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This review deals with our long-range goal of determining why the Prussian blue pigments, typically either the “soluble” KFeIII[FeII(CN)6]·xH2O or the alternative “insoluble” FeIII4[FeII(CN)6]3·xH2O compounds, used by artists from shortly after the discovery of Prussian blue in 1704 and well into the early twentieth century, often fade when exposed to light. In order to achieve this goal it was decided that first, for comparison purposes, we had to prepare and fully characterize Prussian blues prepared by various, often commercially successful, synthetic methods. The characterization has employed a large variety of modern methods to determine both the stoichiometry of the Prussian blues and the arrangement of the voids found in the latter “insoluble” Prussian blues. The refinement of synchrotron radiation derived X-ray powder diffraction data obtained for a formally soluble and an insoluble Prussian blue required …