A closer look
The ultimate symbol of ancient luxury was quite literally derived from boiling thousands of sea snails until the entire coastline smelled like a rotting carcass. The Phoenicians realized that if you poked a specific predatory snail, it secreted a clear slime that turned brilliant purple in the sunlight. To make enough dye for just one Roman toga, you had to systematically slaughter about 10,000 snails. The production facilities smelled so phenomenally bad that they had to be built miles downwind of the city, proving that the ancient elite were perfectly fine smelling like a fish market as long as they looked rich.
