Blue–green distinction in language
In many languages, the colors described in English as "blue" and "green" are colexified, i.e., expressed using a single umbrella term. To render this ambiguous notion in English, linguists use the blend word grue, from green and blue, a term coined by the philosopher Nelson Goodmanwith an unrelated meaningin his 1955 Fact, Fiction, and Forecast to illustrate his "new riddle of induction".
The exact definition of "blue" and "green" may be complicated by the speakers not primarily distinguishing the hue, but using terms that describe other color components such as saturation and luminosity, or other properties of the object being described. For example, "blue" and "green" might be distinguished, but a single term might be used for both if the color is dark. Furthermore, green might be associated with yellow, and blue with either black or gray.
According to Brent Berlin and Paul Kay's 1969 study Basic Color Terms: Their Universality and Evolution, distinct terms for brown, purple, pink, orange, gray and silver will not emerge in a language until the language has made a distinction between green and blue. In their account of the development of color terms the first terms to emerge are those for white/black, red/blue and green/yellow.
Afro-Asiatic
Amazigh
The word for blue in the Amazigh language is azerwal. In some dialects of Amazigh, like Shilha or Kabyle, the word azegzaw is used for both green and blue. It is likely cognate with the English word azure, which represents the color between blue and cyan.Arabic
The color of the sky is sometimes referred to as "the green" in some dialects of Classical Arabic poetry, in which it is . In Arabic the word for blue is . The Arabic word for green is .In Moroccan Arabic, the word for light blue is, whereas stands for blue and for green. The word is used to describe the color of a suffocated person, and is also used pejoratively as a synonym to "dumb, stupid".
Egyptian
The ancient Egyptian word wadjet covered the range of blue, blue-green, and green. It was the name of a goddess, the patroness of Lower Egypt, represented as a cobra called Wadjet, "the green one", or as the Eye of Horus, also called by the same name. At the same time, wedjet was the word used for Egyptian blue in faience ceramics.Hebrew
In Hebrew, the word כחול means blue, while ירוק means green and has the same root, י־ר־ק, as the word for "vegetables". However, in classical Hebrew, ירוק can mean both green and yellow, giving rise to such expressions as ירוק כרישה 'leek green' to specify green to the exclusion of yellow. Like Russian and Italian, Hebrew has a separate name for light blue —the color of the sky and of tzitzit on the tallit, a ritual garment. This color has special symbolic significance in both Judaism and Jewish culture.American languages
Chahta
The Choctaw language has two words, okchʋko and okchʋmali, which have different meanings depending on the source. In 1852 okchakko is translated variously as pale blue or pale green, okchakko chohmi is given as swarthy, and okchamali is defined as deep blue, gray, green, or sky blue. In 1880, okchakko and okchʋmali are both given as blue, and green is not specifically listed as a color. In an 1892 dictionary, okchamali is deep blue or green, okchakko is pale blue or bright green, and a third word kili̱koba is bright green. By 1915, the authoritative Byington dictionary gives okchako as blue and okchamali as green, blue, gray, verdant. A coursebook from 2001 differentiates based on brightness, giving okchʋko as bright blue/green and okchʋmali as pale or dull blue/green. Modern usage in the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma language school is to use okchʋko for blue and okchʋmali for green, with no distinction for brightness.Kanienʼkéha
The language of the Kanien'kehá:ka Nation at Akwesasne is at Stage VII on the Berlin–Kay Scale, and possesses distinct terms for a broad range of spectral and nonspectral colors such as oruía, óhute, kahúji, karákA, and atakArókwa. According to one researcher, the Kanien'kehá:ka term for purple is arihwawakunéha, which translates to, a recent, post-Christianization coinage. The way in which purple was categorized and referenced prior to the addition of the latter term is not clear.Lakota
In the Lakota language, the word tȟó is used for both blue and green, though the word tȟózi has become common. This is in line with common practice of using zíša/šázi for orange, and šátȟo/tȟóša for.Mapudungun
, spoken by indigenous peoples of Chile and Argentina, distinguishes between kurü, kallfü and karü. The word payne was formerly used to refer to a sky blue, and also refers to the bluish color of stones.Mayan
Single words for blue/green are also found in Mayan languages; for example, in the Yucatec Maya language, yax is.Tupian
did not originally differ between the two colors, though they may now as a result of interference of Spanish or Portuguese. The Tupi language|Tupi] word oby meant both, as does the Guaraní hovy. In modern Tupi the word suikiri can be used for green and iakira/akira for blue. However, iakira/akira also means immature, as in pakua akira, and suikiri can also mean blue. In modern Guarani, the word hovy is used for blue and hovy'û is used for green. The word aky, which is cognate with Nheengatu akira, also means.Austronesian languages
Filipino (Tagalog)
Speakers of Tagalog most commonly use the Spanish loanwords in Tagalog|loanwords] for blue and green—asul and berde, respectively. Although these words are much more common in spoken use, Tagalog has native terms: bugháw for blue and lunti for green, which are seen as archaic and more flowery. These are mostly confined to formal and academic writings, alongside artistic fields such literature, music, and poetry.In Cebuano, another major Philippine language, the native words for "blue" and "green" end in the same syllable: pughaw and lunhaw, respectively. Pughaw means sky blue, while lunhaw is fresh leaf green.
Humor and jokes of a sexual or derogatory nature that would otherwise be described as "blue" in English are called "green" in Philippine English. This is a calque of the Hispanic term chiste verde.
Javanese
has distinct words for blue biru and green ijo. These words are derived from Old Javanese birū and hijo. However, in Old Javanese birū could mean pale blue, grayish blue, greenish blue, or even turquoise, while hijo which means green, could also mean the blue-green color of clear water. This concept of wikt:birū as 'grue' can also be seen in the neighboring language of Madurese, where wikt:bhiru means both 'blue' and 'green'. In contemporary use, the word 'green' can be distinguished from wikt:bhiru by using the term wikt:bhiru dâun 'leaf grue'. Biru and ijo in Modern Javanese are cognates of Malay/Indonesian biru and hijau which both have the same meaning.Māori
spoken before contact with Europeans did not distinguish between blue and green, using the word namu for both, while words describing greenery in vegetation or birds were dominant in 19th century dictionaries. Descriptions of the new Anglocentric "blue" was developed in association with the sky, while darker hues are perceived closer to black like pako and uriuri.Dravidian
Kannada
The Kannada language distinguishes between blue, green and yellow. The prefix would indicate darker colors while the prefix would indicate light colors. Thus would mean dark/deep blue, while would mean light blue.Tamil
The Tamil language distinguishes between the colors பச்சை , நீலம் , and கருப்பு . The prefix would indicate dark colors while the prefix would indicate light colors. Thus, கரும்பச்சை would be dark green while இளம்பச்சை would be light greenTelugu
The Telugu language uses a single word, పచ్చ, for green and yellow. To differentiate between the two shades, another word is prefixed in some cases. For example, green will be called ఆకుపచ్చ and yellow పసుపుపచ్చ .Malayalam
In Malayalam, there are distinct words for blue, green and yellow.East Asian languages
Chinese
The modern Standard Chinese language has the blue–green distinction ; however, another word that predates the modern vernacular, , is also used in many contexts. The character depicts the budding of a young plant and it could be understood as "verdant", but the word is used to describe colors ranging from light and yellowish green through deep blue all the way to black, as in For example, the flag of the Republic of China is referred to as whereas is the Chinese word for "green vegetable", referring to bok choy, and the opposing sides of the game liubo were known as and white in antiquity despite using black and white pieces. was the traditional designation of both blue and green for much of the history of the Chinese language, while originally referred to the dye of the indigo plant. However, as a particular 'shade' of applied to cloth and clothing has been attested since the Book of Odes in the Airs of Bei section. After the discarding of Classical Chinese in favor of modern vernacular Chinese, the modern terms for blue and green are now more commonly used than as standalone color terms, although is still part of many common noun phrases. The two forms can also be encountered combined as 青藍 and 青綠, with being used as an intensifier. In modern scientific contexts, refers to cyan as a narrow range of color in between blue and green, and the modern color names are used when referring to other shades of blue or of green.Japanese
The Japanese words and, the same kanji character as the Chinese, can refer to either blue or green depending on the situation. Modern Japanese has a word for green, but it is a relatively recent usage. Ancient Japanese did not have this distinction: the word came into use only in the Heian period and, at that time and for a long time thereafter, was still considered a shade of. Educational materials distinguishing green and blue came into use only after World War II; thus, even though most Japanese consider them to be green, the word is still used to describe certain vegetables, apples, and vegetation. is also the word used to refer to the color on a traffic light that signals drivers to "go". However, most other objects—a green car, a green sweater, etc.—will generally be called. Japanese people also sometimes use the word, based on the English word "green", for colors. The language also has several other words meaning specific shades of green and blue.Korean
The native Korean word 푸르다 explicitly refers to blue, but can also mean either green, or bluish green. These adjectives 푸르다 are used for blue as in 푸른 하늘, or for green as in 푸른 숲. 푸른 is a noun-modifying form. Another word 파랗다 usually means blue, but sometimes it also means green, as in 파란 불. There are Sino-Korean expressions that refer to green and blue. 초록/草綠, 초록색/草綠色 is used for green. 청/靑, another expression borrowed from Chinese, is mostly used for blue, as in 청바지/靑바지 and , the Blue House, which is the former executive office and official residence of the President of the Republic of Korea, but is also used for green as well, as in 청과물/靑果物 and 청포도/靑葡萄.Tibetan
In Tibetan, སྔོན་པོ། is the term traditionally given for the color of the sky and of grass. This term also falls into the general pattern of naming colors by appending the suffix, as in , , , and . Conspicuously, the term for is, likely related to, and defined as—"the grue sprout of wheat or barley".Vietnamese
used to colexify green and blue with the word xanh. This is a colloquial rendering of thanh 靑, as with Chinese and Japanese. In modern usage, blue and green are dislexified. Shades of blue are specifically described as xanh da trời, or xanh dương, xanh nước biển,. Green is described as xanh lá cây.Vietnamese occasionally employs the terms xanh lam and xanh lục in which the second syllables is derived from the Chinese: wikt:藍 and wikt:綠 respectively, sometimes skipping the syllable xanh, for blue and green, respectively, in formal or scientific speech. Xanh can also be used singularly for any color that is the shade in between blue and green inclusively.
Mongolian
makes a distinction between green and blue, which has separate categories for light blue and dark blue. Historically, Mongolian included greens such as fresh grass in the category, and became a more common term in the modern era.Indo-European
Albanian
Albanian has two major words for "blue": kaltër refers to a light blue, such as that of the sky, but it is derived from Vulgar Latin calthinus, itself derived from caltha, a loan from Ancient Greek that meant "marigold" a small and in fact yellow flower. The other word, blu, refers to a darker shade of blue, and like many similar words across many European languages, derives ultimately from Germanic. There is a separate word for green, gjelbër, which derives from the Latin galbinus, which originally meant "yellow" ; the original Latin word for green on the other hand, viridis is the source of the Albanian word for "yellow", verdhë. Albanian also has a borrowed word for green, jeshil, from Turkish yeşil; it tends to be used for non-natural greens in contrast to gjelbër.Baltic
has separate words for green zaļš and blue zils. Both zils and zaļš stem from the same Proto-Indo-European word for yellow. Several other words in Latvian have been derived from these colors, namely grass is called zāle, while the name for iris is zīlīte.The now archaic word mēļš was used to describe both dark blue and black. For instance, blueberries are called mellenes.
In Latvian, black is melns.
In Lithuanian, žalias is green, mėlynas is blue, and žilas is gray or grizzled.
Slavic
, a South Slavic language, makes a clear distinction between blue, green, and black.In the Polish language, blue and green are treated as separate colors. The word for sky blue or azure—błękitny—might be considered either a basic color or a shade of blue by different speakers. Similarly dark blue or navy blue can be considered by some speakers as a separate basic color. Black is completely distinguished from blue. As in English, Polish distinguishes pink from red.
The word siwy means blue-gray in Polish. The word siny refers to violet-blue and is used to describe the color of bruises, hematoma, and the blue skin discoloration that can result from moderate hypothermia.
Russian has several words referring to the range of colors denoted by the English term "blue". It traditionally treats light blue as a separate color independent from plain or dark blue, with all seven "basic" colors of the spectrum –wikt:синий#Russian/ while in English the light blues like azure and cyan are considered mere shades of "blue" and not different colors. The Russian word for "green" is wikt:зелёный#Russian. To better understand this, consider that English makes a similar distinction between "red" and light red, but such a distinction is unknown in several other languages; for example, both "red", and "pink" have traditionally been considered varieties of a single color in Chinese. The Russian language also distinguishes between red and pink.
Similarly, English language descriptions of rainbows have often distinguished between blue or turquoise and indigo, the latter of which is often described as dark blue or ultramarine.
The Serbo-Croatian color system makes a distinction between blue, green and black:
- Blue: plava and modra; in the eastern speaking areas modra indicates dark blue, in some of the western areas it may indicate any blue
- *Navy blue: teget
- *Ash blue: sinje
- Green: zelena
- Black: crna
Sinje, cognate to Bulgarian синьо and Russian синий, is archaic; the term denotes blue-gray, usually used to describe dark seas.
Turquoise is usually described as tirkizna, and similarly, azure will use a loan word azurna. There is no specific word for cyan. Blond hair is called plava, reflecting likely the archaic use of plav for any bright white/blue colors.
Mrko can refer either dark brown, less often dark gray, or even black. It is etymologically derived from the word for , but is distinct from . For instance, it is used to describe the brown bear. Smeđe and kestenjasto refer to brown, crveno means red, ružičasto is for pink and narančasto designates orange.
Shades are defined with a prefix, for example, dark blue is tamnoplavo.
The Slovene language distinguishes among blue, green and black
- Blue: moder or plav is used for any blue. Sometimes sinj is also used to describe azure. The word akvamarin is sometimes used for navy-blue.
- Green: zelen is related to the word zel, which is derived from Proto-Slavic word зель for "herb" – which in turn is believed to be derived from Proto-Indo-European word for "to shine", which also described light shades of colors.
- Black: Črn
Transient hues between blue and green are mostly described as zeleno moder or modro zelen, sometimes as turkizen. Transient hues between green and yellow are described as rumeno zelen or zeleno rumen.
Celtic
The Welsh, Cornish, and Breton word glas is usually translated as 'blue'; however, it can also refer, variously, to the color of the sea, of grass, or of silver. The word gwyrdd is the standard translation for 'green'. In traditional Welsh, glas could refer to certain shades of green and gray as well as blue, and llwyd could refer to various shades of gray and brown. Perhaps under the influence of English, Modern Welsh is trending toward the 11-color Western scheme, restricting glas to 'blue' and using gwyrdd for 'green', llwyd for 'gray' and brown for 'brown', respectively. However, the more traditional usage is still heard today in the Welsh word for 'grass', and in fossilized expressions such as caseg las 'gray mare', tir glas 'green land', papur llwyd 'brown paper' and even red for 'brown' in siwgwr coch 'brown sugar'.In Modern Irish and Scottish Gaelic, the word for 'blue' is gorm – a borrowing from the now obsolete Early Welsh word gwrm 'dark blue, dusky'. A relic of the original meaning 'dusky, dark brown' survives in the Irish term daoine gorma 'Black people'.
In Old and Middle Irish, like in Welsh, glas was a blanket term for colors ranging from green to blue to various shades of gray. In Modern Irish, it has come to mean both various shades of green, with specific reference to plant hues, and gray, respectively; shades of green not related to plants would be referred to in Modern Irish as uaine or uaithne, while liath is gray proper.
Scottish Gaelic uses the term uaine for 'green'. However, the dividing line between it and gorm is somewhat different than between the English "green" and "blue", with uaine signifying a light green or yellow-green, and gorm extending from dark blue to include the dark green or blue-green of vegetation. Grass, for instance, is gorm, rather than uaine. In addition, liath covers a range from light blue to light gray. However, the term for a green apple, such as a Granny Smith, would be ubhal glas.
The boundary between colors varies much more than the "focal point": e.g. an island known in Breton as Enez c'hlas 'the blue island' is l'Île Verte 'the green island' in French, in both cases referring to the grayish-green color of its bushes, even though both languages distinguish green from blue.
Romance
The Romance terms for "green" are all from Latin '. The terms for "blue", on the other hand, vary: Catalan ', Occitan ', French ' and Italian ' come from a Germanic root, the Spanish, Galician and Portuguese azul is likely to come from Arabic, whereas the Romanian albastru is of Latin origin, originating from '. French bleu was in turn loaned into many other languages, including English. Latin itself did not have a word covering all shades of blue, which may help explain these borrowings. It did, however, recognise ', and '.French, as most Romance languages, makes roughly the same distinctions as English and has a specific term for each of blue, green and gray. For all three, different shades can be indicated with different terms, none of them being considered as basic color terms: "bleu ", "bleu ", "bleu ", "bleu " ; "vert clair", "vert " ; "gris ", "gris ". French also uses "" for the lighter shade of blue of the sunny sky, that was in turn loaned to English as "azure".
Catalan distinguishes blue from green and gray. Other basic or common colors by its own right are ' "purple", ' "yellow", ' or ' "orange", ' "red", ' "pink", ' "brown", ' "gray", ' "black" and ' "white". For all these colors except black and white it is possible to indicate different shades using ' "light" and ' "dark"; for blue, though, it generally is blau cel "sky blue" and blau marí "sea blue". Other words and compounds are common to indicate more elaborated shades. Catalan actually distinguishes two reds with different and common words: while ' refers to the color of blood, ' is a red tending towards yellow or the color of clay.
Italian distinguishes blue, green and gray. There are also common words for light blue : ' and ', and other for darker shades, e.g. ', indigo. ', the equivalent of the English azure, is usually considered a separate basic color rather than a shade of blu. Some sources even go to the point of defining blu as a darker shade of azzurro. Celeste literally means ' of the sky' and can be used as synonym of azzurro, although it will more often be considered a less saturated hue. ' literally "sea water", indicates an even lighter, almost transparent, shade of blue. To indicate a mix of green and blue, Italians might say verde , literally water green. The term ', not common in standard Italian and perceived as a literary term, is used in scientific contexts to indicate a mix of blue, green and gray. Other similar terms are ' and ' ; they are more saturated hues and differ in context of use: the first is a literary or bureaucratic term ; the second is more common in any informal speech, along with the variant turchino.
In Portuguese, the word "" means blue and the word "" means green. Furthermore, "azul-" means light-blue, and "azul-" means dark-blue. More distinctions can be made between several hues of blue. For instance, "azul-" means sky blue, "azul-" means navy-blue and "azul-" means turquoise-blue. One can also make the distinction between "verde-claro" and "verde-escuro", meaning light and dark-green respectively, and more distinctions between several qualities of green: for instance, "verde-" means olive-green and "verde-" means emerald-green. Cyan is usually called "azul-celeste" and "verde-", meaning water green.
Romanian clearly distinguishes between the colors green and blue. It also uses separate words for different hues of the same color, e.g. light blue, blue, dark-blue, along with a word for turquoise and azure.
Similarly to French, Romanian, Italian and Portuguese, Spanish distinguishes blue and green and has an additional term for the tone of blue visible in the sky, namely "", which is nonetheless considered a shade of blue.
Germanic
In Old Norse, the word was also used to describe black. In Swedish,, the modern word for blue, was used this way until the early 20th century, and it still is to a limited extent in modern Faroese.German and Dutch distinguish blue and green, very similarly to English. There are terms for light blue and darker shades of blue. In addition, adjective forms of most traditional color names are inflected to match the corresponding noun's case and gender.
Greek
The words for "blue" and "green" completely changed in the transition from Ancient Greek to Modern Greek.Ancient Greek had γλαυκός "clear light blue" contrasting with χλωρός "bright green"; for darker shades of both colors, γλαυκός and χλωρός were replaced by κυανός, meaning either a "dark blue or green". The words had more than one modern meaning: in addition to "clear light blue", γλαυκός also meant "turquoise" and "teal-green" – it was the typical description of the color of the goddess Athena's eyes, portrayed as either gray or light blue. As well as "bright green", χλωρός was also used for "acid yellow". Furthermore, κυανός not only meant "turquoise" and "teal-green", but could mean either a "dark blue" or "dark green" or just "blue".
Those terms changed in Byzantine Greek as seen from the insignia colors of two of Constantinople's rival popular factions: Πράσινοι and Bένετοι. It is not known if those groups' names influenced the word change or if they were named using the new color terms, but whichever way it went, πράσινος is a Modern Greek word for "green".
The ancient term for blue has become an archaic term in Modern Greek, replaced by γαλάζιος or θαλασσής for light blue / sea blue, and the recent indeclinable loan-word μπλε is used for blue.
In the Modern Greek language, there are names for light and dark blues and greens in addition to those discussed above:
| Modern Greek | Transliteration | English |
| τυρκουάζ | turquoise | |
| κυανός | azure | |
| λαχανί | lime green | |
| λαδής | olive green | |
| χακί | dark khaki | |
| κυπαρισσί | brownish green |
As a rule, the first two words of the list are accepted as shades of blue, and the rest as shades of green. Also βιολέ / βιολετί for violet blue.
Iranian
has only one word for blue, light blue and green—цъæх, which also means "gray" and "glaucous"—but it also has a separate word for green, кæрдæгхуыз, literally "grassy". The latter derives from кæрдын .Ossetian also has separate words for the following colors:
- light blue: æрвхуыз from æрвон
- glaucous: бæлонхуыз from бæлон ; also фæздæгхуыз from , from Old Persian *pazdaka-, cognate of Latin pedis
- blue: копрадзхуыз, from копрадз - bluing for laundering, transliteration of Russian купорос from Latin cuprum
- gray: фæныкхуыз, from фæнык , originating from Persian *panu-ka, or Russian cognate песок
Kurdish has two words for 'blue', namely شین şîn and کەوی kewî. Another word, şinahî, means 'green', e.g. for plants and grass.
Persian words for blue include آبی , for blue generally; نیلی , for deeper shades of blue such as the color of rain clouds; فیروزه 'turquoise stone', used to describe the color of blue eyes; لاجوردی or لاژوردی 'lapis lazuli color', source of the words lazuli and azure; نیلوفری 'water lily color'; and کبود, an old literary word for 'blue'.
The Persian word for green is سبز. As in Sudan, dark-skinned people may be described as "green".
The color of the sky is variously described in Persian poetry using the words,,,, or — literally "green", "indigo", "turquoise", "azure" or "the color of water lilies". For example, "green stable", "green ceiling", "green balcony", and "green peacock" are poetic epithets for the sky—in addition to similar compounds using the words for blue, e.g., "lapis lazuli-colored roof" or "turquoise bowl". Moreover, the words for green of Arabic origin اخضر and خضرا are used for epithets of the sky or heaven, such as "green wheel".
Indo-Aryan
& Chambyali have the same term for blue & green, i.e., Takri: ???? ISO:.Other Indo-Aryan languages distinguish blue from green. In Urdu, blue is نیلا and green is سبز. There are some names of shades of blue as well, like فیروزی .
In Hindi, blue is नीला and green is हरा. In Marathi, blue is निळा and green is हिरवा. In Bengali, blue is নীল and green is সবুজ.
Niger-Congo A
In Yoruba, there are only three fundamental terms for colors, one of them, the word dúdú, is used for the word black and colors such as blue, green, purple, and grey. In modern times, unique terms for the colors are formed based on descriptive markers or English loan words, àwọ̀ ewé is used for green, while búlùú or àwọ̀ aró, is used for blue.Niger-Congo B (Bantu)
isiZulu and isiXhosa
and Xhosa use the word -luhlaza for blue/green; the prefix changes according to the class of noun. Speakers of the two mutually intelligible languages can add a descriptive word after the colour term to differentiate between the two colours; for example "hlaza okwesibhakabhaka" meaning 'like the sky' or hlaza okwotshani meaning 'like grass'.Kiswahili
The Swahili word for blue is buluu, which is derived directly from English and has been in the language for a relatively short time. For other colors, Swahili uses either rangi ya ___ or a shortened version, -a ___. For example, green is rangi ya kijani or rangi ya majani. Sky blue is rangi ya samawati from the Arabic word for sky سَمَاء . These examples can be written as -a kijani, -a majani, -a samwatiOtjiHimba
The Himba people use a single word for shades of green and blue: buru. They curiously have only three other color names; thus, their limited color perception has aroused interest in anthropologists, who have studied this phenomenon.Setswana
uses the same word tala to refer to both blue and green. One has to deduce from the context and prior knowledge, of what is being talked about, to be able to pinpoint exactly the color in question.Northern Caucasus languages
In the language Tsakhur, not only are blue and green distinguished, but also turquoise.Pama–Nyungan languages
Eastern Arrernte
In Eastern Arrernte, the words atherrke and atherrke-atherrke both can be used to refer to the colour green, including some shades of blue and yellow. Additionally, atherrke can also be used as a noun to refer to grass and other small plants.Other European languages
Basque
The Basque language has three native color words derived from ur. Urdin, is nowadays used in most cases for blue. Ubel originally meant "flash flood" and, with respect to colors, refers to bruises. Begi ubela would be translated into English by "a black and blue eye". But in Basque, unlike English, ubel remains in use after the hit skin has lost its purple color and become pale, why this word is used for both "purple" in particular and "pale hue" in general. Uher originally meant "dirty", "still water", or "rusty"; it is used for gray or sienna tones, and more generally for dark colors. Green is usually expressed with the loan-word berde from Spanish verde/French vert. The authenticity of the less common Basque terms for green orlegi and musker is disputed.Uralic
makes a distinction between vihreä and sininen. Turquoise or teal is considered to be a separate, intermediate color between green and blue, and musta is also differentiated from blue.The name for blue, sininen, is shared with other Finnic languages. Cognates of the root are also found in the Mordvinic languages and it is thus dated even beyond the era of the Proto-Finnic language. It appears similar to a word found in the Slavic languages, but there is no consensus that there would be a relationship. The word vihreä is related to vehreä and vihanta, and viha, originally. It is not shared with Estonian, in which it is roheline, probably related with the Estonian word rohi. However, the form viha does have correspondences in related languages as far as Permic languages, where it means not only "poison" but "bile" or "green or yellow". It has been originally loaned from an Indo-Iranian protolanguage and is related to Latin virus. Furthermore, the word musta is also of Finnic origin.
The differentiation of several colors by hue is at least Finnic in origin. Before this, only red was clearly distinguished by hue, with other colors described in terms of brightness, using non-color adjectives for further specificity. Alternatively, it appears that the distinction between valkea and musta was in fact "clean, shining" vs. "dirty, murky". The original meaning of sini was possibly either "black/dark" or "green". Mauno Koski's theory is that dark colors of high saturation—both blue and green—would be sini, while shades of color with low saturation, such as dark brown or black, would be musta. Although it is theorized that originally vihreä was not a true color name and was used to describe plants only, the occurrence of vihreä or viha as a name of a color in several related languages shows that it was probably polysemic already in early Baltic-Finnic. However, whatever the case with these theories, differentiation of blue and green must be at least as old as the Baltic-Finnic languages.
Hungarian makes the distinction between green and blue, and also distinguishes black. Intermediate colors between green and blue are commonly referred to as zöldeskék or kékeszöld, but names for specific colors in this continuum—like turquoise —also exist. Particular shades of a color can also have separate names, such as azure.
Turkic
Kazakh
The Kazakh language, like many Turkic languages, distinguishes between kök for blue and jasyl for green. In Kazakh, many adjectival variations can be found referring to perceived gradations in saturation level of "blue", such as kögildir, kökshil, and kökboz, which respectively denominate the gradual decrease in the intensity, kökboz being often used as a color referent in its own right. Kök is occasionally used to denote green plants, but such usage is mostly confined to poetic utterances or certain localized dialects.Tuvan
Before the standardization and mongolization of the Tuvan language, many centuries ago, Tuvans used the word kök for both blue and green. To distinguish the color green from blue, they used to name it sug-kök – "water-blue", no matter how strange it may sound. Although note that kök was used for green primarily, they used sug-kök only if they needed to. Thus, blue was kök, and green was kök, sug-kök. However, the dark hues of both colors can be named similarly as kök even nowadays.Over time, due to the diversity of the country, the green color was named differently from one area to another. In some parts, Tuvans used chazhyl, other parts used the Mongol nogoon, the rest used the traditional kök/sug-kok.
Under the influence of the Mongol Empire and due to the need to standardize the language at the beginning of the 20th century, the word green became nogoon. The linguists who were responsible for the standardization had to take into account two factors: the Mongolization of the language, and the lack of the word for green. They decided to use the Mongolian word for green because they wanted to implicate the Mongol legacy in the lexicon.
Hence today, in the standardized Tuvan language, blue and green are named differently, but it led to the following controversies:
- The problem with nogoon is that it is purely symbolic, and not a natural thing.
- The color was named after a foreign non-Turkic word.
- Not choosing the obvious Turkic chazhyl, which was already used in Western parts of Tuva.
- The new naming of the green color was done in the 20th century, which was subjectively recent. Also, the realization of the innovation was performed forcibly, also touching the previous point, by making the people to switch from chazhyl to nogoon.
Turkish
treats dark or navy blue as a separate color from plain or light blue. Mavi is derived from the Arabic word مائي and lacivert is derived from Persian لاجورد , a semiprecious stone with the color of navy blue. In the pre-Islamic religion of the Turks, blue is the color that represented the east, as well as the zodiac sign Aquarius. A characteristic tone of blue, turquoise, was much used by the Turks for their traditional decorations and jewelry.In traditional pre-Islamic Turkic culture, both blue and green were represented by the same name, gök. The name is still in use in many rural areas. For instance, in many regions of Turkey, when mold is formed on cheese, the phenomenon is called göğermek.