In 1856, William Perkin was an 18–year–old student at the Royal College of Chemistry in London. He was asked by his tutor, the German chemist August Wilhelm von Hoffman (the first Director of the college) to see if he could synthesise quinine as a cure for malaria. Although he failed in his main aim, he succeeded in producing a black solid which made a purple solution when he cleaned the flask with alcohol. Perkin patented his discovery, and set up a factory at Greenford in Middlesex (on the banks of the Grand Union Canal) to mass–produce it. Originally named aniline purple, it was soon named mauve in England, after the French name for the mallow flower; it eventually became known to chemists as mauveine. It's also been called Perkin's mauve.
Mauveine was the first aniline dye to be discovered. Aniline has the chemical formula C6H5NH2, and is the simplest known aromatic chemical (a compound derived from benzene, C6H6). It is highly poisonous, and is present in coal tar, but following Perkin's discovery it began to be synthesised in huge quantities. Other dyes produced from aniline include fuchsine (magenta), safranin (red) and induline (blue, bluish–red or black); lemon yellow, brilliant scarlet, bright green, pink, dark forest green, and dark wine cherry are terms that have been used to describe other aniline dyes.
The importance of the synthetic dye industry is reflected in the full name of the German chemicals giant BASF: Badische Anilin– und Soda–Fabrik (Baden Aniline and Soda Factory, in English – Baden is a historical German territory, now part of the Federal State of Baden–Württemberg).
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