Colour plays a very important role in showing one’s identity. Especially strong, bright colours in textiles were coveted over the millennia—as were colours achieved by expensive, hard-to-get dyestuffs such as shellfish purple. This quickly led to imitation with cheaper colourants. Madder (Rubia tinctorum) was one of the cheaper dyestuffs. For madder, many different recipes exist. One of the most significant antique written sources with recipes is the Papyrus Holmiensis, dated to the third century AD. This contains a recipe to imitate the much sought-after shellfish purple. It states the use of roasted madder roots. Roasting madder radically changes the colour outcome when dyeing, highlighting the need to do more experimental research on the topic of madder dyeing. There is also the common consensus that water plays an important role for madder dye results. As ancient dye recipes do not give precise instructions, a reconstruction of those recipes poses significant challenges. With the many variables regarding these recipes, ranging from pre-treatments to water quality to the identification and amounts of ingredients, a better understanding of the base variability of madder dye outcomes is necessary.