Egyptian blue (CaCuSi₂O₆, cuprorivaite) is the first documented synthetic pigment in human history. It is obtained by heating a mixture of quartz sand, lime, copper compounds (malachite or azurite), and a flux (natron) to temperatures between 850 and 1,000°C. Its industrial-scale production under Ramesses II (13th century BC) made the Pi-Ramesses workshop the first documented center of industrial chemistry. The pigment resists degradation over millennia: the Amarna frescoes (c. 1345 BC) retain their color intact. In 2013, researchers at the British Museum discovered that Egyptian blue emits near-infrared (NIR) radiation with high efficiency when excited by visible light, a property with current applications in medical bioimaging, fiber-optic telecommunications, and detection of art forgeries. The historical canon of chemistry attributes pigment synthesis to the modern European tradition, ignoring that this technology is four thousand years old on the Nile.