Bolinus Bradaris
Leaping out of the fire into the frying pan.

If you were a sea snail, specifically the Bolinus Brandaris, Ancient Rome would be a death pit for you, because Ancient Rome, at the time, was a vacuum for sea snails to make into dye. Producing purple dye in Minecraft and producing purple dye in Ancient Rome was different, however. Instead of thinking of this

as brutal, think of this as a guide to riches. You probably will not gain much today for

snail clothes but if you discover a time machine, this process might come in handy. Yet

somehow, Brody the sea snail happened to end up on the shores of Ancient Rome.

 

How did this happen? Well, Brody happened to just one day get kidnapped by a squid who

was propelling toward his home. Pounding his shell on the squid, he was starting to feel

worried. Would it hurt if the squid ate him? Possibly, but he didn’t want to find out. And

thankfully, he didn’t. The squid came closer to the surface, so close, that if you looked closely, you could see a squid bobbing up and down. A wandering albatross happened to be flying nearby and scooped up Brody in his beak.

 

The wandering albatross flew over the ocean. Brody, himself, was hiding in his shell. What did you expect? He’s a sea snail. The wandering albatross glided through the air, not flapping its wings for several hours, just gliding. We’ll call the wandering albatross Gary. Gary was making his way toward Japan for migration. But this was Gary and he was traveling alone, and since he didn’t have a GPS or a map, he glided toward Rome.

 

When he landed in Rome, Gary knew he was definitely not in Japan. Frustrated, he shook his feathers and squealed with rage. While Gary was complaining, Brody was able to slip out of Gary’s yapping beak. Brody should have probably stayed in that beak though, because Gary had perched in the sales market. Gary then flew off, leaving Brody to fend for himself. However, Brody was not able to crawl for long because a saleswoman spotted the sea snail. Excitedly, she scooped up Brody, thinking of all the riches she would soon have. You see, back then, purple clothing or dye was worth gold. Yes, gold. Only emperors could afford this luxury (which was not really a luxury because who wants to be covered in snail mucus?). As you can probably guess by now, sea snails equaled money. The saleswoman placed Brody in her satchel and rushed home. She had all of the snails she needed to make purple dye now.

When she returned home, she threw Brody in a barrel filled with a hundred or more snails and in

the same room, dozens of more barrels containing hundreds more snails stood. One by one,

each of the snails was harvested, including Brody who was feeling rather stoic. During all this

time, he knew the end of the line was coming. He was a sea snail, after all, and most of his

family had faced the same fate. It was just another day of the sea snail cycle for

Brody. The saleswoman disposed of the glands into a brine-filled lead pot. You might

be thinking that this process takes hours. You would be wrong. This process takes

days. The lead pot was heated for ten days until the glands were a purple-reddish colour.

The saleswoman must have had some kind of ancient air freshener because, trust me, the smell

is worse than body odor.

 

The saleswoman then attempted to dye a toga. It was a smelly process but it was worth it (for the saleswoman, at least). After dying the toga, the saleswoman returned to the market after tiredly slumbering the next day. A merchant who was a friend of the emperor admired the toga and decided to buy it and present it to the emperor as a birthday gift. Hurriedly, the saleswoman and merchant exchanged goods and the merchant blew like the wind into the emperor’s palace. If he didn’t hurry, he would be late for the emperor’s birthday party.

 

When the time for opening the gifts passed by, the emperor took one look at the merchant’s

wrapped-up present and peeled it open first. The face of the emperor was the face of a child

receiving a toy. He thanked the merchant and before opening the other gifts, changed into his

new purple toga. Personally, I think the emperor was not educated enough to know the

contents of his purple toga because snail mucus is repulsive.

 

Each of the characters had their own ending. Including Brody, even if he was dead. He lay in

his grave. Gary found his way to Japan, in the end, reuniting with his flock. The squid

continued kidnapping sea snails just like Brody. And the emperor, with a proud face, wore

Brody as a sign of royalty.