Beads found in Israel are the oldest known example of the use of organic red pigments

A team of archaeologists from The Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Institute of Archaeology, Sorbonne Universite and Conservatoire national des arts et métiers has found the oldest-known example of the use of organic red pigments to color an object—in this case, beads. In their study, reported on the open-access site PLOS ONE, the group used a variety of techniques to identify the source of red coloring on shell beads found in an Israeli cave decades ago.