Mauveine, mauve, violet, which is it?

Mauveine was not exactly renamed "violet" — but there is some confusion around the terms because of the way the color and the dye were marketed and described.

Here’s the story:

• Mauveine was the first synthetic dye, discovered by William Henry Perkin in 1856 while he was trying to make quinine (a treatment for malaria).

• The color mauveine produced was a purple shade, and initially it was sometimes called "aniline purple" (since it was made from aniline, a coal-tar derivative).

• The French name "mauve", meaning mallow (the color of the mallow flower), was adopted for the dye because it sounded more elegant and fashionable than "aniline purple."

• In England, however, the broader public sometimes referred to the color more generically as violet, because "violet" was already a familiar term for purplish shades, and people associated mauveine’s color with violets (the flower).

In short: Mauveine was the specific name for the new synthetic dye. "Mauve" was the fashionable color name derived from it. "Violet" was a popular, casual term people sometimes used to describe the color family it belonged to, but "violet" was already a separate, natural color name long before mauveine existed.

Important distinction:

• Mauveine = name of the chemical dye.

• Mauve = color name inspired by the dye.

• Violet = older color name for a different but related shade of purple.