This ancient dye costs $2,700 per gram and was once 15 times more valuable than gold. Indeed it is the only example of this extremely precious dyed fabric from David and Solomon’s era.

Professor Ben Yosef said there was real excitement when they got the results from the lab – it showed the ancient fabric was dyed with what is known as “true purple”, and was the oldest evidence of it in Israel. Which turns out to be not an insignificant detail, as we shall see. Timna hosts ancient copper mines, thought to have belonged to King Solomon at one point, 2 and today you can visit a life-size model of the Tabernacle there. The ongoing excavation work has been revealing all sort of treasures in the Timna Valley, which lies between Jerusalem and the Red Sea. Professor Erez Ben Yosef from Tel Aviv University and an expert in Iron Age was thrilled to share what they’d found recently here in Israel. “The colour immediately attracted our attention, but we found it hard to believe that we had found true purple from such an ancient period”.

Royal order of purple porpoises