Rubia tinctorum

Rubia tinctorum is a flowering plant in the coffee family, Rubiaceae. Its roots contain red pigments, especially alizarin, and have long been used to make dyes.

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Alizarin: Alizarin is a red organic pigment and dye found in the roots of Rubia tinctorum. It is the principal red colorant associated with the plant’s dyeing use.
Mordant: A mordant is a substance that helps a dye bind to a material, often by forming a coordination complex. Metal mordants help madder colorants attach to fibers and influence the resulting shade.
Madder cultivation: Madder cultivation is the farming of Rubia tinctorum for its dye-bearing roots. The plant’s commercial value depended on growing roots large enough for extraction.
Cochineal: Cochineal is a red dye made from the dried bodies of scale insects native to the Americas. It supplied a competing red colorant from an animal source rather than madder roots.
Turkey red: Turkey red is a vivid, durable red dyeing style historically produced from madder root with oils and other treatments. Madder became the defining dye source for this elaborate cotton-dyeing process.
Dye–fiber interaction: Dye–fiber interaction describes the chemical and physical forces that retain colorants within textile fibers. The effectiveness of madder dye depends on how its compounds associate with the fiber.
Madder trade: The madder trade was the production and exchange of madder roots and dye across regional and international markets. Demand for the plant’s red dye connected cultivation sites to textile centers.
Brazilwood: Brazilwood is a group of tropical trees whose heartwood yields red dyes and pigments. Its plant-derived reds offered textile dyers an alternative to madder.
Madder lake: Madder lake is a red pigment made by precipitating madder dye onto an inert mineral substrate. It turns the plant’s soluble colorants into a pigment usable in paint.
Anthraquinone: Anthraquinone is an aromatic organic compound that forms the structural core of many natural and synthetic dyes. Alizarin belongs to this chemical family of color-producing compounds.