Re: NATLANG: Colours

>By the way, this may have come up earlier in the thread, which I wasn't
>following, but "azure" is a borrowing from the Old Spanish word that
>became "azul" in modern Spanish.  OS borrowed it from Arabic
>"al-la:zaward", which was in turn borrowed from Persian "la:Zward".  All
>of the earlier words referred to the gem we now call "lapis lazuli", the
>"lazuli" portion of which descends from the same Persian root.
In Turkish, the root has given "lacivert", which instead
of to light/sky blue like the derivations of the "azur"
kind, refers to dark/navy blue.

Turkish has also another interesting word for a dark
colour: "nefti" (dark/forest green). It is etymologically
related to "naphtha" and it's the only specific name for
"dark green" that I know of so far. In English I've found
as possible candidates the words "loden" (although this
seems to refer rather to dull green) and "corbeau" (I
guess from the French word for crow, but seems to be
a fancy name thought up by some manufacturer).

Specific names for "light/mint green" aren't very common
either. I think I've heard Russian has "salatoviy" but
my dictionary doesn't list it (is this a derivation from
the word for salad? - I would guess because of the colour
of lettuce leaves). Cantonese "cheng/ching" is sometimes
translated as "light green", sometimes as "yellowgreen".
Words derived from "glaucus/glaukos" are sometimes defined
as "light green", like "glauco" in Spanish dictionaries,
but I think the meaning can be broader to include the
range of pale cold colours.

Cheers,
Javier

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