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comment by b_b
b_b  ·  4535 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Color Wheels
I learned on Radio Lab recently that there is no reference to the color blue in Homer, and that it doesn't exist in pretty much any other ancient work either. In fact, Homer continually refers to the sea as being "wine colored", and seems to ignore the color of the sky. They speculate that the reason for this is that there were no artificial blue pigments, and very few things in nature (none in Greece) are blue. Apparently, until one can artificially manufacture a color, it doesn't hold a lot of significance to humans. Very interesting thought.




mk  ·  4535 days ago  ·  link  ·  
That is a crazy thought.

Food dyes are very interesting. Consider:

Cirtus Red-2: a possible carcinogen, but approved for US orange peels.

and

Orange B: just for hot dog casings.