Safflower (Carthamus tinctorius) is a highly branched, herbaceous, thistle-like annual plant in the family Asteraceae.

It is one of the world's oldest crops, and today is commercially cultivated for vegetable oil extracted from the seeds.

The upper leaves that form the bracts are usually short, stiff and ovate, terminating in a spine.

[2] Buds are borne on the ends of branches, and each composite flower head (capitulum) contains 20–180 individual florets.

Depending on variety, crop management and growing conditions, each plant can develop 3–50 or more flower heads of 1.25–4 cm (0.49–1.57 in) diameter.

Flowers are commonly yellow, orange and red, but white and cream coloured forms exist.

When temperature and daylength start to increase, the central stem begins to elongate and branch, growing more rapidly.

Early sowing allows more time for developing a large rosette and more extensive branching, which results in a higher yield.

[4] John Chadwick reports that the Greek name for safflower (kárthamos, κάρθαμος) occurs many times in Linear B tablets, distinguished into two kinds: a white safflower (ka-na-ko re-u-ka, knākos leukā, κνάκος λευκά), which was measured, and red (ka-na-ko e-ru-ta-ra, knākos eruthrā, κνάκος ερυθρά) which was weighed.

"[5] The early Spanish colonies along the Rio Grande in New Mexico used safflower as a substitute for saffron in traditional recipes.

[6] Also in his 14th-century work Kaftor va-Ferach (Hebrew: כפתור ופרח), Ishtori Haparchi noted that the inhabitants of the Land of Israel in his time used Safflower to dye their food as a substitute for Crocus sativus.

[9] Minimum length of the growing season is 120 and 200 days for summer and winter cultivars, respectively.

[9] Additionally, this tolerance can also be explained by the higher water use efficiency compared to other oil crops such as linseed and mustard.

[10] The deep rooting promotes water and air movement and improves the soil quality for subsequent crops in a rotation.

[10] Safflower is frequently grown in crop rotation with small grains, fallow and annual legumes.

[14] Close rotation with crops susceptible to Sclerotinia sclerotiorum (e.g. sunflower, canola, mustard plant and pea) should be avoided.

[14] Seeds should be sown in spring as early as 4.5 °C (40.1 °F) soil temperature is exceeded, to take advantage of the full growing season.

Usually, row spacing between 15 and 25 cm (5.9 and 9.8 in) are chosen using similar drill settings as recommended for barley.

[16] In 2020, global production of safflower seeds was 653,030 tonnes, led by Kazakhstan with 35% of the world total (table).

[4] For the last fifty years or so,[citation needed] the plant has been cultivated mainly for the vegetable oil extracted from its seeds.

In coloring textiles, dried safflower flowers are used as a natural dye source for the orange-red pigment carthamin.

[29] In Japan, dyers have long utilised a technique of producing a bright red to orange-red dye (known as carthamin) from the dried florets of safflower (Carthamus tinctorius).

[citation needed] Darker shades are achieved by repeating the dyeing process several times, having the fabric dry, and redyed.