I was in Oregon last week to visit family—the first time in two years. Before the pandemic, I’d often try to go every three months or so with my son—to get out, to be reminded of how home feels, to see family, to have my son know his extended family, and to be familiar with a place outside of Alaska.
I was reminded, despite that there were no leaves yet on the trees, how early spring comes to Oregon—so many flowers blooming already, grass glowing green in sunlight. It was the green that my son and I commented on the most—how reassuring it was to see a landscape where there was visible life, growth. While I’ve grown to like the winter—especially a snowy one—it will be months still before we see leaves or the color green in the landscape here.
Green has been my favorite color for as long as I can remember. A while back, I began to collect stories about it, ideas about it, mythologies around it, quotes about it. It’s obsessive and interesting to go back to and find different threads that reappear.
So as a step away from the ever-growing hell-fire that the world seems to keep adding fuel to, and as we move towards the latter half of March, towards the equinox, towards places that are turning green—even if it is not green around me and only in memory—I thought I’d share common-placing notes around the color green.
The first use of green in Old English is from AD 700.
The word green comes from Old English grene, Northumbrian groene "green, of the color of living plants," in reference to plants, "growing, living, vigorous," …through a sense of the "color of growing plants."
Goethe wrote of green:
The eye experiences a distinctly grateful impression from this color…The beholder has neither the wish nor the power to imagine a state beyond it.
In the Renaissance, powdered green stone was used to treat kidney and gallstones. Thus it was known in Latin taxonomy as Lapis nephriticus.
The Aztecs also believed that green jade could cure side pains—kidney, stomach, and other internal pain—which is why the Spanish word for jadeite is piedra de ijada—or side stone.
The Aztecs also mixed the powder of jade with cold water as a drink to cure heartache.
Sir Walter Raleigh claimed that the Amazons—warrior women of the Orinoco—traded plates of gold for green stones.
Green, how I want you green. / Green wind. Green branches. / The ship out on the sea / the horse on the mountain. / With the shade around her waist / she dreams on her balcony, / green flesh, her hair green, / with eyes of cold silver. / Green, how I want you green…. —Federico García Lorca
The writings of Paracelsus instruct that the emerald is good for the eyes, and for memory. It describes the quintessence of the emerald as a green juice—and that just as with dried herbs, it is the same with the flesh—the green spirit which is life ultimately recedes.
Green is at the center of alchemical mysteries, represented by the Green Lion. The symbol of a green lion devouring the sun signifies the purification of matter into gold. Green was believed to be the color of earth, distilled and extracted, and thus the Green Lion stands as an expression of the raw matter of nature—“the green fuse stimulates the flower.”
As the green leaves of a plant are formed with the aid of sunlight, the Green Lion is like the green chlorophyll that receives and captures the golden light of the sun. Gold or the Sun is directly linked with the Spirit. The Green Lion is thus a symbol for when the soul is dissolved of impurities to reach a higher state of consciousness—corresponding symbolically to the Philosopher’s stone—the ‘true medicine,’ the ‘elixir of life,’ the secret fire that leads to spiritual and immortal truth.
I am the true green and Golden Lion without cares, / In me all the secrets of the Philosophers are hidden. —16th century, The Cosmopolite.
The force that through the green fuse drives the flower / Drives my green age; that blasts the roots of trees / Is my destroyer. / And I am dumb to tell the crooked rose / My youth is bent by the same wintry fever. —Dylan Thomas
Hildegard von Bingen, 12th-century abbess, healer, composer, and mystic, believed as a core tenant in viriditas—the greening power, the green soul of the world. She described her visions as an arrival of sunlight, rooted in the green of the soul that glows like that of leaves newly wet in the rain.
She also believed in the healing powers of emeralds, believing them to be effective for all human weaknesses and infirmities because the green stones were brought forth by the sun and sprung from the material greenness of the air. Carry an emerald to warm the flesh of your body, and pains in the heart, stomach, or side will feel better. For headache, she advised placing the stone in your mouth to warm it with one’s breath until moist, stroke your temples with the wet stone, and then keep it in your mouth for a short hour.
Hildegard kept an emerald of her own beside her bed as a symbol or threshold to the green soul of this world. It was also a remedy for the seizures that would arrive with her visions. It is as green as the moisture of the body, as the rain that falls down into the earth and smooth as glass when I run my mouth along the worn edges of the rough cut.
…Greener than grass / I am —Sappho
Writing about this line of Sappho’s, Ann Carson writes that Sappho is
…predicating of her own Being an attribute observable only from outside her own body. This is the condition called ecstasies, literally “standing outside oneself,” a condition regarded by the Greeks as typical of mad persons, geniuses and lovers, and ascribed to poets by Aristotle.
Beryl is a green mineral of hexagonal prisms. The word beryl originates from the 14th century Old French, which in turn is rooted from Latin beryllus and Greek bēryllos, both of which may derive from Sanskrit. In medieval Latin, berillus was used to name precious stones of a green color—and also for fine crystal and eyeglasses—the first example of which may have been made of beryl. The German word for spectacles—brille—hints at this early origin.
In the first century AD, Pliny the Elder wrote Naturalis Historia, an encyclopedia of ancient knowledge, noting that “[…] after straining our eyes by looking at another object, we can restore our vision to normal by gazing at an emerald.”
Pliny also noted that the Emperor Nero used emeralds to watch gladiator combat, ostensibly to protect his sight from the bloody scenes, but more likely to avoid the glare of the sun.
The treasury of Charles V of France (r.1364-80) also features beryls framed as spectacles.
Shah Jahan, the Mughal emperor whose grief for his wife was made manifest in the Taj Mahal, is believed to have had such emerald glasses. Speculating on the reason for them, art historian Ebba Koch writes:
The eyeglasses with lenses of emeralds may have had a more specific meaning for Shah Jahan. Emeralds were held to have miraculous healing powers and to ward off evil. For Shah Jahan, in his extreme mental state of mourning for a lost beloved, looking through emerald glasses could have been… meant to strengthen and heal his vision. And beyond that, green was the colour of the popular Islamic saint Khwaja Khizr, who was believed to have found the water of eternal life. Eternal paradisiacal life was what Shah Jahan envisaged for himself and Mumtaz Mahal, and looking through the green emerald spectacles may have provided him with a foretaste of it.
In the Middle Ages, healers and doctors wore green robes, signifying their knowledge and use of herbs and simples. Green remains the color of pharmacists in Europe.
Green is the emblem of salvation in Islam and the color of knowledge. The Prophet’s cloak was green, a place where his descendants could seek protection and refuge in times of danger. In the Koran, robes worn in paradise are the color of leaves. Khidr or al-Khidr (الخضر,”the Green One") is a revered figure in Islam, whom the Qur'an describes as a righteous servant of God who possessed great wisdom or mystic knowledge. He is said to have worn green and traveled with Moses.
The Greeks thought green was associated with Hermaphorditus, the son of blue Hermes and yellow Aphrodite.
Green is the color of both aliens from other worlds and creatures who dwell in the underworld of the earth.
In Victorian England, the color green was associated with homosexuality.
The Romans adored the color green—the color of Venus, the goddess of gardens, vegetables, and vineyards. A fine earth pigment was widely used in wall paintings recovered from Pompeii, Herculaneum, Lyon, Vaison-la-Romaine, and other Roman remains. They also made a green pigment from verdigris, made by soaking copper plates in wine. By the second century AD, green was used in Roman paintings, mosaics, and glass.
There were ten different words in Latin for the varieties of green.
…Meanwhile the mind, from pleasure less, / Withdraws into its happiness; / The mind, that ocean where each kind / Does straight its own resemblance find, / Yet it creates, transcending these, / Far other worlds, and other seas; / Annihilating all that’s made / To a green thought in a green shade. —Andrew Marvell, The Garden
Vincent Van Gogh wrote to his brother Théo:
With green and red I have tried to give expression to the terrible passions of the human heart.
Democritus, the father of atomic theory, believed that green was a product of red and white. Plato was convinced that green was made by mixing red and black. Red and green were often confused linguistically for the ancients, up until the fifteenth century.
Green dye was notoriously difficult to create and was taboo for centuries due to theories about color mixing. The mixing of materials is something that was done by alchemists, and there was deep mistrust in medieval Europe of creating things that did not naturally occur.
Many countries forbid blue and black dyers to work with red or yellow dye. Anyone caught mixing woad (blue) and weld (yellow) was heavily fined and sometimes exiled. In 1386, Hans Töllner, a third-generation dyer from Nuremberg, was fined, banned from the profession, and exiled to Augsburg for working with a green dye.
The taboos and confusion around the mixing of green might be part of why the color also became associated with jealousy, poison, otherness. Shakespeare cemented the association of green and envy, with green-eyed jealousy in The Merchant of Venice, and in Othello, as Iago speaks O, beware, my lord, of jealousy; / It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock / The meat it feeds on…
In Shakespeare’s day, green costumes were believed to bring bad luck—a superstition that persisted into the nineteenth century.
Wassily Kandinsky wrote:
Green is the most restful color that exists. On exhausted men this restfulness has a beneficial effect, but after a time it becomes wearisome. Pictures painted in shades of green are passive and tend to be wearisome; this contrasts with the active warmth of yellow or the active coolness of blue. In the hierarchy of colors green is the “bourgeoisie”—self-satisfied, immovable, narrow. It is the color of summer, the period when nature is resting from the storms of winter and the productive energy of spring.
In early modern Europe, green became the color associated with wealth, merchants, bankers, and gentry. Red was worn by the nobility, while brown and grey was worn by peasants. Because of this, the benches in the United Kingdom’s House of Commons are green, while the benches for the House of Lords are red.
For the troubadours, green was the color of growing love, and light green clothing was reserved for young unmarried women. This may be one of the reasons that the dress worn by the young woman in Jan Van Eyck’s painting, The Arnolfini Marriage (which is actually called The Arnolfini Portrait) is a verdant green.
In the bohemian set of the late 19th and early 20th century, absinthe was known as “the green fairy.”
…But God be with / the Clown / Who ponders this / Tremendous scene / This fair Apocalypse of Green / As if it were / his own… —Emily Dickinson
Green is a color notoriously difficult to create in paint. Green pigments rapidly faded or changed color. Monks creating illuminated manuscripts would use verdigris, made the same as in Roman times, or ground malachite to make a luminous green. During the early Renaissance painters learned to paint faces with a green undercoat, then with pink, to create flesh tones. But over the centuries the pink has faded, leaving many faces looking green and sickly.
In 1775 Carl Wilhelm Scheele, a Swedish scientist who studied arsenic, came upon copper arsenite—a green that he instantly knew could have commercial appeal in a world of fading green pigments. The world fell in love with it and used it in fabrics, wallpapers, artificial flowers, paper, dresses, paint, and even confectionary.
After a trip to Italy in 1845, Charles Dickens returned from interiors covered in green wallpaper and was seized with a passion to redecorate his whole house in the shade. He was luckily dissuaded by his wife.
Napoleon was not quite as lucky—his small room in exile on the island of St. Helena was covered in wallpaper made with Scheele’s green. When his body was exhumed in 1840 it was curiously well-preserved—a sign of arsenic poisoning, leading to accusations of poisoning by the British. Some also believe that these toxic green pigments may have caused Cézanne’s diabetes and Monet’s blindness.
While green is commonly associated with life, growth, and good health, it is also the color most often associated with toxicity, poison, and illness. This may have arisen because of the toxicity of so many green pigments.
The color celadon, or mis se, “mysterious color” as it was known in ancient China, was lauded for its green beauty and known only by royalty. It’s precise original color remained unknown for centuries until a cache of pottery in the color was recovered in 1987.
The tenth-century Chinese poet Xu Yin described mi se as “carving light from the moon to dye the mountain stream.”
The Chinese poet Li Po wrote:
You ask me why I dwell in the green mountain; / I smile and make no reply for my heart is free of care. // As the peach-blossom flows down the stream and is gone into the unknown / I have a world apart that is not among men.
The Irish fairy known as a leprechaun is commonly portrayed wearing a green suit. However, before the twentieth century, he was usually described wearing a red suit.
Green became the color of Irish nationalism in the 17th century, with the green harp flag becoming a symbol of the movement. When Ireland gained independence in 1922, green was incorporated into the national flag.
Romans used green holly and evergreen leaves as decorations for winter solstice celebrations known as Saturnalia—a tradition that can still be seen in the use of Christmas decorations today.
…Beside Augustus’ portals let the laurel / Guard and watch over the Oak, and as my head / Is always youthful, let the laurel always / Be green and shining!” He said no more. The laurel, / Stirring, seemed to consent, to be saying Yes. —Ovid, from Apollo and Daphne
The legendary symbol of rebirth and regeneration, the Green Man is often depicted in sculpture as a face made of or completely surrounded in leaves and branches. Some have leaves for hair, or a leafy beard, or leafy shoots growing from his mouth—and sometimes the representation is so abstract that the face can only be seen after close examination. The tradition of the Green Man as a sculptural element of churches exists across Europe into the Middle East.
The legendary aspect of the Green Man tradition can be seen in Robin Hood and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. The Green Knight serves as a monster nemesis and mentor to Sir Gawain—belonging to both a Pagan world which is antagonistic but ultimately harmonious with a Christian world.
The German mystics Mechtilde of Magdeburg and Angelus Silsesius associate green and white with the Epiphany and with Christlike qualities—the green of justice complemented with the white of innocence.
The Ancient Egyptians feared cats with green eyes and imposed a penalty of death for any who was found guilty of killing such cats.
In Egypt, the sea was called “very green.”
Green was also the symbol of regeneration, rebirth, symbolic of the fertile fields made possible by the annual flooding of the Nile. Green was the color of Osiris, god of the underworld, often depicted with a green face to represent his role in rebirth and resurrection. Tombs, as well as false tombs—containers of soil in the shape of Osiris—were planted with seed in some New Kingdom tombs, known as Osiris gardens. Seeds were placed within the wrappings of the corpse and sprinkled with water—when the seeds began to grow, it was a sign that the dead had been resurrected.
A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands, / How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more / than he. / I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green / stuff woven. // Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord, / A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropped, / Bearing the owner’s name someway in the corners, that we may / see and remark, and say Whose? // Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the / vegetation… // And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves. —Walt Whitman, Song of Myself, No. 6
Other gods depicted in green are Amoga-siddhi in Tibet, and Tlaloc in Mexico. Vishnu, bearing the weight of the world, is depicted as a tortoise with a green face.
Nymphs, whose name is derived from water, are often depicted in green in classical painting.
Green is the color of water, and red the color of fire—human life exists between these two colors. Green is linked to thunder. In China, it corresponds to ch’en, the arousing of nature in Spring, as well as thunder and the beginning of the ascension of yang.
In China, green is associated with the east and with sunrise, with life and growth.
The dawn was apple-green, / The sky was green wine held up to the sun, / The moon was a golden pedal between. // She opened her eyes, and green / They shone, clear like flowers undone / For the first time, now for the first time seen. —D.H. Lawrence, Green
I have a Green Man tattoo on my right shoulder.
What a beautiful and focused meditation on the color green! Growing up in my culture green always represented the fertility of land and abundance of mother nature. It also symbolises fertility, which is the prime reason behind the customary tradition of the bride wearing green bangles on wedding day, in certain regions of India. It is a color of motherhood and there is even a goddess of fertility who is always represented in green saree.
Thank you for this piece Freya! This made me reflect on my own relationship with the color green.