From: Mark Odegard
Message: 305
Date: 1999-11-20
The magical purple really is an interesting thing!Maybe Sabine would have something to say about it
I do. First of all there is the question of what color we are talking about. One of the professionals in the field of purple, Robert R. Stieglitz, actually answers all our questions in his article 'The Minoan Origin of Tyrian Purple' (in: Biblical Archaeologist 57/1994)
Which color?
"The dye could be produced in a great variety of shades, depending upon the mixture of the different shellfish utilized. Variations could also be made by chemical means, such as light conditions and reducing agents. The resulting colors include red, blue, and dark purple, the latter being considered the most noble of the tints. All shades were utilized primarily to color ceremonial garments." (p. 48) Please not that chemically the dyed with purple (and light, applicable on wool) is exactly the same as indigo (the plant used for dyeing jeans...)
Which language?
"The Mycenaean Greek term po-pu-re-ia 'purple' is found in several Linear B tablets from Knossos, which deal with textile allocations. One of these tablets (KN X976) actually contains the expression wa-na-ka-te-ro po-pu-re-/ /'royal purple'. This is the first written attestation of a term which in later ages became synonymous with 'Tyrian purple'. /.../ The Classical Greek root porphyr- is used to designate both the mollusc and its dye, but it is not an Indo-European word. Astour (1965) proposed, unconvincingly to my mind, to derive this term from a Canaanite root *parpar meaning 'to churn, to boil'. However, the Canaanite word for the purple molluscs was evidently 'hillazon' - or word of unknown origin attested only in Talmudic Hebrew. /.../ As for the Mycenaean term 'porphyr' -, I would suggest that this was originally a Minoan word, borrowed by the Mycenaeans when they learned from the Minoans to produce the dye." (p. 52)
Well?
Lots of greetings from Crete
Sabine
There is of course no doubt that the primary color word purple descends from this etymon, but what it represented in Homeric and pre-Homeric antiquity is another question. The American Heritage Dictionary does not provide a PIE root for the word, but leaves it at Latin.
The question is if this was a primary word for color, or if it was a fuzzy adjective a la fresh-leaf-colored, hare-colored. The 'royal-color', the 'Tyrian-color', 'the snail-based dye', 'the color of the cloth worth its weight in gold' are not primary color-words; these are descriptions, explanations. Since it described a range of colors, red, to blue, to genuine purple, you are left with the feeling the Mycenaean term cannot be considered color-word according to the Berlin-Kay system.
I am not saying a language which lacks a discrete word for a particular color is unable to discern or describe that color. My point here is wholly lexical. Because of the variablity of the exact colors produced, you often see the color referred to as tyrian, with a few words of explanation. Here, tyrian is not a color, but an adjective that describes visual qualities, in the class of adjectives occupied by 'speckled', 'striped', 'shiney', 'mottled', 'matt', 'blond', 'fair', 'swarthy', etc.
I am reporting only what seems to be the consensus of my sources, and take their judgments on the subject almost uncritically. To ascribe to the Mycenaeans a distinct primary color-word for 'purple' complicates the problem of the color-system apparent in Homeric Greek. Do 2nd millennium BCE Egyptian archives have a distinct word for 'purple', or is it just a description? Ditto for the Hittite archives. Is this 'royal-dyed cloth' or 'purple cloth' ?
I am perhaps making overly fine distinctions, but the Berlin-Kay system is compellingly convincing, and from everything I've read, represents a facet of current-day linguistic orthodoxy. You might develop further refinements, but the underlying thesis seems to be unchallenged.
Mark Odegard.