ABSTRACT
As far as one can trace the colour perception of the Greeks, one finds it all founded primarily on the degree of connection between colour and light; the most important fact to them in the colour of red being its connection with fire and sunshine; so that “purple” is, in its original sense, “fire-colour,” and the scarlet, or orange of dawn, more than any other, fire-colour. A colour may be called purple because it is light subdued (and so death is called “purple” or “shadowy” death); or else it may be called purple as being shade kindled with fire, and thus said of the lighted sea; or even of the sun itself, when it is thought of as a luminary opposed to the whiteness of the moon. And then, to keep the whole history in the fantastic course of a dream, one has preferred to rule over coal-mines instead of the sea.
