How do ashes become black?

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KD8TZC

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When you burn something, the ashes normally are white or grey. So how do the ashes used on Ash Wed become black? Is there something mixed in with them?
 
Some holy water and there shouldn’t be anything else but ashes burnt from the palms from last years Palm Sunday. Some parishes don’t follow that but use the unblessed ash from the previous year if they burnt a lot of palms and saved some for next year.
 
Our were whitish-greyish and the only black were where the holy water had been dropped when the ashes were blessed.
 
I get that you sprinkle holy water, but that will only make spots black. Besides, water and ash makes lye last I checked. I’m talking about the nice black ashes that you see. We burned palms last year, and we ended up with a light grey ash that you could hardly see on peoples foreheads.
 
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Thanks for the link. I can confirm to make the burnt palm black, burning (smouldering, really) has to be oxygen starved. Lots of oxygen burns hot and you get light gray, almost no real ash.
 
My husband burned the palms for this year’s Ash Wednesday in a coffee can. He cut them into pieces a few inches long and put them in the can. He used a little liquid paraffin to get the fire started and keep it burning. And then just burned them slowly.

Our ashes turned out very black.
 
HeDa said:
Our were whitish-greyish and the only black were where the holy water had been dropped when the ashes were blessed.
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Some places use quite a bit of water - it makes the ashes stick more in one place and so less messy and dusty to use.
 
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KD8TZC said:
When you burn palms… they just burn white… not black.
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Nope they burn black without needing anything else to be added to the mix. Here’s a photo to prove it:(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)
 
Watching TV and Pope Francis distribute ashes, they looked grey - quite light.
 
Thanks Genesis… that makes sense as I do recall now that is how wood charcoal is made (in an oxygen starved environment so they smolder). I recall doing this with cotton cloth too to make char-cloth (any black powder enthusiasts will know what I am taking about).

Now I just need to figure out how to make a tight fitting metal canister with a small hole in it that can be opened to insert the palms, and remove the ashes after the are made.
 
I have long thought the ashes turn even darker on your forehead. I’m reasonably sure they do. I think it’s the mixture of the ash with body oils from your skin.
 
It’s more like making charcoal, low oxygen…you end up with palm ‘soot’ - nearly pure carbon.
 
Greetings of peace!
Yes there is something to be mixed with it so it can stick to our foreheads it is the holy water that makes the ashes wet and turn to black.
 
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