From a venom-based pigment to a flag for ecological movements: green, the quintessential colour of nature, is one of the most difficult tints to synthesise and, perhaps for this reason, it is also associated with capriciousness and deception. Read the article to find out the positivity and negativity of a colour with many nuances.
Green is the colour of sustainability and ecology par excellence, so much so that it is now common, particularly in technical communications for the manufacturing industry in which we work, to see companies defined as “green”. However, this is a misleading mental association with the world of nature and what is “clean” and sustainable: as green is one of the most difficult colours to synthesise, its production process is actually among the most complex and polluting ones, and the same is also true for its disposal. As chemist Michael Braungart stated in an interview with the New York Times a few years ago, “The colour green can never be green, because of the way it is made. It’s impossible to dye plastic green or to print green ink on paper without contaminating them. Ironic, isn't it?”
Obtained from the combination of yellow, the colour of joy, and blue, the colour of tranquillity, green nevertheless remains a positive colour precisely because of its connection with nature: it evokes feelings such as rebirth, freshness, vitality, and peace. Green promotes relaxation, which is why environments with elements in this hue are seen as peaceful, capable of nourishing our minds and even – it is believed – improving concentration. It is also the colour of hope, vitality, fertility, and abundance. In traffic lights, it gives us – literally – the green light, understood as the go-ahead, as opposed to red, which obliges us to stop. However, it is also the colour of envy, the medieval devil, disgust, and venom. In some cultures, it is associated with money (dollars are green) or the lack of it (in Italian, for example, “essere al verde”, literally “being to the green”, means “being broke”). Green has been appreciated since ancient times but, precisely because it is difficult to produce, it has always also been one of the most problematic colours for artistic production.
The origin of the word “green”
The ancients considered green
(in Italian verde, in French vert, in Spanish and Portuguese verde, and in German grün) to be a shade of colour associated with yellow. This is revealed to us by the Indo-European root ghel, which also meant “bright”, “shining”, and the Proto-Germanic word gewalz, which indicated both tints. This gave rise to the Latin terms galbus (“pale green”) and galbinus
(“yellow”). The first to separate these two colours were the Greeks: in ancient Greek, the same Proto-Indo-European root evolved into khloròs, a word associated less ambiguously with pale green, later becoming itself the root of “chlorophyll”. The English word “green” derives from the Proto-Indo-European ghreh- and the Proto-Germanic groniz, which also, not at all coincidentally, gave origin to the verb “to grow”. The Italian, French, Spanish, and Portuguese names followed the same path: they came from the Latin viridis, which later became virdis, which in turn was related to the verb vireo, i.e. “to sprout”, etymologically also connected to “vigour” and “vegetation” (from the Proto-Indo-European root weg-).
Green in ancient history
In contrast to blue and red, there is no trace of green in prehistoric paintings, perhaps because colours found in nature, of which we can no longer find any trace, were used on cave walls. The first evidence of the use of this colour dates back 5000 years, when the ancient Egyptians chose it to represent the vegetation and fertility of the Nile, which flooded the land with its waters making it lush. The Egyptian deity Osiris was often depicted with green skin to symbolise rebirth and fertility. Palettes of green facial makeup have been found in some tombs of the time, made from malachite, a green mineral rich in copper that was pulverised and used as a pigment: the Egyptians had the custom of making up the edge of their eyes with green dye to protect themselves from evil. The same belief also applied to the dead: small green amulets in the shape of scarabs, made of malachite, have been found inside tombs, probably left for the very purpose of protecting the deceased.
In addition to malachite, pigments such as verdigris and Egyptian green were used to obtain the green tint: verdigris was a compound of copper acetate, obtained from the corrosion of metal, whereas Egyptian green was a mixture of malachite, azurite, and other minerals that was prepared synthetically. To become green, on the other hand, fabrics were first dyed yellow with saffron-based pigments and then soaked in blue dye made from the woad plant’s roots.
Shades of green in the Middle Ages
Whereas during the Late Roman Empire, newborn babies were wrapped in green mats to wish them good luck, in the Middle Ages this colour was chosen by girls seeking husbands and then, once married, as a wish for motherhood. However, perhaps because of its dye instability due to the difficult composition process, at that time green was also associated with deception and cunning and, therefore, to the devil, to witches, and to the most frightening fantastic animals such as dragons, monstrous snakes like the hydra and the basilisk, and mermaids.
From its earliest days, the colour green has also been associated with Islam because of a sentence in the Quran that states that those who are in paradise will “wear green garments of fine silk”. Therefore, mosques are decorated in various colours but almost always with predominant green tones and the tombs of Sufi saints, connected to the mystical dimension of Islam, are covered in green silk. That is also why the tribe of prophet Muhammad had a green banner and why almost all Islamic countries use this colour in their flags.
In Western history, green retained its controversial appeal even in the 15th
and 16th centuries. Its association with good omens was confirmed in the famous “Arnolfini Portrait” by Jan van Eyck (1434-35), in which the woman is not pregnant, as one might guess due to the shape of her dress, but is thought to have been depicted in that position and with green clothes as a propitiatory rite for numerous offspring.
Venomous green
The turning point in the popularity of this colour in the art world and beyond occurred in the Victorian era, with the custom of obtaining green dye by adding arsenic, the highly toxic substance believed to be the cause of the deaths of many people who handled books, toys, and decorative objects or merely lived in rooms painted with it[1]. Both Scheele’s green, developed in 1775 by Swedish chemist Carl Wilhelm Scheele, which was an immediate success due to its intensity and resistance to light, and the Paris green or Schweinfurt green, consisting of arsenic and lead, with which Impressionist painters fell in love during the 19th
century, are believed to have been responsible for poisonings that cost the health or lives of many who came into contact with their toxic green pigments. Just to mention one of the most famous cases, Napoleon Bonaparte’s residence in exile on the island of St. Helena, Longwood House, had its walls painted in this colour. In his “Theory of Colours”, it was Goethe who first described green as “soothing” and thus recommended for use in rooms intended for rest and conviviality. The Romantic movement of the late 1700s, finally, sanctioned green as the colour of nature, ecology, and the environment, as it has been up until today.
Fun facts about the green colour
According to some theories, before Coca-Cola’s marketing move, Santa Claus’ original suit was green to recall the “secular” origin of this figure, linked to the tradition of elves distributing gifts in some Northern European countries. According to the folklore of Ireland, the green island par excellence, green is the favourite colour of fairies.
As for the negative connotations of this colour, the creators of the Pixar film “Inside Out” chose green for the character Disgust, alongside Joy (yellow), Sadness (blue), Anger (red), and Fear (purple); again, the ambivalence of green is however once again confirmed by this very character who, within the emotional concept of the film directed by Pete Docter and Ronnie del Carmen, also has a positive value because she allows the protagonist to protect herself from physical and social contamination.
A final oddity brings us back to the problems associated with the realisation of this colour: do you know why the Incredible Hulk’s skin is green? According to the well-informed, in the original portrayal of the Hulk, Stan Lee wanted him to be grey, but due to some printing issues in early copies of Marvel comics, his figure turned from grey to the green we are used to seeing in comics and films today.
