A type of marine snail or whelk, or a purple dye historically extracted from such sea snails.
From Latin 'buccinum' (mussel or snail), from Greek 'boukina.' This word refers both to the creature and the precious purple dye (similar to Tyrian purple) that ancient cultures extracted from it.
The ancient Romans would boil thousands of sea snails to extract tiny amounts of buccin dye—a single gram of the dye required processing about 12,000 snails, which is why purple clothes were more expensive than gold and only emperors and the richest nobles could afford them.
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