Red Gold: How Cochineal Dye Built Mexican Cities
Dried cochineal insects used for dyeing, Eduardo Verdugo, August 2023. Source: AP News
A dye extracted from crushed bugs might sound archaic, but it is surprisingly ubiquitous. Cochineal—parasitic insects that live on nopal (prickly pear) cacti across Latin America—are the key ingredients in a vivid red pigment known as carmine, which colors foods, beverages, cosmetics, and pharmaceuticals today. In Oaxaca, its production has occupied the heart of indigenous cultures since as early as 2000 BCE. Following colonization, cochineal became a prized commodity in Europe and one of Mexico’s largest commercial exports. Even today, its legacy is felt across the globe.
Cochineal: Pre-Columbian Origins
Long before Spanish colonizers first set foot on the American continent, cochineal red was held with the same reverence as gold and silver amongst the sophisticated indigenous civilizations of ancient Mesoamerica.
The Aztec, Zapotec, and Mixtec peoples of western and south-central Mexico, in particular, were known to associate the dye’s rare color with ancestral magic and protection. According to pre-Columbian legend, nocheztli (the Nahuatl name for cochineal, meaning cactus blood) was originally born out of the blood shed by two quarreling gods across a field of nopal cactus.
An early Mexican codex, the Matrícula de tributos, documents the use of cochineal as a kind of bargaining currency, or tribute, to Aztec rulers. In everyday life, the pigment was used for both sacred and mundane purposes: to dye clothing, feathers, and textiles; in offerings and ceremonies; and even as a cosmetic stain for women’s teeth. It was also commonly used for painting codices and mural art—traces of which can still be found amongst the ancient remains of some Mexican archaeological sites today.
Cochineal produced a vibrant, lasting hue unlike any other, achieving a range of soft pinks, lush scarlets, and deep burgundies that were incomparable to any other natural dye of the time. As its popularity grew, the Oaxaca Valley region became a hub for the production and trade of the pigment. Before long, Mixtec farmers in the neighboring highlands began domesticating cochineal insects, breeding bugs with traits favorable for making the brightest, most stable dyes.
Traditional textile woven by Fidel Cruz Lazo of Teotitlán del Valle (Oaxaca), Amy Butler Greenfield, 2017. Source: J. Paul Getty Collection
What’s in a Color?
While demand for cochineal expanded dramatically over time, much of its traditional production process has remained remarkably intact. Even today, nopalerias (large-scale cactus farms) are used to cultivate and harvest cochineal insects across Mexico.
Producing the pigment itself is a slow and laborious process—about 70,000 bugs are required to makeeach kilogram of dye. The insects themselves are soft-bodied and live in clumps on the pads of nopalcacti. Only the females and their eggs produce carminic acid, the source of the cochineal’s signature red coloring.
Every 90 days or so, traditional nopaleria farmers carefully knock thousands of insects and their eggs from the pads of their cacti hosts using a tiny brush. The insects are first boiled, then cleaned and dried in the sun’s heat, reduced to less than a third of their original body weight. Dried cochineal is then ground—either by hand or using mills—into a fine powder. Finally, this resulting powder is mixed with salts which help isolate the carmine, which can then be used with a mordant for dyeing.
This ancestral art is still alive and well in some parts of Mexico—particularly in modern-day Oaxaca, a colonial city practically built by the prosperity of the cochineal trade. Though synthetic dyes are increasingly chosen as a cheap and convenient modern alternative, many artisans in Oaxaca continue to favor organic pigments like cochineal for traditional handicrafts, including textile weaving.
Read the full story, published May 4 2025, at TheCollector.
