/ · 1894 Brewer’s · M · Melibœan Dye
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A rich purple. Melibœa, in Thessaly, was famous for the ostrum, a fish used in dyeing purple.
“A military vest of purple flowed,
Lovelier than Melibœan.”
Milton: Paradise Lost, xi. 242.
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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.