WeRead Powered by ReaderPub
The symbolism of colour cover

The symbolism of colour

Chapter 7: CHAPTER VI
By Ellen McCaffery
Open in WeRead

Explore more books like this:

Mythology, Legends & FolkloreReligion/Spirituality

About This Book

The text surveys traditional and esoteric meanings attached to colours, arguing that hues function as symbols and vibratory forces linked to emotion, music, and the natural world. It treats individual colours in turn—red, yellow, green, blue, purple, white, black, brown and grey—and considers the rainbow, tracing cultural lore, gem and talismanic uses, and artistic and poetic responses. Practical topics include medical and agricultural applications of coloured rays, meteorological colour signs, chromatics of the sky, and the proposed correspondence between colour and sound. Appendices outline schools of colour, planetary colours, and experiments on plant growth under coloured light.

CHAPTER VI

THE OLD LANGUAGE OF PURPLE

“And they put upon him a robe of purple.”—St John.

The next and highest colour of the spectrum is violet. Like green and blue, it is calming and soothing in its influence. Like green and blue, it is said by the mystics to be a feminine colour. It seems as though the ancient people used the term purple to include violet, and in fact any tint made up of blue and red in whatever proportions. Pliny tells us that the colour of the amaranth is a far more beautiful purple that any the dyers can obtain. This, however, does not help us much, for the amaranth can be almost any shade from red to blue. Even to-day we see how carelessly the word purple is used when we have in a great writer’s book the phrase, “the purple rainbow.”

The symbolism of purple partakes of the Red of Love and Self-sacrifice and the blue of Truth; hence it was considered symbolic of Wisdom, and is mentioned as being the colour of the canopy[18] of Solomon’s chariot. Purple was considered the most glorious of colours, for the purple dye was so costly that it became part of the insignia of royalty. In England it is used as the sign of royal mourning.

[18] Song of Solomon iii. 10.

Before we really comprehend the symbolism of purple, however, we must reflect that purple was said by the Egyptians to be the colour of the earth. At evening, in some parts of the world, looking across the ploughed fields that seem so red in the daylight, we see that they appear tinged with purple. Our painters of landscape show this purple colour, while our poets speak of purple shadows.

Thus the colour became symbolic of the basic qualities in our nature that form a sure foundation on which to build the very highest qualities—patience, endurance, perseverance, ability to be long suffering and slow to anger. All these qualities are a sine qua non to the evolved soul. This is why the suffering Christ was given a purple robe before His crucifixion. It is to show that the King of kings is also the lowliest and most gentle of all beings—that He had such humility as was expressed in the washing of the disciples’ feet. As He Himself said: “He who would be the chief among you, let him be your servant.” How we think here of the humble, fragrant violet.

We remember the story of Sir Gareth in the Idylls of the King.

“And Gareth bowed himself
With all obedience to the king, and wrought
All kind of service with a noble ease
That graced the lowest act in doing it.”

The Egyptians often made their soldiers talismans of amethyst because they said that this stone could give them the necessary calmness of mind to ensure victory. The Magi of Persia said that amethyst was born of the Sun and of the Moon, which confirms us in the belief that purple has all the symbolism of the red and of the blue, the masculine and feminine forces, the spirit and the soul. It evidently seems to have been used in this way by the Finns, for in the “Kalevala,” Wainomoinem sails over the “blue back of the waters” till he “gains the purple-coloured harbour” of the next world. Here purple is used of a greater realm than that of the ocean.

Many old rosaries were made of amethyst, because its effect was to make the wearer withdraw from all the trials of the world and worship in a holy calm.

In King’s Ancient Gnostic Gems we are given a translation of a poem by Marbodus:—

“On high the amethyst is set
In colour like the violet,
With flames as if of gold it shows
And far it purple radiance throws;
The humble heart it signifies
Of him, who in the Saviour dies.”

So we see why the martyrs are often represented as being clad in purple. This ability to endure for the truth brings them the fullest reward in the love of the Saviour.

When we see the angels with purple robes it signifies that they partake of the sorrows of Christ and desire to help men with loving messages to attain the heavenly home beyond the blue firmament. In some of the ancient orders of nuns the women wore purple veils as a sign of repentance and of faith in the divine love of God.

Shakespeare, in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, speaks of the

“Flower of purple dye
Hit with Cupid’s archery”

—a flower that we now consider to be the pansy, the name of which is probably derived from “Pensez à moi,” and emblematic of humility and sweet, loving thoughts.

Purple in its debased meaning gives us over-weening pride, pomp, and vanity. It is the colour of the rich man who has no love in his heart for Lazarus, and no belief in anything but the things of the world.