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I have studied Ancient Hebrew and Classical Greek in Under Grad and Grad School. I really always struggle with this idea that they didn't see blue. They just de
by baldfat 9y ago
I have studied Ancient Hebrew and Classical Greek in Under Grad and Grad School. I really always struggle with this idea that they didn't see blue. They just described different aspects of things based on their world view. For instance the sky was a solid object that was made of a highly reflexive bronze. That bronze isn't blue wasn't the issue it was the so called shine.
The people were much more physical in their writing styles. Take "Apple of my eye." That was an ancient terms. It means that when you look closely at an apple you see your own eyes' reflections. It meant that they keep their eyes close to you.
- DarkTree 9y agoThis still supports your argument, but the wikipedia entry has a different meaning of the phrase "Apple of my eye". From the wiki entry[0]: "Its meaning does indeed derive from an expression signifying the pupil of the eye, one of the most sensitive parts of the body. For example, one can tolerate an eyelash on the white of his eye, but let it barely touch the pupil, and everything else is of secondary importance." It's kind of funny though, I always assumed it was like saying, "out of all the apples around me, you're the one that I notice, the one apple I see with my eye". And all of these definitions kind of hint at the same point. Definitely a misunderstood quote. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_of_my_eye https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_of_my_eye
- pvg 9y agoIt might also be some quirk of literary culture or a reflection of the paucity of our sources. We know Greeks painted their sculptures, quite brightly, according to some reconstructions. This suggests they must have had some way to communicate about quite a few colours.
- ty_a 9y agoThe best explanation I've heard is that words for colors come to exist after the invention of artificially produced pigments and dyes.
- baldfat 9y agoI heard that but WE have blue sky, and yellow flowers. We can't say we didn't have yellow till we transferred the dye from a yellow flower to a fabric? We have documentation of dye millennium before Homer and Cave paintings nearly forty thousands years before them. https://zady.com/features/the-history-of-fabric-dye https://zady.com/features/the-history-of-fabric-dye
- marcosdumay 9y agoWe still have a huge number of colors that don't have names. Blue is not a color that used to appear often on daily objects, and naming the sky's color is quite a useless act.
- dboreham 9y agoI discovered that there were roughly three times as many colo[u]rs in the USA vs the UK when I moved 20 years ago. But thanks to globalization I bet they have Aqua and Taupe in Blighty now...
- stevekemp 9y agoMove to Finland, there are far fewer colour-names there! (UK definitely has taupe these days, "aqua" sounds like the kind of name a paint-salesperson we use!)
- vacri 9y ago> naming the sky's color is quite a useless act. The sky's colour varies greatly. Blue, blue-white, white, light grey, dark grey, yellow, red, purple, black-with-whitish-pinpoints. Probably more, but those are just the ones off the top of my head.
- boomboomsubban 9y agoThough there was some blue dye before Homer, it was very rare. The Mycenaeans had some, but Homer was ~400 years after the Bronze Age collapse where the techniques to make most things were lost.
- wahern 9y ago> I really always struggle with this idea that they didn't see blue. This isn't unique to Classical Greek. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue%E2%80%93green_distinction_in_language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue%E2%80%93green_distinction... And I doubt it's a coincidence that blue, green, and yellow are adjacent on the spectrum.