pigment,” says Subramanian in the study documenting YInMn Blue.

Subramanian and his colleagues have been developing colors ever since, including new bright oranges, new purples, and turquoises and greens. Currently, they’re on the hunt for a chromatic Holy Grail: a stable, heat-reflective, and brilliant, red. It’s a challenge. While red is among the oldest colors, Subramanian calls the shade he seeks “the most elusive color to synthesize.”

[wheretogofrmhere]

Egyptian blue, also known as calcium copper silicate or cuprorivaite, is a pigment that was used in ancient Egypt for thousands of years. It's a bright, intense blue - like Niall's gorgeous eyes.

aksjgdh i love that this is still on going. its so fun

[rayleeschobel]

Egyptian Blue Pigment

Prior to the discovery of Egyptian Blue, color used in painting was highly limited to earth tones—those colors that could be found in soils and minerals—of which blue was not a member. Then, around 2,200 BC, Egyptian chemists developed a process of creating a blue pigment, which is now known as Egyptian Blue. This pigment considered the first synthetic pigment ever created.

Egyptian Blue, also known as cuprorivaite, has the chemical composition CaCuSi4O10, and was created by mixing sand, copper, and natron, and heating the mixture to 800-900* C. Considering the complexity of creating the pigment and the consistency of the color throughout ages, it’s clear that Egyptian chemists were well ahead of their time. While the process of creating the pigment was extremely complex, it was a good substitute for the use of lapis lazuli, due to the mineral being extremely rare and sourced far away.

This pigment was widely used in Ancient Egypt in paintings on walls, tombs, and mummies’ coffins, as well as in a ceramic glaze known as Egyptian faience. Due to the complexity of creating the pigment, its use in works were a sign of high prestige. Egyptian blue spread throughout several countries, eventually making it to the Roman Empire. Following the Roman Empire’s collapse, the use of Egyptian Blue sharply declined.

One key factor used in identifying this pigment is its odd characteristic of emitting infrared light. Using special photographic techniques, the pigment can be detected, even if the color itself is no longer visible to the naked eye. This discovery holds many valuable opportunities within both the scientific and artistic world. For art historians, it means that Egyptian Blue can not only be detected, but decorative patterns that may no longer be visible can be identified and reconstructed. This quality has also been a huge discovery in the study of ancient statues and determining if they were once painted. For example, thanks to Egyptian Blue’s ultraviolet characteristic, the color has been detected on statues in the Parthenon, proving once and for all that the structures had indeed been painted at their creation.

In the scientific world, the pigment has the potential to be a huge development in biomedical imagery. Traditionally in this imaging, UV light or visible photons were used to take images. The Egyptian Blue pigment, however, has a longer luminescence lifetime, and infrared has a greater penetration depth into human tissue, which may make it possible to get more detailed and highly resolved images.

Sources:

https://mymodernmet.com/shades-of-blue-color-history/

https://www.chemistryworld.com/features/egyptian-blue-more-than-just-a-colour/9001.article

http://www.artinsociety.com/egyptian-blue-the-colour-of-technology.html

Photos:

"Cup containing Egyptian Blue pigment from Pompeii" by Dan Diffendale. https://www.flickr.com/photos/dandiffendale/30416460551

"Model Basket as an Amulet ca. 1069-945 BC" by Cleveland Art. https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1978.90

[dot-don-ins]

Egyptian blue

Egyptian blue, also known as calcium copper silicate or cuprorivaite, is a pigment used in ancient Egypt for thousands of years. It is considered to be the first synthetic pigment.

[ifuckingloveminerals]

Cuprorivaite

Nickenicher Weinberg, Nickenich, Pellenz, Mayen-Koblenz, Eifel, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany

[wigmund]

From Mindat.Org Photo Of The Day; December 18, 2016:

Cuprorivaite: CaCuSi4O10

Locality: Nickenicher Weinberg (Nickenicher Sattelberg), Nickenich, Pellenz, Mayen-Koblenz, Eifel, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany

Field of view: 1.0mm. Collection and Photo: Marko Burkhard

[ifuckingloveminerals]

(Synthetic?) Cuprorivaite

As you might know, I'm studying to be a materials engineer, so synthetic minerals are intrinsically fascinating to me. This mineral in particular, a copper silicate, adds another layer of geeky cool since I'm messing around with silicates on my own. I may have to experiment with this idea when I find some free time.