Madder root (Rubia tinctorum) was the dominant red dye plant of the ancient world — cultivated from Egypt to India, used in textiles for at least 3,500 years. The pigment lake made from it was similarly universal in painting.

Madder lake is warm, transparent, and ancient — the red of faded tapestries, of illuminated manuscripts, of the ancient Mediterranean world. Its slight warmth and transparency give it a depth that synthetic reds lack in spirit.

The madder fields of Provence and the Netherlands were major agricultural industries until alizarin synthesis in 1868 destroyed the market overnight. Vermeer, Rubens, and virtually every European painter before 1870 used madder. Many 17th-century red garments in paintings have faded to pink or brown — visible evidence of the pigment's fugitive nature.