Wine-dark sea

[petronia]

In Mykonos: I haven't the gumption to look them up, but there were a few recent articles in which scientists puzzled over Homeric descriptions of colours. How could the Aegean be the same colour as wine, or a bronze mirror? Was puzzled by their puzzlement upon reading, and confirmed in my puzzlement now, because of course the sun shining on the Aegean is precisely the same colour as a metal cup of dark wine and/or a bronze mirror (the Greeks had no glass for either). It's categories like "blue" or "purple" that are poorly applied.

(I am going out again VERY SOON but to my surprise this place has kind of been driving me nuts. It's not very hot, but there's too much wind and too much light. Too much light! I've always wondered how Cortázar eked sinister madness out of the Cyclades, but now I completely grok him. In groundbreaking news, it turns out the ancients did not just randomly point to an island like "our solar deity was born here," there was a reason for it. They grow ONE palm tree still on Delos, for the form, and probably have a deal of a time keeping it watered. I was fine with the heights of Delphi, though.)

EDIT -- I hadn't really put this together, but this weekend is mid-summer AND the full moon, so yeah.

Comments

[yumiyoshi.livejournal.com]

Oh huh I had no idea, always assumed it was either poetic license, or drunkenness talking XD

[petronia.livejournal.com]

IDK, it just always seemed to me that the conceptual categories involved were different, that's all? I mean, the sea is "blue," sure, but an artist who was trying for realism would never paint it like a matte blue wall. In Chinese you have 蓝 and 青, right? English doesn't tend to conflate "reflective dark blue" with "bronze," but it does conflate "fire" with "sunlight" and "gold", which I think Homer would've found just as weird.

[marici.livejournal.com]

Take pictures? I'd love to see it.

[tsutanai.livejournal.com]

Not to mention that with light and surroundings it'd change (just like the green of trees in midday in midsummer can be very very dark), particularly as water is reflective.

It's not really a new observation: the study of what languages have what colors is an old (and well-tested) one. It got recent currency for some reason, maybe the Radiolab piece? But Homeric Greek has no separate word for blue, as many languages don't. (Although the fewest color words you can get in a language--I forget which one right now--is three: for black, white and red. Although of course the sense of those words is a bit different there!)

[papersky.livejournal.com]

It's blue, but it has the same reflective luminosity as red wine.

As for Delos, so very yes.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Well, quite; you can execute an excellent print of my current view with three. XD The dark-colour of the sea and cliffs, the light-colour of the sky and cubic houses, and the fire-colour of the setting sun and electric lights and rhododendron flowers.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I've been taking many! But then the camera becomes a factor, too. (My previous camera was destroyed by being splashed by a tiny bit of sea water, which I found so traumatizing I bought a new one designed for rugged outdoor activities. It has a "beach/snow" auto setting, which I've used 80% of the time throughout Greece.)

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I feel much better today, now that the north wind has died down and I've been to the beach (where there are man-made shade and cool drinks). But yes - what a place.