A short history of blue pigments, from Egyptian blue to YInMn

By the 000098 editorial team · Updated October 2, 2026 · 7 min read

Blue was once one of the hardest and most expensive colors to make. Its history explains why deep blues still carry associations of value and authority, the same associations a modern hex code like #000098 borrows on screen.

Egyptian blue

Ancient Egyptians produced one of the first synthetic pigments, a calcium copper silicate now called Egyptian blue, from roughly the third millennium BCE. It was made by heating sand, copper minerals and lime, and it was used on tomb paintings and statues across the Mediterranean world.

Ultramarine

Natural ultramarine was ground from lapis lazuli, mined for centuries in the Badakhshan region of present-day Afghanistan. In Renaissance Europe it could cost more than gold, so painters reserved it for the most important figures in a picture. Its name means "beyond the sea", a reference to the long journey the stone made.

Indigo

Indigo dye, extracted from plants such as Indigofera, has been used for thousands of years, notably in India, which gave the dye its name through Greek and Latin. It colored textiles worldwide and today is best known as the blue of denim, now mostly produced synthetically.

Prussian blue

Discovered by accident in Berlin in the early 1700s, Prussian blue was one of the first modern synthetic pigments. It was cheaper than ultramarine and spread quickly through European painting and later into blueprints, whose name comes from the cyanotype process that used related iron compounds.

Cobalt and synthetic ultramarine

French chemist Louis Jacques Thénard developed cobalt blue in 1802. In the 1820s a prize offered in France led to a cheap synthetic ultramarine, credited to Jean-Baptiste Guimet, which finally made the most prized blue affordable.

YInMn blue

In 2009 a team led by Mas Subramanian at Oregon State University accidentally created a new inorganic blue pigment while researching electronic materials. Named YInMn after its yttrium, indium and manganese content, it is notably stable and reflects infrared light, which interests manufacturers of cool roofs and coatings.

From pigment to pixel

On screens, blue costs nothing: #000098 is just a number. But the cultural weight of centuries of precious blues is part of why navy still looks trustworthy and premium in modern branding.