To do "green things" was to do behave in a positive, life-affirming manner. Green was the color of the "Eye of Horus," or " Wedjat," which had healing and protective powers, and so the color also represented well-being. The hieroglyph for green is a papyrus stem and frond. Green (Ancient Egyptian name " wahdj'"was the color of fresh growth, vegetation, new life and resurrection (the latter along with the color black). Silver was a rarer metal than gold in Ancient Egypt and held a greater value. Silver (also known by the name "hedj," but written with the determinative for precious metal) represented the color of the sun at dawn, and the moon, and stars. Clothing, which was often just undyed linen, was usually depicted as white. Sacred animals were also depicted as white. Tools, sacred objects and even priest's sandals were white for this reason. White (Ancient Egyptian name " hedj") was the color of purity, sacredness, cleanliness and simplicity. Black was also used as a standard color for hair and to represent the skin color of people from the south – Nubians and Kushites. Black was often used on statues and coffins to invoke the process of regeneration ascribed to the god Osiris. It was also the color of Osiris ('the black one'), the resurrected god of the dead, and was considered the color of the underworld where the sun was said to regenerate every night. Black symbolized fertility, new life and resurrection as seen through the yearly agricultural cycle. Unlike today's pigments which give consistent results, several of those available to Ancient Egyptian artists could react chemically with each other for example, lead white when mixed with orpiment (yellow) actually produces black.īlack (Ancient Egyptian name " kem") was the color of the life-giving silt left by the Nile inundation, which gave rise to the Ancient Egyptian name for the country: " kemet" – the black land. But even at its most creative, color mixing was not widely spread. The degree to which Ancient Egyptian artists and craftsmen mixed colors varies according to dynasty. Paintings would be finished off with fine brushwork to outline the work and add limited interior detail. Purity of color was important to Ancient Egyptians and the artist would usually complete everything in one color before moving on to the next. Where a procession of figures is depicted, the skin tones alternate between light and dark ochre. Red complemented white (think of the double crown Ancient Egypt), and green and black represented different aspects of the process of regeneration. they formed a duality of opposites just like the sun and moon). Silver and gold were considered complementary colors (i.e.
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