 kept the snails fresh and alive.
Even in ancient texts such as the writings of the Roman author Pliny the Elder and the Jewish Talmud, it was emphasized that the snail glands be procured fresh, which creates the best dye. Amar said, having used dried glands that were shipped to Israel in some experiments, he can now vouch for the value of fresh specimens.
The glands were traditionally dried in the sun, but Amar imported an oven from Israel to speed up the process.
“It was very hard work, very stinky,” he said, much like working in a fresh fish market, he said.
The Italian fishermen who delivered the snails “thought I was a bit crazy. What they ate, I threw away, and what they threw away I used,” he laughed.
Two thousand years ago, the rabbis discussed how impure creatures such as the sea snails — forbidden from an observant Jewish diet — could be the source of a dye used in such sacred spaces as the Tabernacle and Temple.
Amar answered that through his experimentation with the snails, he realized that nothing of the meat of the snail remains. Through the chemical processing of the snail glands into dye, “the material turns into something else.”
While two of the species were in plentiful supply, locating the third species saw Amar take out the big guns — his Italian mother in law. With her help, the third species, Red-Mouthed Rock-shell (Murex haemastoma), was sourced in Palermo, Sicily. He traveled to the Mediterranean’s largest island, only to be disappointed when inclement weather caused the fisherman to come back without a catch. Only after a subsequent trip could he successfully harvest the third snail’s dye glands.
Although Amar had studied the theory behind the preparation of the true purple and associated azure dyes, “in conducting in the practical work I learned a lot about the historical sources. It was like time tunnel to the past,” he said.
He conducted his initial experiments bare-handed, only to discover that the dye that lasts millennia on archaeological artifacts quickly stained his hands blue for weeks. He said that it gave insight to a Gemara passage that had always mystified him: The Gemara relates that when priests go in front of the congregation to give the traditional priestly blessing, they cannot have discolored hands. And if they do, it is only permissible for them to give the blessing if the entire congregation is likewise dyed. After walking around with blue hands for a couple weeks, he understood just how distracting people found it.
“When I returned home on the plane, I had to hide my hands,” Amar laughed.
Originally posted at israeladvantagetours.com