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Hey, remember long ago when Ferrebeekeeper was obsessed with the many-eyed Greek mythological monster Argus? We need to get back to some dark mythology this winter…but before we do that, lets take a look at the creature which reminded me of Hera’s loyal monster (one of many, actually, but this guy somehow escaped my first post about speckled animals named for the dead guardian). This is Mangina Argus aka “the crotalaria podborer” (blech! since when are common names even harder to say then scientific nomenclature?), a hungry moth which lives from the South China Sea all the way through the Himalayas and down into Southern India. The crotalaria podborer is known for, um, boring into crotalaria pods which make it a minor agricultural pest, since a few species of crotalaria (a sort of legume) are used as green manure to fix nitrogen into overextended croplands. We aren’t really here to talk about the moth though, but instead to admire its pinkish vermilion wings and beguiling spots! What a beautiful little lepidopteran!
The Villa of the Mysteries in Pompeii
Since prehistory, cinnabar (mercury sulfide) has been sought after for its brilliant red-orange hue. Crushed into a pigment, this mineral becomes vermilion, and it is one of history’s great colors. The bright red-orange of vermilion is unmistakable and takes pride of place in many—maybe most–of the great paintings created prior to the introduction of modern cadmium paints. The villa of the mysteries in Pompeii was painted with vermilion. Medieval illuminators made extensive use of vermillion to color the bibles, codexes, and prayer books of the times.
Michael Battling Demons (from the Book of Hours of Catherine of Cleves)
In the 8th century, Chinese chemists discovered how to artificially synthesize cinnabar. The alchemists of medieval Europe mastered this trick later in the 12th century (after which both painting and chemistry made great strides forward). The brightest reds in the great masterpieces of Renaissance art are vermillion as are the brightest reds in the masterpieces of Baroque, Rococo, and Romantic painting.
Portrait of Cardinal Pietro Bembo (Titian, ca. 1540, oil on canvas)
Because of its high mercury content cinnabar is very toxic to humans. People affected by mercury poisoning develop tremors, violent mood swings, and tunnel vision. They lose first their hearing, then their eyesight, and ultimately their sanity and lives. The Romans knew these problems were associated with cinnabar mining and so they sent criminals and war slaves to man the mines of Spain and Slovenia. Such wretches had an average life span of only three years.
Powdered Cinnabar
Because of its magnificent red color, and because it could be refined to yield liquid mercury (which was regarded as a magical regent of life) cinnabar was thought to be one of the keys to the fabled elixir of life. Taoist charlatans and magicians made extensive use of raw cinnabar for allegedly rejuvenating cups, trinkets, and potions. Contrasting this paragraph with the one prior to it yields an obvious irony: the magical life giving elixirs quaffed by Taoist mystics were toxic. Many Chinese emperors, aristocrats, and elites probably greatly shortened their life by becoming too enamored with the deadly beauty of vermilion
Carved cinnabar lacquer gourd-shaped ewer with floral design Mid Ming Dynasty (c. late 15th-early 16th Century)
ferrebeekeeper 