Contrasting Western views of colour as a de-materialised, abstract value, this paper approaches the technologies of colourant production in Mediterranean antiquity as the active processes of colour materialization by examining the late Hellenistic workshop found on the Aegean Island of Kos as a case study. The challenging pyrotechnological process of Egyptian blue production is the focus of this paper, which aims to illustrate the sequence of material transformations followed to create this saturated blue pigment. Despite the widespread use of Egyptian blue in the ancient Mediterranean world, only scarce archaeological evidence of production sites exists. The Koan workshop, containing an assemblage of successfully and unsuccessfully produced Egyptian blue pellets alongside amorphous lead lumps, litharge rods, and earth pigments, provides the material remains to study the pigment’s manufacture. The process of making blue in the context of this workshop can be broken down into two phases. The first phase includes the production of the initial Egyptian blue pellets and the second the further processing for the creation of different tonalities of blue. Bridging the dematerialised notion of colour to the material remains of production, this paper brings us closer to appreciating ancient conceptualizations of colour.

对比西方将色彩视为去物质化的抽象价值的观点，本文通过研究在爱琴海科斯岛上发现的晚期希腊化车间作为案例研究，将地中海古代的着色剂生产技术视为色彩物质化的积极过程。埃及蓝生产中具有挑战性的烟火工艺是本文的重点，旨在说明制造这种饱和蓝色颜料所遵循的材料转化顺序。尽管埃及蓝在古代地中海世界广泛使用，但生产地点的考古证据很少。Koan 车间，包含成功和未成功生产的埃及蓝颗粒以及无定形铅块、石棒和土颜料的组合，提供材料遗迹研究颜料的制造。在本次研讨会的背景下，制作蓝色的过程可以分为两个阶段。第一阶段包括生产最初的埃及蓝色颗粒，第二阶段包括进一步加工以产生不同色调的蓝色。将非物质化的颜色概念与生产的物质遗存联系起来，本文使我们更接近于欣赏古代的颜色概念。