colour and colour naming 2016 - elexicography.eu · (idioms, phrases, collocations, etc.), the...

COLOUR AND COLOUR NAMING:CROSSLINGUISTIC APPROACHES

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João Paulo Silvestre, Esperança Cardeira & Alina Villalva (eds.)

João Paulo Silvestre, Esperança Cardeira &

Alina V

illalva (eds.) Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa | Universidade de Aveiro

Colour terms behave quite differently across languages, similar to the way in which our psychological interpretation varies in response to refl ected visible light. Indeed, from a linguistic perspective, a defi nitive explanation of basic colour terms still eludes many researchers of different disciplines, posing both cognitive and lexical issues. The Colour and Colour Naming conference, held in 2015 at the University of Lisbon, offered a chance to explore colour naming processes from a cross-linguistic approach. Scholars were invited to present and submit their own research for discussion, covering a wide range of fi elds, notably that of lexicology, lexicography, comparative linguistics, morphology, historical linguistics and cultural studies.

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DICIONARÍSTICAPORTUGUESA- V

Colourandcolournaming:

crosslinguisticapproaches

JoãoPauloSilvestre,EsperançaCardeira&AlinaVillalva(eds.)

CENTRODELINGUÍSTICADAUNIVERSIDADEDELISBOAUNIVERSIDADEDEAVEIRO

2016

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Contents

Presentation……………………….…………………………………………………………….………………….. 3

I.Colournames,pan-Europeanperspective

Adiachronicoverviewofcolortermsintheromancelanguages:thelexicalstabilityofthelatincolorvocabulary ………………………………………………………………….. 9|StevenN.DworkinItaliancolourtermsintheBLUEarea:synchronyanddiachrony............................ 21|MariaGrossmann&PaoloD’AchilleEuropean(dis)unionofcolours:secondarybasiccolourtermsinPolish,PortugueseandSpanish …………………………………...………………………………………………… 51|EwaStala&PrzemysławDębowiakPretoandnegro,pardo,mestiçoandmulato……...............................…….………………. 71|EsperançaCardeiraII.CategorizationandlexicographicdescriptionColourfulmicrostructures:howItaliandictionariesseecolourterms…….............… 91|CarlaMarello&CristinaOnestiOnthegrammaticalsubstanceofcolourwords………………………………....………….…...105|AlinaVillalvaMetaphorandemotionincolourwords………………………................………………………. 130|ErlingStrudsholm,CarlaBazzanella&IreneRongaColourverbsinEnglishandRomanian….................……………………………………………. 145|AdinaCameliaBleotu

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Presentation

Colour termsbehavequitedifferentlyacross languages,similar to theway in

whichourpsychological interpretationvaries inresponse toreflectedvisible light.

Indeed,fromalinguisticperspective,adefinitiveexplanationofbasiccolourterms

still eludes many researchers of different disciplines, posing both cognitive and

lexical issues. The Colour and Colour Naming conference, held in 2015 at the

University of Lisbon, offered a chance to explore colournamingprocesses froma

cross-linguistic approach. Scholars were invited to present and submit their own

research fordiscussion,coveringawide rangeof fields,notably thatof lexicology,

lexicography,comparativelinguistics(especiallyfromaPan-Europeanperspective),

morphology,historicallinguisticsandculturalstudies.

The conference was an initiative of the working group Lexicography And

LexicologyfromaPan-EuropeanPerspective,itselfpartoftheCOSTactionEuropean

NetworkofLexicography.Theworkinggroupinvestigatesthevariouswaysbywhich

vocabularies ofEuropean languages can be represented in dictionaries and how

existing information from single language dictionaries can be displayed and

interlinkedtobettercommunicatetheircommonEuropeanheritage.

This present volume gathers together a selection of studies originally

presentedattheconferenceandisdividedintwosections.Thefirstsectionoutlines

aPan-Europeanperspectiveof colournames. In theopening chapter, STEVENN.

DWORKINoffersadiachronicoverviewofcolourtermsintheRomanceLanguages.

Within a comparative framework, he presents the survival of selected elements

pertaining to Latin’s complex colour vocabulary, addressing both the national

standardand regionalvarietiesofRomance languages.TheauthorexaminesLatin

colour terms that have survived on a Pan-Romance scale (e.g. viridis ‘green’ and

niger ‘black’) as well as items that have only survived in scattered Romance

territories(e.g.coccinus‘scarletred’inRomontsch).Thechapteralsodiscussesthe

rivalrybetweenthecolourterms inherited fromspokenLatinandthoseborrowed

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from other languages (e.g. the spread of the Germanic root *blank ‘white’ at the

expenseoftheLatinalbusandcandidusinRomancelanguages)andcasesinwhich

Romance varieties have created innovative colour terms (e.g. Spanish amarillo,

Portugueseamarelo‘yellow’andtheirgeneticrelationshiptoLatinamarus‘bitter’).

Movingfromthisgeneralpanoramatoamorepreciseanalysisofcolourterms

in particular languages, MARIA GROSSMAN and PAOLO D'ACHILLE propose a

casestudyoftermsregardingthecolour‘blue’intheItalianlanguage.Theyfocuson

thesemanticrelationsbetweensuchtermsatdifferentstagesinthedevelopmentof

theItalianlanguage,rightuptoitscontemporaryform.Followingthepublicationof

Berlin&Kay’s book (Basic Colour Terms: Their universality and evolution, 1969),

thequestionastowhetherthenumberofbasictermsmayexceedeleven,hasbeena

pointofcontentionforcolourvocabularystudiesinseparatelanguages.Infact,even

BerlinandKaythemselvesdidnotruleoutthepossibilitythat12basictermscould

feasibly exist. Indeed, the status of the Russian terms sinij ‘blue / dark blue’ and

goluboj‘lightblue’andtheHungarianpiros‘red1’andvörös‘red2’wasleftopen:on

the one hand, Berlin&Kay hypothesise that all are basic terms (thus raising the

numberofbasictermsinthosetwolanguagestotwelve).Ontheotherhand,they

alsoconsiderthepossibility thatgolubojandvöröscouldwellbesecondaryterms

thatindicatedifferentshadesofthebasictermssinijandpiros.Thedebatedstatus

oftheRussiantermssinijandgolubojhasignitedaninterestingdiscussionamong

linguists, psychologists and anthropologists, stimulating a vast number of specific

studiesfocusedontheBLUEareaalsoinotherlanguages,amongstwhichItalianis

included.Theavailabilityoflargeandsearchablecorporanowmakesitpossibleto

advance studies which focus on the distribution of azzurro, blu, celeste and

turchino,bothfromadiachronicandasynchronicperspective.

EWA STALA and PRZEMYSŁAW DĘBOWIAK propose a cross-cultural and

cross-geographical analysis of secondary basic colours, covering the languages of

Polish, Portuguese and Spanish.Here, the selectedwords are violet, orange, pink

andgrey.However,thesewordsstillpertaintotheclassofBasicColourTerms(as

referredtoinBerlinandKay'shierarchy)astheyareusuallydescribedasamixture

oftwoother(basic)colours(i.e.violet=red+blue;orange=yellow+red;pink=

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red+white;grey=black+white)–wecallthemsecondarycolourterms.Notonly

are they the least studied (in comparison towhite, black and red), but they also

seemmore likely to highlight the potential differences between the languages in

question. The study is essentially synchronic, but also contains information of

diachronic nature (the etymology and, possibly, the history of considered terms).

Havingdemonstratedthepresenceofviolet,orange,pinkandgreyinthelanguage

(idioms,phrases,collocations,etc.),theauthorsgoontodiscussthedifferencesand

similaritiesofcolourtermsgeographicalandlinguisticendsofEuropehavedifferent

colourvisions.

Toconcludethissection,ESPERANÇACARDEIRAwritesabouttheevolution

of words that designate the darkest colour in the Portuguese language, notably

‘negro’ and ‘preto’; words which have been present in Portuguese since the

thirteenth century, and are defined either in terms of the absence of light or the

fusionof all colours. Indeed,whenweconsider the labellingof skin colour,black

alsopresentsitselfasacontrasttowhite.However,duetotheheterogeneousnature

of skin tone, the Portuguese language soon found itself having to search for new

lexicon in order to fill the gaps in colour terminology. Inher chapter, the author

tries to identify theways bywhich try these newwords have emerged from pre-

existingconcepts,usingonlinecorporatoanalysesuchmeaningsand indoingso,

outlinethesemantichistoryofpreto,negro,pardo,mestiçoandmulato.

The second section is devoted to the categorisation and lexicographic

description of colour terms. CARLAMARELLO&CRISTINAONESTI analyse the

ways in which diverse Italian dictionaries deal with colour-related terms, in

particular theattributionofmore thanonepartof speech,usuallyanounandan

adjective, to the same headword, and whether they supply the necessary

morphosyntactic information. They examine how monolingual dictionaries are

ratherquickinhostingnew(sub)entriesfornewcolours,allthemoresowhenthe

newcolour isasemanticneologism.Theyconcludethatdictionariesareslower in

registering morphosyntactic features of colour terms coupled with chiaro ‘light

shade’or scuro ‘deep shade’,whereas theydonot follow the samemicrostructure

schemainthewholedictionaryforallthearticlesdevotedtocolourterms.

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ALINA VILLALVA´s chapter focuses on categorisation issues. The author

presents a hypothesis that advocates the lexical distinction of colour nouns and

colouradjectives, claiming that colouradjectivesareobtainedbyconversion from

colour nouns, although colour adjectives are far more frequent than nouns in

contemporaryPortuguese.InPortuguese,asinmanyotherlanguages,colourwords

arelexicallyambiguouswithregardtotheirgrammaticalcategory.Syntaxmayhelp

todisambiguatebut itcannotclarifyhowever therelationship thatexistsbetween

suchwords.ThisoftenexplainswhyPortuguesecontemporarydictionariespresent

colourwords quite inconsistently; sometimes as nouns, other times as adjectives.

Thisgives rise to furtherquestions, suchaswhether, froma lexicalpointofview,

colournounsandcolouradjectivesareonesoleentityorrathertwodifferentitems,

andifindeedthelatter,howdotheydiffer.

Basedonrecentstudiesfocusingonthemetaphoricalandmetonymicalusesof

colour words, ERLING STRUDSHOLM, CARLA BAZZANELLA & IRENE RONGA

dealwith two particular, deeply entrenched elements regarding the use of colour

words: theirmetaphoricalmeanings and emotional values.More specifically, they

presentexamplesofmetaphoricalmeanings,drivenbyacolourword/collocatein

relation to their conventionalisation and their interlinguistic and intralinguistic

variationsontheonehand,andtheemotional,oftencontrastingvalues,whichare

triggeredbycolourterms,ontheother.Theprincipallanguagesincomparisonare

DanishandItalian,whichshareonlyapartiallycommonlinguisticbackgroundand

Europeanculturalheritage;buttheauthorsalsorefertootherlanguagesthathave

beenanalysedinstudieswhichfocusoncolourwordsfromappliedperspectivesand

alsoinrelationtometaphors,proverbs,idioms,andemotions.

In the final chapter, CAMELIA BLEOTU uses a comparative analysis to

examineverbsdenotingchangeofcolourorcausationofchangeofcolourinEnglish

andRomanian.Aswellaspointingoutthedifferencesbetweenthetwolanguages,

sheprovidesasyntacticrepresentationwhichinturnsenableshertoelucidatetheir

developmentalprocesses.

JoãoPauloSilvestre,EsperançaCardeira,AlinaVillalva

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I

Colournames,pan-Europeanperspective

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Adiachronicoverviewofcolortermsintheromancelanguages:thelexicalstabilityofthelatincolorvocabularyStevenN.Dworkin(UniversityofMichigan)

1.LexicalStability

For the specialist in Romance historical linguistics, lexical stability can be

definedas therateofsurvivalof inheritedspokenLatin lexical itemsthroughoral

transmissionintotheRomancelanguages.TheRomanistwhohasdevotedthemost

attentionto this topicwas the lateArnulfStefenelli (seeespeciallyStefenelli 1992,

1996,2011).Stefenellidistinguishesbetweenorally-transmittedLatinvocabularythat

liveson inallRomance languages, inmostRomance languages,or inonlyoneor

two Romance languages (in Stefenelli’s German terminology, ‘panromanisch’

‘interromanisch’,and ‘teilromanisch’ respectively).Hebasedhissurveyontheone

thousandmostfrequentLatinlexicalitemsaccordingtotwofrequencydictionaries

(Gardner 1971, Delatte et al., 1981). I am unaware of previous studies on lexical

stability in the Romance languages based on a systematic analysis of stability by

semanticcategories.Dworkin(2016)looksbrieflyatlexicalstabilityinsuchfieldsas

basic or lower numerals, kinship terminology, body parts, the calendar and the

seasons,anddomesticandwildanimals.Thispaperseeks todescribeandanalyze

the lexical stability of orally-transmitted Latin color terms or chromonyms in the

Romancelanguages.Inthiscontext, lexicalstabilityreferstothesurvivalasacore

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color term through oral transmission into the Romance languages of the Latin

lexical iteminquestion,anddoesnot implylackof furthersemanticorfunctional

evolution which form part of the word’s history in the individual Romance

languages. Secondarily, as appropriate, it will also make some observations as

relevantonthelexicalstabilitywithintherecordedhistoryofthevariousRomance

languagesofselectedRomancecolortermsandoftheroleoflexicalborrowingand

internalcreationsinthehistoryofsuchlexicalitems.

ThispaperwilllimititspurviewtotheRomancelabelsforsix--white,black,

red,green,yellow,blue--of theelevenbasicorcorecolorcategories identified in

Berlin-Kay(1969).Itwillbeconcernedprincipallywiththesurvivalornon-survival

oftheLatinchromaticlexiconsignifiersascoreRomancecolorterms,andnotwith

some of the difficult semantic interpretations of some of these terms in the

documentedmedieval stages of the Romance languages. Itwill not dealwith the

many Latin color terms that survive only as secondary labels with restricted

semantic scopes (the color of skin, hair, animal hides, etc.), nor will it deal with

figurativemeaningsthatmanyofthese itemsdevelopedovertime,e.g., theuseof

labelsfor‘green’todesignate‘unripe,immature,inexperienced’.

Written Latin had a rich color lexicon, with terms making distinctions

betweenbright,dark,andneutralhues.Insomeinstancesitisdifficulttodetermine

for a given set of Latin chromonyms which one was the core term. The most

detailed study of the Latin color lexicon remains André (1949). Only three Latin

color terms seems to fall into Stefenelli’s pan-Romance category, namely NIGER

‘black’,VIRIDIS ‘green’,andALBUS‘white’.WhereastheRomancedescendantsofthe

first two adjectives have lived on until today inmost of the Romance languages,

reflexes of ALBUS have been supplanted as a core color term in many Romance-

speakingregionsbytheintroductionofarivalGermanicbase.

2.Green

ThereislittletosayregardingthefateofVIRIDISintheRomancelanguages.As

can be seen from the following list of forms the Latin base has survived in all

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Romance-speakingregionsoftheformerEmpire:Sardinianbirde,Rumanian,Italian

verde, Engadine verd, Friulian, French,Occitan, Catalan vert, Spanish, Portuguese

verde,DolomiticLadinvërt,Veglioteverda.AsKristol(1978:271)states:“Levertest

un champ d’une simplicité sans pareil en ce qui concerne la diachronie du

vocabulaire…duchampdanslelatinclassiqueetdanstoutesleslanguesromanes”.

TheLatinadjectivehashadnoseriouscompetitors.TheDELLstates“Lafortunede

l’adjectifviridisdans les languesromanesprovientdesonemploi fréquentdans la

languerustique”(s.v.VIREO).Theimportanceofthecolorgreeninearlyagricultural

societiesraisesthequestionwhetherdesignationsfor‘green’showahighdegreeof

lexicalstabilityinotherlanguagefamilies.ThedatafoundinBuck(1949)pointsto

suchstability in theGermanicandSlavic languages.Nevertheless, theProto-Indo-

Europeanbasethathasbeenreconstructedfortheseitemsmaywellhavereferredto

plantandvegetationgrowth,and,consequently,wasnotabasiccolorterm(Biggam

2014:6-9);cf.Lat.virere‘toshowgreengrowth,tobegreenwithvegetation’.

3.Black

Latin had two terms for ‘black’, NIGER ‘shining black’ and ATER ‘dark black’

(both often employedwithmetaphorical negativemeanings). The latter seems to

have survivedonly inOld Italianatro andnorthern Italianadro as a chromonym

and,frequently,withsecondaryfigurativemeanings(LEI,s.v.ATER,TLIO).Varieties

ofGallo-Romance(especiallyOccitanandFrancoprovençal)offeralargenumberof

substantivizedorally-transmittedderivativesofATERusedtodesignatevariousdark-

colored fruits and plants; cf. Fr. airelle, ‘huckleberry’, and themany other dialect

reflexesrecordedinFEW,25,s.v.ATER.RareFratreisasixteenth-centuryLatinism,

andhasretainedthepejorativeconnotationsofitsLatinsource.

Orally-transmitted reflexes of NIGER are found from the time of the earliest

textsasthebasictermfor‘black’inalltheRomancelanguages:Frenchnoir,Spanish,

Portuguesenegro,Italiannero,Engadinenair,Friulianneri,Catalan,Occitannegre,

Rumaniannegru. One can also include here Sardiniannieḍḍu/nigeḍḍu < NIGELLUS

‘blackish’(REW3,#5917).InPortugueseandSpanish,negrofacedvaryingdegreesof

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competition from preto and prieto. The origin of these two forms is obscure.

Although they differ with regard to the details, Malkiel (1953) and the DCECH

derive them from the verb apretar ‘to squeeze’. Both these adjectives seem to be

synonyms ofnegro. Themedieval textual evidence offersmore examples ofnegro

than of prieto/preto; the small number of derivatives produced by these two

adjectives(OldSpanishpretura,OldPortuguesepretidão)maybespeak the relative

state of their vitality inmedieval Luso- andHispano-Romance.Whereas Spanish

prietowasalreadyconsideredobsoletebythebeginningoftheseventeenthcentury

(tojudgebythestatementinCovarrubias,Tesorodelalenguacastellanaoespañola

[1611]),pretograduallycametobethebasicdesignationfor‘black’inbothEuropean

andBrazilianPortuguese.

In some varieties of Dolomitic Ladin, fosc[h]/fosk, reflexes of lat. FUSCUS

‘dark, swarthy, brown’, are replacing or rivaling nejger, the local descendants of

NIGER.Given the late date of the first Ladin texts, the analyst cannot determine

whetherthisrivalrygoesbacktothelevelofregionalspokenLatinorrepresentsa

latersemanticevolutionofthedescendantsofFUSCUS.

4.White

Latindistinguishedtwotermsfor‘white’,ALBUS,thebasicterm,andCANDIDUS,

‘brilliant,shiningwhite’.Theformerleftreflexesin(almost)allRomanceterritories.

Although the family of ALBUS has left descendants in Gallo- and Italo-Romance,

examplesofOldFrenchalbe/aubeandOldItalianalvoasanindependentadjective

are very rare. Schafer (1987: 36) calls into question the authenticity of the few

instances of the Old French forms. The Latin adjective has survived in such

compounds as aubifoin, aubépine ‘hawthorn’, and in such toponyms asAuberive,

Fiumalbo.TheLEI,(s.v.ALBUS)recordsmedievalexamplesofalbousedtodescribe

thefruitofcertainplants(ficoalbo),paper,clothing,andtextiles.Italsoclaimsthat

theexampleofalbo intheso-calledIndovinelloVeronese isprobablyaLatinform.

Although far outnumbered in Spanish and Portuguese by blanco and branco

respectively,alvoseemstohaveenjoyedahighdegreeofvitalityasacoloradjective

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inmedievalSpanishandPortuguese.beforefallingintodisuseintheearlymodern

period (for examples, see DEM, s.v. albo). ALBUS has also survived in relic areas:

Rumanian alb, Vegliote yualb, Friulian stradalbe ‘Milky Way’, Grigione alf/alva,

LowerEngadinealp/alba,Sardinianalbu,alvu,archaicarvu.

In contrast, CANDIDUS did not fare well in the Romance languages. Some

northernvarietiesofItalo-Romancecontainsuchformsascando/canda,cand(e);see

LEI(s.v.CANDIDUS).Doescandido,welldocumentedinmedievaltextswithreferenceto

objects,cloths,textiles,reflectlearnedororaltransmissionoftheLatinbase(cf.tiepido<

TEPIDUS) ?; This Latin base also survived in some varieties of southern Gallo-

Romance: Occitan cande ‘blanc; clair, proper; transparent (de l’eau); Cantal,

Limousin.cande‘trèsblanc’,Gasconcande‘brillant,propre’purblancclair;seeFEW

(Vol.2:281-282).

ThereisnoevidenceforthesurvivalofCANDIDUSasanindependentadjective

in Spanish or Portuguese. The toponymRucandio (province of Burgos) has been

explained as a derivative of RIVUS CANDIDUS (García Sánchez 2007: 161, 261); oral

transmissionofCANDIDUSwouldhaveyielded*candioinHispano-Romance.Dothe

toponymsCandemuela, Candepajares (Menéndez Pidal 1950: par. 39:1), as well as

Spanish, Portuguese. trigo candial,OldCatalan forment candel, Gascpan canesal,

referringtoatypeofwheatthatproducesaverywhitebread,bespeakthepresence

at some point in the spoken Latin of the Iberian Peninsula of the Latin family

headedbyCANDERE‘tobeshiningwhite’?

InmostRomancevarietiesthereflexesofALBUSandCANDIDUSgavewaybefore

descendants of theGermanic root *BLANK ‘bright, shiningwhite’,whichmayhave

been employed at the outsetwith reference to horses, and only later came to be

applied to animals,weapons, and thehuman face.Reflexesof thisGermanicbase

arewidespreadintheRomancelanguages:Frenchblanc,Spanishblanco,Portuguese

branco, Italian bianco, Catalan blanc, Friulian blanc, Dolomitic Ladin blanch.

Specialistshaveoffered twodifferent analyses for the introduction, incorporation,

and diffusion of these chromonyms in the Romance languages. One school of

thought holds that theGermanic base represents a very early borrowing into the

LatinoftheEmpireinthoseregionsofLatin-Germaniclinguisticcontact(henceits

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absence from Rumanian). I am not aware of any vestiges of a Latinized

*blankus/blancus in post-Classical sources (cf. blavus ‘blue’, below). More recent

thinkinghasproposedthattheGermanicbasefirstenteredthespokenlanguageof

Gaul, fromwhere it spread elsewhere (with the localphonetic adjustmentsof the

/bl-/ cluster) with the Carolinagian Empire (for a summary of the pertinent

argumentsandrelevantbibliographyseetheentry[authoredbyM.Barbato]inLEI,

Germanismi,fascicolo6:cols.1053-1057).

5.Red

Although RUBER (documented as early as Ennius and traceable to a proto-

Indoeuropeanbase))mayhavebeenthecoredesignationfor‘red’inwrittenLatin,

flanked by RUFUS (whose medial –F- points to its non-Latin Italic origin), the

Romanceevidenceshowsthatitfailedtostrikerootinthespokenlanguage.Before

fallingintodisuseRUBERactedondialectalandruralROBUS/ROBEUS,whichoriginally

designatedthehidesofanimals,especiallyoxen.Theresultofthislexicalblendwas

RUBEUS, the source of French rouge, Occitan roge, Catalan roig, Spanish rubio,

Portuguese ruivo, Sardinian, ruyu, short-lived Old Italian robbio, and Rumanian

roib.AlthoughtheseRomanceformsdocumentthelexicalstabilityofrubeusinthe

transition from Latin to Romance, their semantic ranges show a high degree of

variation. Rumanian roib designated only the coat of a horse; Spanish rubio and

Portugueseruivo indicateareddishorstrawberryblonde,especiallywithregardto

hair color, ameaning that is found inmedieval sources. (Cunha 2014: 2255).Old

Italianrobbioisfoundmainlyinnotarialtextstodescribethecolorofsteers,cows,

and calves. In a contiguous swath of territory comprising French, Occitan, and

Catalan,thereflexesofRUBEUSlistedabovefacedcompetitionasthebasictermfor

‘red’fromthedescendantsofVERMICULUS(seebelow).

Though not frequent in written Latin, RUSS(E)US ‘brownish-red; red-haired’

enjoyedmuch vitality in the spoken language as illustrated by Old Spanish roxo

(modernrojo),Portugueseroxo,Frenchroux,Catalanros,Italianrosso,Friulianros,

Vegliote ruas/raus. The French and Catalan terms here designate a hair color.

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Though not unknown in earlier periods, Old Spanish roxo appears infrequently

before the fifteenth century. Medieval Spanish preferred vermejo/bermejo as the

designationfor‘red’,asdoesPortuguesetodaywithvermelho.Portugueseroxonow

designates a color leaning toward ‘purple’, and is scantily documented with the

meaning ‘red’ in medieval sources (Swearingen 2014). Specialists in Rumanian

etymology aredivided as towhether roşu ‘red’ goesback to RUSSEUS or to ROSEUS

Phonetically both bases can account for roşu, but favors RUSSUS on grounds of

semanticidentityseemtofavorRUSSEUS.

Asacolorterm,VERMICULUS,diminutiveofVERMIS‘worm’originallyreferredto

abrightredorscarletdyeproducedbythelarvaofacertainsmallworm.Itisfirst

attested as a color adjective in the Vulgate (Exodus 35:25), where it designates a

brightcolor,varyinglytranslatedinEnglishbiblesas‘crimson’or‘scarlet’.InIsidore

ofSeville,itseemstobeequatedwithRUBER.InmedievalvarietiesofRomanceits

descendants (Old French vermeil, Old Spanish vermejo) often served as the core

termfor‘red,astatusthatstillappliestoPortuguesevermelhoandCatalanvermell.

Typologically similar is the history of COCCINUS/COCCINEUS ‘scarlet colored’ <

COCCUM ‘berry/insect that grows upon the scarlet oak’, attested already as color

terms inLatin,whosereflexeshavebecomethecore labels for ‘red’ inRomontsch

and inDolomitic Ladin (tgietschen, cotschens, cöc and other formal variants; see

Kramer,EWDS, Liver 2012:88).Kramercites regionalRumaniancoacin ‘brebis au

museaujauneourougeâtre’,megelenorumaniancoatsin ‘red’asadditionalreflexes

ofthisbase.

6.Yellow

NooneLatintermthatdesignatedshadesof‘yellow’cametodominateinthe

Romancelanguages.LatinlabelsforshadesofthecolorinquestionarePALLIDUS,

FALVUS, FULVUS, LURIDUS, MELLEUS, CROCEUS, GALBINUS. This last term,

whichmeant ‘greenish-yellow’ is the source of Rumanian galbàn andOld French

jalne (the forerunner of modern jaune). The Old French form was borrowed as

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Italian giallo (> Sardinian ğallu/dzallu [DES: 602]), Sicilian gálinu, Friulan zâl,

DolomiticLadinghel,andOldSpanishjalde.

Elsewhere,variousLatinwordsbecamethebasiclabelfor‘yellow’.Amongthe

labelsfor‘yellow’intheIberianPeninsula,SpanishamarilloandPortugueseamarelo

haveauniquehistory.Amplydocumentedinthemedievallanguage,bothcontinue

AMARELLUS, diminutiveof AMARUS ‘bitter’ (PérezGonzález 2010: 40).The semantic

historyreflectsthemedievalbeliefthatayellowishskincolorcharacterizedaperson

sufferingfromanexcessofbile.CatalangroccontinuesLatinCROCUS‘saffron’,asdid

OldOccitangrocbefore itcededto jauna/jaune,borrowings fromnorthernGallo-

Romance. Wagner (DES: s.v. grogo) and Coromines (DECat, s.v. groc) consider

Sardiniangrogo/grogutobeCatalanisms.InRomontschthebasictermfor ‘yellow’

ismellen, a reflex of LatinMELINUS ‘pertaining toquince’ (Liver 2012: 73).Wagner

pointsoutthatinSardinian,melinurefersspecificallytoacolorofahorse’shide.In

somevarietiesofOccitan,rosset/rossel,atermreferringtoredcolorhairelsewhere,

hasbecomethebasicwordfor‘yellow’.

7.Blue

ThevariousLatinadjectivesforthedifferentshadesof‘blue’–CAERULUS‘sky-

blue’,LIVIDUS,GLAUCUS,CAESIUS(usedonlywithreferencetotheeyes),andVENETUS

‘sea blue’ – did not fare well in the Romance languages. Of these terms, only

VENETUS survived throughoral transmission intoRumanianasvînăt.Nevertheless,

thecoreterminRumanianfor ‘blue’ isalabastru,adescendantofLatinALABASTER

‘alabaster,typeofwhitishmarble’,alreadydocumentedin1588(AcademiaRomână

2012:60).Theoriginalmeaningofalbastrumayhavebeen ‘gray,ash-colored’,as in

Arumanianoaiealbastra‘graysheep’(Mihaescu1993:227).

MostRomancelanguageshaveturnedtoborrowingsfromotherlanguagesto

designate‘blue’.TheoldestappearstobeGermanic*BLAO,thesourceofOldFrench

blo(modernbleu).ThisbasealsolivesoninRomontsch,Friulian,DolomiticLadin,

varietiesofnorthernItalian,andVegliote.Italianistsanalyzebluasanearlymodern

Gallicism.InDolomiticLadinonefindsbrüm,glossedintheEWDas‘dunkelblau’,

17

but translated in Latin as ‘caerulus color’ in 1763 (Bartolomei). Its source is the

GermanicbasethatgivesFr.brun‘brown’.InDolomiticLadinblé(f),usedtodayonly

insomeregions,canmean‘lightblue’(EWD,300,362).

Spanish,Portuguese,andItalianhaveadaptedanArabicbaseLĀZAWARDasthe

coretermfor‘blue’.Spanishazulisrarelydocumentedpriortothemidthirteenth-

century, when it is usually found as a nounmeaning ‘lapis lazuli’. The Alfonsine

corpusprovidesnoexamplesof adjectivalazul (KastenandNitti 2002).Thebasic

Arabic term for ‘blue’ ZARQA is the source of Spanish, Portuguese zarco, with a

specializedmeaning ‘light blue’.Most of the nine thirteenth century examples of

zarco found inCORDEare in texts suchasPoridatde lasporidades, Judiziode las

estrellas,Bocadosdeoro,allbasedonArabicoriginals.SinceazulenteredSpanishas

part of a technical jargon, how did speakers of earlymedieval Hispano-Romance

denotethecolor‘blue’(assumingthattheyhadneedtodoso)?Mightadescendant

of theGermanicbasediscussedabovehaveenjoyedsomedegreeofvitality in the

spokenRomancevarietiesof the IberianPeninsula?A listunder theheading “De

coloribus versium” in the Etimologiae of Isidore of Seville (xix: 28:8) contains a

Latinized blavus (Sofer 1930: 108-109). Lapesa (2003: 94) records one example of

blavo in a late eleventh-century document from the eastern part of the Iberian

Peninsula.OpinionsaredividedastowhetherCatalanblauisaGallicismoralocal

descendantof*BLAO.Althoughazzurro is foundinOldItaliantexts,thereissome

questionastoitsvitalityinthespokenlanguageatearlierstages.Itdoesnotappear

in Italian dialects, where one finds for blue terms cognate to standard turchino.

AlthoughbluisamodernGallicism,OldItaliantextsofferexamplesofbiada,biado,

blavo, blava, and theGallicismbioa, biodo, bioe, bioi, bioia, bioio, bloi, bloio, broi,

broia,broio<OldFrenchbloi.

8.ABriefConclusion

Incomparison to theother semantic fieldsexamined inDworkin2016,Latin

colortermsshowarelatively lowdegreeof lexicalstability inthetransitiontothe

Romance languages. Itwouldbeworthwhile studying theevolutionofbasic color

18

termsinotherindividuallanguagesoracrosslanguagefamiliestoseeifthisrelative

lack of diachronic lexical stability is widespread cross-linguistically. It seems that

there is a great degree of variability and instability with regard to how humans

physicallyandcognitivelyperceiveanddistinguishthevarioustonesandshadesof

color.Itseemsreasonabletoconcludethatthisperceptualandcognitiveinstability

may be linguistically reflected in the historical evolution of the Latin chromatic

vocabularyintheRomancelanguages.

References

Abbreviations

DECAT=Coromines1980-2002

DCECH=CorominasandPascual1980-1991

DÉLL=Eronut-Meillet1967

DEM=Müller1987-

DES=Wagner1960-64

EWD=Kramer1988-1998

FEW=Wartburg1922-2002

LEI=PfisterandSchweickard1979-

TLIO=Beltrami1998-

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André, J. (1949). Étude sur les termes de couleur dans la langue latine. Paris:Klincksieck.

Beltrami, P. (dir) (1998-). Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini. Florencia:CNR/AccademiadellaCrusca(http://gattoweb.ovi.cnr.it).

Berlin, B. andKay, P. (1969).Basic Color Terms: TheirUniversality and Evolution.Berkeley,LosAngeles,andLondon:UniversityofCaliforniaPress.

Biggam,C.P. (2014). “PrehistoricColourSemantics:AContradiction inTerms”, InAnderson,W.etalii(eds.),ColourStudies:ABroadSpectrum.AmsterdamandPhiladelphia:JohnBenjamins,3-28.

19

Buck,C.D.(1949).ADictionaryofSelectedSynonymsinthePrincipleIndo-Europeananguages.Chicago:UniversityofChicagoPress.

Capidan,Th.(1935).Meglenoromânii,III.Dicționarmeglenoromân.Bucarest:CarteaRomânească.

Corominas, J. and Pascual, J. A. (1980-1991). Diccionario crítico etimológicocastellanoehispánico.6vols.Madrid:Gredos.

Coromines, J. (1980-2001). Diccionari etimologic i complementari de la llenguacatalana.10vols.Barcelona:Curial.

Cunha,A.G.da(2014),Vocabuláriohistórico-cronológicodoportuguêsmedieval.RiodeJaneiro:FundaçãoCasadeRuiBarbosa.

Delatte,L.etalii.(1981).Dictionnairefréquentieletindexinversedelalanguelatine.Liège:L.A.S.L.A.

Dworkin, S. N. (2016): “Lexical Stability and Shared Lexicon”. inMaiden,M. andLedgeway,A.(eds.).OxfordGuidetotheRomanceLanguages,Oxford:OxfordUniversityPress,577-587.

Ernout, A. and Meillet, A. (1967): Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue latine:Histoiredesmots.Fourthed.Paris:Klincksiesck.

GarcíaSánchez,J.J.(2007):AtlastoponímicodeEspaña,Madrid:ArcoLibros.Gardner,D. (1971).A FrequencyDictionary of Classical LatinWords. Unpublished

Dissertation,StanfordUniversity.Grossmann, M. and D’Achille, P. (2015). “Italian Color Terms in the BLUE Area:

Synchrony and Diachrony”. Paper read at the International Conference“Colour and Colour Naming: Crosslinguistic Approaches”, Lisboa, July 2-3,2015.

Kasten,L.A.andNitti,J.J.(2002).DiccionariodelaprosacastellanadelReyAlfonsoX.NewYork:HispanicSeminaryofMedievalStudies.

Kramer,J.(dir.)(1988-1998).EtymologischesWörterbuchdesDolomitenladinischen.Hamburg:Buske.

Kristol, A. M. (1978). COLOR Les langues romanes devant le phénomène de lacouleur.RomanicaHelvetica88.Berne:Francke.

Lapesa, R. con la colaboración de Constantino García (2003). Léxico hispánicoprimitivo (siglosVIIIalXII).Versionprimitivadel “Glosariodelprimitivo léxicoiberorrománico”. Ed. Manuel Seco. Madrid: Fundación Ramón MenéndezPidal/RealAcademiaEspañola.

Liver, R. (2012). Der Wortschatz des Bünderromanischen. Elemente zu einerrätoromanischenLexicologie,Berne:FranckeVerlag.

Malkiel,Y.(1953[1955].“Apretar,pr(i)eto,perto:historiadeuncrucehispanolatino”,Thesaurus:BoletíndelInstitutoCaroyCuervo9,1-139.

MenéndezPidal,R. (1950).Orígenesdel español:Estado lingüísticode laPenínsulaibéricahastaelsigloXI.Thirdedition.Madrid:Espasa-Calpe.

Mihaescu, H. (1993). La Romanité dans le Sud-Est de l’Europe, Bucharest: EdituraAcademieRomâne.

Müller,Bodo(1987-):Diccionariodelespañolmedieval,Heidelberg:Winter.PérezGonzález,Maurilio(2010):LexiconLatinitatisMediiAeviRegniLeonis(S.VIII-

1230)Imperfectum,Turnhout:Brepols.

20

Pfister, M. y Schweickard, W. (1979-). Lessico etimológico italiano, Wiesbaden:Reichert.

Ramat, A. Giacalone (1967). “Colori germanici nel mondo romanzo”, en Atti ememoriedell’AccademiaToscanadiScienzeeLettere“LaColombaria”,32,105-211.

Schäfer, B. (1987). Die Semantik der Farbadjektive im Altfranzösischen, Tubinga:GunterNarr.

Sofer,Johann(1930):LateinischesundRomanischesausdenEtymologiaedesIsidorusvon Sevilla. Untersuchungen zur lateinischen und romanischen Wortkunde,Göttingen:Vandenhoeck&Ruprecht.

Stefenelli,A.(1992).DasSchicksaldeslateinischenWortschatzesindenromanischenSprachen.Passau:Rothe.

– (1996). “Gemeinromanische Tendenzen VIII. Lexikon undSemantik/Tendances communes aux langues romanes VIII. Lexique etsémantique”,inHoltus,G.,M.Metzeltin,M.,andC.Schmitt,C.(eds.),LexiconderRomanistischenLinguistik2:1.Tübingen:MaxNiemeyerVerlag,368-86.

– (2011).“LexicalStability”,inMaiden,M.,Smith,J.C.andLedgeway,A.(eds.),Cambridge History of the Romance Languages, I: Structures. Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress,564-84.

Swearingen, A. (2014). “From Blood to Worms: The Semantic Evolution of aPortuguese Colour Term”. In Anderson, W. et alii (eds.), Colour Studies: ABroadSpectrum.AmsterdamandPhiladelphia:JohnBenjamins,79-92.

Wagner,M. L. (1960-1964).Dizionario etimológico sardo. 3 vols. Heidelberg: CarlWinterUniversitätsverlag.

Wartburg, W. von (1922-2002). Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch. Einedarstelleung des galloromanischen sprachsatzes. 25 vols,Bonn/Heidelberg/Leipzig-Berlin/Basel,Klopp/Winter/Teubner/Zbinden.

21

ItaliancolourtermsintheBLUEarea:synchronyanddiachronyMariaGrossmann(UniversityofL’Aquila)PaoloD’Achille(UniversityofRomaTre)

1.Briefsurveyoftheliterature

The linguistic encoding of colour – i.e. the existence of a continuum that

different languages break into arbitrary discrete segments and the evolution

towards ever more complex and differentiated colour-naming systems – is a

privileged topic for both ethnolinguistics and psycholinguistics. Semantics also

frequentlyreferstocolourtermsforillustratingtheoreticalissues.Colourtermsare

ofcoursealsothesubjectofspecificresearch.

Colour-naming in its different aspects (linguistic, perceptive, cognitive,

cultural) has been a privileged area of research for linguists, psychologists and

anthropologistssincethe19thcentury.Grossmann(1988),astudyonthesemantics

of colour terms in Catalan, Spanish, Italian, Romanian, Latin and Hungarian,

includes a history of the literature and an interdisciplinary bibliography of about

1300studiesonthecolour-namingsystemsofdifferentlanguagespublishedbetween

1814and1987.Thenumberofworkspublishedafterthisdateissohighthatweshall

onlybeabletomentionafewhere.

The“space”ofcolournames,whosereferentisthecolourspace,ismadeupof

thesemanticstructureofasetoflexemes.Thelinguisticencodingoftheperceptual

andphysicalsubstanceofcoloursimpliesageneralizationprocess:eachnamerefers

toagroupofshades,abstractingawayfromthedifferencesamongthem.Different

22

languagessegmentthecolourspaceindifferentways:theboundariesofindividual

categoriesmay fall indifferentplaces; theremaybedifferences in: thenumberof

availableterms,thebasisformakingdistinctions,theweightattributedtothethree

psycho-sensorialvariablesofcolour,i.e.hue(whatalaymanreferstowhentalking

aboutcolourbyclassifyinghis/herperceptionas‘green’,‘red’,etc.),brightness(the

variation in intensity, passing from lighter to darker shades), saturation (the

percentageofpurehueinacolour;saturationishigherwhenthecolourappearsto

be less blended with white). The assessment of differences between languages

shouldalsotakeaccountofotherfactorssuchas: insomelanguages,colourterms

canalsoincludeinformationaboutotherfactorsbesidesthethreeaforementioned

variables (succulence vs. desiccation, featuresof surface texture, featuresof shape

andconsistency,etc.);often,apartfromidentifyingagivenshade,colournamescan

beusedassymbolsforrepresentingsocial,religiousandmoralconceptsofvarying

complexity.Also, intralinguisticdifferencescanemergebasedonvariablessuchas

age,gender,educationandsocialstatusofspeaker.

Themost recent studiesoncolour termscanbe framed in themoregeneral

debate regarding linguistic relativism vs. universalism. The seminal work in this

respectisthe1969bookbyBrentBerlinandPaulKay.Theirresearchwasaimedat

demonstratingboththeexistenceofuniversalsincolourlexiconsandthepresence

of an evolutionary connection between these universals and the historical

developmentoflanguages.Accordingtothesetwoscholars,thereexistsauniversal

inventory of eleven perceptual categories that act as psychophysical referents for

basiccolourterms(twotoeleven)ineachlanguage.Thesetermshaveanumberof

characteristic features: fromthemorphologicalpointofview theyarenotcomplex;

fromthesemanticpointofviewtheyarenottransparent,theyarenothyponymsof

othertermsandtheirapplicationisnotrestrictedtospecificclassesofentities;from

thepsychologicalpointofview,theyaresalienttospeakers.Non-basiccolourterms,

on the other hand, are morphologically analysable, semantically transparent and

generallymorerecentthanbasicterms.Whenalanguageencodeslessthaneleven

categories,accordingtoBerlinandKay,restrictionsapplytothecategoriesthatare

actuallyencoded.Astothehistoricalevolutionofthecolourlexicon,itisassumed

23

that the encoding of the eleven universal perceptual categories takes place, as

shown in Figure 1, in a partially fixed chronological order of seven evolutionary

stages(Berlin/Kay1969:4):

Figure1

Berlin andKay’s (1969) bookwas a “revolution” in colour-naming studies. It

attracted vast consensus, but alsowidespread disagreement, and literally boosted

researchaimedatvalidatingorinvalidatingthetheoryofthetwoscholars.Weshall

mention but a few of the many partial revisions and successive elaborations of

BerlinandKay’stheses.Kay(1975)revisitedthetemporalorderinwhichfocalpoints

are encoded by introducing the GRUE category and established correlations

betweentheevolutionofcolourtermsystemsandthesynchronicheterogeneityofa

linguistic community. Itwas againKay, this time in collaborationwithMcDaniel

(1978),whointroduced:a)thedistinction,basedontheneurophysiologyofcolour

vision, between “primary”, “composite” and “derived” colour categories; b) the

reinterpretation of the evolutionary sequence, no longer seen as a successive

encoding of new focal points but rather as a differentiation of previously existing

primary colour categories. The two scholars maintain that the number of basic

terms in a language canbehigher than that assumedbyBerlin andKay and that

theirnumbercanvaryevenwithinoneandthesame linguisticcommunity(Kay/

McDaniel 1978: 640-641). Other important studies were authored by Kay et al.

(1997),Kay/Maffi(1999,2013)andotherscholarswhoworkedonthedatacollected

fortheWorldColorSurvey(Kayetal.2009;http://www1.icsi.berkeley.edu/wcs/)and

theMesoamericanColorSurvey (MacLaury 1997andotherstudies in the “Vantage

theory” framework). A different interpretation of the evolutionary sequence was

proposedbyWierzbicka(1990)whoseesthedevelopmentofnewbasiccolourterms

24

as a consequence of the differentiation of complex concepts and not as the

emergenceofnewfocalpoints.

AfterthepublicationofBerlinandKay’sbook,tryingtoanswerthequestion

whether the number of basic terms could be increased past the elevenmark has

been a frequent challenge for colour vocabulary studies in individual languages.

Actually,theauthorsthemselvesdidnotruleoutthepossibilitythat12basicterms

couldexist.ThestatusoftheRussiantermssinij‘blue/darkblue’andgoluboj‘light

blue’andtheHungarianpiros‘red1’andvörös‘red2’wasinfactleftopen:ontheone

handBerlinandKayadmitthepossibilitythatallcouldbebasic(thusraisingto12

the number of basic terms in those two languages), on the other hand they also

consider the possibility that goluboj and vörös are secondary terms that denote

differentshadesofthebasictermssinijandpiros(Berlin/Kay1969:35-36,95,99).

The dichotomy between the Hungarian terms piros ‘red1’ and vörös ‘red2’,

pointedoutbyBerlinandKay,generatedinterestinmanyscholars(cf.Grossmann

2006, Uusküla 2011, Benczes / Tóth-Czifra 2014, and their references). Other

analysesintheREDareahavebeencarriedoutasregardsthedistributionofvermell

and roig in Catalan (Grossmann 1988), rojo, colorado and encarnado in Spanish

(Grossmann1988),vermelho,encarnadoandroxo inEuropeanPortuguese(Correia

2006,Schäfer-Priess2010,Silvestreetal.2014),červenýandrudýinCzech(Uusküla

2011).IntheBROWNarea,Forbes(1979,1986,2006)studiedthedichotomybetween

brunandmarroninFrench.

Thedisputed status of theRussian terms sinij ‘blue / darkblue’ andgoluboj

‘light blue’ ignited an interesting debate among linguists, psychologists and

anthropologists.Thereisavastliteratureonthesubject,includingworksbyagroup

ofresearchersattheUniversityofSurrey(Corbett/Morgan1988,Morgan/Corbett

1989,Moss et al. 1990,Davies /Corbett 1994, 1997, Laws et al. 1995,Davies et al.

1998, etc.) and variousRussian scholars (discussed in Paramei 2005, 2007). These

studies are based on experiments with informants (work with colour arrays -

naming,mapping,identifyingfocalpoint;color-elicitingtasks,etc.),occasionallyin

combinationwithananalysisofcorpus-basedfrequency,derivationalpotentialand

collocationalpreferencesoftheterms.Whilethereisagreementuponthefactthat

25

bothtermsarebasicandvaryonthebrightnessaxis(goluboj, lightvs.sinij,dark),

recent research singled out the existence of differences in their combinatory

possibilities and in their figurative, connotative and symbolic meanings. An

interestingresearchangleisprovidedbyTayloretal.(1997):Theauthors,whobuild

on MacLaury’s “Vantage theory”, underline the partial overlapping of the

distributionofthetwolexemesandassigna“dominant”roleproperofabasicterm

tosinijasopposedtoa“recessive”,non-basicstatustogoluboj.

BerlinandKay’sbookand,morespecifically,thedebateonthestatusofsinij

andgolubojignitedavastnumberofspecificstudiesontheBLUEareaalsoinother

languages, such Ukrainian and Bielorussian (Hippisley 2001, Starko 2013), Polish

(Stanulewicz 2010, Skuza 2014), Old English (Biggam 1997), Old French (Schäfer-

Priess 2011), Catalan (Davies et al. 1995), Modern Greek (Androulaki et al. 2006,

Athanasopoulos 2009),Nepali (Bolton et al. 1980), Turkish (Özgen /Davies 1998,

Rätsep2011),Maltese(Borg2011),Udmurt(Ryabina2011),etc.

The literature on colour terms in Italian is rather substantial. Most of the

studies, be they on the entire set of colour terms or specifically on the nearest

equivalents of sinij and goluboj, were published after Berlin / Kay (1969). Among

studies published before Berlin / Kay (1969), attention should be drawn to two

studiesmoving fromaRomanceperspective:Martius (1947), adissertationon the

BLUEarea, andGiacaloneRamat (1967), awide-rangingpaperon colour termsof

Germanicorigin.Inoutliningthehistoryofblu,GiacaloneRamatalsodwellsonthe

semanticrelationshipsbetweenazzurro,blu,celesteandturchino incontemporary

Italianandobservesthatblutookoverazzurroasthetermusedforalltheshadesof

theBLUEarea.

AlsotheworksbyKristolandGrossmannmove fromaRomanceperspective

and,fromthemethodologicalpointofview,arecouchedintheframeworkoflexical

semantics. In his book,Kristol (1978) analyses Italian colour terms both from the

synchronicandthediachronicpointofview;inGrossmann’smonograph(1988;cf.

alsoGrossmann/Mazzoni1972,1976)thetypologicaloverviewofdifferentnaming

systemsismainlyfromasynchronicperspectiveandthedescriptionofthehistorical

evolution of colour terminology is limited to Catalan.With respect to the BLUE

26

area,Kristolcomestotheconclusionthatazzurro,thedominantterminthearea,

washistoricallypresentonlyinthewrittenlanguageandabsentinthedialects,and

entered the spoken language only after the political unification of Italy. Also in

written language, celeste denotes light shades whereas turchino and blu denote

darkershadesoftheBLUEarea(theturchino-bludualismisaccountedforbythe

puristpreferenceinthe19thcenturyforturchinotothedetrimentofblu,awordof

Frenchorigin).AccordingtoKristol,bothcelesteandblu/turchinoarecommonin

dialects, with a predominance ofblu. Grossmann (1988: 170), based on data from

lexicographic sources and informant interviews,underlines that in some speakers’

opinionazzurrodenotesashadein-betweenceleste ‘lightblue’andblu ‘darkblue’,

whereasforothersitsmeaningissimilartocelesteandbothareinoppositiontoblu.

Grossmannfurtherunderlinesthattheextensionofoneofthetwoterms,azzurroor

blu, or both, as also their degree of usage are subject to diatopic, diastratic and

diaphasicvariation.

RED, YELLOWand BLUE are the subject of a recentwork by Skuza (2014).

Building on previous synchronic and diachronic studies on the colour lexicon in

Italian and Polish, the author broadens the research field to a number of

ethnolinguisticandculturalaspects.MentionshouldalsobegiventoRonga(2009)

wheretheauthorexaminesfromahistoricalperspectivethelinguisticandcultural

factorsthatledtothe“exceptionofblue”inItalian,asopposedtootherEuropean

languages.

Many recent psycholinguistic studies on the BLUE area in Italian adopt

methodologiessimilartothoseadoptedbytheaforementionedstudiesonRussian

andotherlanguages,i.e.theyarebasedonnamingexperimentsandelicitationtasks

and,insomecases,onidentifyingcollocationalpreferences.Amongthem:Paggetti

et al. (2011), Sandford (2012),Valdegamberi et al. (2011),Paggetti /Menegaz (2012,

2013), Paramei / Menegaz (2013), Bimler / Uusküla (2014), Paramei et al. (2014),

Uusküla(2014),Paggettietal.(2015).Theoverallfindingsconfirmthatnamingthe

areainItalianrequiresatleasttwobasicterms,bluplusazzurroand/orceleste,and

show that the prototypes for the latter two and their interrelationship are

determined by diatopic factors. It is further shown that blu, apart from denoting

27

darkshades,canalsoactashyperonymforthetwootherterms.Significantinthis

respectaretheanswerstoataskonhyponymyrelationscollectedbySandford(2012:

287):“‘KindofBLUE’taskresponsesshowthat93%ofItalianinformantsresponded

affirmativelytoazzurroasakindofblu,and100%affirmedthatcelesteisakindof

blu,butbluisnotakindofazzurroorceleste.Only10%ofinformantsclaimedthat

celeste was a type of azzurro.” The author claims that even though both blu and

azzurromaintaintheirstatusasbasiccolourtermsincontemporaryItalian,azzurro

isexperiencingagradualrecession.

The structure of naming systems that fall within our interest has also been

studied in other Romance languages spoken in Italy and Italo-Romance dialects.

Kristol (1979, 1980) authored two specific studies on the history and usage of

azzurro,blu,celesteandturchinoinItalo-Romancedialects.Basedondataextracted

frommaterialcollected in theperiod 1919-1927 for the linguisticandethnographic

atlas of Italy and Southern Switzerland by K. Jaberg and J. Jud (Sprach- und

Sachatlas Italiens und der Südschweiz, Zofingen, Ringier, 1928-1940), Kristol

identifies regression phenomena, i.e. a system that is poorer when compared to

Latin, and claims that Italian dialects are basically a “museum” of the different

evolutionarystagesofthecolourlexicon.DataalsosupportKristol’s(1978)findings

on the status of azzurro. Vincent (1986, cf. also 1987) points out an interesting

coexistenceinNaplesofthreeforms,ble,bleu[blø]andblu.Thesearedifferentand

independent adaptations of the French term bleu, whose usage is influenced by

diastratic and diaphasic factors. Sardinian colour terms have been studied by

Giacalone Ramat (1978) and Wolf (1985). Giacalone Ramat (1978) points out a

dialectaldifferentiationasregardscentraltermsintheBLUEarea:Southerndialects

use an Ispanism, aṡúlu (< Sp. azul ‘blue’) as central term,whereas the Italianism

biaíttu(<It.biadetto ‘bluish’orMedievalLat.bladictus)iswidespreadinNorthern

dialects.OneshouldalsorememberZörner(2005),astudyonthecolourlexiconin

somePiedmonteseandFranco-ProvençaldialectsspokeninNorthernItaly.

Various morphological features of Italian colour terms, i.e. patterns for

formingderivedandcompoundwords,havebeenstudiedinGrossmann/Mazzoni

(1972), Grossmann (1988), Elwert (1989), Koura (1992), Timmermann (2002) and

28

D’Achille/Grossmann(2013).

There are also specific works on the figurative, idiomatic and symbolic

meanings of Italian colour terms. Among them, with specific reference to new

coinages, the rather substantial study by Fresu (2006) and, in a contrastive

perspective,Arcaini(1993,1996)onItalianandFrench,Philip(2003,2006)onItalian

and English, Bronowski (1998) and Skuza (2010, 2014) on Italian and Polish, Ross

(1989)onItalianandDutch,Bocz(2012)onItalianandHungarian.Furtherresearch

dealtwithtraductological(Pierini2000)andacquisitional(Mecacci/Serafini1987)

aspectsofthecolourlexicon.

2.LatincolourtermsintheBLUEarea

ThetermsoftheBLUEareainLatinwereratherlimitedasopposedtoother

areas of the colour space, such as RED or YELLOW. The term with the broader

meaningintheBLUEareawascaerul(e)us(cf.André1949:162-183,GiacaloneRamat

1967:184-187,Kristol1978:220-228,Grossmann1988:111-112).Caerul(e)us isderived

fromcaelu(m)‘sky’,buttherelationshipbetweenthetwotermswasmostlikelyno

longertransparenttospeakers,whoprimarilyusedcaerul(e)us fordenotingrather

dark shadesofblue,which inparticular contexts tended toblackorgreen. Itwas

usedfordescribingthecolourofthesky,thesea,thebluebandinarainbowanda

colouring agent. Also cyaneus and lividus denoted dark shades: the first term, of

Greekorigin,describedthecolourofthesky,ofsapphires,birds,etc.,whereasthe

secondmainlyreferredtothepurplishbluecolouroftheskinfollowingatrauma.

Asforlightshades,withparticularreferencetoeyes,caesiuswasusedfordescribing

those tending to grey, whereas another Grecism, glaucus, referred to greenish

shades.Theadjectivevenetus, thatdenoted inparticularoneof thecoloursof the

aurigainthecircus,probablyoriginatedfromtheethnicnounVenetus,nameofthe

inhabitantsof theareawherea specificcorporationofcharioteersoriginallycame

from. André (1949: 224-229) also points out a number of adjectives derived from

these terms: subcaerul(e)us and sublividus, for shades near to caerul(e)us and

lividus,andlivens,adeverbaladjectivedenotingthestateofbeinglividus.

29

ThecolourlexiconoftheBLUEareainRomancelanguagesreflectsathorough

renovationwhencomparedtoLatin.Noneof theoriginalLatintermshasadirect

Romancecontinuation,withthesoleexceptionofvenetus,preserved inRomanian

(vânăt ‘purplish dark blue, livid’; vânătă, an ellipsis of the noun phrase pătlăgea

vânătă,isalsothenamefor‘aubergine’)andinafewSouthernItaliandialects.The

basictermsofthemajorityofRomancelanguageseithercomefromPersianthrough

Arabic(Sp.andPort.azul,It.azzurro)orareofGermanicorigin(Fr.bleu,Cat.and

Occ. blau, It. blu through French); only Romanian uses a term of Latin origin,

albastru,whoseetymon*albasterderivesfromalbus‘white’.Itshouldbenotedthat

some of the aforementioned Latin terms can be found in Italian, i.e. ceruleo or

cerulo‘lightblue’,cesio‘lightblue’,glauco‘greenishblue’,livido‘purplishdarkblue,

livid’.ThesetermsarelearnedwordsborrowedfromLatinand,withtheexception

oflivido,typicaloftheliteraryregister.Theyareattestedsincetheearliesttimesof

thehistoryofItalianandarestillinusage.

3.ItaliancolourtermsintheBLUEarea

The availability of large and searchable corpora makes it now possible to

deepen the studyof thedistributionof the central terms, i.e.azzurro,blu,celeste

and turchino, fromboth a diachronic and a synchronic perspective.Our research

focuses on the semantic relations between these terms at different stages of the

developmentoftheItalian language,uptocontemporaryItalian.Thedatawewill

bediscussingaretakenfromthefollowingcorpora:

• laRepubblica(newspapertextsdatingfrom1985to2000,roughly380M

tokens),http://sslmitdevonline.sslmit.unibo.it/corpora/corpus.php?path=&

name=Repubblica

• DiaCORIS(differentkindsofprosetextsdatingfrom1861to2001,roughly25M

tokens),http://corpora.ficlit.unibo.it/DiaCORIS/

• PTLLIN(literaryprosetextsdatingfrom1947to2006),DVD-ROM

• OVI (Old Italian texts dating before 1375, roughly 23M tokens),

http://gattoweb.ovi.cnr.it/

30

• MIDIA (various types of texts dating from the 13th century to 1947, roughly

7.5Mtokens),http://www.corpusmidia.unito.it/

• BIZ (literary texts fromearly Italian to the firstdecadesof the20th century),

DVD-ROM

• BADIP – Corpus LIP (different types of spoken texts recorded in the period

1990-1992 in Milan, Florence, Rome and Naples, roughly 0.5M tokens),

http://badip.uni-graz.at/it/.

To start with let us briefly recap the history of azzurro, blu, celeste and

turchino.

Azzurro, as we anticipated, is a Persian word (lāžward) that entered into

Italian throughArabic. It is attested inLatinalready in the9th centuryas lazurus

andin13thcenturyOldItalianwithnumerousformalvariants(seeinTLIO:aççurro,

açuro, açurro, agiur, agiurro, arzuro, azule, azur, azurlo, azuro, azurro, azzuro,

laçur, lagiuro, lazuro). Originally, it denoted lapis lazuli. The semantic

transformation intoaname for colouringagentsand intopropercolour termhad

alreadyhappenedinOldItalian,whereazzurrowasusedforindicatingthecolourof

cloths, clothes, heraldry elements and also of the sky (lo die …. lo cielo azzurro

chiaro,elanotte…quelloazzurropiùoscuro‘duringtheday…thelightazzurrosky,

andduring thenight… thedarkerazzurro one’, Restorod’Arezzo, 1282).Azzurro

alsooccurs twice inDante’s Infernoandthreetimes inBoccaccio.Withrespect to

Dante,Perrone(2001)pointsoutthatthetermsoftheBLUEareaareamere2%of

thetotalofDante’scolourlexicon,asopposedto31%forWHITE,26%forBLACK,

19%forRED,14%forGREEN,8%forYELLOW.Inalldiachroniccorporaazzurrois

extremelyfrequent.Itcanbefoundmainly(thoughnotexclusively)inliterarytexts,

whereitqualifiesthecolourofvariousentities(sky,sea,lakes,mountains,flowers,

birds;eyes;gemstones;drapes,cloths,clothes,coatsofarms,etc.).The termalso

frequently occurs as a noun and, especially in treatises on painting, it is a

component of phrases that denote colouring agents (azzurro della Magna /

d’Alemagna ‘azzurro from Germany’, azzurro oltramarino ‘ultramarine azzurro’,

etc.).The roleofazzurro as thebasic term for theBLUEarea inwrittenOld and

Modern Italian appears to be confirmedby the fact that it is themost frequently

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used–evenintheoldesttimes–inlistsofcolours.Examplesare:Chesonqueste?

sonellerosse?sonelleazzurre?sonellenere?nonsonellebianche?‘Whatarethese?

Aretheyred?Aretheyazzurro?Aretheyblack?Oraretheymaybewhite?’(Franco

Sacchetti,endof14thcentury[referringtobedsheets]);Altrisonostatidiparerechei

principali [colori] sieno sette, cioè il bianco, il nero, il giallo, il rosso, il verde, la

porpora,e l’azzurro ‘Otherswereoftheopinionthatthemain[colours]areseven,

that is, white, black, yellow, red, green, purple and azzurro’ (Filippo Baldinucci,

Vocabolariotoscanodell’artedeldisegno,1681).

BluisaGermanismthatenteredItalianattheendofthe17thcenturyunderthe

influence of French bleu. Originally it was used to qualify the colour of cloths,

uniformsormilitarystandards,alsointhevariantblo,bléorthenon-adaptedform

bleu(Dardi1990).Indiachroniccorporaitoccurswithalimitedfrequencyanditis

also used as a noun. It denotes darker shades and, for the most part, refers to

clothes,occasionallyobjects,eyes,theseaandthesky.Thenon-adaptedformbleu

canbewidelyfoundinthe19thcentury,when,bywayofexample,itoccursinavast

numberofcompoundsusedinthefashionjargon,suchasbleusultano‘sultanbleu’

(Sergio2010).TheheydayofbleucametoanendintheFortiesofthe20thcentury,

when the Fascist regime listed it among the foreign terms that needed to be

expungedfromtheItalianlanguage,indicatingbluasareplacement(Raffaelli2010).

BluinlieuofbleuwasalsochampionedbythePuristmovementintheaftermathof

World War II (Messina 1965). Associated with the fortune of blu in the fashion

jargon is the pseudo-Gallicismbluette (the French bluet is the commonname for

‘bluebottle’)whichdenotesalightershadeinclothes.

InOldItalianwecanalreadyfindcolourtermsthatcanbetracedbacktothe

LateLatin termblavus(documented in the7thcentury,cf.Pfister 1999)whichhas

thesameGermanicetymonasFrenchbleu(*blēwa-).Thesearebioio(orbiodo,bloio,

broio)andbiavo(orbiado,blavo),usedalmostexclusivelyfordenotingthecolourof

cloths (cf. TLIO). The same applies to its derivative biavetto (or biaveto, blaveto,

biadetto,biadeto)andothertermsassociatedwithbiavo(sbiavo,sbiavato,sbiadato,

sbiadito, etc.). In contrastwith themodern usage ofblu, they all seem to denote

lightershades.Intheliterary,Tuscan-basedlanguage,thereisabreakincontinuity

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betweenthesetermsandblu.Intextsdatingfromafterthe14thcenturybiavo,biado,

biadetto are only occasionally found: azzurro di biadetto is a colouring agent

mentionedinBaldinucci’s(1681)Vocabolario;inthe20thcentury,Pirandellospeaks

of occhi biavi ‘biavo eyes’ andMontale of tinte ora scarlatte ora biade ‘hues now

scarlet nowbiado’.Many of themoderndialectal forms ofblu recorded in Pfister

(1999)mightwellbecontinuatorsoftheLateLatinblavus.Others,tothecontrary,

derivedirectlyfromtheFrenchbleuandenteredintothedialectsatdifferenttimes

(starting from the Middle Ages), depending on the degree of contact with the

Frenchculture.

CelesteformallyderivesfromLatin,buttheadjectivecaelestisdidnotcarrya

colourmeaning in Classical Latin. The semantic shift came about already inOld

Italian. The first instances of celeste carrying a colour value are found in the 13th

century, at a time when the term basically carried the ‘celestial’ and ‘divine’

meanings. In some contexts, the meaning of the adjective can be ambiguous

(especiallywhen it qualifies light, lamp, ray, etc.). The term can be found inOld

Italianinmanyotherforms(seeinTLIO:çeleste,celesto,celestro,celleste,cielesstre,

cieleste,cielesto,cielestre,cielestro,cileste,cilesto,cilestre,cilestro,zeleste,zelestro,

zileste).Amongthese,cilestro(formedbyanalogywithterrestre‘terrestrial’)would

soon acquire an exclusively colour-related meaning, documented in Dante and

Boccaccio,butisnolongerinuse.Ontheotherhand,cilestrino‘somewhatcilestro’

hasnotcompletelydisappeared in literaryuse. Indiachroniccorporaceleste is far

lessfrequentasanounthanazzurro.InOldItalianitusuallyreferstothecolourof

cloths and clothes, but also of gem stones, and it denotes a shade lighter than

azzurro. Inmore recent literary language celeste is also used in connection with

eyes, water, air, a number of objects and occasionally, by way of metonymical

extension,evenwithpeoplewhowearthiscolour.

Turchino derives from turco ‘Turkish’. It is documented already in the 14th

century and it was usually used to qualify cloths, clothes, standards: in the

beginning it probably referred to the origin of the cloths and only later to their

colour. The term was also used to denote the gem stone commonly known as

turchese‘turquoise’.Albeittoalesserextentthanazzurro,turchinoisalsopresentin

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colour lists,particularlywhendescribing rainbows (si distinguono sette colori, che

possono considerarsi come primitivi, e sono il rosso, l’arancio, il giallo, il verde, il

turchino,l’indacoeilvioletto‘Onecanidentifysevencoloursthatcanbeconsidered

asprimitive,and theseare red,orange,yellow,green, turchino, indigoandviolet’,

Leopardi, 1813). Rather common in dialects, as recorded in Schweickard (2013),

turchinoisnotexclusivetoliterarylanguage.Indiachroniccorporaitisalsousedas

a noun and it qualifies first and foremost cloths, clothes and various objects, but

oftenalsoeyes,shadows,thesky,thesea,mountains,theair.Betweenthe19thand

the 20th century its usage spreads to denote the darker shades, right at the time

when blu becomes an important competitor. As of today turchino is an obsolete

termthatoccursalmostexclusivelyinalimitednumberofidiomaticexpressions,as

weshallsee.OnlyinTuscanycanwefindsomeevidenceofsurvival,sinceitisused

alongwith blu, azzurro and celeste for naming the colours of the insignia of the

‘contradas’(districts)ofSiena.

Inordertobetterunderstandtheusageofazzurro,blu,celesteandturchinoin

texts dating from the last decades of the 19th century and 20th centurywemainly

searched two corpora:Diacoris (different kinds of prose texts dating from 1861 to

2001)andlaRepubblica(newspapertextsdatingfrom1985to2000).Beforedelving

intotheanalysisofcollocationsweshallpresentafewfigures.Table1illustratesthe

numberofoccurrencesofthefourtermsinthereferencecorpora:

AZZURRO BLU CELESTE TURCHINO

Diacoris 1729 446 861 389

laRepubblica 18555 16938 2965 275

Table1

Ananalysisofthecontextsinwhichtheyoccur,however,revealsthatapartof

thecollocationscanbeascribedto figurativemeanings, idiomaticexpressionsand

propernouns(inthecaseofceleste,mainly totheothermeaningof theterm, i.e.

‘celestial’), with frequent calques from other languages. In order to evaluate the

quantitativeweight of these contexts,whose variety has significantly increased in

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the second half of the 20th century for both azzurro and blu, we made a rough

calculation of the occurrences in the la Repubblica corpus, whose texts aremore

recent and larger in number. The calculations reveal that the percentages of

collocationsareintheorderofapproximately50%forblu,60%forturchino,65%for

azzurro,and75%forceleste.Thefrequencyofthistypeofcollocationsforazzurrois

ascribabletothefactthatitisconsideredasnationalcolouroftheRepublicofItaly.

Thecolourwasoriginallyused in the standards, flags,military scarves, etc.of the

Savoia royal family and became the official colour of the Italian national sports

teams.Thenational jersey is calledmaglia azzurra, even though the actual shade

canbedarkerorlighter,andazzurroisused,byvirtueofmetonymicextension,to

qualify or denote the athletes, coaches, sites, abstract concepts and ultimately

anything that revolves around the national teams. A similar mechanism applies

when one ormore colours (the so-called “club colours”) come to identify a sport

club.Thetermsazzurro,blu,celeste,thatareusedtoindicatethejerseys,flagsetc.,

arealsousedtorefertotheathletes, fans,etc.of therespectiveclubs(cf.also3.2.

below). The absence of turchino in this type of contexts is probably due to the

associationwiththeethnicnounandadjectiveturco‘Turkish’thatmakesitill-fitas

“clubcolour”forItalianandothernon-Turkishsportclubs.

AsillustratedinTable2,Diacorisprovidesuswithotherinterestingnumbers

asregardsthetrendofoccurrencesinthe5chronologicalsub-periodstowhichthe

textsofthecorpusbelong:

DIACORIS AZZURRO BLU CELESTE TURCHINO

1861-1900 305 27 314 121

1901-1922 286 10 90 122

1923-1945 464 32 143 74

1946-1967 429 185 145 54

1968-2001 245 192 169 18

Table2

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Data from the two corpora confirm the hypothesis, expressed in previous

studies,thatin20thcenturyItalian–andinparticularinthelastdecades–thereisa

restructuring of the BLUE area: blu is spreading more and more, even to the

detrimentofazzurro,celesteholds,whereastheusageofturchinoisexperiencinga

sharpdownfall.

The four adjectives qualify nouns that roughly belong to the same semantic

areasbutoccurwithdifferentdegreesof frequencydependingon thearea.Letus

analyzeingreaterdetailthecollocationsforthethreetermsthat,atpresent,arethe

mostcommon,i.e.azzurro,celesteandblu.

All three, andblu inparticular,qualify first and foremostnouns thatdenote

cloths, clothes and clothing accessories. Azzurro and celeste denote the lighter

shades, blu the darker ones: among the most frequent collocations we find, for

example,anazzurroorcelesteshirtwithablujacket,sweater,trousersortie.Darker

andlightershadescanbepresentinoneandthesamegarment,forexampleasuit

orashirtwithbluandazzurropinstripes.

With reference to the human body, eyes are azzurro par excellence, much

morerarelysocelesteorblu,whereasbluisselectedforskinspotscausedbybruises

orcyanosisorto indicatethecolourthat lipsturntobecauseofthecold.Azzurro

andbluarealsousedwithreferencetoveinsanddyes,asisthecaseforhair,nailsor

tattooedskin.Uominiblu‘lit.bluemen’isthecommonnamefortheTuaregpeople,

whosetraditionalblueveilcanoccasionallystaintheskin.

Both azzurro and blu, rarely so celeste, describe the colour or one of the

colours of various birds, butterflies, fish, and occur in names of taxonomic

categories (e.g., sula dai piedi azzurri / piediazzurri ‘blue-footed booby’, volpe

azzurra ‘blue fox’, a variety of the Arctic fox, tonno pinna blu ‘bluefin tuna’,orso

azzurro/blutibetano‘Tibetanbluebear’).Itshouldalsobenotedthatpesceazzurro

‘oilyfish’identifiesaclassofsmallfishindependentlyoftheirtruecolour.

Thecolourorcoloursofsomeflowers,likeirisorwindflower,isazzurroorblu;

hydrangeas, bluebells and gentians can also be celeste. Fruits and plants such as

bilberries, plums and aubergines are blu, but also other deteriorated or

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contaminated fruits and foods can be said to be blu (mozzarella blu ‘blu

mozzarella’).

Thecolourof thesky,and inparticularof theday-timebrightsky, ismainly

azzurro,butaftersunsetitgenerallybecomesblu.Bothbluandazzurrodenotethe

colourofthesea,ofriversandlakes,etc.Gemstoneslikediamondsandsapphires

areazzurroandblubutalsoceleste,which,tothecontrary,isonlyseldomusedfor

thecolourofthesky,ofthesea,etc.

Artificiallightshedbylightingequipmentisbothazzurroandblu,butwitha

sharppreferenceforbluwhenreferringtoflashingwarninglights.

Asforothercontextsinwhichthethreeadjectivesqualifynamesofinanimate

entities, apart from the previously mentioned garments, there are numerous

referencestothecolourofdecor,furnitureandornaments,asalsoofbuildingsand

buildingmaterials.

As for the colour of paper and paper products, book covers, graphical signs

and instruments for writing and drawing, all three terms are found but with a

prevalenceofblu;theschoolhabitofunderliningmajormistakeswithablupencil

gaverisetotheidiomerroreblu ‘lit.blueerror’(asopposedtoerrorerosso ‘lit.red

error’aminorerror).Blu,azzurroandcelesteareallusedforidentifyingcolouring

agentsandcoloursusedinpaintings.

Blu is slightly predominant overazzurro, andmuchmore so overceleste, in

denoting colourspresent in flags, standards, banners, etc. Inparticular,blu is the

international flag awarded to beaches and marinas that comply with sustainable

developmentcriteria.BluisthecolouroftheUnitedNationsflagandofthehelmet

worn by the UN troops; casco blu ‘Blue Helmet’ is used as a metonym for the

soldiersoftheinternationalpeacekeepingforces.

Blu is prevalentoverazzurro, andbothoverceleste, alsowhendenoting the

colourofvariousmeansof transport, inparticularcars,butalsoairplanes,vessels,

etc.Vehiclesusedbypoliticiansorhighpublicofficialsorthepublicadministration

arecalledautoblu ‘officialdedicatedcar’and,bywayofanalogy,wealsohaveblu

helicopters,bicycles(andblumobiles,i.e.dedicatedmobiles).

37

ThelowernumberofoccurrencesofturchinointhelaRepubblicaandDiacoris

corpora makes it more difficult to analyze in further detail the collocational

preferencesoftheterm.Itdenotesdarkershadesanditqualifiesfirstandforemost

garments,butalsothesky,thesea,eyes,etc.

Metonymic connections and semantic associations derived from symbolic

valuesaccountforthepresenceofthefouradjectives,andinparticularofazzurro

andblu, inmany other contexts not yetmentioned.We shall illustrate but a few

examplesofstablecollocationsthatoccurfrequentlyinourcorpora.

Both azzurro and blu are also “political colours”, in the sense that they are

symbolicallyused to representapoliticalparty, itsmembers, constituency, etc. In

the past decades, for example, azzurro has been associated with the Forza Italia

party. Further,azzurro is associatedwith newbornmales in the expression fiocco

azzurro ‘blue baby ribbon’ (as opposed to fiocco rosa ‘pink baby ribbon’) and in

generaltochildprotectionintelefonoazzurro ‘lit.bluephone’,akindofChildline.

Principeazzurro‘lit.blueprince’,thenameforPrinceCharming,atypicalcharacter

oflikelyFrenchoriginthatappearsinvariousfairytales(cf.D’Achille2011),denotes

by antonomasia the quintessential romantic ideal for amale partner or husband.

The expressions fata turchina ‘lit. blue fairy’ or fata dai capelli turchini ‘lit. blue-

hairedfairy’,associatedwiththecharacterofthenovelforchildrenTheAdventures

ofPinocchiobyCarloCollodi,havealsobecomeantonomasticandattimesareused

(also ironically) to refer to a woman who is someone’s benefactor, mentor or

counsellor.

Denominations suchas tuteblu ‘lit.blueoveralls’orcolletti blu ‘blue-collars’

forlaborers(asopposedtocollettibianchi‘white-collars’),cinturablu‘bluebelt’for

athleteswho reached a given level at karate (as opposed to cintura bianca ‘white

belt’, cintura gialla ‘yellow belt’, etc.) are metonymically motivated and they are

usedwith classifying function. Strisce blu ‘lit. blue stripes’ and zona blu ‘lit. blue

zone’ are expressions used in the regulation of car traffic and parking, whereas

bollinoblu‘lit.bluesticker’isacertificationofproperfunctioningforcars,devices,

etc.Expressions suchaspaurablu ‘lit. ‘blue fear’or fifablu ‘lit.blue fright’,which

refertoahugefrightthatturnsyourfaceblue,orsangueblu ‘blueblood’,usedto

38

indicate aristocratic lineage (apparently, a very light complexion with blue veins

clearly visible on one’s wrists was considered as a sign of nobility), are also of

metonymicorigin.

Azzurroandblu,andtoamuchlesserextentcelesteandturchino,alsooccurin

differenttypesofpropernouns:ofsites(e.g.,CostaAzzurra‘FrenchRiviera,Fr.Côte

d’Azur’,Grotta Azzurra ‘Blue Grotto’), persons (as a feminine name: Azzurra; as

both feminine andmasculine:Celeste), institutions (Arma azzurra is the name of

the Italian air force), companies (Blu was a telecommunications operator),

establishments (e.g., Bar Trattoria Blu in Milano, Hotel Residence Azzurro in

L’Aquila, Hotel Celeste in Procida, Sassi Turchini – hostel in the Isola d’Elba),

products(e.g.,NastroAzzurro‘lit.blueribbon’isabeer,ACEDensoBluisawashing

powder,BluDiesel is a typeof fuel),meansof transport (e.g.,Freccia azzurra ‘lit.

bluearrow’trains),literary,musicalandartworks(e.g.,Celeste,azzurroeblu–an

album of songs by Gianni Morandi; Nel blu dipinto di blu (Volare) – a song by

DomenicoModugno;insomecases,translationspresentvariantswithbothazzurro

and blu, for example Bluebird by Bukowski is rendered as Uccellino azzurro or

Uccellino blu, Der Blaue Reiter by Kandinsky is both Il cavaliere azzurro and Il

cavaliereblu),etc.

OthertermsoftheBLUEareaareformedbymeansofvariousmorphological

devices. In 3.1. – 3.3. we shall briefly illustrate themain word-formation patterns

without dwelling on the possible differences regarding their combinatory

possibilities.

3.1.Azzurro,blu,celesteandturchinoasbasesforderivation

The four termswe analyzed in the previous paragraph can be bases for the

derivationofothercolouradjectives(Grossmann/Mazzoni1972,Grossmann1988,

MerliniBarbaresi2004).Themajorityofderivedadjectivesbelongstothefirstofthe

followingtwotypes:

1)derivativesformedbysuffixationthatdenoteanapproximation–intermsof

hue, brightness and saturation – to the focal point denoted by the base.

Lexicographic sources list a number of adjectives that denote shades that are

39

approximatelyazzurro (azzurrino andazzurrigno, already attested in the 13th and

14th century respectively, azzurrognolo, azzurrastro, azzurretto, azzurriccio), blu

(bluastro), celeste (celestino) and turchino (turchinetto, turchiniccio, turchinaccio,

turchinuccio,turchinastro).Thesetermswiththesoleexceptionofazzurrinoand,to

a lesser extent,azzurrognolo andbluastro, are rareor absent in the laRepubblica

and Diacoris corpora. Azzurrino also denotes, by metonymy, young athletes of

Italian national teams. One should mention that the selection of a specific

approximative and/or evaluative suffix may depend on diatopic and diaphasic

factors,asisthecasewithothertypesofadjectivalbasesinItalian;

2)derivativeswiththeelativesuffix-issimothatdenotethehighestdegreeof

brightnessandsaturationcomparedtoanimplicitstandard.Featuredinthecorpora

are: azzurrissimo, mainly referred to eyes, the sky and the sea, and the rare

celestissimo and turchinissimo. Instances of bluissimo can only be found on the

Internet (Googled on 10.04.2015). It should be noted that Italian can express

intensificationofagivenqualityalsobymeansoftheprefixstra-,whichhoweveris

seldom known to modify colour terms. Straazzurro can only be found on the

Internet,whereasstrabluisalexicalizedformthatdenotesakindofcheese.

Azzurro,blu,celesteandturchinocanalsobebasesforthederivationofnouns

and verbs. Derived verbs (cf. Timmermann 2002), formed by suffixation,

parasynthesisorconversion, aremainlybasedon azzurro.Theseare (in)azzurrare

‘todye/tocolourazzurro’,alsousedinthepronominalform(in)azzurrarsi‘toturn

azzurro’,andazzurreggiare‘tobesomewhatazzurro’.Lexicographicsourcesalsolist

rare verbs such as inturchinire ‘to dye / to colour turchino’, inturchinarsi ‘to turn

turchino’, turchineggiare ‘to be somewhat turchino’, while blueggiare ‘to be

somewhat blu’ can only be found on the Internet. Internet also provides us with

adjectives derived from the stative verbs in -eggiare, such as azzurreggiante,

blueggiante, turchineggiante, thatdenote the stateofbeingazzurro, blu, turchino.

Asforderivednouns,corporaarerepletewithqualitynounsformedbyconversion

(l’azzurrodei suoiocchi ‘theazzurroofhis/hereyes’, ilbludelcielo ‘thebluof the

sky’, il turchinodelmare ‘the turchino of the sea’, etc.)and, less so,by suffixation

(azzurrità ‘the quality of being azzurro’). Other nouns derive from the

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aforementioned verb azzurrare ‘to colour azzurro’: these are azzurramento

‘action/result of azzurrar(si)’, azzurraggio and azzurrante ‘blu(e)ing’, technical

termsthatapplytocolouringagentsandrelatedprocesses.

3.2.Azzurro,blu,celesteandturchinoasconstituentsofcompounds

Acommonlyuseddeviceforenlargingtheinventoryofcolourtermsisforming

compound words made up of two adjectives or an adjective and a noun. These

constructions, frequently nonce-formations in both literary and journalistic texts,

confront scholars with the same problems as all other adjectival compounds in

Italian, i.e. spelling, allomorphy, inflectional characteristics, etc. (cf. D’Achille /

Grossmann2009,2010,Grossmann/Rainer2009,and,withparticularreferenceto

colour compounds, Grossmann 1988, D’Achille / Grossmann 2013). When

considering the relationship between the constituents, we have two groups:

coordinateandsubordinatecompounds.

Among coordinate compoundswe can further identify three subtypeswhich

spread in usage from the 18th century onwards, with some isolated examples in

earliertimes:

1) constructions that qualify two- or multi-coloured entities such as flags,

apparel,etc.(suchasdrappiblubianchi‘blu-whitecloths’,bandiereblu-bianco-rosse

‘blu-white-red flags’), or denote the colours of a team jersey (the so-called “club

colours”), especially in football, and, by metonymy, the players, fans, managers,

executives, etc. D’Achille’s (2014) study on this kind of terms, based on CONI

(Italian National Olympic Committee) documents dating from the 20th century

(http://dlib.coninet.it) lists the following, among others: biancazzurri ‘white

azzurro’ (later re-denominated biancocelesti ‘white celeste’) relating to the Lazio

football team, rossoblù ‘redblu’ relating toGenoa,Cagliari andBologna,gialloblù

‘yellow blu’ relating to Verona, Chievo and Parma. Notice that turchino does not

appearinthiskindofconstruction;

2) constructions indicating a hue that is intermediate between the colours

denotedbytheconstituents(suchasocchiazzurro-grigi ‘azzurro-greyeyes’,capelli

blu-neri‘blu-blackhair’);

41

3) reduplicative constructions (more syntactic in nature) of the type occhi

azzurriazzurri‘azzurroazzurroeyes’,usedfordescribingthepresenceofthecolour

at the highest degree of brightness and saturation, as is the case with the

aforementionedderivativesin-issimo(cf.Rainer1983).

The majority of compounds found in corpora are left-headed subordinate

constructions.Most are documented since the 18th century,with the exception of

sub-type1),alreadyattestedinOldItalian.Thefirstconstituentisthehyperonymof

theconstructionwhile the secondconstituentacts asmodifier.Thesecompounds

describeaparticularshadeofthecolourdenotedbythehead.Modifierscanbe:

1)adjectivesthatrefertothedegreeofbrightnessandsaturationofthecolour

(such as azzurro-chiaro ‘light azzurro’, blu intenso ‘intense blu’). These

constructionsarevery frequent in the laRepubblica andDiacoris corporaand the

arrayofadjectivalmodifiersisvast.Bothazzurroandbluarefoundincombination

withadjectivessuchasacceso ‘bright’,brillante ‘shining’,chiaro ‘light’,cupo ‘dark’,

elettrico ‘electric’, intenso ‘intense’, pallido ‘pale’, profondo ‘deep’, sbiadito ‘faded’,

scuro ‘dark’, vivo ‘vivid’.Otheradjectives suchas forte ‘strong’, spento ‘dull’, tenue

‘soft’, modify azzurro but not blu, whereas fiammante ‘flaming’, opaco ‘opaque’,

slavato‘faded’,squillante‘shrill’,occurwithblubutnotwithazzurro.Someofthese

modifiersalsooccurwithcelesteandturchino;

2)aderivativeofanothercolouradjectiveindicatingahuetowhichthecolour

denoted by the head comes close (such as azzurro grigiastro ‘grayish azzurro’,

azzurro verdognolo ‘greenish azzurro’, azzurro violaceo ‘purplish azzurro’; blu

verdastro ‘greenish blu’, blu violaceo ‘purplish blu’; celeste biancastro ‘whitish

celeste’);

3) a noun (such as blu notte ‘night blu’) or a denominal adjective (such as

azzurro-smeraldino ‘emerald azzurro’) that specifies the shade by virtue of a

comparisonwiththequintessentialcolourattributedtoitsreferent.Amongazzurro

orblu+NcompoundsinthelaRepubblicaandDiacoriscorporathereisavastarray

ofnounsthatcanactasmodifiersofthetwoadjectives(cf.Kristol1978,Grossmann

1988:182-199).Therearenounsdenotingmetals/minerals,stones/jewels,colouring

agents, flowers, fruits/vegetables, associated with the animal kingdom and a

42

numberofothersstill.Nounssuchasacciaio‘steel’,cartadazucchero‘sugarpaper’,

cielo ‘sky’, cobalto ‘cobalt’, ghiaccio ‘ice’, indaco ‘indigo’,mare ‘sea’, notte ‘night’,

pervinca ‘periwinkle’,petrolio ‘petroleum’, occur in compoundswith bothazzurro

andblu albeitwithdifferent frequency.Themost frequentmodifier forazzurro is

cielo‘sky’,whilebluoccursfrequentlyfollowedbynotte‘night’.Othernounssuchas

acqua ‘water’, fiordaliso ‘cornflower’, glicine ‘wisteria’, lavanda ‘lavender’, polvere

‘dust’,etc.onlyoccurwithazzurro,othersstill,likeasfalto‘asphalt’,inchiostro‘ink’,

lavagna ‘slate’,melanzana ‘aubergine’,mirtillo ‘bilberry’,zaffiro ‘sapphire’,etc.only

occur with blu. Also the remaining two terms, celeste and turchino, can be

constituents of an A+N compound, but the types are fewer in number and their

frequency is lower. Among themodifiers of celeste there are, for example, acqua

‘water’,ortensia‘hydrangea’,polvere‘dust’.Turchino,ontheotherhand,canonlybe

found in combination with pavone ‘peacock’. While these types of compounds

denoteashadeofazzurro,blu,celesteandturchinothatistypicalforthereferentof

thenoun,inothercasesitisacolourofanobjectthatisintimatelyassociatedwith/

typical of the referent (azzurro + forzista ‘member/supporter of the Forza Italia

party’, blu + aviazione ‘air force’, etc.). The nominal constituent is generally a

commonnoun,howevertherearealsoafewinstancesofnamesofpersons(azzurro

Tiepolo ‘Tiepolo azzurro’, blu Savoia ‘Savoia blu’, etc.) and institutions (azzurro

Europa ‘Europe azzurro’, blu Nazioni Unite ‘United Nations blu’, etc.). Similar in

nature,fromthesemanticpointofview,arecompoundsmadeupofazzurroorblu

and a denominal adjective such as azzurro ministeriale ‘ministerial azzurro’, blu

berlusconiano ‘Berlusconianblu’.TheproliferationofA+Ncompoundcolourterms

inthe20thcenturyismainlyattributabletothefashionindustryandtoanumberof

crafts and businesses that kept introducing new hues into themarket and giving

them coined names that were subsequently disseminated by themass-media. An

interestingcaseinpointisrepresentedbythenamescoinedforcarbodycolours(cf.

Caffarelli2014).Theapparentlyarbitraryselectionofnominalmodifierscanoftenbe

accounted for by the cultural salience of their referents in the Italian linguistic

community,andinsomecasesisinfluencedbyforeignmodels.

43

3.3.Nounsusedascolourterms

Thelastdeviceforcreatingcolourterms,whichweshallonlybrieflymention

here since it is less relevant to our topic, is recourse to names of entities for

denoting,bymetonymy,acolour(ananalysisofthemorphologicalcharacteristicsof

thistypeoflexemes,thatcanbeinterpretedastheresultofaconversionprocess,is

given inThornton 2004: 529-530).These are someof thenominal constituents of

compounds listed in the previous paragraph, that can be used independently to

denote a particular shade (such as abito acquamarina ‘aquamarine dress’, stoffa

indaco ‘indigocloth’),asalsoothernounsthataregenerallyusedintheabsenceof

azzurro or blu (such as lago turchese ‘turquoise lake’). These terms are probably

generated by ellipsis of phrases like: un brillante colore di acquamarina ‘lit. a

diamond of colour of aquamarine’, brillante color acquamarina ‘lit. aquamarine

colourdiamond’,brillanteazzurro/bluacquamarina ‘lit.aquamarineazzurro/blu

diamond’,occhidiacquamarina‘lit.eyesofaquamarine’.

4.Conclusion

The existence of large and searchable corpora, unavailable at the time of

Grossmann’s studies on Italian colour terms (Grossmann 1988, Grossmann /

Mazzoni 1972, 1976), asalso the findingsof themany studiespublished thereafter

especiallyontheareaofBLUE,makeitnowpossibletofine-tunetheobservations

outlinedover25yearsago.

Our analysis of the historical evolution and contemporary use of azzurro,

celeste,bluandturchinoinwrittenItaliansuggeststhat:

• azzurroandblu,thetwotermsthatarenowdominantinthearea,meetthe

criteriathatareusuallyrequiredforbeingconsideredbasiccolourterms;

• celeste, which is analyzable from a morphological point of view and

semantically transparent, cannot be considered as a basic colour term and is

peripheralwithrespecttoazzurroandblu;

44

• turchino,whichisalsoanalyzablefromthemorphologicalpointofviewbut

lesstransparentfromasemanticpointofview,wasperipheralinprevioushistorical

periodsandisnowadaysindisuse;

• thehistoryoftherelationshipsamongthefourtermscanbegroupedinthree

broad periods: a) a first period (from the 14th to the 17th century) during which

azzurro is the central termandceleste denotes light shades and turchino denotes

dark shades;b) a secondperiod (from the 18th century to the firsthalfof the20th

century) during which azzurro remains the central term, celeste denotes light

shadesand turchino andbludenotedarkshades;c)a thirdperiod (secondhalfof

the 20th century) during which azzurro still denotes a shade in-between celeste

(light) and blu (dark), but gradually hands over the central term role to blu and

comesclosertocelesteinasmuchasitindicatesonlylightshades;

• thehuge increase intheuseofbluduringthe20thcenturycancertainlybe

ascribed,atleastinpart,tothehighnumberofcalques(suchastheaforementioned

caschi blu ‘BlueHelmet’,colletti blu ‘blue-collars’, etc.) and loans (blue-jeans,blue

chip, etc.) by contact with French, German and, above all, English that have a

similarcentralterm(Fr.bleu,Ger.blau,Eng.blue);

• the derivational potential of blu and celeste is more limited than that of

azzurro and turchino; in compounding, the prevalence ofazzurro andblu is very

marked;

• theusewithfigurativemeaningsandthepresenceinidiomaticexpressionsis

basically limited to azzurro and blu; the number of these contexts with blu is

continuallyexpandingalsobyvirtueofcalquesfromotherlanguages.

Furthermaterial forstudyingthehistoryof thesemanticrelationshipamong

thefourtermscouldbeofferedbyresearchonspecializedtechnicaltexts(suchas

treatises on painting, minerals, gems, etc.) in different historical periods and on

botholdandcontemporarydialectaltexts.

45

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TLIO = CNR. Opera del Vocabolario Italiano. Tesoro della Lingua Italiana delle Origini.http://tlio.ovi.cnr.it/TLIO/[Accessdate:10February2015].

Uusküla,M.(2011).“TermsforredinCentralEurope:AnarealphenomenoninHungarianandCzech”. InBiggam,C.P.;Hough,C.A.;Kay,Ch. J.;Simmons,D.R. (eds.).Newdirectionsincolourstudies.Amsterdam:Benjamins.147-156.

Uusküla,M.(2014).“LinguisticcategorizationofblueinStandardItalian”.InAnderson,W.;Biggam, C. P.; Hough, C.; Kay, Ch. (eds.). Colour studies: A broad spectrum.Amsterdam:Benjamins.67-78.

Valdegamberi,V.;Paggetti,G.;Menegaz,G. (2011). “On theperceptual/linguisticoriginofthetwelfthbasiccolortermintheItaliancolorlexicon”.InRossiM.(ed.).Colourandcolorimetry:Multidisciplinarycontributions.AttidellaVIIConferenzanazionaledelcolore(Roma,15-16settembre2011).Bologna:Maggioli.VIIB.291-298.

Vincent, J. (1986). “Variation inNeapolitanBLUEs”. InLePage,R.B. (ed.).ProceedingsoftheWorkshopof the InternationalGroup for theStudyof language standardizationandvernacularizationof literacy (April 18-20, 1986,DepartmentofLanguage).York:YorkUniversity.35-38.

VincentMarrelli,J.(1987).InvestigatingItalianbasiccolourterms:The“giallo”oftheBLUEsandthecaseofthesubliminalORANGE.PhDDiss.UniversityofSussex.

Wierzbicka, A. (1990). “The meaning of color terms: Semantics, culture and cognition”.CognitiveLinguistics1.99-150.

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Wolf, H. J. (1985). “Ein unbekanntes Erbwort: Zu zentralsardischen Farbbezeichnungen”.RomanischeForschungen97.353-368.

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European(dis)unionofcolours:secondarybasiccolourtermsinPolish,PortugueseandSpanishEwaStala&PrzemysławDębowiak(JagiellonianUniversity)

1.Subject,objectandpurpose

Althoughthephysiologicalperceptionofcoloursbythehumanspecieshasnot

changed, the cultural filter creates differences between their connotations across

populations.Thisisreflectedinthelanguagethatfunctionsasalinguisticprism.

Thepresentstudyiscross-culturalandcross-geographical,coveringlanguages

of theEastern andWestern endof theEuropeanUnion: Polish on the onehand,

PortugueseandSpanishontheotherhand.Itaimstocomparetheuseofsecondary

colournames:purple,pink,orangeandgreyatbothendsofEurope.Itisundisputed

that “the analysis of the colours petrified in phraseological units can be an

inexhaustiblesourceofinformationoftheprocessofsemanticencoding,carriedout

within a given linguistic system”1 (Szałek 2005: 88). By showing the presence of

selectedcolournamesinthelanguage(idioms,phrases,collocations,etc.),wehope

to discover if both geographical and linguistic ends of Europe have different or

rathercommoncolourvisions.

1 Our translation of the original text: “el análisis de los colores fijados en unidades

fraseológicas puede ser una fuente inagotable de información sobre los procesos decodificaciónsemánticallevadosacabodentrodeunsistemalingüísticodado”.

52

Thecolours thatwehavechosentoanalyseoccupythe lastplaceamongthe

so-called basic terms of colours in the hierarchy of Berlin andKay2. Even though

theystillpertaintotheclassofBasicColourTerms,theyareusuallydescribedasa

mixtureoftwoother(basic)colours(i.e.purple=red+blue;orange=yellow+red;

pink = red +white; grey = black +white). Consequently,we call them secondary

colourterms.

Let us remember that Berlin and Kay suggest the existence of a universal

lexical category: the names of basic colours terms. Based on the hypothesis of a

neuro-physiologicalnature, according towhich theocular apparatusof allhuman

beings focuses as central to a finite number of parts of the spectrum, the lexical

itemsthatarebeyondthissharecertaincharacteristicswhichidentifythemasbasic

nameseffectively3.AnotablecontributionistheworkofKayandMcDaniel(1978)

whichemphasisesthatthelexicalorganisationofthespectrumhascharacteristicsof

a continuum, so no discreet segmentation is possible: “the development of basic

colours-term lexicon (is) not the successive encoding of foci but the successive

differentiationofpreviouslyexistingcolouredbasiccategories”(ibidem:640).Thus

coloursexemplifythetheoryof“fuzzysets”.

What is more, in the latest research the adjectives of colour appear as

polysemic entities (cf. Leduc-Adine 1980: 69). This ability to attribute multiple

meanings to one signifier plays an important role in the “linguistic economy”. In

fact,Leduc-Adineinhisarticleliststhesocalled“pseudo-adjectivesofcolour”(e.g.

Sp.turismoverde‘greentourism’,eminenciagris‘greyeminence’)andpresentstheir

features.Thepolysemyof the adjectivesof colourmakes that theymayappear in

different contexts and be subject to very differentmeanings. Tokarski (1963: 142)

calls this phenomenon “subjective polysemy in the highest degree”4 and offers

varioususesofthePolishadjectiveczarny‘black’.Thesamechromaticadjectivecan

2 InthistextwehaveoptedfortheBerlinandKayoptics(1969),althoughtherearemore

classifications: van Wijk 1959, Bidu Vrănceanu 1976, Kristol 1978a, Grossmann 1988,EspejoMuriel1987,1990orMartinell1979.

3 Thereareexceptions,e.g.Russianwithtwoequivalentsofblue:golubóy ‘lightblue’andsíniy‘darkblue’(Kay&McDaniel1978:640).SeealsoKristol1978b.

4 Pol.“polisemiawznacznejmierzesubiektywna”.

53

mean‘dangerous,grim’(blackcharacter,blackfuture)aswellas‘dark’(blacknight,

blackclouds)5.

Going back to the reasons for our choice, we would like to emphasise that

purple,orange,pinkandgreyarenotonlytheleaststudied(versuswhite,blackand

red),but, at the same time,onecouldexpect that they seemmore likely to show

potentialdifferencesbetweenthethreelanguagesinquestion.

2.Analysis

Our study is basically synchronic, but it also contains information of a

diachronicnature (etymologyand,possibly, thehistoryof considered terms).The

sourcesaremainlylexicographic:dictionaries,lexiconsorcorpora,yetitwouldbeof

great interest toshowtheoccurrencesofmentionedcolours in literatureas itcan

open different research pathways. Such a study, however, would overlook the

dimensions of the present contribution and we leave this question for the

considerationofotherinterestedresearchers.

As Bochnakowa (1990: 7) remarked, the degree of lexicalisation of nominal

syntagmascontainingthenamesofcolours,aswellastheirclassificationinclichés,

phrases, idiomaticexpressions,phraseologicalunits,etc. isacomplicatedquestion

forsuchsciencesaslexicology,lexicographyanddidacticsoflanguage.Wewillnot

discussthisproblemhereasitisnotrelevantforthepurposesofourstudy.Wetake

into consideration every kind of expression that contains the name of one of the

fourcoloursweareinterestedin.

Some examples have become entrenched in language because they name a

specific historical event, situation or person, largely commented on and generally

knowninagivenculturalmilieu,suchase.g.:

- Pol. pomarańczowa rewolucja / Port. Revolução Laranja / Sp. Revolución

naranja ‘OrangeRevolution, i.e. a series of protests that took place inUkraine in

2004–2005’,

5 Ofcourse,allthisreferstosomePolishexpressions.

54

- Port.mapa cor-de-rosa / Sp.mapa rosado / Pol. różowamapa ‘pinkmap /

rose-colouredmap,i.e.adocumentpreparedin1885torepresentPortugal’sclaimof

sovereigntyoveralandcorridorconnectingthePortuguesecoloniesofAngolaand

Mozambique’,

- Pol. szara eminencja / Port. eminência cinzenta / Sp. eminencia gris

‘counsellorwhoinspiresunostensiblythedecisionsofanotherperson,corporation

or a party’, but they are direct translations of the French Éminence grise ‘grey

eminence’ (1st half of the 17th century, with reference to François Leclerc du

Tremblay or Father Joseph (1577–1638), confidant and private advisor of Cardinal

Richelieu).

Nevertheless, thenamesof coloursused in these expressionsdonot achieve

newmeanings.Beyondtheseexpressions,theycannotbeappliedelsewhere,sothey

aretobeomittedinouranalysis.

Letusaddthatwedonottakeintoaccountthispartofsemanticsofanalysed

unitsthatreferstoobjectsandnotcolours(e.g.‘orange–fruit’,‘rose–flower’).

2.1.Polish

Colours are an enormously popular topic among Slavic linguists. There are

works that analyse the socio-cultural connotations of colours (cf. Tokarski 1995),

semantic-culturalapproaches(cf.Wierzbicka2006)ormonographicworks(Zaręba

1954,Komorowska&Stanulewicz2010).Therearenumerousarticlesthatdealwith

colours in Polish literature; for a more complete bibliography, we refer those

interestedtothemonographbyKomorowska(2010).

InordertoanalysePolishcolournames,thefollowingsourceshavebeenused:

• dictionaries ofContemporaryPolish:WSJP (on-line), SJPPWN (on-line too)

andISJP,bringingdefinitionsandsomefixedusages;

• corpusofContemporaryPolish:NKJP,providingmorecollocations;

• Boryś’ (SEJP) and Bańkowski’s (ESJP, ESMP) etymological dictionaries,

indicatingtheoriginandthefirstattestationsofanalysedterms.

55

fioletowy‘purple’etymology <fiolet‘purplecolour’←Germ.Violett‘purple;purplecolour’←Fr.

violette‘viola’<OFr.viole‘id.’←Lat.viola1statt. 2ndhalfofthe17thcenturyconcretemeanings

1.‘ofthecolourresultingfrommixingredandblue,liketheoneofheatherorcrocuses’

figurativemeanings&usages

2.‘undertheinfluenceofdifferentphysicalfactorsorstrongemotions’-fioletowyzzimna‘frozen’,fioletowyzprzepicia‘beery’,etc.-fioletowyzewściekłości,fioletowyzgniewu‘furious,angry’

Table1

Fioletowy(formerlyalsofijoletowy)replacedtheprimitivePolishnameofthis

colour,i.e.fiołkowy‘ofthecolouroftheviola’(1stattestedtoatthebeginningofthe

15thcentury)<fiołek‘viola’(<MHGvīol(e)‘id.’<Lat.viola).Evenifthemotivationof

thismore ancientwordwasmore explicit for Polish speakers, the final source of

both remains identical.Fioletowy is used only in a few expressions related to the

physical aspect of someone whose body is reacting to external (cold) or internal

(alcoholconsumption)stimuliorwho isexperiencingan intenseemotion(anger).

These usages have a clear concrete basis and refer to the colour of body or face

resulting from concentration of blood under the skin. Albeit, the adjective can

denotedescribedstatesevenifthephysicalaspectofthepersoninquestionremains

unchanged.

pomarańczowy‘orange’

etymology <pomarańcza‘orange’←It.pomod’arancia,wherearancia‘orange’←Ar.nāranǧ←Pers.nārang←Sanskr.nāraṅga

1statt. early18thcenturyconcretemeanings

1.‘yellowwithredtint,likethecolourofaripeorange’


-

Table2

No metaphorical usages of pomarańczowy in phraseology or collocations

havebeenfound.Itisusedexclusivelyinitsconcretemeaning.

56

różowy‘pink’etymology <róża‘rose’←OHGrōsa‘id.’←Lat.rosa1statt. 2ndhalfofthe18thcenturyconcretemeanings

1.‘ofredcolourmixedwithabigquantityofwhite’2.‘flushed’


3.‘prosperous,favourable,satisfyingone’sexpectations,optimistic’-różowyscenariusz‘positivescenario’,różowaprzyszłość‘greatfuture’,

etc.-różowyhumor‘verygood,cheerfulmood’-widziećcośwróżowychbarwach‘toseesomethingoptimistically’-malowaćsięwróżowychbarwach‘tobeexpectedtobegood,prosperous’-oglądać/patrzećnaświatprzezróżoweokulary‘tobeanoptimist,tosee

onlythepositiveaspects’4.‘sympathisingwiththeleft,socialismorcommunism’-różowiateiści,różowidemokraci,etc.‘atheists,democrats,etc.

sympathisingwiththefar-left’5.‘erotic,relatedtosex’-Różowalandrynka‘titleofaneroticTVprogrammepresentingnude

women’-różowebalety‘bigpartyofanexpresslysexualnature’

Table3

Różowy replaced the former adjective naming this colour – różany (also

derived from róża ‘rose’, butwas first attested to already in the 1st half of the 15th

century)thatincontemporarylanguagereferspredominantlytothesmellofroseor

tothefloweringeneral(e.g.wodaróżana‘rosewater’).

Różowy has mainly positive connotations in Polish, denoting either an

optimisticattitudeormoodofapersonorfavourablecircumstancesandsituations.

However,itcanalsosuggestsomebody’spoliticalaffiliation,namelythefar-left,but

ina“light”versionifcomparedtoczerwony ‘red’(theintensityofcolourisdirectly

proportionate to the intensity of political convictions). Polish dictionaries do not

noteaseparatemeaningreferringtoeroticismorsex,butonemustrecognisethat

różowy sometimes has this kind of association too, which is proved by the cited

collocations6.

6Cf.thisfragmentfromapoembyMariaPawlikowska-Jasnorzewska(1923):“Zalotnośćjest

pachnącairóżowa,/amądrośćżółtaisucha./Wolałabym,bymnieMickiewiczchciałcałować, / niż bymnie chciał słuchać […]”,which could be translated as: “Coquetry isfragrantandpink/andwisdomisyellowanddry./IwouldpreferMickiewicztokissme/ratherthanlistentome[…]”.

57

szary‘grey’etymology ←Occid.Proto-Sl.*šarъ‘ofthecolourofash,grey’1statt. 15thcenturyconcretemeanings

1.‘ofthecolourresultingfrommixingwhiteandblack’2.‘colourless’


3.‘average,mediocre’-szaryczłowiek(>szarak,szaraczek),szaramysz/myszka‘average

person’4.‘monotonous,boring’-szararzeczywistość‘monotonousreality’,szaracodzienność‘boring

everyday’5.‘cloudy,gloomy’-szarydzień‘gloomyday’-szaragodzina(>szarówka)‘crepuscule’76.‘showingsignsoffatigue,lackofsleeporadisease’-szaratwarz‘sicklyface’,szaraskóra‘unhealthypallorofskin’7.‘bad,poor,difficult’-byćnaszarymkońcu‘tobeattheveryend,intheworstposition’-zrobićkogośnaszaro‘tocheatsomebody,puttinghimintentionallyin

adifficultsituation’8.‘undetermined,vague,indistinct,invisible’-szarastrefa‘partofeconomywhichisoutofthecontrolofthestate’

Table4

The history of the term szary in Polish has already been detailed by

Bochnakowa(2010:33)whogivesitsfirstattestationsindifferentcollocationsfound

intextsanddictionaries,startingfromthe16thcentury.Thesearemainlyconcrete

usages,relatedtotheeffectivecolourofreferents,stillpresentintoday’slanguage,

e.g.:szarypapier ‘greypaper’,szarysos ‘greysauce’,szaremydło ‘greysoap’, istota

szara ‘greymatter’8.Szary isalsoa frequentepithet innamesofsomespeciesand

diseases: wierzba szara ‘grey willow’, szary niedźwiedź ‘grey bear’, słowik szary

‘thrushnightingale’,szarapleśń‘noblerot’,etc.

As it has been shown, when it comes to figurative meanings, szary refers

rather to negative qualities:mediocrity,monotony, lack of health and vagueness.

Theyarecertainlyduetoanundefinedcharacterofthiscolour.Someofthemeven 7 Thecollocationszaragodzinapertainsrathertoliteraryorformalregister,whereasthe

derivativeszarówkaisusedinthecasualone.8 However, the expression szara pycha / szara pyszka ‘grey pride, haughtiness’ (16th

century),thatisnomoreinuseinContemporaryPolish,deservestobementionedhereasacounterpart.

58

constituted the basis for further derivatives, such as szarak / szaraczek ‘average

person’,szarówka‘crepuscule’,wherethechromatictermisemphasised.

Asacuriosity, letusmentionanexamplewhich iscontrarytothe lastone.

Theexpressionrządzićsięjakszaragęś‘toimposeone’swill,toabuseone’spower’

(literally‘tobosslikeagreygoose’)hasalsocreatedaderivative,theverbszarogęsić

sięwith the samemeaning.However, in this case it isnot thegrey colour that is

stressed, but the goose which is accidentally grey. That is why this picturesque

expressionhasnotenteredintoourcorpus.

2.2.Portuguese

TherehavenotbeenmanystudiesaboutPortuguesecolournames.SaidAli

(1975) offers a brief and general overview of the subject. Schmitz (1983), Jensen

(1992) and Kobędza (2014) study them in a comparative and / or historical

perspective.Zavaglia(2006)andMoreiraBrangel(2011)discussproblemsrelatedto

colour terms from thepointof viewof lexicographicdescription.Moreover, there

areworksoncolours in the toponymyofPortugal:RocaGarriga (1958),Dębowiak

(2010).

With the purpose of analysing Portuguese colour names, the following

sourceshavebeenused:

• dictionariesofContemporaryPortuguese:DPLP(on-line)andDLPthatoffer

definitionsandapartoftheirusages;

• corpus of Portuguese from the 13th to the 20th century: CDP, helpful in

establishingfirstattestationsandsomecollocations;

• Machado’s (DELP1) and da Cunha’s (DELP2) etymological dictionaries,

providingtheoriginandthefirstattestationsofstudiedterms.

59

roxo‘purple’etymology ←Lat.rŭssĕu-‘darkred’1statt. 1258concretemeanings

1.‘whichisofthecolourofviolaoramethyst;purple’2.(obsolete)‘red’


3.‘undertheinfluenceofdifferentphysicalfactors;exaggerated,excessive’

-teroslábiosroxosdefrio‘tohavefrozenlips’,choraratéficarroxo‘tocryintensively’,etc.9

Table5

ThehistoryoftheadjectiveroxoinPortuguesemeritsfurthercommentary.It

firstmeant ‘red’,a factwhichbringsthiswordcloserto itsSpanishcorrespondent

rojo ‘red’ and to the Latin etymon of both. By way of example, the Red Sea was

calledMar Roxo (orRoixo) in Portuguese still in the 16th century (cf. DELP1 s.v.

Roxo).Theadjectivewaseventuallyreplacedbyvermelho(←Lat.vermĭcŭlu-‘small

worm (producing scarlet dye)’) and encarnado (< carne ‘flesh,meat’), whereas its

semanticextenthasmovedtowards‘purple,violet’.

When itcomesto figurativemeanings,roxodenotesdifferentstatesrelated

to intense physical factors experienced by somebody: cold, weep etc. Aswe have

already explained it for Polish, these usages come from referring to the colour of

bodyorfaceresultingfromtheconcentrationofbloodundertheskin.Itseemsthat

roxo can describe the aforementioned states even if the physical aspect of the

personinquestionremainsunchanged10.

9 Letusnotethat inBrazilianPortuguesethereareexpressionsthatcouldpertaintothe

samegroup:roxoderaiva‘furious,angry’androxodeciúmes/inveja‘extremelyjealous’(itismorefrequentforthelastonetooccurwiththeadjectivemeaning‘green’:verdedeciúmes/inveja).

10 LetusnotethatthePortuguesecontemporarywriterFernandoCamposwritesasfollows:“Oheternalandabsolutecolour!Vagueandundecidedandmysteriousasagodwhoishidingbehindyourveilsfullofsecrets!Youdonotexpresstheendnorthefall,likeblackwhich represents the night and sin, and purple that symbolises the crepuscule anddeath.Youdonotexpressthebeginningnorfaith,likepinkoryellow,thatdenouncetheaurora,andred,thatstandsforpassion.Youdonotexpressnaivetynorcandidness,likeblue, nor contingency, like green and brown, with which nature colours many of itsmortalforms.”(fragmentofnarrativeFlordeestufa,1999).(Originaltext:“Ócoreternaeabsoluta!Vagaeindecisaemisteriosacomoodeusqueseescondepara ládos teusvéuscheiosde segredo!Tunãoexprimeso fimnemaqueda,comoonegro,querepresentaanoiteeopecado,eoroxo,quesimbolizaocrespúsculoe

60

(cor-de-)laranja‘orange’etymology <laranja‘orange(fruit)’←Hisp.Ar.naranǧa←Ar.nāranǧ←Pers.

nārang←Sanskr.nāraṅga1statt. 16thcenturyconcretemeanings

1.‘whichhasthecolourofthepeelofanorange,betweenintenseyellowandareddishhue’


-

Table6

Formally,twoadjectivesfor ‘orange’areusedinPortuguese.Thefirstoneis

descriptive:cor-de-laranja,literally‘colouroforange(fruit)’;thesecondone,simply

laranja,resultsfromanellipsisofthepreviousterm.Bothareinvariable.

Therearenofigurativemeaningsof‘orange’inPortuguese11.

(cor-de-)rosa‘pink’etymology <rosa‘rose’←Lat.rosa1statt. 16thcenturyconcretemeanings

1.‘verylightredcolour’


2.‘happy,positive,optimistic’-sonhoscor-de-rosa‘happydreams’-vertudocor-de-rosa‘tobeanoptimist’

Table7

amorte.Tunãoexprimesocomeçonemafé,comoorosaeoamarelo,quedenunciamaaurora, e o vermelho, que figura a paixão. Tu não exprimes a ingenuidade nem acandura, como o azul, nem a contingência, como o verde e o castanho, com que anaturezacoloremuitasdassuasformasmortais.”).ThissymbolicmeaningattributedtoroxoseemstobeexclusivelyliteraryandisprobablyrelatedtoChristiancommemorationsoffunerals,AdventandLent,duringwhichpurpleattireisdonned.LetusaddthatinBrazilianPortugueseroxocanalsomean‘desirous,anxious’,referringinformallytosomeone’slackofpatienceorevengreed.

11 Infact,wehavemanagedtofindthetermlaranjausedasanouninBrazilianPortuguesewith two metaphorical meanings: 1. ‘simple or naïve person’, 2. ‘person used as anintermediary in fraud and suspicious business’.We suppose the secondone is derivedfromthefirstmeaning,whichisprobablyrelatedtoorangeasafruit,notacolour.

61

Asinthecaseoforange,twoadjectivesfor‘pink’areinuseinPortuguese:a

descriptive one, cor-de-rosa, literally ‘colour of a rose’, and a shortened one,

resultingfromellipsis,rosa.Bothtermsareinvariable.

Theadjectiveinquestioncanappearinnamesofsomespecies,e.g.botocor-

de-rosa/botorosa‘pinkriverdolphin’(knowninBrazil)12.Itistobenotedthatits

concretemeaningproducedaderivativeverbwitha figurativemeaning:rosar (‘to

blushbecauseofbeingashamed’>)‘tobeashamed’.

Metaphorical usages of (cor-de-) rosa show its extremely positive

connotations,relatedtohappinessandoptimism13.

cinzento‘grey’etymology <cinza‘ash’←Lat.*cinīsia‘ashesmixedwithembers’1statt. 1506–1510concretemeanings

1.‘ofthecolourofash,anintermediatebetweenblackandwhite;mousy’


2.‘whichdoesnothaveenoughluminosity’-manhãcinzenta‘gloomymorning’,diacinzento‘cloudyday’3.‘whichdoesnothavebrightness,vivacityorinterest’-vidacinzenta‘boring,monotonouslife’,atmosferacinzenta‘uninterestingambience’,cidadecinzenta‘drearycity’,etc.

Table8

At first referring to the colourof ashes, this adjectivehas a clear relational

origin. As it has been demonstrated, its figurative meanings are rather negative

ones,denotinglackofluminosity,characterandinterest.

2.3.Spanish

Infact,theworksdevotedtothechromaticproblemsinSpanishcoveravery

broad spectrum, including: the work of rather general or theoretical nature (cf.

Michelena1972,CaboVillaverde2001),colourinplacenames(cf.RocaGarriga1954,

Dębowiak2013),colourinacertainperiod(Stala2011),chromaticdenominationsof

12 Butalso:botovermelhoorbotobranco,literally‘red’or‘whiteriverdolphin’.13 Therearealsometaphoricalexpressionswiththewordrosainthequalityofthenoun:de

rosas ‘overjoyed’;marde rosas ‘occasiononwhicheverythinggoeswell’;maréde rosas‘period inwhich everything happens just aswewish’. They have similar, very positiveconnotations.

62

humanraces(cf.Stephens1989).Finally,anumberofworksdedicatedtocolourin

literarywork,tociteafewexamples:Spanishballads(Kenyon1915),Spanishpoetry

(Rogers1964)ortheBible(AlegreHeitzman1979).

IntheanalysisofSpanishthefollowinghavebeentakenintoaccount:

• dictionaries of Contemporary Spanish: DRAE, 22nd edition on-line, that

provides the actualmeaning,Diccionario de uso del español (Moliner 1991)

andaphraseologicaldictionary(Varela&Kubarth1994);

• CorpusDiacrónicodelEspañol(CORDE)thatgivesfirstattestations;

• Corpusdereferenciadelespañolactual(CREA)thatoffersfrequencyoflexical

items;

• BDELCthatgivestheetymology.

Spanish presents curiosities also at a formal level: there is more than one

denomination of some of the secondary colours. That is, in addition to the

monolexematicgris ‘grey’,violeta (608314) appears togetherwithmorado (16726);

rosa(961)appearsmoreoftenthanrosado(11881).

violeta‘purple’etymology ←Fr.violette‘viola’<OFr.viole‘id.’←Lat.viola1statt. 1477–1491concretemeanings

1.‘lightvioletcolour,likeviolet’


2.‘superficial,ignorant’-eruditoalavioleta‘manwhoonlyhasasuperficialknowledgeofsciencesandarts’

Table9

morado‘purple’etymology <mora‘mulberry’←Lat.vg.mōra,Lat.mōrum1statt. 1407–1463concretemeanings

1.‘colourbetweencrimsonandblue’


2.‘unfortunate’-pasarlasmoradas‘tobeinadifficultorpainfulsituation’3.‘excessive,intense’-ponersemorado‘togorgeonfood;toenjoyfood,sexorsomeother

14 This isthenumberoftheplacewhichoccupiesacertainwordonthefrequencylistby

CREA(Listadodefrecuencias),althoughitcanbeduetoacoincidenceofmeaning:both‘colour’and‘flower’.

63

pleasurefully’Table10

First of all, the predominance of violeta as a chromatic term is clearly seen

althoughvioleta’s firstmeaning is thatofa flowerandnotacolour.Whilevioleta

originallycomesfromFrench,morado isaderivativeofthenameofthemulberry.

They have almost simultaneous attestations as a colour name: the 15th century.

Neither violeta normorado has awide usage except for the name of a plant or a

colour.Ifany,theyarerathernegative:theyrefertosomethingsuperficial,difficult

orexcessive.Morado isalsousedtonamesomevegetal species:berenjenamorada

‘sortofeggplant’,camburmorado‘musaparadisiaca,sortoffruit’oracertaincloth:

granamorada‘asortofclothofthatcolourwhichmakesitinferiortootherkindsof

cloth’.

rosado‘pink’

etymology ←Lat.rosātu-‘ofroses’<rosa‘rose’1statt. c.1250concretemeanings

1.‘speakingofcolours:asthatofroses’


-

Table11

rosa‘pink’etymology (?<colorderosa,whererosa‘rose’)←Lat.rosa1statt. 1493concretemeanings

1.‘redmixedwithwhite’


2.‘romanticandbanalatthesametime’-novelarosa‘varietyofnovelisticnarrative,theactionofwhichappearsinmoderntimesandpresentsveryconventionalcharactersandenvironmentsinwhichthevicissitudesoftwoloversarenarrated,whoselovetriumphsagainstallodds’

3.‘optimistic,good,cheerful’-pasardelrosaalamarillo‘tochangeone’smoodsuddenlyorunexpectedly’-verlotododecolorderosa‘tobeanoptimist’

Table12

Perhapsaprocessofellipsiswaspossibleinthecaseofrosa,yetaccordingto

dictionariesbothrosadoandrosaderivedirectlyorindirectlyfromLatin,although

themainmeaningofthelastoneisthatofflower:DRAEdocumentsthechromatic

meaning in its 12th position. Yet, only rosa has created some lateralmeanings in

64

associationwiththecolourandiswidespreadinSpanishasacolourname.Except

forsomeneutralextension(duetotherealcolour)likesalsarosa‘saucemadewith

mayonnaiseandketchup’), themainconnotation isverypositive:health,comfort,

optimism,romanticism.Thevisiblecontrastwithyellow(pasardelrosaalamarillo)

onlyunderlinesthepositiveaspectofthischromaticterm.

naranja‘orange’

etymology (?<colordenaranja,wherenaranja‘orange(fruit)’)←Hisp.Ar.naranǧa←Ar.nāranǧ←Pers.nārang←Sanskr.nāraṅga

1statt. 1622concretemeanings

1.‘yellowwitharedtint’


-

Table13

Although orange in Spanish has at least two denominations: naranja and

anaranjado, the second one clearly refers to the colour as such,which is scarcely

used,comparedtonaranja.At thesametime, it ismainlythenameofa fruitand

thatiswhyitschromaticmeaningisnotthefirstone.

Asthecolourterm,naranjaappearsrelativelylate:inthe17thcentury.Thatis

why,perhaps,therearenotmanyspecialusagesinSpanish15.

gris‘grey’etymology probably←Occit.gris‘id.’←OldLowFrankishgrîs1statt. 1150concretemeanings

1.‘colourthatusuallyresultsfrommixingwhiteandblack’


2.‘unattractive,mediocre’-personagris‘amediocreperson’3.‘overcast’-díagris‘grey,cloudyday’4.‘cold’-haceungris‘itiscold’

Table14 15 In fact, there are some expressions like piel de naranja ‘orange peel’, naranjas chinas

(interjection)ormedianaranja ‘somebody’s lifepartner’ (lit. ‘half orange’), yetnoneofthemrefertothecolour.

65

Gris has an early attestation and a discussed origin. The contemporary

analysisofphrasesinSpanishformedwithcolouradjectiveleadstotheconclusion

that grey is commonly associated with sadness and melancholy, intellectual or

emotional mediocrity, dull objects, worthless, without particular qualities. These

meaningsconfirmtheconnotativeapproachtoblackratherthanamixtureofblack

andwhite.

3.Observationsandconclusions

Fromanetymologicalpointofview,thenamesofthefouranalysedcolours

canbeclassifiedinthefollowinggroups:

1) with an ancient origin from protolanguage, today opaque (Pol. szary←

Occid.Proto-Sl.*šarъ;Port.roxo←Lat.rŭssĕu-);

2)with a concrete, relational origin, themotivation ofwhich is still visible

(Pol.różowy,pomarańczowy,Port.(cor-de-)laranja,(cor-de-)rosa,Sp.naranja,rosa,

toalesserextentalsoPort.cinzentoandSp.morado);inPortugueseandSpanishit

hasmorphologicalconsequences:(cor-de-)laranja,(cor-de-)rosa,naranjaandrosa

areinvariableadjectives;

3)ofaforeignorigin(Pol.fioletowy<fiolet[←Germ.Violett]←Fr.violette;

Sp.violetaofthesameorigin;Sp.gris←Occit.gris).

One could then expect that various connotations have developed mostly

around the names of colours from the first group, as they have existed in the

languageforalongtimeandtheyaremorphologicallyunanalysable.Consequently,

the connotations should be less represented around the terms which are most

recent.Albeit,ourstudyrevealsthattheageandtheorigin(native/borrowed)of

chromatictermsdonotconditiontheirculturalmeaningandfrequency.Ofallthe

fourcoloursconsidered,pinkandgreyare theonesthathavedevelopedthemost

figurativemeanings,evenifthenamesofgreyhavecompletelydistinctoriginsand

the names of pink appeared later on (if compared to the other adjectives) in all

languagesanalysed.

66

Besides the concrete values of the adjectives analysed,when they denote a

real colour of something, we observe a greater or lesser disappearance of the

primitivemeaningofcolour insomemetaphoricalusages: thentheadjectivedoes

notevokearealcolour,butismentionedwithextra-chromaticassociations.

Purple’smetaphoricalusages inPolishandPortuguesearemainlybasedon

the transposition of meaning from the effective colour of someone’s skin to the

emotion or state itself. Thus a range of possible usages is obtained, concentrated

around bad emotions (anger) and some anomalous physical states (heavy cold,

drunkenness).Spanish seemsnot toassociatepurplewith these situations,maybe

with the exception of excessive gluttony.However, it rather links it to superficial

wisdomanddifficulties.Thesearestillnotverypositiveconnotations.

Strangely enough, orange has practically not developed any figurative

meaningsinanyofthelanguagesconsidered.

Pink is generally related to strongpositive emotions in all these languages:

happiness,optimism,hope forprosperity.This is indisputably thecolourwith the

bestassociationsfromourgroup.Nevertheless,therearealsosomeconnotationsof

pinkthatourlanguagesdonotshare:thecommunistone–onlyinPolish,beinga

traceoftherecenthistoryofPoland;theeroticone–inPolishtoo,probablybecause

ofthesymbolismofredandpinkascoloursofpassionandlove;theromanticone–

inSpanish,inrelationtothesamesymbolism,butevokingbanalitytoo.

An undefined character of grey (somewhere between black andwhite, but

also between red and green) makes its linguistic image dubious, polyvalent (cf.

Bochnakowa 2010). It is frequently an indeterminate colour, which is reflected in

PolishandSpanish.Mediocrity, average character,nothing special – theseare the

connotationsofgrey.

Infact,therearetwopossiblelinesofinterpretation:

invisible>insignificant

lackofcolour

average>poor

Thefirstoneismoreliteralandisreferredmainlytoobjectslikeday,person,

character and the fossilised syntagma inPolish szaramysz ‘greymouse, someone

67

shy and self-effacing’. The second one is more metaphorical with reference to a

situation,personand,again, reflected inPolishasszarykoniec ‘greyend, thevery

end’witha ratherpejorative connotation.Finally,Polish sources alsodocumenta

negativeextension‘tocheatsomeone’.

All these observations support the hypothesis that, in Spanish, only two

coloursaretruemetaphoricalbases:blackandgreen(Tatoj2006).Inaddition,so-

called cold colours connotenegativephenomena,while thewarmorneutralones

arepositive(Szałek2005).Generally,“theperceptionofcoloursbynativespeakers

ofSpanishisnotnecessarilythesameastheexperienceofotherEuropeanpeoples,

althoughusuallynotsodissimilarfromEuropeanculturalparadigm”(Szałek2005:

89;Arcaini1993).SuchahypothesisseemstobevalidforPolishandPortugueseas

well.

Thepresenceofthenamesofcoloursinlanguageshowsustheimportanceof

thevisualsideofourperceptionoftheworld.Weassociatecolourswithemotions,

characteristicfeatures,ideas,notionsandpetrifytheminsomeexpressionsthatare

sometimes identic and sometimesdivergent in a given cultural-geographical area.

Still, Europe, at least seen through the prism of secondary colour terms, seems

ratherhomogenousandthereismoreunionthandisunionintheirperception.

Symbolsandabbreviations

<isaderivativeformof

←comesfrom

Ar.=Arabic

Fr.=French

Germ.=German

Hisp.=Hispanic

It.=Italian

Lat.=Latin

MHG=MiddleHighGerman

Occid.=Occidental

Occit.=Occitan

OFr.=OldFrench

OHG=OldHighGerman

Pers.=Persian

Pol.=Polish

Port.=Portuguese

Proto-Sl.=Proto-Slavic

Sanskr.=Sanskrit

Sp.=Spanish

68

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71

Pretoandnegro,pardo,mestiçoandmulatoEsperançaCardeira(UniversityofLisbon)*

The words that designate the darkest colour, negro and preto, which are

definedeitherintermsoftheabsenceoflightorthefusionofallcolours,havebeen

presentinthePortugueselanguagesincethethirteenthcentury.Indeed,itiseasyto

understand how a colour that absorbs rather than reflects beams of light has

becomeanobviousmetaphor forall that isdarkand sad,whereasbranco (white)

hasbecomethesymbolofhappinessandpurity.Whenweconsiderthelabellingof

skin colour,black also presents itself as a contrast towhite.However, due to the

heterogeneous nature of skin tone, the Portuguese language soon found itself

havingtosearchfornewlexiconinordertofillthegapsincolourterminology.In

thispaper, Iwill attempt to identify thewaysbywhich try thesenewwordshave

emergedfrompre-existingconcepts,usingonlinecorporatoanalysesuchmeanings

and in doing so, outline the semantic history ofpreto,negro,pardo,mestiço and

mulato.

1.Negroandpreto

TheLatinnounNĬGERhasbeenfounddocumentedinallRomancelanguages,

with the exception of Sardinian. As well as designating the colour Black,

metaphorical uses of the word also stretch back several centuries, either being

* The author wishes to thank Catherine Bremner for her assistance in proofreading.

72

assigned to ‘sadness, mourning’ or to ‘dark skin’. When referring to ‘dark skin’,

negrohasbeenfoundin15thcenturySpanishtexts(Corominas1991,s.v.negro);the

Frenchnègre16, Italiannegro,Englishnigger, andGermanneger (whichhave same

meaning)areallborrowingsfromtheSpanish.

The etymology of preto seems to bemore problematic. Corominas (1991, s.v.

apretar)suggestedafirstform*apetrar,fromlateLatinAPPĔCTŎRARE(<PĔCTUS).

Theunderstandingof‘brownskin’(Portuguesepreto,oldSpanishprieto17)maycome

fromtheideaof‘dense,thick’,asanequivalentto‘dark’.

Negroandpretohavebeenpresent in thePortuguese languagesince the 13th

century. As adjectives, both words designate something which is 'dark coloured’

(either as tangible entities or irrealia) and such usage may be observed in the

HistoriaTroyana(14thcentury)18:

mandoutragerdouscarneirosnegros(twoblacksheep),fl.14rb

etosollosavíangrandesepretos(blackeyes),fl.49vb

aswellasinmedievalsongbooks19

Permeusnegrospecados,tiveũucasteloforteedei-oaseudon[o](blacksins),B1592

/V1124.

Here,negroretainstheLatinconnotationof ‘gloomy,sinister’;thesamegoes

forpretoandthisisevidentinthedescriptionofjusticeinBooscoDeleitoso(thelate

14th, early 15th century)20.Once again, the black colour is related to pain and the

whitecolour(alva)topleasure:

16Nègreisdocumentedonthe16thcentury(LeTrésordelaLangueFrançaiseInformatisé,s.v.

nègre).17TheNebrija’dictionarygivesprietoasasynonymofnegro:“prietoaquellomesmoesque

negro”(Corominas(1991,s.v.apretar).18Ed.Pichel(2013).19 InDicionáriodedicionáriosdogalegomedieval -Corpus lexicográficomedievalda língua

galega.20InCorpusdoPortuguês.

73

[ajustiça]asuavistidurahededuascoloreshacolorpretademostraatribulaçõeha

door que ha justiça faz padecer aosmaãos. E a color alua demostra ho prazer e o

gualardõqueelladaaosboõs(justice’clothinghastwocolours:theblackcolourstands

forthepainthatthewickedwillsufferandthewhitecolourrepresentspleasure,which

istherewardforthevirtuous).

Contemporary dictionaries (I will use Infopedia, an online dictionary

commonlyusedas a referencedictionary for contemporaryEuropeanPortuguese)

keepbothmeanings.Here,negro,aswellaspreto(adj.),isdescribedassomething1.

defined by the absence of colour; 2. dark coloured; 3. dirty; 4. gloomy; 5. sad. 6.

mournful.Thedefinitionforpreto isalmostexactlythesame21duetothefactthat

negroandpretoareseenassynonyms.Asanoun,bothnegroandpretocanreferto

an individual who is dark skinned, but in this case, preto is considered to be

pejorative.

However, a diachronic analysis reveals an important difference: whilst as

adjectives, bothnegro andpreto apply, as early as the 13thCentury, to ‘something

dark’ or ‘sad’, as nouns and as ameans of labelling skin colour, thedictionaries22

onlyrecordnegrointhe15thCenturyandpretointhe18th.Nevertheless,anon-line

corpus23 survey shows that it is possible to find evidence of the adjective negro

referringtoskincolourorraceevenbeforethe15thcentury:

Casseosenhoracousaquiserdemãdarporsua&formouil&uiuaassycomeseruo

deuedizeronomedelseosouber&sehebarõ.oumolher.oumãçebo.ouuelho.ou

brãcoounegro (themaster should tell the servant'snameandwhetherhe ismaleor

female,youngorold,whiteorblack),TerceyraPartidadeAfonsoX,13th-14thcentury;

E,emsayndoelreydaclaustra,vyoviinrhuuclerigoqueeramuynegrodesuacolor.

El rey, por que o vyo assynegro, preguntoulhe por o nomede seu padre e elle lhe

dissequeavyanomeÇolleyma.(thekingsawaclergymanwhowasblack;hisfather’s

namewasÇolleima),CrónicaGeraldeEspanhade1344.

21InBrazilianportuguesepretoalsomeanssomething‘tricky’,‘hard’(Infopedia).22Machado1977;Cunha1986;Houaiss2001,s.v.negro,preto.23Corpusdoportuguês.

74

Interestingly,inthesetexts,itisalwaystheadjectivenegrowhichisusedwhen

referringtoskincolour,neverpreto.Weonlyfindthelatterusedwiththismeaning

inthe16thcentury:

Opayerapretoegentil-homemdebomcorpo,mayorqueodofilho.(thefatherwas

black),ChronicadosReisdeBisnaga.

AsurveyintheCorpusdoPortuguês(adatabaseofPortuguesetextsstretching

fromthe1300stothe1900s)revealsasignificantdifferencebetweentheoccurrences

ofpretoandnegro(forthecolouroftheskin):notonlyispretoalaterword,italso

appearslessfrequentlythannegro,particularlyafterthe18thcentury:

Fig.1:Thefrequencyofpretoandnegro(skincolour)inthetotalofformsreferringto

blackcolourintheCorpusdoPortuguês24.

Rafael Bluteau, one of the first lexicographers of Portuguese, defines both

preto25 and negro as synonymous in their designation of the colour black

(VocabulárioPortuguezeLatino,1712-28)26:

24 InCorpusdoPortuguêstherearereferencestopretoandnegrowithotheruses(suchas

toponymoranthroponym)thatwerenottakenintoaccountinthisdistribution.25 Preto isalso thenameofacoin,preciselybecauseof thecolour(therewerewhiteand

blackcoins):“Preto.AntigamoedadePortugal.QuandoElReyD.Duartemandoubater

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

XIV XV XVI XVII XVIII XIX XX

preto

negro

75

preto.Negro.Ater,atra,um.ouNiger,gra,grum.

negro.Cornegra,outintanegra.Hehudosdousestremosdascores,&heoppostoao

branco(blackcolororblackink,asopposedtowhite).

When referring to clothing, the colour black (negro or preto) appears in

associationwithpenitenceand,ingeneral,withsadnessandmourning:

AcornegraeraantigamentepropriadasvestesdosMonges(…)queprofessavãovida

penitente(…)Arazãofoi,porqueacorpretahemaispropriadahumildadedoestado

Monastico,&sesignificanellaatristeza;pelaqualrazãoseaccommodaaostumulos,

exequias,&representaçõesfunebres(inthepasttheclothingofthemonkswasblack

dueto itbeingsuitable forhumility;blacksignifiessadnessand issuitable for funeral

rites);

Negro.Infausto.Desgarciado.Dacornegra,queheamaisescuradetodas,tomamos

motivoparachamarmosnegroatodaacousaquenosenfada,molesta,&entristece,

comoquandodizemos,Negraventura,negravida,&c.(wecalleverythingthatmakes

ussad,black).

Bytheearly18thcentury,inBluteau’sdictionary,negroandpretohavealready

becomesynonymswhenidentifyingskincolour:

Negro.Homemdaterradosnegros,oufilhodepaysnegros.Pretotambemsechama

oescravoPreto.Servusniger.Pretinho.Negrinho.Pretinho,tambemvalomesmoque

pequenoescravo.Preto.Servulusniger(blackman,sonofblackparents,slave).

Itshouldbenotedthatthenegativeconnotationsthatlaterextendedtoskin

colour,andwhichwerealreadypresentinLatin,areregardedasamischance:

Quemnegronace.nũcaserabranco(thosebornblackwillneverbewhite), Jerónimo

Cardoso, Dictionarium latinolusitanicum & vice versa lusitanicolatinum cum

adagiorum,1570;

humamoeda, que chamáraõReaes brancos, parece quemandoubater outramoeda, aquechamouPretos“(Bluteau,VocabulárioPortuguezeLatino,1712-1728).

26 AllquotationsofancientdictionariesaretakenfromCorpusLexicográficodoPortuguês.

76

Aindaquenegros,gentesomos,&almatemos(weareblackbutwearepeopleandwe

haveasoul)Bluteau,VocabulárioPortuguezeLatino,1712-28.

Apparently,theblackskincolourwasconsideredapunishmentfromGod,and

in this instance,Bluteauoffersus somehypotheses (whichwerecirculatingat the

time)fortheoriginofblackskin:

AttribuemalgunsestacorpretaàforçadoSolnasterrasqueestespovoshabitão;mas

debaixodaZonaTorrida,ondeperpendicularmenteardeestePlaneta,hahomenstão

brancos, como na Europa (…) Para evitar os inconvenientes desta controversia, se

respondequeestanegridãodoscorposfoicastigodoCeo(somethinkthatthecoloris

causedbytheheatofthesunbutbelowthetorridzonetherearealsowhitemen;some

saythatthiscolourisapunishmentfromheaven).

As a result of Portuguese expansionoverseas, the figure of theAfrican slave

becameincreasinglyfrequentfromthemid-fifteenthcenturyonwards,mainlyasa

character in theatre.Forexample, inGarciadeResende’sCancioneiroGeral (1516),

andasdepictedinFernãodaSilveira’slyrics(44)27,weseethefigureofanAfrican

KingwhoispresentinordertocelebratetheweddingofPrinceFernando(1490):

AmimreidenegroestarSerraLioa,

lonjemuitoterraondevivernós,

lodarcaitbelatubaodeLixboa

falarmuaonovascasarperavós.

Quereramimlogover-voscomovai,

leixarmolhermeu,partirmuitosinha,

porquesemprenósservirvossopai,

folgarmuitonegro,estarvósrainha.

Aquestegentemeutaibo,terranossa

nuncafolgar,andarsempreguerra,

namsaberquiquebalharterravossa,

balharquesabercomonossaterra.

27 ThenumberingofthecompositionsistheoneintheeditionofDias(1990-93).

77

Selogovosquermandar,amimvenha

fazerquesaber,tomarqueachar,

mandarfazertaibolugar,Desmantenha!

Elogomeunegro,Senhora,balhar.28

InVida e Feitos d’el-reyDom João Segundo, Garcia deResendedescribes the

dance accompanying the song and from this, we learn that such ‘africans’ were

playedbymenpaintedinblack(“dozentoshomenstintosdenegromuitograndes

bayladores”)29.However,intheverseswrittenbyAnriquedaMota,whichpresentus

with a clergymanwho loses awinebarrel only to then accusehis slave (797), the

subjecthasalreadybecomeablackslave(negra):

(Falacomasuanegra).

—OoperradeManicongo,

tuentornasteestevinho!

Ũapostadetoucinho

t'hei-degastarnesselombo!

………………..

Osisoserácalar

peranambuscardesculpa.

Poisanegranamtemculpa,

peraquelhaquerodar?

……………….

anegraficaconvosco

comquevosconfortareis.

AfewyearslaterthetheatretextsbyGilVicentehaveseveralblackcharacters:

(VemumNegrocantandonalínguadesuaterra)

Negro:queindaquenegrosó 28 Teyssier gives a fairly complete analysis of this song (2005:276-8) and describes the

‘línguadepreto’(2005:275-305).29 Ed.Verdelho1994,p.334.

78

………………

Vénus:Cúyoeresnegrocoitado?

Negro:Amisánegrodecrivão

agorasávossocão

vossacravomurgurado.

Cativocomogalinha

quandobosoáguaquerê

logoamibaitrazê

emásofeixedelenha.

………………

Negro:Faze-mebrancorogo-tehomem(Fráguad’amor,1524);30

(VemumNegrodeBeniediz:)

.......................

Negroquefazefolia

.......................

Frade:EsteNegrochilramais

quesalmoneteemfigueira(Naod’amores,1527);

……………….

Clérigo:Setoparesláemfundo

umnegropõe-tearecado

porqueéumperromalvado

omaiorladrãodomundo.

…………….

Gonçalo:DizeNegroésdacorte?

Negro:Jáamiforronamsácatibo(ClérigodaBeira,1529-30).

GilVicentealwaysusedthewordnegro,neverpreto.Therefore,itappearsthat,

in theearly 16thcentury, the formerwas theonlyPortugueseword thatexisted to

denote black skin colour. However, Venus, a Spanish-speaking character from

Fráguad’amor,alsousedthewordprieto(“Vénus:PrietovienesdeCastilla?”).Due

tothefactthatmanywritersofPortugueseliteraturewerefrequentlyexposedtothe 30 All quotations ofGil Vicente´s plays are taken fromTeatro deAutores Portugueses do

séculoXVI.

79

Spanish language, it isplausible thatpreto,with themeaningof 'skincolor'wasa

Spanish loan. In any case, by the 17th century, preto was already in use with

reference to skin colour, aswe can see in the followingdescription inCrónica da

CompanhiadeJesus(SimãodeVasconcelos,1663)31.Inthistext,wealsocomeacross

anotherconcept,thatof‘miscegenation’:

…amulherbranca,debrancoparebranco,edenegromulato;sejaquente,oufriaa

disposiçaodoventre.Dondesetiramanifestamente,quenaoestásomentenoventre

a virtude do grau do frio, ou calor necessário; senao na virtude seminária, que

dependedeambososgenerantesporqueseambostêmvirtudefria,gerambranco;se

amboscálida,gerampreto:eseumfria,outrocálida,gerammulatodecorentremeia,

nemperfeitamentebranca,nempreta (whitewomanwithwhitemangeneratewhite

children;withblackmanmulatto,neitherwhitenorblack).

2.Pardo,mulatoandmestiço

Portuguese has an early word, pardo, meaning ‘dark’, that has been

documented since the 12th century: “unopoldro colorepardo” (Machado 1977, s.v.

pardo).Pardo was a fairly common form in the 15th-16th centuries and designated

anythingwithadarkhue32andinparticular,akindoffabric(“hũasopasvermellas

dobradasdepannopardo”,1414).33Asaresult,itquicklyadoptedthenewmeaning

of ‘dark skinorof indefined tonality’ and later, ‘mestizo,mulatto’. In fact,wecan

findpardousedasareferencetoskincolourasearlyasthe14th-15thcenturies,such

asinMiragresdeSantiago:34

31 InCorpusdoPortuguês.32 Pardowasalsousedasanamefortheleopard.AccordingtoCorominas(1991,s.v.pardo),

leoparduscouldhavebeenunderstoodasleo-pardus,thusparduswouldhavebeseenasanadjectivereferringtothedark-coloredpatchesthatdistinguishtheleopardfromthelion.Then,pardo came todesignate the colorofhorses andother animals, and finallyany dark object. A resemblance to pardal (sparrow, from Greek párdalos) may havecontributedtothissemanticevolution.However,Viaro2011:186)suggestedtheevolutionPALLIDUM>*paldo>pardo. In the 15th-16th centuriespardo (andpardilho)wasalsoakindofdarkandmixedfabric(Houaiss2001,s.v.pardo).

33 Maia(1986:104).34 InCorpusdoPortuguês.

80

Etdemaisainda tomoutodaa terra [...]que tinãosmouros,a terrados serranoset

dospardosetdoscastelãos.

Although isnot exactly clearwho thesepardoswere, thediary of Fernãode

Magalhães’,writtenintheearly16thcentury,presents‘genteparda’asasynonymfor

‘dark-skinnedpeople’:

tendo andado mays de mil leguas achou perto da linha duas ilhas não grandes

pouoadasdegentepardadecabello corrediogẽtios, saluagẽs,nus semuestidonem

polliciaalgũa35.

Around the same time, João de Barros’Décadas da Ásia (Década Segunda,

LivrosI-X,1553)36,showedthatbeingpardowasapparentlyareasonforcontempt:

DinisFernandesdeMelo, filhobastardodeGonçaloVazdeMelo,oqual,postoque

naquele tempo era pouco conhecido e estimado, por ser homem pardo nas cores

(Dinis Fernandes de Melo, bastard son of Gonçalo Vaz de Melo, was little valued

becauseofthecolourofhisskin)

InGilVicente’splays,thecharacterofMariaPardawouldprobablyhavebeen

dark-skinned,justlikethepardamujerinFráguadeAmor;bythattime,inAnrique

Lopes’ Cena Policiana/Auto do Estudante37, pardo and mulato had become

synonyms:

Teodósio:Quemcantaaosomd’almofaça?

Inofre:ÉomulatodeLicardo.

Teodósio:DaiaDeos,bemcantaopardo.

Mulato,fromLatinMŪLUS+ATTUS(thesuffixthatappliestoyounganimals)

is, inbothPortugueseandSpanish,thetermthatinitiallyreferredtotheoffspring 35 InCorpusdoPortuguês.36 InCorpusdoPortuguês.37 InTeatrodeAutoresPortuguesesdoséculoXVI.

81

producedthroughthebreedingofadonkeyandahorse.Corominas(1991s.v.mulo)

claimsthatthePortuguesewordmulatoisaloanfromSpanish,fromtheearly16th

century.Thewordtravelled,fromSpanishorfromPortuguese,toItalian(mulatto)38

and then to French (mulâtre)39 and English (mulatto).When referring to ´mule’,

mulato occurred in some of Gil Vicente’s plays, such as with a Spanish-speaking

characterJulião(TragicomédiadeDomDuardos):

Julião:…hadeheredar

unaburrayunpumar

yunmulatoyunmolino

andalsowithPortuguesespeakingcharacters(FarsadoClérigodaBeira)

Filho:…écousaperigosa

andardesàcaçaapé.

Clérigo:Sebeatoimmaculato

m’emprestasseoseumulato

masnamseisequererá.

Retainingthesamemeaning,thewordmulatoappearsinthefirstPortuguese

lexicography,writtenby JerónimoCardoso,who in the 16th century (Dictionarium

latinolusitanicum, 1570), translatesmulato with the word burdo: “mulato filho de

asnoedeegoa.Burdo,onis”(cubofadonkeyandamare).Inthefollowingcentury,

Barbosa (Dictionarium lusitanico latinum, 1611) stilldefinesmulato in termsof the

animal(“Mulatofilhodecavalo,easna.Burdo,onis”),asdoesBentoPereirainhis

Thesourodalinguaportugueza,1697(“Mulato,besta.Buido,onis”).

38MulattooccurredinItalianinatranslationbyRamusioofaPortuguesedocumentdated

1525;latter,in1580,Pigafettaalsousedthisword(Corominas1991s.v.mulo).39Mulâtre (mullatre, mulastre, mulate, mulat) is documented in French since the 16th

century,meaninga‘personbornfromtheunionofawhitewithablack’.ItisaloanfromPortuguese(LeTrésordelaLangueFrançaiseInformatisé,s.v.mulâtre).

82

In the 18th century, Bluteau´s Vocabulário also retains the same meaning:

“Mulato é a besta, o macho asneiro, filho de cavallo, & burra”. Bluteau even

highlightssomepopularproverbsconcerningthisanimal:

Caminholargo,oumula,oumulato(longwalk,muleormulatto);

O mulato sempre parece asno; quer na Cabeça, quer no rabo (the mulato always

appearstobeadonkey,beitwithhisheadorwithhistail).

Nevertheless,inthewritingsofCardoso,BentoPereira,andBluteau,theword

mulatocanalsobefoundappliedtoahumanbeing:

Hybrida(ae). Ho homem mulato (mullatto man), Cardoso, Dictionarium

latinolusitanicum,1570;

omulato,ou filhodenatural,&estrangeiro (sonof anativeanda foreigner),Bento

Pereira,Prosodiainvocabulariumbilingue,Latinum,etLusitanumdigesta,1697;

OfilhodepayEuropeo,&mãynegra,chama-seMulato(achildofaEuropeanfather

andblackmotherisamulatto)40,Bluteau,VocabulárioPortuguezeLatino,1712-28.

Bluteau demonstrates quite clearly the metaphorical twist on the original

meaning:

EstenomeMulatovemdeMú,oumulo,animalgèradodedousoutrosdedifferente

especie(theword‘mulato’comesfrom‘mulo’,ananimalgeneratedfromtwoanimals

ofdifferentspecies).

Therefore,eversincethe16thcentury,mulatohasnotsimplybeenrestrictedto

animals,buthasalsoreferredtoanindividualbornfromtwodifferentspecies,thus

combiningthenotionofmixingbothspeciesandcolours.

As for the word mestiço, traditionally it was employed in the Spanish and

Portuguese overseas dominions to indicate crossbreeding. From the late Latin

MĬXTĪCIUS,‘bornofamixedbreed’(<MIXTUS,p.p.MISCĔRE,‘tomix,tomerge’),

40According to Corominas (1991 s.v. mulo), in the 16th century mulato meant ‘son of

European andMoorish’ or ‘black and Indian’; itwas only in the 17th century that thiswordwasappliedto‘blackandwhite’.

83

documentedinSaintJerome(c. 347-420)andSaintIsidoreofSeville(c.560-636)41,

mestiçohasoccurredinPortuguesetextssincethe14thcentury.42JerónimoCardoso

(1570) andAgostinhoBarbosa (1611) translatedmestiçowith thewordsHybris,idis,

Ibrida,ae; the originalmeaningof 'mixed'was initially a reference to the result of

crossingspecies43asobservedinBentoPereira’Prosódia,1697:

Lycopantheros,Animalmestiçodelobo,&onça(crossbredofwolfandjaguar);

Leopardus,Leopardo,animalmistiçodepardo,&leoa(crossbredofleopardandlion).

Corominasobservedthatthemeaningof ‘darkskin’wasa loanfromSpanish

mestizo, first documented in 1600. Yet,Machado (1977, s.v.mestiço) claimed that

thiswordhadalreadybeeninuseina16thCenturyPortuguesetext:

HabitãmaisnaquellaprouinciadoMalabardousgenerosdemouros,huusnaturaes

daterraaqueelleschamãNayteasquesammestiços(Moorswhoaremestizos),João

deBarros,DécadasdaÁsia:DécadaPrimeira,LivroIX,1552.

Eitherway,Bluteau,inhisVocabulário(1712-28),alreadyidentifiesmestiçoasa

referencetoanytypeofanimal(rationalorirrational)thatresultsfromthecrossing

ofspecies:

mestíço. Diz-se dos animaes racionaes, & irracionaes. Animal mestiço. Nascido de

pay,&mãydedifferentesespecies,comomú,leopardo,&c.

Homemmestiço.Nascidodepaysdedifferentesnações.V.g.FilhodePortuguez,&

de India,oudepay Indio,&demãyPortugueza (rationalor irrationalanimalsborn

fromparentsofdifferentspecies;childofPortugueseandIndian).

41 Corominas1991s.v.mecer.42Machado1977;Cunha1986;Houaiss2001,s.v.mestiço.43 TheFrenchmétis(adj.)isdocumentedinthe13thcentury,inthesenseof‘mixed’,‘oflow

birth’, and in the 14th century, meaning ‘animal generated from two different species’(chienmestis);inthe17thmetice(adj.andn.)alreadymeans‘personbornofawhitemanwithanIndian’.Metice,mesticewerecommoninthe17-18thcenturiesandare,probably,anadaptationofthePortugueseortheSpanishword.AncientProvencalhadmestiz(adj.‘oflowbirth’,‘mixedblood’,‘bad’,‘vile’andn.,‘bastardoflowbirth’),fromtheearly12thcentury(LeTrésordelaLangueFrançaiseInformatisé,s.v.métis).

84

Bluteau’s Vocabulario de synonimos e phrases portuguezas (1728) adds a

pejorative dimension to this word, associating it with the concept of ‘fake,

adulterated’: “Mistiço, ou Mestiço. Bastardo. Adulterino. Illegitimo. Naõ castiço

(bastard,illegitimate).

3.Closingremarks

Although negro has always been the word of preference to designate non-

whiteskin(probablybecauseitcanencompassanyskinwhichisdark),bytheend

ofthe15thcenturythePortuguesefelttheneedtointroducenewlexicon.Asshown

infigure2,theonlywordinthe14thcenturythatwasusedtodesignateanon-white

skincolourwasnegro; in the followingcentury,pardobecameanavailableoption

fordarkskincolour;inthe16th,pretoemerges(asanalternativetonegro)butalso

themixedskincolours,mestiçoandmulato.44

Fig.2:Thefrequencyofpreto,negro,pardo,mestiçoandmulato(referringskincolor)

inCorpusdoPortuguês.

ThevarietyofcultureswithwhichthePortuguesecameintocontactinthe16th

centurymusthavestimulatedthisneedtospecifycolorsandbackgrounds.Hence,

aside from the terms preto/negro, branco, pardo,mulato andmestiço, therewere

44Allthesewordsarestillinuse,forskincolor(Infopedia).

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

XIV XV XVI XVII XVIII XIX XX

pardo

mes8ço

mulato

preto

negro

85

othernewerwords,suchascriouloandcaboclo,whichalsofoundthemselveslisted

inBluteau,1712-28:

O filhodepayEuropeo,&mãynegra, chama-seMulato (European fatherandblack

mother);

O filho de pay do Brasil, &mãy negra, chama-se Curiboca, ou Cabocles (Brazilian

fatherandblackmother);

Ofilhodepay,&mãy,negros,chama-seCrioulo(blackfatherandmother).

Itwasno longersufficient tosimplyrefer toa ‘mixtureofspecies’; rather, it

had become necessary to specify the exact type of mixture. This desire for

specificationwaspossiblyduetothefactthatnegrowasperceivedasanexcessively

broadterm.ThePortuguesealreadyknewthecolourblack(negro)andcoulduseit

toqualifyAfricanswithwhomtheyhadhadcontacteversincetheearlyperiodof

the Christian ‘Reconquista’. But from the 16th century onwards, when the

expansionistoverseasmovementresultedinnewinterculturalcontacts,skincolour

couldnolongerbereducedtoabinarycoloursystem:blackandwhite.Therefore,

theneedtogivenamestodifferentskintones,inparticularthe'mixed'skin,ledtoa

commonstrategyforextendingthelexicon:usingwordsthatalreadyexistedandto

whichknownrealitieshavebeenassigned,andgivethemnewmeanings,adaptedto

newrealities.Thisiswhatseemstohaveoccurredinthisparticularsemanticfield:

theparticularadjectivethatqualifiedacolorstartedbeingappliedtotheskincolor

ofanindividualand,later,namedtheindividualitself.

negro darkcolor,somber,sad(13th)

↓

skincolor(14th)→blackman(15th)

preto darkcolor,somber,sad(13th)

↓

skincolor(16th)→blackman(17th)

86

pardo darkcolor,(12th)

↓

mixedfabric,mixedskincolor(15th)→personofmixedrace,n.(16th)

mestiço mongrelanimal(14th)→personofmixedrace,adj.,n.(16th)

mulato mule(16th)→personofmixedrace,adj.,n.(16th)

The element which supports this extension of the meaning for negro and

preto,isindeedcolour.Ontheotherhand,thenewmeaningforpardo,mestiçoand

mulatowasnotonlybasedoncolourbutalsoontheveryconceptof intersection;

mixingmaterials,cross-breeding,andalsothecrossingofcolours.

Withregardtothenamingofskincolour,negroandpretoareclearlyopposed

tobranco;but,astheworld isnotsimply 'blackandwhite', thecolourof theskin

cannotbeexclusively reducedto these twocolours,especiallywith thenew inter-

culturalcontactsbroughtaboutwithbeginningofPortugueseoverseasexpansion.

Hencetheneedformorespecificwordssuchaspardo,mestiçoandmulato;words

that already existed but which had previously designated other realities. New

experiences arise from already existing concepts, and indeed, the same applies to

lexicon.Inessence,ifwegobacktotherootsofwordsandstudytheiretymological

chain,wemayreachsimplerformsandmore'primitive'concepts.

References

Corpus Lexicográfico do Português. Universidade de Aveiro-Centro de Linguística daUniversidadedeLisboa,http://clp.dlc.ua.pt/Corpus.aspx[04.12.2015].

Dicionáriodedicionáriosdogalegomedieval-Corpuslexicográficomedievaldalínguagalega.Instituto da LínguaGalega, [ErnestoGonzález Seoane (coord.),MaríaÁlvarez de laGranja e Ana Isabel Boullón Agrelo, 2006-2012], http://sli.uvigo.es/DDGM[06.12.2015].

Corominas, J. & J. Pascual (1991) [1980]. Diccionario Crítico Etimológico Castellano eHispánico.Madrid:Gredos.

Corpus do Português. [Mark Davies & Michael Ferreira (orgs.)],http://www.corpusdoportugues.org[02.12.2015].

Cunha,A.G. (19862) [1982].Dicionário EtimológicoNova Fronteira da Língua Portuguesa.RiodeJaneiro:NovaFronteira.

Dias, A. F. (1990-93).Cancioneiro Geral de Garcia de Resende (IV vols). Lisboa: ImprensaNacional-CasadaMoeda.

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Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa com Acordo Ortográfico. [Porto Editora, 2003-2015],http://www.infopedia.pt/dicionarios/lingua-portuguesa/[04.12.2015].

Houaiss,A.&MaurodeSallesVillar(2001).DicionárioHouaissdaLínguaPortuguesa.RiodeJaneiro:Objectiva.

Le Trésor de la Langue Française Informatisé. CNRS-Université de Lorraine,http://atilf.atilf.fr/[06.12.2015].

Machado, J. P. (19773) [1952]. Dicionário Etimológico da Língua Portuguesa. Lisboa:Horizonte.

Maia, Clarinda de Azevedo (1986). História do Galego-Português. Coimbra: InstitutoNacionaldeInvestigaçãoCientífica.

Pichel, R. (2013). A Historia Troiana (BMP ms.558). Edición e estudo histórico-filolóxico,TomoII.SantiagodeCompostela:USC-DepartamentodeFiloloxíaGalega.

TeatrodeAutoresPortuguesesdoséculoXV.[JoséCamões,HelenaR.Silva,IsabelPintoetal(orgs.).UniversidadedeLisboa-CentrodeEstudosdeTeatro,2010],http://www.cet-e-quinhentos.com[04.12.2015].

Teyssier,P.(2005).ALínguadeGilVicente.Lisboa:ImprensaNacional-CasadaMoeda.Verdelho,E.(1994).LivrodasObrasdeGarciadeResende.Lisboa:Gulbenkian.

89

II

Categorizationandlexicographicdescription

91

Colourfulmicrostructures:HowItaliandictionariesseecolourtermsCarlaMarello&CristinaOnesti(UniversityofTurin)

AColorstandsabroadOnSolitaryFields

ThatSciencecannotovertakeButHumanNaturefeels.

(EmilyDickinson)

1.Introduction

This paper aims to analyze how different Italian dictionaries (mainly digitalmonolingualdictionaries)dealwithcolour-relatedterms,inparticularasconcerns:

-theattributionofpartsofspeech;-thetreatmentofnewchromonymsandcompoundcolours.Theassociationofcolourwithfontsandmicrostructuredesignhasmassively

entered the world of digital dictionaries. As Dziemianko (2015) demonstrated inarecentpublication, thiskindof information ineverymicrostructure significantlyincreasesthespeedandeffectivenessofonlinedictionarysearches.

Thoughthisisanimportantaspectofcolouruseinlexicography,itisnottheprimarytopicofourresearch.Ourmainaimistoanalysehowdifferentdictionariesdealwith theattributionofmore thanonepartof speech,usually anounandanadjective, to the same headword, and whether they supply the necessarymorphosyntacticinformation.

At a methodological level, we worked with full text queries in digitaldictionaries andwith queries exploiting part of speech (POS) labels in annotatedcorpora(see§3).

92

2.ColoursinItaliandictionariesA complete analysis of dictionary definitions of colour terms is discussed in

Casati(1990),whodefendsanAristotelianparadigmofdefinition(colournamesareintroduced by pointing to objects of a specific colour) against the scientificparadigmusedbymostItaliandictionaries. Inhisopinion,thestateofconceptualconfusion in Italian lexicographyderived froma tendencywhich first appeared inTommaseo–Bellini(1861-1879)and,duetoitsauthoritativeinfluence,waspassedonin many subsequent works, whereas correct reference to a prototype wascharacteristicofourearlylexicographictradition(seeVocabolariodellaCrusca).The lack of homogeneous criteria is documented by the range of possibledefinitions,asoutlinedinthefollowingscheme:

-adefinitionstartingfromtypicalsubstance45,whichreferstoaprototype,asforexampleviola=ilcoloredellaviolamammola(Palazzi1986),‘thecolourofwoodviolet’

-adefinitionstarting fromthesauralassociationwith idiomaticexpressions(like rosso come il fuoco ‘red as fire’) which are vague and not always true orsufficient;

- a definition starting from the spectrum position in terms of wavelength(i.e.: “radiazionidi lunghezzad’ondacomprese tra7500e6540A”/ “chesta tra ilgialloeilblu”).

Consider that inourdigital era suchvariety isdecreasingbecause seriesofheadwordssharingthesamefeaturesaredealtwithusingthesamemicrostructuremodel.

Lookingat Italianpaperdictionaries,Marconi (1997:300-301)observed thatillustrationscouldbeaddedtocolourdefinitionstoclarify fineshadedistinctions;otherwise, in some cases they become almost unintelligible. For example, users’referentialcompetenceisnotreallysupportedbydefinitionslike:

magenta = [...] color porpora carico venutodimodadopo la battaglia diMagenta(1859),conriferimentoalcoloredeipantalonideglizuavifrancesi[Treccani1989]‘intensepurplecolour,whichbecamefashionableaftertheBattleofMagenta(1859),referringtothecolourofFrenchZouavetrousers’We can find the same definition in Zingarelli 1970 (magenta = [...] colore

cremisicarico,Eng. ‘intensecrimson’):acomparisonwith themost recentedition(Zingarelli2016)showsarevision,inanattempttoreferonlytobasiccolours,likerosso‘red’andvioletto‘violet’:

45 Some attention should also be devoted to websites where people post images they

associatewithfeelingsandcolours,becausenowadaysdefiningcoloursaccordingtothe“typicalsubstance”ofthatcolour,asCasati(1990)suggests,mightreservesomesurprisesandrevealshiftsintypicality.

93

magènta/ maˈdʒɛnta/[daMagenta,luogodellasanguinosabattaglia(1859),conallusionealsanguechevifusparso☼1872]agg.;anches.m.inv.●dicolorerossomoltointenso,tendentealvioletto

InZingarelli2008inthe internalpartofthecoverthepublisherprovidedanatlas of colours and indicated thenameof each colour and thepercentageof thefour-colourprocessforeachhue.

In the Merriam Webster online Learner’s Dictionary we find (seehttp://www.learnersdictionary.com/definition/magenta):

magenta/məˈʤɛntə/nounpluralmagentasLearner'sdefinitionofMAGENTA[count,noncount]:abright,deeppurplish-redcolor—seecolorpictureonthispagemagentaadjective

Clickingonthelink“thispage”wecanseeatableofcolourswheremagentais

placednearfuchsia:anundeniableadvantageofe-lexicographyonline.

3.Searchingforcolourterms (withoutgetting lost somewhereovertherainbow...)

Initially, our methodology worked with full text queries within digital

dictionaries, running the risk of also obtaining articleswhich contained exampleswhereacolouradjectiveismentionedasanyotheradjectivemightbe.Overallthemethodworkedwellandofferedmoreresultsthanasearchforthewordcolour inthefield“definition”oftheadvancedsearchmode.Thenweusedannotatedcorporaof Italian in order to verify the frequency and use of some particular cases:ItTenTen46andNUNC-It47corporawerethemainsources.

Grossmann(1988)alreadydealtwithmosttopicsweareinterestedinbecauseherresearchwas(also)basedonpaperdictionaries.Wewilldealwiththesepointsmainlythroughdigitalonlinedictionariessincetheyallowtheabovementioned“fulltext”searchmodewhichhelpstodiscoverunexpectedoccurrencesofcolourtermsinmicrostructuresaswell.Inanycase,wenoticedthatcolourtermmicrostructures 46 The Italian TenTen corpus (v. 1.0, 2010) is available in Sketch Engine

(https://www.sketchengine.co.uk/)with3.1billion tokens. It is taggedwithTreeTaggerusingMarcoBaroni’sparameterfile.

47 The NUNC suite of multilingual corpora (Newsgroups UseNet Corpora) is based onnewsgroups’language:itwasimplementedatTurinUniversitybytheresearchgroupledbyCarlaMarelloandManuelBarberaand is freely searchableatwww.corpora.unito.it.TheItaliansubsetofdataNUNC-Ithas237.401.299tokens.

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havenotundergonemajorrestylingsinceGrossmann’sstudy,soitcanbesaidthatmostofwhatsheobservedremainstrue.

Apreliminarynoteisrelatedtowhatwecannotfindwhensearchingcolore:insomecases,dictionaryglosseshave theplural formcoloriorwords like riflesso (=glare, reflection); for example, the entry posterizzàre ‘to posterize’ whosedefinitioncontainscoloriinthepluralinZingarelli2016.

WeexaminedwhetherItaliandictionariesalwaystreateverycolourorcolourcategorythesameway.

Basicallywefacedifferentlevelsoflexicalisationofcolourterms,asoutlinedinthefollowingexamplifications:

(1) verde‘green’(2) verde scuro ‘dark green’: the term is followedby a characterization givenby

anotheradjective;verdolino-verdino‘lightgreen’,allowedbytherichpaletteofItaliansuffixesofendearment

(3) verde smeraldo / verde bottiglia ‘emerald green’ / ‘bottle green’: the term isfollowedbyacharacterizationgivenbyaninvariablenoun48

(4) verdeoro ‘green and gold’ (in particular when referring to Brazilian sportteams):thetermiscomposedbytwojuxtaposedcolourtermswhosemeaningsremaindistinct49

(5) verd(e)azzurro ‘bluish green’: the term is composed of two colour terms,indicatinganewcolourbetweenthetwo

(6) smeraldo/sabbia‘emerald’/‘sand’

In the following discussion we will analyse some aspects of their linguistic(andlexicographic)behaviour.

Predictably, moving towards the last classes, which represent the lesslexicalised types, the likelihood of finding definitions and examples such as “(di)color(e) + X” ‘ of colour X, X-coloured’ before the colour term itself (a situationpotentiallyoccurringalsofortype(1))grows:e.g.unamagliettacoloralbicocca ‘anapricot-colouredt-shirt’ismorecommonthanunamagliettaalbicocca’anapricott-shirt’bothincorporaandindictionaries.

48Colourtermsaresometimeshapax,intendedtocreateabrilliantstyleandthereforethey

arenotrecordedindictionaries(Sergio2010:248);type(3)termsinparticulararemorelikely to be occasional neologisms. An Italian research paper focusing on children’scategorization of colours has shown that colour vocabulary enrichment in earlychildhood ismainlyduetocompoundexpressionsmadeupofabasiccolour+anounwhich is generally related to real objects, e.g.: giallo formaggio ‘yellow [like] cheese’;rosso guancia ‘red [like a] cheek’;blu grembiule ‘blue [like a] smock’ (Mecacci/Serafini1987:82).

49The difference between type (4) and type (5) is clearly illustrated byD’Achille/Grossmann (2013), distinguishing respectively additive and intersectiverelations.

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4.Partofspeechattribution

As concerns the categorization of word classes, we aremainly dealing withadjectives.Grossmannalreadyargued(1988:35)thatthesetermsexpressqualitiesorfeatures of people, objects, and ideas which can also be named by nouns (colorsabbia),compounds(verdebottiglia/fumodiLondra),elementsderivedfromverbs(verdeggiante it. adj coming from present participle of verb verdeggiare ‘to beverdant’),actingasanADJfromasyntacticandsemanticperspective.

However, we can note that some forms are more or less adjectival. Aprototypical ADJ is formally defined by a series of properties; for example, +/-agreementwith its head is an interesting aspect tobe considered in our analysis.Thetermshereconsideredcanbevariableorinvariablelexemes.

Giventhenormalnumberandgenderagreementofcolourtermsofwhatwecalled type (1) (pantaloni bianchi ‘white trousers’; penne rosse ‘red pens’), let usconsidertype(2):

(1) lagonnagiallachiara/legonnegiallechiare/gliabitigiallichiari(2) *lagonnagiallachiaro/legonnegiallechiaro/gliabitigiallichiaro(3) lagonnagiallochiaro/legonnegiallochiaro/gliabitigiallochiaro

• ad(1)la[[gonna][[giallo]&[chiaro]].Bothchiaro‘light’andgiallo‘yellow’are

adjectivesandmodifygonna‘skirt’.• ad (3) la [[gonna] [[giallo] chiaro]], i.e. chiaro (adjective) modifies giallo

(noun)andgiallo chiaromodifiesgonna.Giallo ismeantascoloregiallo andgiallo chiaro is invariable, being an attributeofcolore ( thoughcolore isnotexpressed).

Italian behaves differently from Russian, another language rich inmorphological agreement markers, where we have to deal with compoundadjectives:

• светло-желтая юбка - светло-желтая← composed by светл(ая) (light) +желтая (yellow) ; linking morpheme 'o'; светло-желтая (It. giallo chiaro)agreesinnumbergenderandcasewiththenounheadofthenominalphrase.

Movingtowardsthelesslexicalisedcases,wecanobservedifferentbehavioursfortypes(3),(4),(5)and(6):

(4) Lecalzeverdebottiglia/*verdibottiglia/*verdebottiglie/*verdibottiglie‘bottlegreensocks’

(5) Lecalzeverdeoro/?verdioro/*verdeori/*verdiori‘greenandgoldsocks’(6) Le calze verdeazzurro / ?verdiazzurro / ?verdeazzurre / ?verdiazzurre50 ‘bluish green

socks’(7) Lecalzesmeraldo/*smeralde‘emeraldsocks’

50 This last form (verdiazzurre) would be easily accepted in the case of, e.g., socks with

stripesofbothgreenandblue,which isacasebelonging to type (4)withanaddictiverelation.

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Generally dictionaries do not devote enough attention to these cases ofagreement.

5.Nounsturningintocolourattributes

Let us now consider those colour termswhich come from natural elements(e.g.avorio,theItaliancorrespondentofivory),orparticularstones(e.g.coral,jade,ruby),mineralsandmetals(e.g.bronze,copper),fruitandvegetables(e.g.apricot,eggplant), food (e.g. cream,mustard), fauna (e.g. lobster, salmon)or flowers (e.g.cyclamen,lilac),andareusedfordenominatingtheirtypicalcolour.

Thornton(2004)considerssuchcolourterms,whichareveryfrequentinthefield of textiles and fashion, under the process of NOUN → ADJ conversion.However,sheremarkedthattheydonotbehave likeadjectives intraditional tests(number/genderagreement,comparative,superlative,adverbialuse,antepositioninfrontofN),unlikemostbasiccolours:

(a) i.unamagliarosa/fucsia/salmone/albicocca/panna duemaglierosa/fucsia/salmone/albicocca/panna duemaglie*rose/*fucsie/*salmoni/*albicocche/*panne vsunamagliarossa/nera,duemaglierosse/nere ii.unmaglionerosa/fucsia/albicocca/panna, unamagliasalmone unmaglione*roso/*fucsio/*albicocco/*panno unamaglia*salmona vsunmaglionerosso/nero,unamagliarossa/nera(b) i.lamiamagliaèpiùrosa/?salmone/?albicocca/?pannadellatua ii.lamiamagliaè*rosissima/*salmonissima/*albicocchissima/ *pannissima vslamiamagliaènerissima/rossissima(c) *rosamente/*albicoccamentevestito butalso:*rossamente/*neramentevestito(d) la?rosa/*fucsia/*salmone/*pannamaglia vslenerechiome,lebianchevesti,iverdipascoli

Thornton(2004:530)

Consequently,thiscategoryofmodifiersseemstohave,onthewhole,a“nullgrade of adjectivality” and it should be classified as nouns modifying nouns,accordingtoThornton.

This leads to the problematic decisions lexicographers need to take: howshouldtheattributionofmorethanonepartofspeechtothesameheadwordtobemanagedandhowshouldthenecessarymorphosyntacticinformationbeprovided.

Wecantakeintoconsiderationthosenounsenteredasrecentchromonymsinourdictionaries,beginningwiththetermsabbia‘sand’,usedinexpressionslike“ungolfinocolorsabbia”.

Most cases in the ItTenTencorpuspresent the formcolor sabbia (with somevariantsbutthesamestructure:tonalitàsabbia):(8) Trerusticiditufodalcoloresabbiachiarochericordalaterradeideserti

‘Threesandcolouredtuffcottages’

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(9) Ifruttisonoachenicolorsabbia,espessovengonoscambiatipersemi.‘Thefruitaresandcolouredachene,andoftenaremistakenforseeds’

(10) giocanosull’accostamentodellatonalitàsabbiaedelbeige‘theyplaywiththecombinationofshadesofsandandbeige’

However,someexamplesaredocumentedwheresabbiaisnotprecededby“colour”:(11) moquettesabbiaeselleriainpellebeigeconcopricapote

‘sandcarpetingandbeigeleatherupholsteringwithslipcovers’

(12) Questa farina si ottiene in primo luogo essiccando le castagne, [...]macinandole[...]cosìdaridurleinfarinafinissima.Questasipresentaconuncaratteristicocoloravoriodallepossibilisfumaturesabbia.‘Theflourisobtainedbydryingthechestnutsfirst,[...]grindingthem[...]intoaveryfineflour.Thisshouldbe ivorycolourandmaybetintedwithvariousshadesofsand.’

ThiskindofinformationisactuallyincludedinZingarelli2016(Breferstothe

possibleroleofinvariableadjective),butitisprovidedwithabadexample:

♦ sàbbia/ ˈsabbja/[lat.săbula,nt.pl.disăbulum‘sabbia’,prob.diorig.indeur.☼1440]As.f.[...]Binfunzionediagg.inv.●(pospostoaunsost.)chehailcoloretrailbeigeeilgrigiochiarocaratteristicodellasostanzaomonima:ungolfinocolorsabbia

The singular form un golfino color sabbia cannot really illustrate the

invariabilityoftheform–whereascorporadataclearlyshowthatalsopluralwords(likecappottiin13.)arefollowedbythesingularsabbia:(13) cappottisabbiadaimprenditoreconsaniprincipi.(LaStampaModa)

‘Sandcolouredcoatstypicalofbusinessmenwithsoundprinciples’Seealsothecaseofardesia,‘slate’.UndertheheadwordardesiainZingarelli

2016wefindthefollowingdefinitionsandexamples:

ardèsia/ arˈdɛzja/[fr.ardoise,dietim.incerta☼1741]As.f.1rocciascistosaargillosafacilmentedivisibileinlastresottilidicoloregrigiooverdastro;èusataperlacoperturaditetti,perlavagneecc.2coloregrigiobluastrocaratteristicodellasostanzaomonima:cielod'ardesiaBinfunzionediagg.inv.●(pospostoalsost.)nellaloc.grigioardesia,dettodelletonalitàdigrigiotendentealblu,tipicadell'omonimominerale:abito,tessutogrigioardesia

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TheexamplesgiveninB.donotbelongtotheuseoftheadj.ardesiabuttothemultiwordgrigioardesia.ThisisnotsurprisingbecauseeveninlargemoderndigitalcorporaofItalianwecannotfindmanyexampleswhereardesiaisalone,asatotallylexicalisedcolourterm:(14) lacupoladellenuvolediardesia(NUNC-It) ‘thedomeofslate(grey)clouds’(15) cielitemporaleschidiardesiainunmiscugliodisguardiimpigliatiebrivididell'aria

(NUNC-It) ‘stormyskiesofslateinamixofentwinedexpressionsandshiversofair’(16) Ilcieloprendevaunatintadiardesia(ItTenTen) ‘Theskybecamethecolourofslate’

Contexts (14-16)showtheprepositionalphrasediardesia;we foundonlyonecontextinascientificdescriptionwherethecolourtermaloneisanadjective:(17) nelCanarinobiancooardesiaildatohaunautilitàbenmaggiore(ItTenTen)(18) ‘forwhiteorslate-greycanarythedatumismuchmoreuseful’

Most terms of this type are classified as invariable adjectives; for instance,cachiorkaki ‘khaki’andalbicocca ‘apricot’ inZingarelli2016,butnoexamplesareprovided.

This is not valid for melanzana ‘eggplant’ (which is a colour term inGrossmann’s list), described as a NOUN (s.f.) with the meaning ofplant/vegetable/etc.,butwithnomentionofthecorrespondingcolourinZingarelli,NuovoDeMauroorSabatini-Coletti.Devoto-Oli2011registerstheadjectivaluseinfashionjargonbutgivestheexample:accessoricolormelanzana,‘eggplant–colouredaccessories’wheremelanzanaactuallyisusedasanappositionofcolor.Underthedefinitionofprugna‘plum’theNuovoDeMauroonlinedistinguishesboththenounandtheinvariableadjective:

prù|gnas.f.,s.m.inv.,agg.inv.av.1320;lat.tardoprūnĭa(m),der.diprunus“susino”.AD1.s.f.,susina:marmellatadiprugne2.s.m.inv.,colorerossoviolaceosimileaquelloditalefrutto|agg.inv.,ditalecolore:cappottoprugna

Zingarelli 2016 gives two examples:una borsa color prugna ‘a plum-coloured

bag’;unvestitoprugna‘aplumdress’.Onlythesecondoneisatrueexampleoftheadjectivaluse.

Asconcernstype(3)ofourclassification, itneedstobedeterminedwhethercaseslikegiallozafferano‘saffronyellow’areindependentlexicographicalentriesorwhether these shades are specified among the co-occurrence strings of a lemma,andinparticular,ofabasiccolour.

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InGRADITwe find thephraseologywithin themicrostructure insteadof anindependentheadword-seee.g.undergiallo:

4. s.m., il coloredel limoneodell'oro:unmaglionediunbelgiallo, quest'annovadimoda il giallo | seguito da un sostantivo che indica una cosa o un animale di talecolore che individua la tonalità: giallo limone, giallo oro, giallo canarino, giallozafferano; anche seguito da un aggettivo o da un altro colore: giallo carico, vivace,intenso, allegro, tenue, delicato; giallo arancio, giallo verde |TS fis. colore primariocompresonell'iridetral'aranciatoeilverdeInZingarelli2016,ontheotherhand, the independentcolourtermzafferano

‘saffron’ is lemmatizedwithout any reference togiallo ‘yellow’ (withno recordingundertheheadwordgiallo):

zafferàno/ *dzaffeˈrano/[dall'araboza‘farān‘croco’☼1303]As.m.[...]Binfunzionediagg.inv.●(pospostoaunsost.)dettodicoloregiallointenso:vestitozafferano|gabbianozafferano,piccologabbianodalvivaceeintensocoloregiallocheviveagruppisullecostenord-europee(Larusfuscus)

Studies such as Fresu (2006) and D’Achille (2014) might help Italian

lexicographers toreviseandenlarge thephraseologicalpartof themicrostructure.Fresu (2006)51 inparticular tries toverifyhownewchromonyms relate toexistingtermsofcolours.

Notethatlookingforcolore ine-dictionariesusingthefulltextsearchmodeproduces a list of lemmaswith theword in the etymology, butwith very specificmeanings:

enrosadìra/ enrozaˈdira/[ladinodolomiticoenrosadöraerosadüra,propr.‘ilfarsidicolorerosa’,darösa‘(colordi)rosa’☼1924]s.f.●lagradualecolorazionerosachesfumaversoilviola,cheleparetidolomiticheassumonoaltramonto

Fulltextqueriesforcoloreidentifyverbsrelatedtocoloursaswell,suchasthe

rarearrubinàre ‘tobecomeruby-coloured’, thestillusedazzurreggiàre ‘tobecome,tobeblue-coloured’,imporporare‘tobecomepurple-coloured’.

51Fresu(2006)remarksthatinItaliannero,bianco,rossoarevery“productive”andstable.

Morerecentcolourslikearancioneorviolahavenot(yet)developedtheirmetaphoricaldomain.

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The dictionary definition of imporporare does not contain the figurativemeaningwhichisattestedinsomecorpusdata,connectedtohighchurchpositions:Fresu(2006:78)considersita“highgradeofsemanticspecialization”(ilporporato=cardinal), actually recorded under the lemma porpora ‘purple’, for example inZingarelli2016:

pórpora/ ˈporpora/[vc.Dotta,lat.Pŭrpura(m),dalgr.Porphýra,dietim.Incerta☼av.1250]s.f.1sostanzacoloranterossausatadagliantichi,secretadaghiandoledeltegumentodigasteropodimarinidelgenerePurpuraeMurex2colorevermiglio:cielodiporpora|essere,diventare,farsidiporpora,(fig.)arrossireviolentemente3drappo,tessutotintoconlaporpora|(est.)vesterealizzatacontaletessuto:laporporaregia,prelatizia|(est.)ladignitàeiltitolodicardinale:aspirareallaporpora;essereinnalzatoallaporpora|indossarelaporpora,essereelettocardinale4(med.)macularosso-violaceadellapelledovutaaunapiccolaemorragia:porporaemorragica|porporaretinica,rodopsinaInItTenTenwefindonly5casesoutof206occurrences(+1caseinNUNC)in

whichthewordimporporatoreferstocardinalsas,forinstance,in:(19) farcitadallapresenzadiautoritàgraduateeimporporate

‘filled by the presence ofmilitary [lit. graduated] and ecclesiastic [lit. cardinal red]authorities’

5.Compoundterms

SpecialattentionisdevotedinItaliantocompoundcolourtermsrelatedtothefieldofsport,footballinparticular.

Teams, players, supporters and related lemmas are frequently denominatedwith termsdesignatingcoloursof teamkits52: a simpleword likegranataor viola;more often compounds, like bianconero, rossonero, nerazzurro, biancoceleste,rosanero,giallorosso,53etc.

SimilarItalianadjectivesagreeinnumberandgenderwithnouns(lasquadranerazzurra; i campionibianconeri/rossoneri; l’allenatorebianconero),whereas, forexample,Catalanblaugrana (=of/orrelatingtothe football teamFCBarcelona) isinvariable.

A special case mentioned by D’Achille (2014) is represented by rosanero(referredtoPalermo’splayers),recordedalso-andmostly-asinvariable:irosanero.

52 See the very detailed analysis proposed by D’Achille (2014) and his bibliographical

references.53 The mentioned examples refer respectively to the football teams Torino, Fiorentina,

Juventus,Milan,Inter,Lazio,PalermoandRoma.

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Among the examples presented by D’Achille such colour terms have a nominalvalue.However, their use as adjectives is highly frequent: actually, they probablyemerged as adjectives - see the ellipsis process suggested by Nascimbeni54 andmentionedinD’Achille(2014:117,footnote38): igiocatori inmagliaviola→ iviola‘theplayerswithviolett-shirt→theviolets’,whichletsuspresumeanintermediatestep:igiocatoriviola‘thevioletplayers’.

GRADIThasconsideredviolaasanoun,withthemeaningof‘supporteroftheFiorentinateam’,alsousedasaninvariableadjective.Ontheotherhand,itrecordedthecompoundgiallorossoasanadjectivealsousedasanoun.

InZingarelli2016wefindbothcategorizations:aninvariableadjective(‘thatisplaying on the football team Fiorentina or is a supporter of the team’) and aninvariablenoun(‘personplayingonthe football teamFiorentinaorasupporteroftheteam’):

♦viòla(1)/ viˈɔla/[...]Binfunzionediagg.inv.[...]2chegiocanellasquadradicalciodellaFiorentinaoneèsostenitoreCs.m.inv.(anchef.nelsign.2)[...]2chigiocanellasquadradicalciodellaFiorentinaoneèsostenitore

6.Closingremarks:colourfulmicrostructuresmightbebetter

Colourtermsarepresentlystudiedbylinguistsbecausetheyaredeeplytiedtoemotionsandvisualexperiences.Inthepastcenturytheyweremainlyinvestigatedbecausetheyshowedahighdegreeoflanguage(andculture)specificity,inspiteofthefactthathumanbeingssharethesameorganofsight.

Italianlinguistshavewrittenmanyinterestingpapersandbooksaboutcolourterms, both from a diachronic perspective and from a morphosyntactic point ofview.

Theknowledgegatheredaboutthefirstwrittenoccurrenceofacolourtermisnow fairly represented in dictionaries because almost all monolingual Italiandictionariesgivethedateofthefirstappearanceofaword.Lexicologicalstudieson“new” colours are facilitated by large corpora, including newspapers and fashionmagazines. We mentioned specialised studies such as the one by D’Achille 2014aboutbicolorcompoundsinfootballpressreports.

Fromoursurvey,itappearsthatmonolingualdictionariesareratherquickinhostingnew(sub)entriesfornewcolours,allthemoresowhenthenewcolourisasemanticneologism, likeapricot,meaning ‘apricot-coloured’addedasanadjective

54 Nascimbeni,G.(1992-1993).“Lalinguadelcalcio”.InLudus.Sport&Loisir.I,3-4.26-31.

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to apricot fruit noun. They often do not give examples for such adjectival usewithoutthecompanyofthewordcolor.ItshouldbeimportanttostressthatapricotcanbeanADJofcolourinitsownright,withoutcolorinfrontofapricot.

Dictionaries are slower in registering morphosyntactic features of colourterms coupledwith chiaro ‘light shade’ or scuro ‘dark, deep shade’; yet,we knowthat languages vary in theway they showagreementbetween the adjective shadeandthecolournoun/adjwiththeheadofthenounphrase.

If dictionaries registermany shades of basic colours, they do not follow thesamemicrostructureschemainthewholedictionaryforallthearticlesdevotedtocolour terms. The Zingarelli dictionary (2016) is probably the only Italian deskdictionarywhichhasmassively applied the following formula to colour adjectivesderivingfromanoun:

Infunzionediagg.inv(pospostoalsost)(‘Usedasanadj.itisinvariableandfollowsthenoun’)

IntheZingarellidictionary2016outof395entriescontainingthisformula,83arecolourterms.Aqueryonthewebshowsthattheinvariabilityoftheseadjective+nouncouplets,asforinstancegialloocra,verdebottiglia,rossofuoco,isnotalwaysobservedintheuseofthenativespeaking/writingcommunity.Ifdictionariesplayakey role in defining themorphology of difficult verbs and unusual plural, in thesameway,theyshouldnotethatnotonlythesecondmemberisinvariablebutthatalsothecolouradjective“becomes”invariablebecauseitismeantasanattributeofellipticalcolore :occhiverdi (literallyeyes pluralgreenplural)butocchiverdebottiglia(literally ‘eyespluralgreensingularbottlesingular)andnot*occhiverdibottiglia(literally‘eyespluralgreenpluralbottlesingular).

In the French monolingual lexicographic landscape, we find that Le PetitRobert2013moreaccuratelyregistersthedifferencebetweenwhatiscalledAPPOS.INV.i.e.appositioninvariable,incasessuchasbleu,grisardoise‘slateblue,grey’orvert bouteille and what is labelled ADJT INV. “adjectivement invariable” i.e.invariableadjectivaluseofawordwhichusuallyisnotanadjectiveincasessuchasabricot, aubergine, ivoire, prune, sable (‘apricot, eggplant, ivory, plum, sand’) andregisters thedistinctionwhenbothbehavioursarepossible, as forsafran:APPOS.INV.Jaunesafran‘saffronyellow’-ADJTINV.“Lesoirsafranquisurlesquaisdéteint”Aragon‘Thesaffroneveningwhichdiscoloursontheriverwalks’.

In theSpanishmonolingual lexicography, theauthoritativeDiccionariode laReal Academia Española registers two adjectival uses of azafrán: no. 4 is theapposition;no.5.istheinvariableadjectivaluse,butitsbeinginvariableissignalledonlythroughtheexample,wheretúnicasisplural55.Albaricoque‘apricot’andmarfil‘ivory’ are dealt in the sameway: the invariable use of the adjectives is conveyed 55 DRAE online http://dle.rae.es sub voce azafrán […] 4. adj. Dicho de un color: Rojo

anaranjadosemejantealquesesacadelestigmadelazafrán.U.t.c.s.m.5.adj.Decolorazafrán.Túnicasazafrán.U.t.c.s.m.istheshorteningofusadotambiéncomosustantivomasculino andmeans thatazafrán can also be used alone as a nounmeaning ‘saffroncolour’withoutbeingaccompaniedbythewordcolor.

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through plural nouns sedas albaricoque ‘apricot silks’, sábanas marfil ‘ivorysavannahs’56.

This small sample of comparison with dictionaries of two other Romancelanguages shows that there is not just one way to deal with this type ofmorphological behaviour, though the French Le Robert approach appears moreconsistent. The English language, with its invariable adjectives and with theprenominal position of nouns used as adjectives, handles this lexicographic issuemoreeasily.

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Mecacci, L.; Serafini, A. (1987). “Sviluppo del lessico dei colori” Rassegna italiana dilinguisticaapplicataXIX,n.2.77-90.

Sergio,G.(2010).Paroledimoda.IlCorrieredelleDameeillessicodellamodanell’Ottocento.Milano:FrancoAngeli.

Thornton,A.M.(2004).“Conversioneinsostantivi”.InGrossmann,M.;RainerF.(eds.),Laformazionedelleparoleinitaliano.Tübingen:Niemeyer.505-26.

www.corpora.unito.it[Lastaccess:24January.2016]https://www.sketchengine.co.uk/[Lastaccess:24January.2016] 56 Berenjena ‘eggplant’, ciruela ‘plum’, pizarra ‘slate’ do not register a color meaning in

DRAE.

104

DictionariesDeMauro, T. (2000). IlNuovo dizionario della lingua italianaDeMauro. Torino: Paravia.

Nowavailableon-lineathttp://dizionario.internazionale.it/ [Lastaccess:24 January.2016]

Devoto-Oli = Devoto, G.; Oli, G.C. (2011). Il Vocabolario della lingua italiana. Editors:Serianni,L.;Trifone,M.Firenze:LeMonnier.

DRAE =Diccionario de la Real Academia Española. (2014) [23.ª edición]. http://dle.rae.es[Lastaccess:24January.2016]

GRADIT=DeMauro,T. (1999). IlGrandedizionario italianodell’uso.6vol. (supplementi:vol.VIINuoveparoleitalianedell’uso,2003evol.VIIINuoveparoleitalianedell’uso2,2007),Torino:UTET.

LePetitRobert(2013)=LePetitRobertDictionnairealphabétiqueetanalogiquedelalanguefrançaise,Paris,LeRobert,nouvelleéditionmillésime2013

Palazzi,F.(1986).Nuovissimodizionariodellalinguaitaliana.Torino:Loescher.Palazzi,F.;Folena,G.(1992).DizionariodellaLinguaItaliana.Torino:Loescher.Sabatini-Coletti=Sabatini,F.;Coletti,V. (2008). IlSabatiniColettiDizionariodella lingua

italiana.Firenze:Giunti. http://dizionari.corriere.it/dizionario_italiano/ [Last access:24January.2016]

Tommaseo, N.; Bellini, B. (eds.) (1865-79). Dizionario della lingua italiana, nuovamentecompilato dai signori Nicolò Tommaseo e Cav. Professor Bernardo Bellini con oltre100000giunteaiprecedentidizionariiraccoltedaNicolòTommaseo,Gius.Campi,Gius.Meini, Pietro Fanfani e da molti altri distinti filologi e scienziati, corredato di undiscorso preliminare dello stesso Tommaseo. Torino: Società l’Unione tipografico-editricetorinese.

Treccani 1989 = Duro, A. (dir.) (1986-1991).Vocabolario della lingua italiana. 4 voll. in 5tomi.Roma:Treccani.

Zingarelli,N. (1970).Vocabolario della lingua italiana [X edizione]. Editors:Dogliotti,M.;Rosiello,L.;Valesio,P.Bologna:Zanichelli.

Zingarelli,N.(2016).LoZingarelli2016.Vocabolariodella lingua italiana[on-linerestrictedaccess]. Editors: Cannella, M.; Lazzarini, B. Bologna: Zanichelli.http://ubidictionary.zanichelli.it/dizionariOnline/#zingarelli[Lastaccess:24January.2016]

105

OnthegrammaticalsubstanceofcolourwordsAlinaVillalva(UniversityofLisbon)

Portuguese colourwords - those that refer a colour and those that refer the

colour of something or someone - surface either as nouns or as adjectives. These

colour words are lexically ambiguous with regard to their grammatical category.

Syntaxmaydisambiguatethem(andifoftendoes),butthatdisambiguationdoesn’t

provide enough information to understand the relationship that holds between

colournounsandcolouradjectives.

In this paper, I will explore different avenues (i.e. etymology, semantics,

grammaticalpropertiesandcontemporaryusage)todiscussthefollowingissues:

• Fromalexicalpointofview,arecolournounsandcolouradjectivesonesoleentityortwodifferentitems?

• Ifcolournounsandcolouradjectivesdifferent,howdotheydiffer?Whichofthemcomesfirst?Howistheotheroneobtained?

• Iftheyareoneonlylexicalitem,howcanitsdifferentoutputsbegenerated?• Dodiachronicandsynchronicanalysesconvergeordiverge?

Thewords under considerationwill beamarelo ‘yellow’,azul ‘ blue’, laranja

‘orange’,verde‘green’andvermelho‘red’.Iwillpresentabriefdescriptiononcolour

words gender and number variation, within the general picture for gender and

numbervariationinPortuguese.ThisdescriptionwilljustifywhyIwilljustconsider

non-femininesingularcolournouns.Inthesecondsection,Iwillshowtheresultsof

acolourwordqueryontwoPortuguesetextualdatabases.Theyindicatethatcolour

adjectivesaremoresalientthancolournouns,butnorthestatisticsnortherecord

of early usage make significant contributions to the discussion of the above-

106

mentioned questions. The following section offers a survey of colour words in a

contemporary and some early dictionaries, that, again, is unable to providemore

definitivehints.

Giventheaccumulationofinconclusiveobservations,Idecidedtotakealook

atcompoundcolourwords.Thesecompoundshaveahybridnatureduetothefact

thattheyarewordsbuiltuponaphrasalsequence.Colouradjectivecompoundsare

particularlyinteresting.Infact,theyoriginateinanounphrase,whichmeansthat

theyareobtainedbyconversion.Butnotstraightforward-thescrutinyofusagedata

willallowustoconcludethat,irrespectiveofthegenderandnumbervaluesoftheir

syntacticantecedent,mostof thesecolourcompoundadjectiveswillbemasculine

and singular, just like simple colour nouns. Based on this, Iwill claim that these

compound adjectives are generated by conversion of a compound colour noun,

whichisproducedbyconversionofanounphraseheadedbyasimplecolournoun.

Thesamekindofreasoningwillthenbeappliedtosimplecolourwords.

1.Genderandnumbervariation

Portugueseadjectivesandnounshaveaquitesimilarmorphologicalbehaviour

as far as gender and number variation are concerned; yet they are not exactly

identical(seeVillalva2008fordetails).

Portuguese nounsmust have a gender value (eithermasculine, feminine or

underspecified). When they refer animate entities, the gender value largely

correspondstothemale/femaledistinction(cf.1a),buttherearesomemismatches,

suchasunderspecifiednouns(cf.1b),masculinenounsthatreferfemalebeings(cf.

1c)andfemininenounsthatreferbothgenders,aswellastheopposite(cf.1d).Asto

thegenderofinanimatenouns,itisfullyunmotivated(cf.1e):

(1) a. alunomasc ‘malepupil’ alunafem ‘femalepupil’ b. (um/uma)estudantemasc/fem ‘(amale/afemale)student’ c. mulherãomasc ‘kindofwoman’ d. testemunhafem ‘(male/female)witness’ cônjuguemasc ‘(male/female)spouse’ e. sofámasc ‘couch’ poltronafem ‘armchair’

107

All nouns do require a gender value, but only a subset is prone to gender

variation.Infact,variationisrestrictedtoanimatenouns,althoughitadmitsmany

different realizations (cf. 2a). Furthermore, it is not compulsory, not evenwithin

thissubgroupofnouns,soalargenumberofanimatenounsareinvariable(cf.2b):

(2) a. alunomasc/alunafem ‘malepupil’/‘femalepupil’ doutormasc/doutorafem ‘maledoctor’/‘femaledoctor’ estudantemasc/estudantefem ‘malestudent’/‘femalestudent’ galomasc/galinhafem ‘rooster’/’hen’ profetamasc/profetisafem ‘maleprophet’/’femaleprophet’ [águiafem-machomasc]fem ‘maleeagle’ [crocodilomasc-fêmeafem]masc ‘femalecrocodile’ homemmasc/mulherfem ‘man’/‘woman’ soldadomasc/fem ‘(male/female)soldier’ b. criançafem ‘child’ indivíduomasc ‘individual’

Colournouns,whichareinanimatenouns,arequitesystematicwrttogender.

In fact, although they spread for different thematic classes, their value is

systematicallymasculine57:

(3) -o amarelomasc vermelhomasc -a laranjamasc -e verdemasc -Ø azulmasc

Astoadjectives,generallyspeaking,theymayeitherbevariableorinvariable

for gender, a capacity that is lexically determined, usually for diachronic reasons,

anditisalsorelatedtotheirthematicafilliation:

(4) a. secomasc ‘Xmascdry’ secafem ‘Xfemdry’ b. levemasc/fem ‘Xmasc/Xfemlight’

57Thecaseof laranja isparticularly revealing, since it corresponds toa conversionof the

nameofafruit,whichisfeminine(i.e.alaranja‘theorange’).

108

Colour adjectives accommodate quite easily to this state of affairs, which

meansthat thesetcorresponding(3)getsabitmorecrowded,onceweaddthose

formsthatcanonlybeadjectives(whicharemarkedingrey):

(5) -o amarelo vermelho -a amarela vermelha laranja -e verde -Ø azul

Number variation is customary for both nouns and adjectives, and it is

systematicallyobtainedbyaddingthesuffix-s.Therearesomemorphophonological

processes operating on -Ø stems, especially when they have a final lateral

consonant.Theyaretriggeredbytheneedtofulfilthethematicindexpositionfor

phoneticreasons,relatedtotheresultingsequenceofconsonants:

(6) a. mar‘sea’ mar+sàmares‘seas’ anel‘ring’ anel+sàanéis‘rings’ b. capaz‘capableXsing’ capaz+sàcapazes‘capableXpl’ normal‘normalXsing’ normal+sànormais‘normalXpl’

Some nouns (e.g. lápis ‘pencil’, in (7a)) and some adjectives (e.g. simples

‘simple’,in(7b))areambiguousregardingtonumber,duetothefactthattheirroot

endswithafricativeconsonant.Consequently,inthesecases,theadjunctionofthe

pluralsuffix,althoughoccurring,yieldsnovisibleresult:

(7) a. tenhoaquiumlápisbemafiado‘Ihaveawellsharpedpencilhere’ tenhoaquiunslápisbemafiados-cf.lápis+s=lápis b. estemotorémuitosimples‘thisengineisverysimple’ estesmotoressãomuitosimples-cf.simples+s=simples

Amajor restriction fornumber inflectionconcernsmassnounssuchaságua

‘water’.Usually,thiskindofnounscanonlyoccurinthesingularform,eventhough

apluralformisfullyavailable(cf.8a).Arguably,massnounsthatmayoccurinthe

pluralform(cf.águas)arenolongermassnouns(cf.8b):

109

(8) a. velhice‘oldage’vs.?velhices b. Traga-meduaságuascomgás‘bringmetwo(bottlesof)sparklingwaters’ Aságuassulfurosassãoterapêuticas‘sulphurwatersaretherapeutic’

Being intrinsically mass nouns, colour nouns resist pluralisation, and when

theyallowit,pluralformsrefertodifferentsortsofthecolourthatthenounrefers,

usuallyhuesorshadesofthatcolour:

(9) Overmelhoéumacorquente‘redisahotcolour’ Nestequadro,osvermelhos(=tonsdevermelho)predominam‘inthispainting, reds(=huesofred)arepredominant’

Thus,Portuguesecolourwordscaneitherbeinanimatemasculinemassnouns,

if singular, or count nouns if plural, or adjectives that can be gender variable or

invariable.Theyhaveaquitestraightforwardlexicalbehaviour,sincetheysplitover

allthematicclassesandtheyinflectfornumberasallothernounsandadjectives:

(10)

MASCULINENOUNS ADJECTIVES

SINGULAR(MASSNOUNS)

PLURAL(COUNTNOUNS)

SINGULAR PLURAL

-o amarelo

vermelhoamarelosvermelhos

amarelomvermelhom

amarelosm

vermelhosm-a

laranja

laranjas

amarelafvermelhaflaranjam/f

amarelasfvermelhasflaranjasm/f

-e verde verdes verdem/f verdesm/f-Ø azul azuis azulm/f azuism/f

Apart from the feminine form of gender variable adjectives (i.e. amarela(s),

vermelha(s)),allcolourwordsarelexicallyambiguouswrttosyntacticcategory.This

iswhyweneedtotakealookatcolourwordsincontext.

2.ColourwordsinPortuguesecontemporaryandinearlyusage

In this section I will consider the real usage of Portuguese colour words. A

search of colour nouns (tagged CN) on the Corpus de Referência do Português

Contemporâneo(=CRPC)yieldsasetofhitssimilartothefollowing:

(11) azul_CN,vermelho_CNeamarelo_CNvãodominarsinaléticadaExpo-98 ‘blue,redandyellowwilldominateExpo-98’slabelling’

110

This set of results had to be manually filtered, since they included a large

numberofcasesthatcan’tbetreatedascolournouns.Feminineandpluralforms,

forinstance,wheresystematicallyexcluded,since,asithasbeenestablishedinthe

previoussection,theyarenotcolournames.Thisisclearlythecaseinthefollowing

circumstance: politics and sportsmake a very extensive usage of colourwords to

identifyorganizationsandtheirmembers.Thesehits(oftenusedintheplural)were

excludedbecausetheydon’trefertoacolour:

(12) Verdes-Denominaçãodeumcuriosopartidopolíticoquetemporhábito[…]aliar-seaosvermelhos

‘Greens–Nameofacuriouspoliticalpartythatusuallymakesallianceswiththereds’

Secondly, thequery line ‘colourname_CN’ (e.g.verde_CN)broughthits thatshould have been tagged as adjectives. They occur as nounsmerely superficially,duetoanellipsisoftheantecedent:

(13) foi uma chuva de […] cartões: ao todo, nove [cartões] amarelos_CN e um [cartão]

vermelho_CN‘itwasarainshowerof[…]cards:nineyellow[cards]andared[card],intotal’

umaoutra[cerâmica]vermelha_CNegrosseira‘anotherredandrough[china]’ devia estar a pensar nos [sacos] vermelhos_CN ‘[he] was probably thinking of red

[bags]’

Aparticularcaseofwrongtagginginvolvesthesequencebué,whichisaloan

ofAfricanorigin,nowadaysoftenusedbyyoungerspeakers.InInfopediaitislisted

asanadverb;inCRPCitisoftentaggedasanoun,butitalsogetsanadjectivetag

andevenother,moreexotic,optionsdoshowup.InPortuguese,buéismostlyused

asanadverb(aproxyofmuito‘very’)anditisoftenaccompaniedbydeorda,which,

atfirstsight,looklikeprepositions(withthecontractionofadefinitearticleinthe

secondcase).Eventually,buédeorbuédamaybeanalysedasadjectivalquantifiers,

whichmeansthatvermelhos,inthefollowingexample,iswronglytaggedasanoun:

(14) ogajoestásemprejanado,meu,osolhosbuédavermelhos_CN ‘theguyisalwayshigh,dude,hiseyesareveryred’

Thus,afterfiltering,thenumberofsingularcolournounsisroughlyasin(15).

Noticethat,apart from laranja -whichclearlyseemstobe far less frequent, these

figureslookquitebalanced:

111

(15) NOUNS amarelo azul laranja verde vermelho TOTALSINGULAR 1.031 1.584 3 1.426 1.534 5.578

Asforadjectives58,nofilteringwasapplied,althoughtheywerenotalltested

fortheirsemantics.Figuresin(16)showthattheylargelyoutnumbertheirnominal

counterparts, and that singular forms are always more frequent, as well as

masculine, if both gender forms are available.Laranja is again the least frequent

case,butthedistancetotheotherislessimpressive:

(16) ADJECTIVES amarelo azul laranja verde vermelho TOTAL

SINGULARMASCULINE 2.156

4.271 3.486 7.3392.932

24.147FEMININE 2.018 1.945

PLURALMASCULINE 1.172

2.113 2 4.4071.507

10.431FEMININE 409 824

TOTAL 5.755 6.384 3.488 11.746 7.208 34.581

So,apparently,colouradjectivesarefarmoresalientforspeakersthancolour

nouns,butdoes this saliencehaveanybearing in thequestions thatwere initially

raised?Itdoesn’tseemtobethecase.Themeaningofthisnumbers,ifany,remains

unclear and the observation of colourwords in syntactic contexts surely helps to

disambiguatetheirspecificuses,butitdoesn’tmakeanysignificantcontributionto

thediscussionoftheissuesinitiallystated.

Regarding early usage, the output of a search on the Corpus do Português

(=CdP)producesasetofquitesimilar results:amarelo,azul,verdeandvermelho59

are well documented since the late 14th century or the early 15th. Apparently,

58InPortuguese,allcolouradjectivesoccurinapost-nominalposition.Prenominalposition

isclearlyunacceptable(cf.saiaazulvs*azulsaia).59Laranjawasnotscrutinized,sincemosthitsconcernthefruit,notthecolour.Probably,

theearlycolournamehadaderivativeform,laranjado(cf.camatambemdeverdeeouromuito rica e de boa emuenção forrada delaranjado – CdP:Mosteiro de Guadalupe ePortugal,16thcentury);oralaranjado(cf.capalombardadecetimalaranjado–CdP:JoãodeBarros(1553)DécadasdaÁsia.Décadasegunda.Asacolourname,laranjaisprobablythe outcome of an ellipsis from the expression cor (de) laranja and a subsequentconversionthatentailsagenderchange.Laranja, the fruit, isa femininenoun; laranja,thecolourname,isamasculinenoun.

112

adjectivesareagainmorecommonlyusedthannouns,butitisimpossibletodraw

anyconclusionfromthatfact.

NOUNS ADJECTIVES

aspenasrosadascõcolloramareloesplandecenteCdP:OrtodoEsposo(<1438)

caeuenterraamareloettodobanadoensangeCdP:CronicaTroyana(1388)

tabernaculomuynobremëteobradoaouroeazulCdP:CrónicaGeraldeEspanhade1344

seisCapazdeveludoazulCdP:CrónicadeD.Fernando(1431-1443)

DondelhevemoverdenafolhadeforaeobrancodedentroCdP:JoãodeLucena(1600)HistoriadavidadoPadreS.FranciscoXavier

deitarõnoenhûahervaverdeCdP:CrónicadeD.Fernando(1431-1443)

nopeytotraziahumsynaldevermelhomaisluzentequeasestrelasCdP:CronicadePortugal(1419)

hûûboybrancoeoutrovermelhoCdP:CrónicaGeraldeEspanhade1344

3.ColourwordsinPortuguesedictionaries

ThesalienceofcolouradjectivesfoundinCRPCparallelswhatcanbefoundin

Portuguese contemporary dictionaries, although this is not explicitly stated.

Infopedia,anonlinereferencedictionaryforcontemporaryPortuguese,forinstance,

treatsazul,laranja,verdeandvermelho,firstly,asadjectives,andthenasnouns(cf.

17);amareloispresentedtheotherwayround(cf.18).Noclarificationisofferedwrt

therelationshipbetweenadjectiveandnounineachcase:

(17) azuladjetivode2géneros1.dacordocéusemnuvens;cerúleonomemasculino1.cordoarco-írissemelhanteàdocéusemnuvens2.qualquergradaçãodestacor

vermelhoadjetivo1.dacordosanguenomemasculino1.cordosangue

laranjaadjetivoinvariávelqueédacorcaracterísticadestefrutonomemasculinocorresultantedaadiçãodevermelhoeamarelo

verdeadjetivode2géneros1.dacordaerva;dacorresultantedamisturadoazulcomoamarelonomemasculino1.umadascoresdoarco-íris,situadaentreoamareloeoazul

113

(18) amarelo nomemasculino 1.corque,noespetrosolar,sesituaentreoverdeeolaranja,semelhanteàcordolimão

maduro,dagemadoovooudoouro adjetivo 1.quetemacordolimão,dagemadoovooudoouro

Is there any grounded reason to present thesewords differently?Under the

influenceofthehaphazardsemanticdescriptionoftheseentries(whicheithermake

reference to the ‘solar spectrum’ or to the ‘rainbow’, or to metaphors such as

‘lemon’, ‘yolk’, ‘gold’, ‘cloudlesssky’, ‘grass’and ‘blood’andobviously ‘orange’,and

eventoprocesses,likethe‘mixofblueandyellow’orthe‘sumofredandyellow’),

wemightconcludethatwordclassispresentedrandomly.Althoughnojustification

isgiven,wemightpresumethattheorderofpresentationisrelatedtotheancestry

ofthecolourwordsinthePortugueselexicon.However,etymologydoesn’tseemto

beofmuchhelp either.According toCoromines,amarillo (anobvious cognateof

amarelo) has probably originated in the Hispanic Latin adjective AMARELLUS, a

diminutiveoftheadjectiveAMARUS;andbermejo(theSpanishcognateofvermelho)

originatedintheLatindiminutivenounVERMICULUS.So,anetymologicalapproach

wouldjustifyexactlytheoppositeresult-nottheoutputthatisinfactpresentedby

Infopedia.

Alookupofaselectionofearlydictionariesmayhelptoshedsomelight.In

Cardoso(1559),amareloisclearlyregisteredasanadjective(cf.amarelacousa),but

theotherthree(i.e.azul,verde,vermelho)arenot,althoughtheyaretranslatedinto

Latinadjectives.Thereisnomentiontolaranjaasacolourwordinthisdictionary.

Barbosa(1611)hasamoresystematicapproach:allthesecolourwordsarepresented

as colournames, although theyareadjectives trapped inside theexpressioncorX

‘colourX’(cf.coramarela,corazul,cor laranjada,corverde,corvermelha);but, in

thisdictionary, eachentry, except for laranja, isdominatedby theadjectival item

(cf.amarelacousa,azulcousa,verdecousa,vermelhacousa),againastranslationsof

Latincolouradjectives.Pereira(1647)resumesCardoso’s lesson,butheaddssome

more Latin equivalents. Bluteau (1712-28), who first presents colours as nouns,

114

suppliesaconsiderableamountof informationonhowtheymaybeobtained,and

used (laranja is again differently treated, appearing as a ‘caste’ of ‘red’, but still a

colour name, i.e. cor de […] laranja). Then, in some cases, Bluteau alsomakes a

registerofcolouradjectives,butthisisquitenon-systematicallyachieved.Folqman

(1755) resumes the pre-Bluteau tradition that favours colour adjectives, either by

showing that they are gender variable forms (cf. amarello, a; vermelho, a) or by

explicitlystatingthewordclass,forthefirsttimeinthissetofearlydictionaries(cf.

azul,adj;verde,adj).Thereisnoroomforlaranjainthisdictionary.

Moraes(1789)triesadifferentsolution,sinceheconveystwoseparateentries

forsomeofthesecolourwords:anounentryandanadjectiveentryareavailablefor

azul and verde, butamarelo and vermelho are just entitled to the adjective entry.

Laranja,asusual,isnotacolourword,butthederivedadjectivelaranjadore-entries

in the word list. Finally, Figueiredo (1899) concentrates all the information in a

single entry: azul, verde and vermelho are presented as adjectives and then, as

nouns;amareloismerelyconsideredasanadjectiveandlaranjaisabsent.

Despite the interest that a thorough analysis of all this lexicographic

information60mayhaveforthestudyofcolourwords,thefactisthattheydon’tadd

muchintermsofcategorization.Nosystematicandcoherentpictureemergesfrom

thesurveyofearlyorcontemporarydictionaries.

60EarlydictionaryconsideredinthispaperareavailableatCLP.

Car

doso

1559

Amarelacousa.Pallidus(a.um).

Azul.Caeruleus(a.um).

Verde.viridis(e).

Vermelho.Ruber(a.ũ).rubicũdus.

Bar

bosa

1611

Amarelacousa.Pallidus,a,ums.v.corCoramarela.Colorpallidus.

Azulcousa.Caeruleus,a,eum.s.v.corCorazul.Caeruleuscolor.[...]aliàscordoceo,oucorceleste.

s.v.corCorlaranjada.Luteuscolor.

Verdecousa.Viridiss.v.corCorverde.Colorviridis,colorherbeus

Vermelhacousa.Ruber,rubra,rubrum.s.vcorCorvermelha.Colorruber

115

4.Compoundcolourwords

Since focusingoncolourwordsbythemselvesseemstoreachnosatisfactory

answers,thefocuswillnowbeputoncompoundcolourwords,sincetheyprovide

interesting insights to the understanding of the word class of their colour

constituents.

Per

eira

1647

Amarellacousa.Pallidus,a,um.Luteus,a,um

Azul.Caeruleus,a,um.Thalastinus,a,ü.

Verdecousa.Viridis,&de.Glaucus,a,um.

Vermelhacousa.Ruber,bra,brum.Rubiumdus,a,um.

Blu

teau

1712-28

amarello.Corentrebranco,&vermelho

azùl.DerivasedoArabicoZul,quesegundoalgüs,valomesmo,queemLatimCaeruleus.[...]Cousaazul.Caeruleus,a,um.

s.v.vermelho[...]trescastasdevermelho[...]Asegunda,quetemsuapartedeamarello,comoacordefogo,&adeLaranjas.v.Pintarroxoacordagarganta[...]nãohevermelha,masalaranjada

verde.Acor,queanaturezadààshervas,arvores,&c.

vermelho.Cor.Vermelho.Cousadecorvermelha.Ruber,bra,brum

Folqman

1755

amarello,a,Flavus,a,um.[...]

azul,adj.Coeruleus

verde,adj.Viridis

vermelho,a,Ruber,bra,brum.

Mor

aes

1789

amaréllo,adj.Dacòrdagemmadeovo,doouro[...]

azúl,s.m.Tintaazulazúl,adj.Còrdamassaextrahidadoanil

laranjádo,adj.Decòrdelaranja.

vèrde,s.m.Humadascoresprincipaesvèrde,adj.Dacòrdoverde

vermèlho,adj.Còrdorostocoradocomvergonha

Figu

eire

do

1899

amareloadj.Quetemacordooiro,dagemadeovo,[...]

azuladj.QuetemumadascoresdoespectrosolarM.Acorazul.

verdeadj.Queédacorordináriadaervaedasfolhasdasárvores.M.Acorverde.

vermelhoadj.Muitoencarnado;rubro.M.Acorvermelha.

116

The following lists include all the compounds (formed upon the five colour

wordsinitiallyestablished)thatoccurinBluteau(cf.19),inInfopedia(cf.20)andin

CRPC(cf.21).

(19)amarellogualdeamarellotostadoazulcelesteazulferreteazulturqui

azulultramarinoverdeazuladoverdebexigaverdecrèverdedesmayado

verdelirioverdemarverdemontanhaverdenegroverdeterra

(20)amarelo-claroamarelo-canárioamarelo-escuroamarelo-pálidoamarelo-topázioamarelo-torradoazulcelesteazul-bebéazul-claro

azul-cobaltoazul-escuroazul-ferreteazul-marinhoazul-pavãoazul-turquesaazul-violetaverdealfaceverdecré

verde-águaverde-amareladoverde-azeitonaverde-claroverde-escuroverde-esmeraldaverde-gaioverde-garrafaverde-limão

verde-marverde-musgoverde-negroverde-velhovermelhoescurovermelho-amareladovermelho-púrpuravermelho-tijolovermelho-vivo

(21)amarelo-açafrãoamarelo-acastanhadoamarelo-águaamarelo-alaranjadoamarelo-avermelhadoamarelo-baçoamarelo-bananaamarelo-canárioamarelo-castanhoamarelo-ceraamarelo-cháamarelo-claroamarelo-de-ovoamarelo-desbotadoamarelo-doceamarelo-douradoamarelo-encarniçadoamarelo-escuroamarelo-esverdeadoamarelo-ferrugemamarelo-forteamarelo-fosforescenteamarelo-gemaamarelo-impérioamarelo-incandescente

azul-céuazul-cinzaazul-cinzentoazul-clarinhoazul-claroazul-cobaltoazul-cobreazul-de-metilenoazul-do-céuazul-eléctricoazul-esbranquiçadoazul-escuroazul-esverdeadoazul-faíscaazul-ferreteazul-forteazul-geloazul-gangaazul-glaucoazul-índigoazul-lisoazul-marinheiroazul-marinhoazul-metálicoazul-miosótisazul-negroazul-negruscoazulnocturno

verde-arbóreoverde-azebreverde-azeitonaverde-azulverde-azul-claroverde-azuladoverde-azulada-escuraverde-bandeiraverde-bosqueverde-brancoverde-bronzeverde-cadáververde-caquiverde-castanhoverde-castanho-tristeverde-cinzaverde-cinzentoverde-claroverde-cobreverde-couveverde-de-prataverde-douradoverde-ecologistaverde-ervaverde-esbatidoverde-escarlateverde-escuro

verde-salvaverde-secoverde-sedaverde-sujoverde-tíliaverdes-Tirolverde-transparenteverde-tropaverde-turquesaverde-verdeverde-verde-verdeverde-vivovermelho-abrunhovermelho-acastanhadovermelho-acinzentadavermelho-alaranjadovermelho-alizarinavermelho-amareladovermelho-amarelovermelho-arroxadovermelho-arroxeadovermelho-azulvermelho-azuladovermelho-baçovermelho-barrovermelho-bordeaux

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amarelo-junquilhoamarelo-laranjaamarelo-limãoamarelo-manteigaamarelo-metalizadoamarelo-ministérioamarelo-mostardaamarelo-negroamarelo-ocreamarelo-ouroamarelo-palhaamarelo-pálidoamarelo-pardoamarelo-primaveraamarelo-púrpuraamarelo-queimadoamarelo-saramagoamarelo-semáforoamarelos-sépiaamarelo-sujoamarelo-terrosaamarelo-torradoamarelo-tostadoamarelo-uniãoamarelo-vivoazuldaPrússiaazul-acinzentadoazul-águaazul-aguadoazul-amareloazul-anilazul-arroxeadoazul-bebéazul-berranteazul-brilhanteazul-celesteazulcelesteclaroazul-celestialazul-cerâmica

azul-noiteazul-oceanoazul-pálidoazul-pardoazul-pavãoazul-pervincaazul-petróleoazul-piscinaazul-prataazul-prateadoazul-profundoazul-prussianoazul-roxaazul-safiraazul-sulfatoazul-tintaazul-transparenteazul-turquesaazul-ultramarinoazul-verdeazul-vermelhoazul-violáceaazul-violetaazul-vivoverde-acastanhadoverde-ácidoverde-acinzentadoverde-açoverde-águaverde-alfaceverde-alfazemaverde-algaverde-alvoverde-amareladoverde-amêndoaverde-anil

verde-esmeraldaverde-esperançaverde-florescenteverde-foscoverde-francoverde-frescaverde-gaioverde-garrafaverde-góticoverde-grandeverde-Guinéverde-lagartaverde-lamaverde-limaverde-limosoverde-maçãverde-malvaverde-marverde-marinhoverde-mateverde-musgoverde-negroverde-noiteverde-ocreverde-olivaverde-palhaverde-pálidoverde-papagaioverde-pastelverde-pinheiroverde-pinhoverde-rãverde-relvaverde-rosaverde-rubroverde-salsa

vermelho-brancovermelho-brilhantevermelho-cádmiovermelho-carmimvermelho-castanhovermelho-cerejavermelho-chamavermelho-clarovermelho-coca-colavermelho-desbotadovermelho-distânciavermelho-douradovermelho-escarlatevermelho-escurovermelho-esverdeadovermelho-forçavermelho-fortevermelho-granadavermelho-intensivovermelho-laranjavermelho-míniovermelho-negrovermelho-ocrevermelho-pálidovermelho-púrpuravermelho-rosavermelho-rosadovermelho-rubrovermelho-ruçovermelho-sanguevermelho-sanguíneovermelho-terractovermelho-tijolovermelho-tomatevermelho-verdevermelho-violáceovermelho-vivo

Notice that from Bluteau’s fifteen dictionary registers, ten fail to be

acknowledgedbyInfopedia(cf.22a)andeighthavenoregisterinCRPC(cf.22b).Also

notice that very few of the compounds that are listed in Infopedia fail to occur in

CRPC.Exceptionsarethosein(22c).

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(22) a. amarellogualdeamarellotostadoazulturquiazulultramarinoverdeazuladoverdebexiga-----verdedesmayadoverdelírioverdemontanhaverdeterra

b. amarellogualde-----azulturqui----------verdebexigaverde-créverde-desmayadoverde-lírioverdemontanhaverdeterra

c. amarelo-topázio‘topazeyellow’verde-cré‘goldengreen’verde-limão‘lemongreen’verde-velho‘oldgreen’vermelho-púrpura‘purplered’

ThenumberofcompoundsfoundinCRPC(i.e.254)showsthatrealitygoes

indeedmuchbeyond imagination,but this isaverypromisingresult, since their

morphosyntactic behaviourwill probably reveal the grammatical nature of their

constituents,unbiasedasfarasgrammaticalprescriptionsareconcerned.Mostof

the compoundsactuallyusedby speakers (maybeonlyonceor twice) arenot in

thedictionary–theyshowupiftheyareneededandnodictionaryregisterisfelt

toberequired.

The categorization of these compounds is certainly one of their most

interesting aspects. In Infopedia, different possibilities are offered: they can be

listedasnounsandthenasadjectives,asin(23a),(23b)and(23c);orasadjectives

firstandnounsafterwards,asin(23d),(23e)and(23f);orasadjectivesandnouns,

at the same time (cf. 23g) and (23h) and, finally, just as nouns (23i). This

classificationlooksasarbitraryastheclassificationofsimplecolourwords(cf.(17)

and (18)).The largestgroup favours theprecedenceof adjectives (cf. 23d-h),but

thepercentageoftheoppositegroup(cf.23a-c)isnotlow.

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(23) a. amarelo-canárionomemasculino.tomamarelo-claroligeiramenteesverdeado,comoodecertoscanáriosadjetivo.queapresentaessetom

amarelo-claroamarelo-escuroamarelo-pálidoamarelo-torradoazul-escuroazul-marinhoazul-cobaltoazul-ferreteazul-pavãoazul-turquesaazul-violeta

39,0% b. azul-claro

nomemasculino.tomclarodoazuladjetivo.queapresentaessetom

c. azul-bebénomemasculino.tomdeazulquetendeparaobranco;azul-claroadjetivoinvariável.queapresentaessetom

d. amarelo-topázioadjetivo.dacordotopázionomemasculino.1.umadascoresdoespetrosolar.2.cordotopázio

verde-águaverde-amareladoverde-azeitonaverde-escuroverde-esmeraldaverde-gaioverde-garrafaverde-limãoverde-negroverde-marverde-musgoverde-velhovermelho-amareladovermelho-púrpuravermelho-tijolovermelho-vivo

58,3%

e. verde-claroadjetivo.queapresentaumatonalidadeclaradeverdenomemasculino.essatonalidade

f. vermelhoescuroadjetivoinvariável.queapresentaumatonalidadeescuradevermelhonomemasculino.essatonalidade

g. verdealfaceadjetivoinvariável,nomemasculino.queoutomqueéverde-clarovivocaracterísticodaalface

h. azulcelesteadjetivode2géneros,nomemasculino.azuldacordocéu

i. verdecrénomemasculino.verdetiranteaouro 2,7%

Furthermore,regarding,itisworthmentioningthattheorderofthelistingof

majorcategoriesforthesecolourcompoundsinInfopediaisquiteinconsistentwith

theorderfollowedforsimplecolournouns:

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(24) N,ADJ ADJ,N amarelo

amarelo-canárioamarelo-claroamarelo-escuroamarelo-pálidoamarelo-torradoazulcobaltoazulferreteazulpavãoazulturquesaazulvioleta

amarelo-topázioazulazul-celesteverdeverde-águaverde-alfaceverdeamareladoverdeescuroverdeesmeraldaverdegaioverdegarrafaverdenegro

verdevelhoverdeazeitonaverdelimaoverdemarverdemusgovermelhovermelhoamareladovermelho-escurovermelho-púrpuravermelho-tijolovermelhovivo

Gender variation for compound colour adjectives is also problematic.

Apparently,ifthecompoundincludesonevariableconstituent,itwillbepresented

as a variable adjective (cf. (23a), (23b), (23d) and (23e)), but the classification of

vermelho-escuro(cf.(23f))asaninvariableadjectiveisabsolutelypuzzling,sinceits

twoconstituentsarevariableandalsobecauseamarelo-escuro,whichisstructurally

identical,isclassifiedasavariableadjective.Eventually,thisisamistakesince,for

instance,castanho-escuroandcinzento-escurofollowthemodelofamarelo-escuro.

Thedistinctionbetween ‘adjetivoinvariável’(in(23c)and(23g))and ‘adjetivode2

géneros’ (in23h) isequallyanundesirablebackgroundnoise, sincetheymeanthe

same.

5.Variationincompounds–theresults

The following data was extracted from CRPC, on the basis of a query line

formed by one of the above colourwords followed by a dash61 (-) and any other

word(e.g. ‘amarelo-*').Thesearchyieldedmorethanonethousandhits,but,once

again,someoftheresultshadtobeexcluded,eitherforstructuralorforsemantic

reasons.Inthefirstcase,Ihaveeliminatedallcoordinatedstructures(cf.25),mainly

61 Theorthographyofthistypeofwordcompoundsrequirestheuseofadashtoconnect

bothwords(cf.VOP).

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formed by two colour words, since these compounds are exocentric and the

identificationofthecompoundwisneededfortheupcomingdiscussion.

(25) cubinhoscomduascores:umvermelho-amarelo,outroazul-amareloeumterceiroazul-vermelho

‘two-colouredlittlecubes:thefirstisred-yellow,theotherisblue-yellowandathirdoneisblue-red’

Hits thatwere excluded for semantic reasons include, like for simple colour

words,colourcompoundsthatarenotusedtoreferacolour,suchasthefollowing:

(26) coligaçãovermelha-verde‘red-greencoalition’clubevermelho-branco‘red-whiteteam’

The subcorpus thus obtained is formed by 875 different compounds. Their

frequencywillnotbe taken intoaccount, since,generally, it is individuallyalways

verylow.

Beforelookingattheresults,someremarksontaggingareadvisable.Tagging

of a corpus such as CRPC is largely obtained automatically, which is a risky but

inevitable operation. In the case of colour words, this automatic tagging is even

morerisky,since,aswehaveseenbefore(cf.(10)),theformofadjectivesandnouns

is virtually the same.Wrong tagging was identified above, in the case of simple

colour words (cf. (12) and (13)), but it seriously increases when we consider

compoundcolourwords.

The first problem concerns the appearance of bizarre categories, given their

syntacticcontext. In fact, somecolourcompoundsare taggedasverb formsother

than past participle, infinitive and gerund forms (cf. 27a), but these can also be

found(cf.(27b),(27c),(27d)and(27e)).Someothercolourcompoundsaretagged

aspropernames(cf.(27f),andevenascardinals(cf.(27g))andromannumerals(cf.

27h),althoughthelasttwoarequitescarcelyfound.

(27) a. V=Verbbarra[vermelha-escura]V

b. PPT=PastParticiple(incompoundtenses) ORabisgato[…]temosbagosdum[verde-claro]PPTdecertoslicores

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c. PPA=PastParticiple(notincompoundtenses)ocloroéumgás[amarelo-esverdeado]PPAdeaspectolímpidoecor[amarelo-pálido]PPA

d. INF=Infinitive tonsintensosde[verde-mar]INF e. GER=Gerunds viu-lhenoolhinho[amarelo-castanho]GERocírculovermelhodaorlacontrair-se f. PNM=PartofName entrecortada[...]pelo[verde-escuro]PNMdosmontados g. CARD=Cardinals ostons«camel»,[verde-bronze]CARDepretopredominam h. DTGR=RomanNumerals dezclassificadoresdeumhorrível[verde-caqui]DTGR

These hits (94 in total) could be disregarded, and the searchwould still be

representative, buthits tagged asnounsor adjectives are alsoproblematic,which

meansthattheresultsareveryunreliable:

(28) a. Nounswronglytaggedasadjectivesostonscaracterísticossãooverdeeoazul-acinzentado,[...]o[vermelho-tijolo]ADJ

b. Adjectiveswronglytaggedasnounsgrãoscor[vermelho-alaranjada]N

Another frequently mistaken tagging concerns sequences that involve two

potential colourwords, as in (29), for very understandable reasons: if one colour

wordisdifficulttotag,asequenceoftwohastobeevenhardertoclassify.But,in

thiscase,thefirstwordisnotacolourword,hencethesequenceisnotacompound

colourword:

(29) Sóalguns espíritosmaisobservadores seaperceberamdeumpormenorpoético:uma

rosa_ADJvermelha_CNtambémlançadapelotratador ‘onlyafewattentivespiritsrealizedthepoeticdetail:aredrosealsothrownbythe

keeper’umsumodelaranja_ADJvermelho_CN‘aredorangejuice’

Mentioning this kind of mistaken tagging has a purpose, which is not to

evaluatenegativelytheCRPC’stagger.Infact,colourcompoundsaredifficulttotag

because they have to be morpho-syntactically analysed and that functionality is

probablynotthere.Hence,CRPC’sPOSresultswillbedisregarded.

Thus,searchresultsthatIwillnowpresenthavebeenmanuallytagged,both

globally and internally. Morphosyntactic compounds, such as these colour

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compounds are lexical itemswith aphrasalbasis. So, Ihavepinpointed theword

class of each constituent and the word class of the compound, according to its

syntactic context. I have also annotated gender and number values for the

antecedents of compound adjectives and gender and number values for each

compound constituent. In total, this subcorpus includes 316 nouns and 559

adjectives. Unexpectedly, the asymmetry between nouns and adjectives is much

morediscretenowthanwhatitwaswithsimplecolourwords(cf.(15)and(16)):

(30)nouns

singular 300 plural 16 adjectives 559

This complexmorphosyntactic tagging allows to set different configurations

anditalsoallowstodetectpredominantgrammaticalbehaviours.Thisisasummary

ofthesurveyofnouncolourcompounds:

(31) a. [[X]singularcolourword[Y]singularadjective]singularmasculinenoun (144/300) e.g. amarelo-claro ‘light yellow’, azul-celeste ‘sky blue’, laranja-escuro ‘dark orange’,

verde-pálido‘palegreen’,vermelho-vivo‘vividred’ b. [[X]singularcolourword[Y]singularnoun]singularmasculinenoun (127/300)

e.g. abrunho ‘apricot’, açafrão ‘saffron’, limão ‘lemon’, miosótis ‘myositis’,musgo‘moss’,saramago‘wildradish’alface ‘lettuce’, alfazema ‘lavender’, amêndoa ‘almond’, banana ‘banana’,cereja ‘cherry’, coca-cola ‘Coca-Cola’, couve ‘kale’, lima ‘lime’, maçã ‘apple’,salva‘sage’,violeta‘violet’bronze ‘bronze’, cádmio ‘cadmium’, cobalto ‘cobalt’, cobre ‘copper’, indigo‘indigo’, mínio ‘minium’, ocre ‘ochre’, ouro ‘gold’, petróleo ‘petrol’, sulfato‘sulphate’água‘water’,alizarina‘alizarin’,ardósia‘slate’,esmeralda‘emerald’,ferrugem‘rust’,safira‘sapphire’

c. [[X]singularcolourword[Y]singularcolourword]singularmasculinenoun (33/300) e.g. azul-turquesa ‘turquoise blue’, verde-negro ‘black green’, vermelho-escarlate

‘scarletred’ d. [[X]singularcolourword[Y]pluraladjective]pluralmasculinenoun (1/16) e.g.amarelo-acastanhados‘brownyellow’ e. [[X]pluralcolourword[Y]pluraladjective]pluralmasculinenoun (7/16) e.g.amarelos-doces‘sweetyellow’,azuis-berrantes‘shoutingblue’,azuis-celestiais‘sky

blue’ f. [[X]pluralcolourword[Y]singularnoun]pluralmasculinenoun (7/16) e.g. amarelos-ouro ‘gold yellow’, azuis-turquesa ‘turquoise blue’, verdes-cinza ‘ash

green’,vermelhos-rosa‘rosered’ g. [[X]pluralcolourword[Y]pluralnoun]pluralmasculinenoun (1/16) e.g.verdes-algas‘algaegreen’

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The analysis of singularnounsmust focuson the second constituent,which

can either be an adjective (cf. (31a)) or a noun, referring to a fruit, a vegetable, a

mineral,or anythingelse, in fact (cf. 31b).The third type (cf. (31c)),witha colour

wordasitssecondconstituentisnotarealtype–I’veisolatedthembecausetheir

analysisas those in (31a)oras those in (31b) isequallyavailable.Fromasemantic

pointofview,allthesecompoundsarehyponymsofthefirstconstituent:amarelo-

claro is a kind of amarelo; vermelho-coca-cola is a kind of vermelho. So, if these

nounsareheadedbyacolourwordthat ismodifiedeitherbyanadjectiveorbya

noun,thecolourwordhastobeanoun-ifinvermelho-coca-cola,vermelhowasto

be an adjective, then it would be a kind of coca-cola, which is semantically

inadequate, if not for other reasons,merely because the feminine noun coca-cola

would require the feminine adjectivevermelha, but alsobecause colour adjectives

cannotprecedenounsinPortuguese(seefootnote2).Compoundsin(31c)alsohave

acolourheadnounandtheirmodifiercaneitherbeanadjective(e.g.verde-negro

‘black green’), similarly to those in (31a), or a noun (e.g. vermelho-escarlate), like

thosein(31b).

Pluralnounsareobviouslyofsecondaryimportance,simplybecausethereare

onlyafewofthem.

Adjectives offer much more interesting information. In this case, I will set

three different subtypes: agreement configurations, ‘disagreement’ configurations

and irrelevant context. In the first subtype (cf. 32), one of the compound

constituents(thefirst,thesecondorboth)explicitlyagreeswithitsantecedent:

(32) a. MASCULINESINGULARANTECEDENT (144/225) e.g.açúcaramareloMASCSING-escuroMASCSING ‘darkyellowsugar’ cabeloamareloMASCSING-manteigaNOUNSING ‘butteryellowhair’ vestidoazulINVSING-claroMASCSING ‘lightbluedress’ b. FEMININESINGULARANTECEDENT (69/201) e.g.camisadepopelinaamarelaFEMSING-cháNOUN ‘teayellowpoplinshirt’ coloraçãoamarelaFEMSING-esverdeadaFEMSING ‘greenishyellowcolour’ camisaazulINVSING-claraFEMSING ‘lightblueshirt’ c. FEMININEPLURALANTECEDENT (13/79) e.g.ondasazuisINVPLU-escurasFEMPLU ‘darkbluewaves’ t-shirtsazuisINVPLU-gangaNOUN ‘denimbluet-shirts’ d. MASCULINEPLURALANTECEDENT (8/53) e.g.olhosazuisINVPLU-clarosMASCPLU ‘lightblueeyes’

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Inthesecondsubtype(cf.33),thereisnoagreementbetweenoneorbothof

thecompoundconstituentsanditsantecedent.Therearenocasesof‘disagreement’

withmasculinesingularantecedents,whichwillbearelevantissuefortheanalysis

below:

(33) a. FEMININESINGULARANTECEDENT (76/201) e.g.auréolaamareloMASCSING-douradaFEMSING ‘goldenyellowhalo’ cabeleiraamareloMASCSING-fosforescenteINVSING ‘phosphorescentyellowhair’ camisolaverdeINVSING-claroMASCSING ‘lightgreensweater’ casacavermelhoMASCSING-escuroMASCSING ‘darkredcoat’ tonalidadevermelhoMASCSING-sangueNOUN ‘bloodredhue’ b. FEMININEPLURALANTECEDENT (66/79) e.g.floresamareloMASCSING-esverdeadasFEMPLU ‘greenishyellowflowers’ letrasazulINVSING-celestesINVPLU ‘skyblueletters’ manchasazulINVSING-celesteINVSING ‘skybluespots’ calçasazulINVSING-escuroMASCSING ‘darkbluetrousers’ folhasverdeINVSING-escurasFEMPLU ‘darkgreenleaves’ boinasvermelhoMASCSING-escuroMASCSING ‘darkredberets’ unhasvermelhoMASCSING-sangueNOUN ‘bloodrednails’ c. MASCULINEPLURALANTECEDENT (45/53) e.g.tonsamareloMASCSING-escurosMASCPLU ‘daryellowhues’ panosamareloMASCSING-torradoMASCSING ‘toastedyellowclths’ livrinhosazulINVSING-bebéNOUN ‘babybluebooklets’ poenteslaranjaMASCSING-púrpuraNOUN ‘purpleorangesunsets’ uniformesverdeINVSING-escurosMASCPLU ‘darkgreenuniform’ paralelipípedosverdeINVSING-secoMASCSING ‘drygreenparallelepiped tufosverdeINVSING-mateINVSING ‘mategreenwisp’ óculosvermelhoMASCSING-azulINVSING ‘blueredglasses’ rolosvermelhoMASCSING-rosaNOUN ‘roseredhairpin’ d. MASCULINESINGULARANTECEDENT (0/225)

Finally, the third subtype comprises all the cases that involve singular

antecedents andgender invariable colournames, invariablemodifier adjectivesor

modifiernounsthatdonotagreewiththecolourhead(cf.34).Ifthereisanykindof

agreement,inthesecases,itisnotvisible:

(34) a. MASCULINESINGULARANTECEDENT (81/225) e.g.véuazulINVSING-águaNOUN ‘waterblueveil’ céuazulINVSING-celesteINVSING ‘skybluesky’ b. FEMININESINGULARANTECEDENT (57/201) e.g.malinhaazulINVSING-bebéNOUN ‘babybluebag’ cúpulaazulINVSING-celesteINVSING ‘skybluedome’

126

In sum, most of these colour compounds show agreement features (circa

41,9%), but the antecedent is predominantly a masculine singular noun (circa

61,5%). This observationmust be related to the fact that there are nomasculine

singular antecedentswhenagreement fails tooccur and it is still relevant tonote

that the ‘disagreeing’ formswithin the compound aremasculine and singular (cf.

boinas vermelho-escuro ‘dark-red berets’). A similar observation is offered by the

factthatcompoundsthathaveinvariableforms(cf.véuazul-água ‘waterblueveil’,

malinhaazul-bebé‘babybluelittlebag’)alwayshavesingularantecedents.Thisisa

summaryofthecounting:

(35) ANTECEDENTTOTAL SINGULAR PLURAL

MASC FEM MASC FEM AGREEMENTSTRUCTURES 144 69 8 13 234 ‘DISAGREEMENT’STRUCTURES ----- 76 45 66 187 IRRELEVANTCONTEXT 81 57 ----- ----- 138 225 202 53 79 559

Thecorollaryofalltheseobservationsseemstobethatthereisatendencyto

assignunmarkedgenderandnumbervalues to thesecompounds. Inotherwords,

mostof these compoundswillhave amasculine singular form, irrespectiveof the

genderandnumbervaluesoftheantecedent.Noticethatonly90colourcompounds

exhibit full agreement with non-masculine singular antecedents (circa 16%) and

probably,nativespeakerswouldacceptstheirnon-agreeingcounterparts:

(36) coloraçãoamarela-esverdeadavs.coloraçãoamarelo-esverdeado olhosazuis-clarosvs.olhosazul-claro

Wewillnowleavethislineofreasoninginstand-by,tofindoutwhatisgoing

on inside colour compounds that surface as adjectives. All the cases under

considerationhereareformedbyacolourwordplusamodifierthatcanbeeitheran

adjectiveoranoun.Apparently,thestructureofthesecompoundsissimilartothe

nouncompoundsdescribedabove(cf.31).So,ifamodifierfollowsthecolourword,

thenthecolourwordmustbeanoun,butifthisisso(i.e.ifthecolourword,which

istheheadofthecompound,isanoun),howdoesthecompoundcomestobean

adjective? The hypothesis that seems more plausible is that these compound

127

adjectives are initially generated as nouns and then they are re-categorised as

adjectives.

(37) [[amarelo]NOUN[escuro]ADJ]NOUN à [[[amarelo]NOUN[escuro]ADJ]NOUN]ADJ

Conversion processes often have a ‘freezing’ effect wrt to morpho-syntactic

variation.Thismaybethereasonwhyadjectivalcolourcompoundstendtooccurin

themasculine-singularform(whichistheformofthebasenoun)andtendtoelope

agreementwithitsantecedent.Theseadjectivesaregenderandnumberinvariable

forms:

(38) [casaca]FEMSING[vermelhoMASCSING-escuroMASCSING]INVADJ [boinas]FEMPLU[vermelhoMASCSING-escuroMASCSING]INVADJ [panos]MASCPLU[amareloMASCSING-torradoMASCSING]INVADJ

Finally,weneedtoaccountforthecasesofcompoundcolouradjectivesthat

donotbehaveasinvariableadjectives,sincetheyexhibitpartial(cf.39a)orfull(cf.

39b)agreementfeatures.

(39) a. [auréola]FEMSING[amarelo-dourad]aFEMSING [flores]FEMPLU[amarelo-esverdead]asFEMPLU [tons]MASPLU[amarelo-escur]osFEMPLU b. [coloração]FEMSING[amarela]FEMSING[esverdeada]FEMSING [ondas]FEMPLU[azuis]INVPLU[escuras]FEMPLU

[olhos]MASCPLU[azuis]INVPLU[claros]MASCPLU

Certainly,partialandfull‘agreement’caseshavedifferentimplications.Partial

agreement, which affects the last constituent, is probably due to a more

consolidated stage of lexicalization. Frozen forms, such as those in (38) are the

directoutputofconversion;adjectivesthatshowgenderandnumberagreementat

theright-handperipheryarelexicalisedformsthathave‘lost’theiroriginalinternal

structure.Fullagreement,ontheotherhand,seemstorevealacompletelydifferent

word-formation strategy. In this case, we may consider that the compound is

formed upon a simple colour adjective by coordination, which is a plausible

explanation for cases such as coloração amarela esverdeada ‘greenish yellow

colouring’.

128

Noticethatafewcasesofpartialagreementcomefromcompoundsthathavea

modifier noun (e.g. camisa amarela-chá, t-shirts azuis-ganga). The coordination

hypothesis to explain these cases is simply inadequate: sequences of nouns and

adjectives can’t be coordinated, nor can sequences of adjectives, unless theyhave

cumulativereading,whichisnotthecase.Noothergoodexplanationseemstobe

available,whichmaysuggestthatthesecasesareoccasionaldeviations.

6.Closingremarks

Portuguesecolourwords, suchasamarelo,azul, laranja,verde andvermelho,

are more frequently used as adjectives, although they may also occur as nouns.

Lexicographic descriptions, from early to contemporary dictionaries also tend to

privilege the description of these words as adjectives, although descriptions are

quiteinconsistent.Etymologycan’tbeofmuchhelpeither,sincesomecolourwords

originateinnouns(e.g.azul)andotheroriginateinadjectives(e.g.amarelo).Thus,

the analysis of colourwords doesn’t provide enough information to decide about

theirwordclassstatus.

Compoundcolourwordspresentaquiteinterestingsetofpropertiesthatmay

help to better understand the former. Compound colour nouns are formed by a

simple colour noun and a modifier (an adjective or a noun). Like simple colour

nouns, they are typically masculine nouns. Compound colour adjectives provide

somemoreinterestinginformation.Ingeneral,theseadjectivestakethemasculine

singular form even when they have other kinds of antecedents, which may be

explainedasanoutcomeofconversion,thewordformationprocessusedtoproduce

them.Ifthisisthecase,compoundcolouradjectivesareobtainedfromcompound

colournouns,whicharealsoobtainedbyconversionofanounphraseheadedbya

colournoun.

So,thosequestionsthatwereinitiallyputcannowbereplied.Theobservation

of thegrammaticalbehaviourofsimpleandcompoundcolourwordssupports the

hypothesis thatcolournounsandcolouradjectivesaredifferent lexical items,and

alsothatadjectivesareobtainedbyconversionofcolournouns.

129

The small setof compoundcolouradjectives that exhibits agreementon the

rightmostconstituentmaysuggestthatothercolourwordformationstrategiesmay

apply,althoughmarginallyforthetimebeing.

References

Barbosa,A. (1611)DictionariumLusitanicoLatinum.Bracharae:FructuosiLaurentijdeBasto.

Bluteau,R.(1712-1728)VocabularioPortuguezeLatino[...].Coimbra-Lisboa:CollegiodasArtesdaCompanhiadeJesu.

Cardoso, J. (1569-1570) Dictionarium Latinolusitanicum. Conimbricae: JoanBarrerius.

CdP=Davies,Mark&MichaelFerreira(2006-)CorpusdoPortuguês:45millionwords,1300s-1900s.[www.corpusdoportugues.org](01-02-2016).

Corominas, J. & J. Pascual (1992) Diccionario Crítico Etimológico Castellano eHispánico.Madrid:Gredos.

CLP-CorpusLexicográficodoPortuguês[clp.dlc.ua.pt/DICIweb/](01-02-2016).CRPC - Corpus de Referência do Português Contemporâneo [alfclul.clul.ul.pt/

CQPweb/].Figueiredo, C. de (1913) Novo Diccionário da Língua Portuguesa. Porto: Typ. da

Empr.Litter.eTypographyca.Folqman,C.(1755)DiccionarioPortuguez,eLatino.Lisboa:naOfficinadeMiguel

ManescaldaCostaInfopédia -Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa com Acordo Ortográfico [em linha].

Porto: Porto Editora, 2003-2016. [www.infopedia.pt/dicionarios/lingua-portuguesa/dicionário](01-02-2016).

MoraiseSilva,A.(1789)DiccionariodaLinguaPortugueza.Lisboa:naTypographiaLacerdina. [archive.org/details/diccionariodalin01mora & archive.org/stream/diccionariodalin02mora](01-02-2016).

Pereira,B.(1647):Thesourodalinguaportugueza.Eborae:TypographiaAcademiae.Villalva,A.(2008).MorfologiadoPortuguês.Lisboa:UniversidadeAberta.VOP–VocabulárioOrtográficodoPortuguês.

[http://www.portaldalinguaportuguesa.org/vop.html](01-02-2016).

130

MetaphorandemotionincolourwordsErlingStrudsholm(KøbenhavnsUniversitet),CarlaBazzanella&IreneRonga(UniversitàdegliStudidiTorino)

1.Introduction

Within the rich and fruitful, research on colour words, starting from Berlin

andKay 1969 (more recently cf. Grossmann 1988; Lyons 2003; Biggam 2011 et al.;

Rossi 2012, 2013, 2014; Anderson 2014 et al.), a significant and complex

intertwinement of language/culture/context has been highlighted, together with

psychologicalandcognitiveprocesses,suchasperceptionandcategorization.

A general, still recurring question is the following: When studying colour

words, do we find universal pairings or cultural and linguistic specificities? With

regard toour issue, are themetaphorical62meaning and the emotional valueof a

colour word in a given language completely dependent on culture, context, and

language?Oristhereaconvergenttendencyamonglanguages(possiblygrounded

in embodiment and intersubjectivity, cf. Gibbs 2005, Fusaroli et al. 2012), in

associatingmetaphoricalmeaningsandvaluestocolourwords?

62 Thedifferencesbetweenmetaphorandmetonymy(see,e.g.,Koch2001;Niemeier1998;

Barcelona2003,Sandford2014a),willnotbetakenintoaccounthere.Bothofthemareconsideredaspartofthefigurativelanguagethatisawider,powerfulumbrellareferringto non-literal meaning (see Gibbs 1994; Dobrovol’ski and Piirainen 2005; Bazzanella2014).

131

The integrative answer provided by an increasing amount of recent, cross-

linguistic studies consists in maintaining the significance of both cultural and

universal facetsof theiruse,by attenuating the strong, initial oppositionbetween

nurtureandnature(cf.,amongothers,RegierandKay,2009;CruzandPlebe,2013;

Ronga,etal.2014;RongaandBazzanella2015;Strudsholmetal.submitted).

Inthisperspective,wewilldealherewithtwoparticular,strictlyentrenched,

aspects of the use of colour words, that is: their metaphorical meanings and

emotionalvalues.Morespecifically,wewillpresentsomeexamplesofmetaphorical

meanings, driven by a colour word/collocate in relation with their

embodiment/conventionalization and their interlinguistic and intralinguistic

variations, on the one hand (§ 2), and the emotional, often contrasting values,

whicharetriggeredbycolourterms,ontheotherhand(§3).

We will mainly compare Danish and Italian, which share only a partially

commonlinguisticbelongingandEuropeanculturalheritage;butreferalsotoother

languages that have been analysed in studies discussing colour words in applied

perspectives (McCarthy and O’ Dell 2002, Diadori 2012) and in relation with

metaphors, proverbs, idioms, and emotions (Niemeier 1998, 2007; Kövecses 2010;

Albertazzi 2009, 2010; Bazzanella et al. 2012; Dobreva 2014; Ronga et al. 2014;

Sandford2011,2014a,2014b).

2.Colourwordsandmetaphoricalmeaning

2.1Embodimentandconventionalization

Colourwordsareoftenusednotasasimplereferencetoaperceptualportion

of the colour spectrum, that is, not literally: they often assume a metaphoric

meaning, which is grounded in the correspondence between perceptual and

semantic processes (Albertazzi 2010) and varies according to its context and

collocation,asinthefollowingDanishexample:

132

1) Da.Grønkoncerterhverkenrødellerblå(lit.63‘Greenconcertisneitherrednorblue’;

met.‘Grønkoncertispoliticallyindependent’).

The threemetaphorical values, here associated togreen, red, andblue, need

explication:

• Since1983,theGrønkoncert,whichhasbecomeaninstitutioninDanishmusic

andculturallife,referstoanopen-airrocconcertandtakesplaceeveryyear;

• The colour green is generally64 associated to nature in general and to the

ecologicalmovement (Niemeier 1998: 131): see, e.g., the green petrol, theUK

GreenParty (formerly theecologicalone), thecorrespondinggreenparties in

Europe(suchasinFranceLesVerts,inGermanyDieGrünen,inItalyIVerdi),

and The European Green Party founded in 2004. In fragment 1), the use of

greenisalsorelatedtothemainsponsor,namely:theDanishbreweryTuborg

(http://www.groenkoncert.dk/;standNovember2015);

• Red and blue are meant here to represent, symbolically, opposite political

parties,thatis,left-andright-wingideologiesinDenmark,respectively.

Colours associated to the political parties are mostly conventionally and

arbitrarily established; e.g., the United States color symbolism is opposite to the

Danishone: themoreconservativeRepublicanParty is symbolizedbyred andthe

DemocraticPartyissymbolizedbyblue,thecolorsymbolismistheoppositetothe

Danishone.However,since1854redinpoliticalideology“[…]iswidelyusedtorefer

toleft-wingpolitics(communism,Marxism,socialism.)”(Niemeier1998:129).

Also thecolourof the roadsignsarehighlyconventional, somuchso thata

Vienna Conventions on Road Signs and Signals has been established for the

European countries in 1968, but in a flexible way, given that the road markings

63Themetaphoricalmeaning follows theEnglish literal translation that ismarkedby ‘lit.’

and‘met’,respectively.64 See already in the Latin language: “The adjectives uiridis and uirens (‘green’) most

commonly described the healthy crops and shrubs of Roman agriculture andhorticulture,ortherichverdureoftheItaliancountryside”(Bradley2009:7).

133

partly vary among countries; e.g.: althoughyellow is commonlyused tomark the

forbiddenparking,inNorwayyellowmarkingsseparatethetrafficdirections.

Furthermore, there are colours, or coloured objects, which have been

conventionallyselectedinmanysocieties/languagesasasymbol,suchaswhite for

truce/peace,oryellowin:

• the yellow ribbon, which is used in the United States, Denmark, Italy etc.

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_ribbon; stand December 2015), for

supportingthewarprisonersandsoldiers,and

• the yellow t-shirt used in Thailand as a sign of protest

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_Shirts;standDecember2015).

Ingeneral, themetaphorical, conventionalusesof colourwords aremoreor

lesssharedamongEnglish,Danish,andItalian,asinthefollowingidioms:

2) En. green fingers/thumb, Da. grønne fingre (lit. ‘green fingers’), It. pollice verde (lit.

‘greenthumb’).

3) En.outoftheblue,Da.udafdetblå(lit.‘outoftheblue’);itdoesnotexistinItalian.

4) En.yellow-bellydoesnotexistneitherinDanishnorinItalian.

AccordingtoRongaetal.2014,commontendenciesinthemetaphoricaluses

ofcolouraremore frequentlyrelatedtoembodiedexperienceandnaturalobjects.

Perceptualproperties (Albertazzi2009,2010), experience, cognitiveprocesses, and

culturalmotivation affect together the creation and conventionalizationof colour

metaphors.Thevariableinterlacementbetweenembodied(oriconic,suchasinthe

Grønkoncertabove),andtheconventional(orarbitrary,suchasintheredandblue

above)associationspertainstometaphoringeneral(cf.,amongmanyothers,Lakoff

and Johnson 1980;Kittay 1987;Kövecses2010;Lakoff 1987;Bazzanella2009, 2014),

and, by extension, to the metaphorical uses of colour words, especially in

collocations,idiomaticexpressions,orproverbs(Bazzanellaetal.2012,Rongaetal.

2014,Strudsholmetal.submitted).Toquoteanexample,themeaningoftheEnglish

idiomoutoftheblueisrelatedtoablueandclearsky,fromwhichnothingunusual

isexpected;but,nowadays,itishighlyconventionalized.

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Embodied metaphors, initially grounded in nature and experience, when

conventionalizedbecome“storedandretrievedwholefrommemoryatthetimeof

use” (Wray 2002: 9), by referring to a general exemplar of an object, as in the

Englishphrasewhiteasasheet:theoriginalcolourofsheetsmetaphoricallyinvokes

the paleness of a visage, even todaywhen sheets are, usually, variously coloured.

Not surprisingly, Danish and Italian people resort to the same, literally and

metaphoricallycorrespondingidioms:

5) Da.hvidsometlagen,

6) It.biancocomeunlenzuolo.

Interestingly,theEnglishidiomwhitenoiseandthecorrespondingItalianand

Spanish ones (that is, rumor bianco, ruido blanco), the colourwhite - that is, an

‘achromatic’colour-matchesthewordnoise,andmetaphoricallysuggestsa light,

background noise (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=islibiZhbxc; stand

December2015).

The association appears arbitrary or partly motivated also in the Italian

idiomaticexpressionvedovanera,whichinotherlanguages,likeDanish,onlyrefers

totheverypoisonousspider:

7) It.vedovanera,(lit.‘blackwidow’;met.‘awidowwhokilledherhusbandormadehim

been killed’; but also a category of serial killers (men included!), who mainly act

withinthefamily).

TheItalianmetaphoricalmeaningof:

8) It.Principeazzurro(lit.‘lightblueprince’;met.,PrinceCharming,thatis‘amanwho

fulfillsawoman’sromanticexpectations’),

issharedby:PrincipeazulinSpanish,PrincipeazulinPortuguese,Prinzepblau

inCatalan(lit. ‘blueprince’ forallthreelanguages);butnotinGerman,whereder

blauePrinzwouldmean‘thedrunkprince’.

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2.2 Inter-/intralinguistic variations and multiple metaphorical

meanings

Withregardtothetranslationofcolourterms,which isadelicatetask,given

theirpossibledifferentconnotationsandvalues,Sutrop(2011:44)pointedout:“Ifwe

lookatcolourtermsonlyinonelanguage,orespeciallytheBCTsinthatlanguage,

ourobservationsremainstaticbut,ifwetrytolookatdifferencesinonelanguageor

betweenlanguages,werunintoproblemsofintra-andinterlinguistictranslation.”

Wewill touch upon these two kinds of variation in the use ofmetaphorical

colourwords65:

• on the one hand, the interlinguistic variety consists either in the absence of

correspondences in other languages of specific metaphorical uses (such as

English yellow-belly, which is neither used in Danish nor in Italian), or in

different associations, which themetaphorical use of the same colour word

cantriggeramonglanguages(see2.2.1),

• on the other hand, the intralinguistic variety, which is more surprising,

consists in the different associations, which can be attributed by the

metaphorical use of the same colour word within one single language (see

2.2.2).

2.2.1. The interlinguistic variety has been widely discussed in a contrastive

perspective, and the contextual, cultural, historical, and social parameters (which

play a crucial role in characterizing the selection, establishment and

conventionalizationofthemetaphoricalusesofcolourwordsinaspecificlanguage

and society, in comparison to other languages and societies) have been recently

highlighted(see§1).

Toquoteanexampletakenfromourcorpus66:Danishveddetgrønnebord(lit.

‘atthegreentable’)denotes‘intheexaminationroom’,whileItalianaltavoloverde

65Wewillnotdealherewith‘creative’and‘polyphonic’uses,whicharecommoninDanish

newspapertitles,suchas:Københavnsungeharstemtogmalerhelebyenirødt(lit.‘TheyouthofCopenhagenhas voted andpaints thewhole town red’, i.e. youngpeoplehaspreferentiallyvotedfortheleftwing/redparties).

136

‘(lit. ‘at the green table’),means ‘at the card table’ (Strudsholm et al. submitted).

Another example is theuseofblue-eyed: interlinguistically, ithas the same literal

meaning, that is, ‘with blue eyes’; but, while the English a blue-eyed boy has the

figurative meaning of ‘a darling’ or ‘a favoured person’, the correspondences in

DanishblåøjetandinGermanblauäugigmean‘naïve’or‘ingenuous’.

2.2.2. In general, metaphorical meaning is ambiguous67. Therefore, not

surprisingly,whenthemetaphoricalmeaning isdrivenbyanexpressiongrounded

onacolourword/collocateinaspecificcontext,itmayvarynotonlybetweentwo

(oramongmore)languages,butalsowithinasinglelanguage.Inotherwords,the

intralinguisticvariationconsistsindifferentassociationsandvaluesconstrainedby

perception, culture, history, and linguistic context, which that can be

metaphoricallyattributedtothesamecolourwordwithinonesinglelanguage:e.g.,

inItalianweusebiancocomelaneve(‘whiteassnow’),whichcontrastswithbianco

comeunmorto(‘whiteasadeadman’).

TheEnglishgreencanrefertofreshness,vitality,butalsotoimmaturity,such

asinEn.greenyears(‘aperson’sdevelopingyears’),andgreenideas(‘unripeideas’).

SimilarlyinDanishandItalian,wheretheidioms imingrønneungdom(lit. ‘inmy

green youth’) andesserenel verde degli anni (lit. ‘tobe in the greenof the years’;

met. to be in the early youth) are commonly used (Strudsholm et al. submitted).

Recently, anew “serie verde” (‘green series’), specifically addressed toA1 learners,

startedwithinaTVquizprogram(seeALMA.tv;http://www.almaedizioni.it/it/

almatv/lingua-quiz/;standDecember2015).

With regard to English red, it assumes both a positive value, such as in

examples9)and10),andanegativeone,e.g.,inred-eye(met.‘slavewhisky’)andred

tape(met.‘bureaucraticdelays’).

66See Ronga et al. 2014 for details on our corpus, grounded both in questionnaires and

corpora.67 “Vagueness,ambiguity,andpolysemyaretypicalfeaturesofthemetaphoricallanguage”

(Radman1995:228).

137

9) redcarpet,Da.rødløber,It.tappetorosso.

10) paintthetownred,Da.malebyenrød(‘tocelebrateboisterously’).

On the contrary, theblack colour expresses only fewpositive – or neutral –

associations (see examples 11-12). Negative associations prevail, by referring to

unofficial, illegal uses (see examples 13-16), bad reputations (see examples 17-18),

sadnessordysphoricfeelingsrelatedtoemotion,etc.(see§3).Theseusesaremore

orlesssharedamongEnglish,Danish,andItalian:

11) blacktie;Da.denlillesorte(‘thelittleblack’);It.abitonero(‘blackdress’).

12) Da.enlillesort(‘alittleblack’,i.e.coffeelacedwithbrandy;It.caffècorretto)68.

13) blackmarket,Da.sortmarked/sortbørs,It.mercatonero/borsanera.

14) Da.sortarbejde,It.lavoronero(‘illegalwork’,moonlight??).

15) Da. sorte penge (lit. ‘blackmoney’), It. denaro sporco (lit. ‘dirtymoney’); Da. vaske

sortepengehvide(lit.‘washblackmoneywhite’;met.‘launderblackmoney’).

16) blackeconomy,It.economianear.

17) toblacklist,Da.atsortliste;Da.atkommepådensorteliste(lit.‘tocomeontheblack

list’,i.e.‘tobeblacklisted’).

18) blacksheep,Da.sortfår,It.pecora.

In some cases, as in the following Danish example, positive or negative

interpretationsdependonthecontext:

19) sortafmennesker(lit.‘blackwithpeople’,met.verycrowded).

Let us briefly discuss here the ‘mixed case’ of black Friday, in their partially

convergentanddivergentuses,whichencompassbothapositivemeaningrelatedto

shopping (which is commonly used by English and Danish; http://blackfriday-

guide.dk; stand December 2015), and a negative one, related to several sad events

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Friday; stand December 2015), which is also

sharedbyItalian.Recently,alsotheshoppingmeaningisbecomingcommoninthe

Italian advertisements, e.g. in EATALY’s Speciale Black Friday

(http://www.eataly.net/it_it/black-friday; stand December 2015). A recent Danish 68 InTriestinedialectunnero(lit.‘ablack’)isacupofexpressocoffee.

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expressionwithreferencetoBlackFriday(example20)playsontheDanishwordfor

blackintheidiomatgåisort(lit.‘togoinblack’,met.‘togophut’):

20) Byengårisorttil“BlackFriday”(lit.‘ThetowngoesinblackforBlackFriday’).

Withregardtoblue,consideredbyRomansasablackhue(Pastoureau,2000,

Garcea 2003), the Italian blu (which alternates also with azzurro ‘azure-medium

blue’andthelesscommonceleste‘lightblue’69)refersbothtopositive(example21)

andnegative(example22)meanings:

21) Telefono Azzurro (lit. ‘the Blue Phone’, that is, an institution set up to safeguard

children’srights).

22) Avere una fifa blu (lit. ‘having a blue fear’; met. experiencing an intense fear, thus

causingafacesopalethatisalmostlooksbluish,asifitisexposedtoagreatchill;see

Biasietal.2013:158).

The multiplicity of metaphorical meanings, which can be attributed to a

colour word/expression in different languages and within the same language,

increases when emotional features are involved, as we will see in the following

section.

3. Emotional values and double polarity in the metaphorical uses of

colourwords

Recent studies have developed a wide conception of emotion, in its

relationship not only with reason and mind, but also with history, culture, and

language(see,e.g.,Bodei1991,Damasio1994,BazzanellaandKobau2002,Weigand

2004).

Colour words can be used for referring to emotion on the basis of diverse

forms of embodiment (see. 2.1). To quote an example related to the externally 69 Interestingly, also inother languages, suchasModernGreek,Maltese,Polish,Russian,

andTurkish,theEnglishBLUEcategoryisoftensplitintotwoorthreecolourwords(seeRonga 2009, Sandford 2012b, Paramei and Menegaz 2013, Bimler and Uusküla 2014,Uusküla2014,RongaandBazzanella2015).

139

observable, facial reactions,anger isassociatedwithred inseveral languages,such

asEnglish,Danish (at blive rød i hovedet af raseri, lit. ‘tobecome red in thehead

with anger’), Italian (rosso di rabbia), Bulgarian (Почервенявам от гняв ‘go red

with anger’; Dobreva 2014: 196), Chinese (mian-hong er-chi; lit. face-red ears-red)

‘become red in the face; flushwith anger, shameor shyness’;NingYu2002: 343),

Czech,andHungarian:

“theCzechrudáaswellastheHungarianvörösareconnectedwithastateof

beingangryatsomeone(inCzechbýtrudývztekem‘toberedwithanger’,zroudnot

jako krocan ‘to become red as turkey’, meaning ‘to become red with anger’, in

Hungarianelvörösödik‘tobecomered(withanger)’.”(Uusküla2008:24).

Emotional associations and values attributed to colour words either can be

sharedbymanylanguagesorcanvary,accordingtolanguage,culture,andlinguistic

context, in a complex intertwinement of factors. Unavoidably, when one speaks

about emotion, the complex balance between nature and nurture and the cross-

linguistic variability come to foreground (see § 1). According to Soriano and

Valenzuela (2009: 441), who applied Adams and Osgood (1973)’s semantic

dimensions:“[…]colourPotencyandActivitysemanticratingsarelikelytobemore

stableacrosslanguagesbecauseoftheirimportantrelationtophysicalpropertiesof

colour,likebrightnessorsaturation.Evaluation,ontheotherhand,isinfluencedby

saturation, but seemsneverthelessmore sensitive to context,more dependent on

external associations and a framework of reference, and thereforemore prone to

cross-linguisticvariability.”

As Da Pos and Green-Armytage (2007: 12) write: “There can be no single

‘correct’ colour for each emotion; emotions themselves are not one-dimensional.”

Forexample, in Italianwenotonlyuserossodi rabbia (‘redwithanger’),butalso

verdedirabbia(‘greenwithanger’),similarlytoBulgarian:Позеленявамотяд ‘go

greenwithanger’(Dobreva2014:196).

Within the same language, a colour word may be related with contrasting

emotional values – let us label it double polarity - similarly to themetaphorical,

multiplemeanings of the colour words that we highlighted above (see § 2.2). In

140

Italian, the colour green expresses both positive (in: verde speranza lit. ‘green

hope’70), and negative, emotional values, such as anger (see above), and envy in

verde di invidia, which corresponds to the following idioms English and Danish

idioms:greenwithenvy,grønafmisundelse.

In English, to see red is an expression of anger, but red-letter day is an

expressionofjoy.Ingeneral,theredcolourtermismostcommonlyassociatedwith

joy(example23),love(seetheredroseasasymboloflove),andpassion:

23) red passion, It. passione rossa (which is the name of the Ferrari Owners Club;

http://www.ferrariclubtorino.it/new/images/Documenti/schedaeventochivasso.pdf;

StandDecember2015).

On the negative side, red is related to anger (see above), urgency, warning,

fear,anddanger(example24):

24) redallert,Da.rødallarm,It.allarmerosso.

By contrast, black generally represents negative emotions, such as fear,

depression,badluck,hopeless,andgloomy:

25) Da.ensortdag,It.unagiornatanera(lit.‘ablackday’,met.off-day,badday)

26) Da.atsesortpåtingene(lit.‘toseeblackonthethings’,met.‘tolookonthedarkside

ofthings’),It.vederetuttonero(lit.toseeeverythingblack’,met.‘tobeapessimist’)

27) blackhumour,Da.sorthumor,It.humornero

28) blackmood,dasorthumør,It.nero

29) blackdog–depression

30) blackandblue–battered;Da.guloggrøn(‘yellowandgreen’)

31) Da.densortebog(lit.‘theblackbook’,i.e.a(black)notebookwhereanauthoritarian

person(suchasateacher)registershissubordinates’(hispupils’)errors)

70 The‘hope’value,whichisattributedtothegreencolourinItalian,canberelatedtothe

DanishandItalianusesofDanishveddetgrønnebord(lit. ‘atthegreentable’;met.. ‘inthe examination room’; https://www.youtube.com/user/veddetgronnebord; standDecember 2015), while Italian al tavolo verde ‘(lit. ‘at the green table’; see § 2.2.1),respectively.

141

32) Da.densorteskole (lit. ‘theblackschool’, i.e.anold-fashioned,reactionaryteaching

systembuildingonrotelearningandteachers’authority)

33) Da.sortsnak(lit.‘blacktalk’,i.e.nonsense)

34) Da.atsnakkesort(lit.‘totalkblack’,met.‘totalknonsense’)

35) It.cronacanera(lit.‘blacknews’,i.e.crimenews,crimepages)

With regard to blue (see note 10), the two Russian corresponding terms,

namely sinij and goluboj, show distinct emotional connotations and interesting

diachronicchanges,asreportedbyParamei(2005:14):

In semantics of sinij, realizationof extremedegreesofhue intensity (bright,

saturatedversusdim)isconceivedtocallforpositiveaswellasnegativeemotional

associations (Alimpieva, 1983).By comparison,goluboj conveyspositive emotional

expressive features and is commonly associated with tender, affectionate, soft

(Alimpieva, 1980, 1982b, 1983).Thenuanceofcloudlessandserenehasadheredto

goluboj under the influence of German and French 19th-century romanticism. It

thence has transferred to its abstract (poetic) connotations implying cloudless

insouciance,unrealisticallysanguine(Wade, 1985),oratthebeginningofthe20th

century,theunearthlyorinnocent(Grebenšcikova,2002).

4.Conclusion

Asexpectedinanintegrativeperspective,ontheonehand,metaphoricaluses

ofcolourtermssharecommontendencies(whicharebasedonembodiedfeatures

or conventionally established ones), and show significant variations, on the other

hand.

Furthermore, colour terms in context assume a multiplicity of metaphoric

meanings,byshowingbothinter-andintralinguisticvariations,whichcharacterize

also thepositiveornegativevaluesassociated to themetaphoricaluseofacolour

word.

The cognitive force, vagueness, and ambiguity of themetaphorical processes

combinewiththerichnessofthechromaticspectrumanditsmultifarioushues,to

142

represent the complexity and variety of emotion in their common and diverse

forms.

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ColourVerbsinEnglishandRomanianAdinaCameliaBleotu(UniversityofBucharest)

1.Aim

The aim of this paper is to take a comparative look at verbs derived fromcolour names in two languages: English (a Germanic language) and Romanian (aRomance language), pointing out the differences between them. In addition, thepaper provides a syntactic representation of colour verbs in the spanningframework, a refined Distributed Morphology framework which assumes that aword is a span, i.e. a sequence of complement heads in an extended projection(Svenonius2012,2014),alongwithBrody’sideathattherearenointermediaryheads(noX-bar).Thismakestheanalysisbotheconomicalandelegant.Iwilltrytoshowthat the spanning framework manages to account quite well, even better thanincorporation(Hale&Keyser2002),forthedifferencesbetweencolourverbsinthetwo languages, for instance, the difference between the English verb to blacken,where–enisasuffix,beingpositionedattheendoftheword,andtheRomanianaînnegri(lit.toin-black-verbalsuffix),wherethereisaprefixîn-precedingthecolourname.

2.RemarksonColourVerbs

Colour verbs have not received much focused attention in the generativegrammar literature. They have been listed under the label deadjectival verbs andchangeofstateverbs(Hale&Keyser2002),andtreatedaccordingly;however,noGGstudyhasexplicitydealtwiththeminanextensiveandspecificway.

Infact,eventhelabelsthattheyhavebeenputunderareproblematic.Firstofall,itisnotthatclearthatcolourverbsarederivedfromadjectives.Isaverbsuchastoyellowderivedfromanadjectiveorfromanoun:thenounyellow71,orthesilentnounCOLOURfollowedbytheadjectiveyellow, inasilentitemtheoryàlaKayne(Kayne 2003)?Moreover, if one looksmore in depth, one realizes that even thisquestion starts from the assumption that colour verbs should be derived from

71 In a sentence such as I like yellow, yellowmay be taken to be a noun, so onemight

assumetheverbyellow isderivedfromthenounyellowratherthanfromtheadjective.Moreover, ifconsideredanoun,yellowcouldevenbearguedtohavethethematicroleGoalorEndpointinasentencesuchasThewallturnedyellow.

146

categories (noun, adjective). However, there is an alternative to that, namely,arguingthattheyarederivedfromroots(Levinson2007),which,intheirturn,canbecategorialornaked,bearingno informationwhatsoever. Suchmatters areveryhardtoestablishinthecaseofEnglish,wheretheverbandthenoun/theadjective(andtheroot)sooftenhave thesame form,as in thecaseof theverb toblue, forinstance72. Romanian differs from English in that denominal/deadjectival verbspresentaverbalsuffixattheend,indicatingtheverbalconjugation,asonecannoteforaalbăstri(lit.toblue-verbalsuffix).AverbalsuffixmaybearguedtobepresentinEnglishaswell,althoughintheformofanullmorpheme.Whilethepresenceoftheverbalsuffixcreatesacleardifferencebetweenverbsandnouns/adjectives,itisstilldifficult toestablishwhethertheverbcomesfromtheN/A,andtheN/Amaycomefromaroot,orwhetherboththeverbandtheN/Acomefromthesameroot.Onemightverywellarguethatalbăstri(V)comesfromalbastru(N/A),andthelastvowelwaselided,orthatalbăstriandalbastruhavethecommonrootalbastr-.

Asforthechangeofstatelabel,itisagaindebatablewhetheritcancapturethecomplex behaviour of colour verbs. Essentially, colour verbs have twomeanings,both telic: (a) tobecome/ to turna certaincolour (an inchoativemeaning) (b) tomakesmthbecomeacertaincolour(acausativemeaning).Toblue,forinstance,canmeaneither(1a)toturnblue,or(1b)tomakesmthblue.

(1) a.Theskybluedasthesunrose. b.Shewantstoblueherhair.

Similarly,bothmeaningscanbeexpressednotonlybyaverbwhose form is

identicaltotheadjective/nounitderivesfrom,butbyasuffixedverbliketowhiten(2).(2) a.Herhairwhitenedwiththepassingoftime. b.Thetoothpastewhitensyourteeth.

Syntactically, these two meanings correlate with two different syntactic

configurations: an intransitive configuration (unaccusative) and a transitiveconfiguration. In Romanian, the firstmeaning can be expressed bymeans of theverb(3a)orbymeansoftheverbandareflexivepronoun/clitic(3b).(3) a.FataaroşitlavederealuiIon. Girl-thehasreddened/blushedatsightofJohn. ThegirlblushedatseeingJohn.’ b.Fatas-aînroşitlavederealuiIon. Girl-thereflexive3rdsg-hasin-red-PastPartatsight-ArtFem,sgofJohn. ThegirlreddenedatseeingJohn.’

72 However, this is not so in the case of to blacken, towhiten, to redden,where the verb

makesuseofthesuffix–en.

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From an aspectual point of view, verbs denoting colour processes are telic.However,thechangeofstatetheyexpressisoftengradual.Theydisplaybothtelicandatelicproperties,combiningwithfor-phrasesandin-phrasesalike(4).

(4) a.Ireddenedthewallin5minutes. b.Ireddenedthewallforanhour.

Forthisreason,ratherthanarguingthatcolourverbsarechangeofstateverbs,onemightassumetheyaredegreeachievements(Dowty1979,Hay,Kennedy&Levin1999).

3.ColourVerbsinEnglishversusColourVerbsinRomanian

English makes use of three types of verbs/ verbal constructions to denote

processesrelatedtocolour:(i)verbswhoseformisidenticaltothatoftheadjective/nountheyarederivedfrom(suchastoblue,togray,toyellow,tobrown,togreen),(ii)verbscreatedwiththesuffix–en(suchastowhiten,toblacken,toredden),(iii)verbal paraphrases (such as to turn pink/ orange, or to make something pink/orange).MostEnglishcolourverbshavethesameformasthenoun/adjectivetheyderivefrom,whichisinlinewiththegeneralobservationthatEnglishtendstouseidenticaldenominal/deadjectivalverbs(Hale&Keyser2002).

InRomanian, this is not the case; one cannote that the verb and theN/Aneverhaveidenticalforms,asthereisalwaysaverbalsuffixattheendoftheword,indicating the verbaldeclension (i)aalbi lit. ‘towhite-verbal suffix’, a (se) roşi tored-verbalsuffix’,agălbeni toyellow-verbalsuffix’,aalbăstri toblue-verbalsuffix’.One alsouses (ii) verbal paraphrases such asa face ca ceva să fie roz/ gri/maro/portocaliu ‘tocausethatsomethingshouldbepink/gray/brown/orange’,and(iii)verbscreatedwiththeprefixîn-(aîn-ălb-i‘toprefix-white-verbalsuffix’-towhiten,aîn-negr-i ‘to prefix-black-verbal suffix’- to blacken, a în-roş-i ‘to prefix-red-verbalsuffix’- to redden,a în-gălben-i ‘toprefix-yellow-verbal suffix’,a în-verz-i ‘toprefix-green-verbalsuffix’)(5b,6b).

(5) (a)

Colour Verb(s)inEnglish(http://www.oxforddictionaries.com)

white to whiten - to become white or whiter: Shegrippedthe handle untilherknuckleswhitened.-tomakesmthwhiteorwhiter:Snowwhitenedthemountaintops.

grey togrey-(ofhair)tobecomegrey:Herhairgreyed.

pink topink-(ofacarengine)tomakeknockingsoundsbecausethefuelisnotburningcorrectly(itdoesnotcomefromthecolourpink)

red toredden-tobecomered:Theskyisreddening.-tomakesmthred:barearmsreddenedbysunandwind-toblush:Lynreddenedatthedescriptionofherself.

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- (of the eyes) become pink as the rims as a result of crying: Thereddenedeyesfilledafresh.

brown tobrown-tobecomebrown:Grillthepizzauntilthecheesehasbrowned.-tomakesmthbrown:askilletinwhichfoodhasbeenbrowned.

orange missing yellow toyellow-tobecomeyellow,especiallywithage:Thecreampaintwasbeginning

toyellow.

green

togreen-tobecomegreen:Theroofwasgreeningwithlichen.-tomake(anurbanordesertarea)moreverdantbyplantingtreesorothervegetation:Theywillcontinuegreeningthemanytreelessanddustysuburbs.-tomakelessharmfultotheenvironment:tipsonhowtogreenyourhome

blue toblue-toturnblue:Thedaywouldhaze,theairbluingwithafternoon.-tomakesmthblue:Thelightdims,bluingtheretina.- to heat metal so as to give it a greyish-blue finish (asadjectiveblued):nickel-platedorbluedhooks-historicalwash (white clothes) with bluing: Theyblued the shirtsandstarchedtheuniforms.

black toblacken-toturnblack,especiallyasaresultofburning,decay,orbruising:Stoneblackenedbythesootofages.-tomakesmthblack:Hesetlighttothepaper,watchingtheendblackenasitburned.-todyeorcolour(thefaceorhair)blackforcamouflageorcosmeticeffect:Parasinfullcombatgearwithblackenedfaces.-todamageordestroy(someone’sreputation)byspeakingbadlyofthem:Shewon’tthankyouforblackeningherhusband’sname.

violet missing

(b)verbsidenticaltonouns -enverbs

verbalexpressions/constructionsrequired

togrey,tobrown,toyellow,togreen,toblue

towhiten,toredden,toblacken

tomakesmthpink/orange/violet

(6) (a)

Colour Verb(s)inRomanian(http://dexonline.ro)

alb(white) aalbi‘towhite-suffix’–(refl,intrans)tobecomewhite-(trans)tomakesmthwhite(ofhair)-toturnwhiteaînălbi‘toprefix-white-suffix’-thesameas‘aalbi’

gri(grey) missing

roz(pink) missing

roşu(red) a(se)roşi‘to(reflexiveclitic3rdp)red-suffix’-(intrans,reflexive)tobecomered-(trans)tomakesmthreda(se)înroşi‘to(reflexiveclitic3rdp)prefix-red-suffix’

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-(refl)tobecomered-(transs)tomakesmthred;topaintsmth(eggs)

maro(brown)

missing

oranj(orange)

missing

galben(yellow)

a(se)îngălbeni‘to(reflexiveclitic3rdp)prefix-yellow-suffix’-tobecomeyellow-tomakesmthyellowagălbeni‘to(reflexiveclitic3rdp)yellow-suffix’-tobecomeyellow-tomakesmthyellow

verde(green)

aînverzi‘togreen-suffix’-(trans)topaintgreen,tostainwithgreen-(intrans,reflexive)tobecomegreen-(intrans)toturngreen,tosprout

albastru(blue)

aalbăstri‘toblue-suffix’-sameasaînălbăstri,alsotorinseclothesaînălbăstri‘toprefix-blue-suffix’-(intrans,reflexive)toturnblue;(aboutpeople)toturnblueoutofanger-(trans)tomakesmthblue

negru(black)

aînnegri‘toprefix-black-suffix’-toturnblack-tomakesmthblack

violet(violet)

missing

(b)verbsderivedfromnouns+theverbalsuffixfortheconjugation

În-verbs

verbalexpressions/constructionsrequired

aalbi,a(se)roşi,agălbeni,aalbăstri

aînălbi,aînroşi,aîngălbeni,aînverzi,aînălbăstri,aînnegri

afacecacevasăfieoranj/roz/violet(‘tocausethatsmthconjBEorange/pink/violet’)

Apart from the inchoativemeaning and the causativemeaning, some colour

verbs have acquired specialized meanings such as the verb to green (which mayrefertocreatingparksandotherareaswithtreesandplantsinacityortomakingsomebodymoreawareofissuesrelatedtotheenvironment)ortheverbtoblue,aswellasthecorrespondingRomanianverbaalbăstri,forinstance(whichmayrefertorinsingclothes)(ascanbeseenin(5a),(6a)).Also,someRomanianverbshavebothaprefixedvariantandanon-prefixedone(aînălbi,aalbi;aalbăstri,aînălbăstri;agălbeni,aîngălbeni;aroşi,aînroşi).Outofthese,onlytheverbsinthepairaroşi,aînroşi differ: the first verb a roşi can be used intransitively with the meaning toblush’,whilethesecondverbcannot.

By looking at the tables in (5) and (6), one can note that the suffix –en inEnglish is usedwith fundamental colours (red,white, black),while, for the othercolours, no suffix is used. A possible explanation for this could be related to theconclusion reached by Berlin & Kay (1969, 1973) on the basis of a study with

150

speakers of twenty different languages that there are eleven fundamental colours(white,black, red,green,yellow,blue,brown,purple,pink,orange,andgray)andthere is a hierarchy of colour words. According to this hierarchy, all languagescontain terms forblackandwhite,and ifa languagecontains three terms, then itcontains a term for red73. Another explanation could be related to how old thewords are in thehistoryof language-white, black, redentered the languagequiteearlyinthe13thcentury,earlierthangreeninthe15thcenturyoryelloworpinkinthe16thcentury,orblueinthe17thcentury,accordingtoTheConciseOxfordDictionaryofEnglishEtymology(1991).

Incontrast,Romanianusestheprefixîn-inalmostallcases(althoughitallowsthe unprefixed variant aswell e.g.a roşi ‘to blush’). Just like English, it also usesparaphrases with more recent words denoting colours (roz ‘pink’, maro ‘brown’,portocaliu‘orange’).

4.TheIncorporationAnalysis

The traditional analysis of denominal and deadjectival verbs is theincorporationanalysisofHale&Keyser (2002),assumingthat thenoun/adjectiveincorporates into the verb.A verb such as redden is considered a change of stateverbderivedfromanadjectivalroot(7).

(7) Englishinchoativeredden(asinTheskyreddened)(Hale&Keyser2002:48)

V

2 DPV 5 2 thesky VAen-red

The causative is derived from the inchoative by combination with aphonologicallynull causativizing functionalhead intowhich the verbmoves afterpickinguptheinchoativemorphemeen-.

73 Inaddition,BerlinandKay(1969)furtherestablishthat,ifalanguagecontainsfourterms,thenit

containsatermforeithergreenoryellow(butnotboth);ifalanguagecontainsfiveterms,thenitcontainstermsforbothgreenandyellow;ifalanguagecontainssixterms,thenitcontainsatermfor blue; if a language contains seven terms, then it contains a term for brown; if a languagecontainseightormoreterms,thenitcontainstermsforpurple,pink,orange,and/orgray.

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(8) English causative redden (as inThe sunset reddened the sky) (Hale&Keyser2002:48)

v

2 vV

redden 2 DPV 5 2 thesky VA

While there may be differences in morphology across languages, the

derivationalrelationsstaythesame(Koontz-Garboden2014).IncontrasttoEnglish,forinstance,wheretheinchoativizingfunctionalhead(en-)isconsideredovert,andthecausativizingheadisnull,thereverseisassumedforNavajo:theinchoativizingfunctional head is assumed to be null, while the causativizing functional head isassumedtobeovert.

In order to capture the difference between English redden and Romanian aînroşi,onehastostipulatethat–enisasuffixandîn-isaprefix(9,10).

(9) V

2 DPV 5 2 cerul VAîn-roşu74

(10) v

2 vV

înroşi 2 DPV 5 2 cerul VA

Ifsuchinformationisnotretainedinthelexicon,thenonedoesnotget theappropriate affix-root ordering. The adjective will move into the verb andincorporate,combiningwiththeaffixinaccordancewithitsprefix/suffixstatus. 74 Whilethereisnoverbaînroşiwithaninchoativemeaning,thereisaverbaroşiwithan

inchoativemeaning.Also, there is a verba îngălbeni (lit. to in-yellow-verbal suffix’, toyellow), aswell as a verba înverzi (lit. to in-green-verbal suffix’ , to green) ora înălbi(lit. to in-white-verbal suffix’, to whiten), hence, it is not the case that there are noprefixedcolourverbswithaninchoativemeaninginRomanian.

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5.ASpanningAccountofColourVerbs

Inwhatfollows,Iprovideadifferentaccountofcolourverbsinthespanningframework,whicheliminatesmovementandgeneratesthecolourwordsbymeansof spelling out a sequence of complement heads. Adopting such a frameworkmanagestoaccountforthedatainamuchmoreeconomicalandelegantwaythanincorporation,asnomovementisrequired,andnoprefix/suffixinformationneedstoberetainedinthelexicon.

5.1.AGeneralPresentationofSpanningasaFramework

Spanning isaversionofDistributedMorphologywhereSpell-Outrecognizesspans rather than terminal nodes likeDMdoes or phrasal nodes like nanosyntaxdoes. Following Svenonius (2012), I will assume a span can be defined as acomplementsequenceofheadsinasingleextendedprojection,whereanextendedprojection(Grimshaw2005)ismadeofa lexicalheadanditsassociatedfunctionalprojections(DforN,TforV).

If, for instance, one takes a PP which contains a noun phrase DP1 with aprenominalpossessorDP2: (11) PP

2 PDP1 2 DP2D1 2 D1NumP 2 NumNPthespansinthemainprojectionlinewouldbe:(12) P-D1,P-D1-Num,P-D1-Num-N,D1-Num,D1-Num-N,Num-N

Thisbecomesvery clear if oneadopts the telescopeperspective assumed in

Brody’s(2000)mirrortheoryrepresentation,consideringphraselabelsredundant:

(13) PD1 2 D2NumN

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Amorpheme can spell out one head (which is a trivial span), two heads oreven more, on condition that the heads be in a complement relation with eachother. Head-movement thus becomes a matter of where in a span the wordlinearizes (Brody 2000), and there is a direct linearizationmechanism in Brody’sMirrorTheory(2000)throughwhichwordorderisreaddirectlyoffthestructure:(14) Word Mirror: The syntactic relation ‘X complement of Y’ is identical to an

inverse-ordermorphological relation ‘XspecifierofY’ (where the lattergivesrisetothemorphologicalstrucure[X[Y]linearizedfromlefttoright)

There are no intermediate projections, and unnecessary labels should be

eliminated. Given that it is always the head of a projection that selects anotherprojection, itseemslegitimatetoarguethatheadsselectheads,hence,there isnoneedtoresorttoredundantlabellingX/XPifonecanmakeuseofonelabelonly,X(Telescope).Inthisway,bymeansofTelescope,astructuresuchas(15):

(15) [ZPQZ[YPRY[XPSX...]]]

becomes

(16) Z2

QY 2 RXS

whereQ,R,SarethespecifiersofZ,Y,Xrespectively.Specifiersarelinearizedtotheleftoftheirheads,whileheadsarelinearizedtotheleftoftheircomplements.TheBrodyanapproachisadirectlinearizationtheory(DLT)wherelinearizationisread off the structure75. It is thus highly innovative as it allows one to state alanguage specificparameter concerningwhereamorphemespellsout rather thanresort to syntacticmovement.The location is indicatedbyBrodybymeansof [email protected],intheexamplein(17):

75 As shown by Ramchand (2014), this has a serious advantage over the Linear

Correspondence Axiom (LCA) tradition (Kayne 1994 a.o). In the antisymmetricalapproach,itisassumedthatasymmetricc-commandsmeansprecedence.Theproblemisthat, ina languagewhich lookshead-finalon thesurface,oneneeds to firstcreate theappropriatec-commandstructuresbeforelettingtheLCAlinearizeit,andthisisdonebyresorting to variousmovement operations,many of which are unmotivated. Hence, adesirable alternative to word order movements would be DLA (direct linearizationalgorithm).

154

(17) Z2

QY 2 RX@Sthediacritic@indicatesthatthemorphologicalword[X[Y[Z]]]spellsoutintheXposition of the tree, and the linearization would beQ R S [X-Y-Z]. In addition,Ramchand makes use of a * diacritic to indicate certain language specific factsrelated to linearization, inparticular, the fact that thehead thusnotated forms aword in the Brody-an sense with the head immediately below it. In Bangla, forinstance,onewouldhavesomethinglike(18).(18) Neg*

2 PFin@ 2 QT* 2

RAsp*2 SV@Linearizedas:PQ[Fin-Neg]RS[V-Asp-T]

Intheexampleabove,FinformsamirrortheoreticwordwithNeg,AspformsamirrortheoreticwordwithT,andVformsamirrortheoreticwordwithAsp.Theseare language specific factsaboutmorphological composition,and theyneed tobelearnedassuch.

5.2.SpanningAppliedtoColourVerbs

Iproposethatspanningcanaccountfordenominalanddeadjectivalverbsaswell: a single item (‘dance’, ‘shelve’, ‘hammer’) spells out a span, a complementsequence involving N, V and v (<N, V, v>) in the simplest case. Starting fromRamchand’sanalysisofverbs(2008), inthecaseofthedenominalverbdance,onecanconstructthefollowingrepresentation:

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(19) Init@*2 ‘x’Proc*2 ‘x’NdanceLinearizedasx[NProcInit]

AtL-Match(LexicalMatch)76,thisstructurewillgiverisetotheitem<dance-Ø-Ø>. For a verb like corral, an <init, Proc, Goal, Place, N> (using Pantcheva’sanalysisofprepositions(2011)),onecanassumethatthestructureislinearizedasx[Proc-Init–Place-Goal–N]y.

Iarguethatthespanningframeworkcanaccountforcolourverbsaswell.Asitdoesnotresort tohead-movement, it ismoreeconomical than incorporationand,hence,preferable.Averbliketobluereceivesthefollowingrepresentations:

(20) (a)inchoative

Proc*@ 2 ‘x’AblueLinearizedasx[AProc](b)causative Init*@ 2 ‘x’Proc*77 2 ‘y’AblueLinearizedasx[AProcInit]y

AccordingtoHale&Keyser(2002),-enisalwaysinchoative,andthecausativemeaningisaresultofcombiningwithav(cause).Suchaperspectiveassumesthattherewould be a single lexical entry for the suffix –en in English. Thiswould, of

76 LexicalMatch is the first stepof SpellOut in spanning, involving syntactic categories;

thesecondisInsertanditinvolvesphonologicalinformation. 77 Onecouldverywellplacethe@diacriticattheInitlevel.Theresultwouldbethesame.

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course,beanoption(20a,b).Analternativetothiswouldbetoassumethat–enhasaninchoativemeaninginaninchoativesentenceandacausativeoneinacausativemeaninginacausativesentence,whichwouldleadtohavingtwolexicalentriesfor-en:

(21) (a)inchoative

Proc*@-en

2 ‘x’AredLinearizedasx[AProc] (b)causative(i)Init* 2 ‘x’Proc@*-en 2 ‘y’AredLinearizedasx[AProcInit]y(ii)Init@*-en 2 ‘x’Proc* 2 ‘y’AredLinearizedasx[AProcInit]y

English represents a particular case among languages as there is no verbalendingsuffix in thebare infinitive.This isnot thecase inRomanian,whereverbspresentasuffixindicatingtheverbaldeclension(-a,-ea,-e,i/î).Thequestionwouldbewheretoplacethissuffix,whetheritshouldbeplacedunderProcorunderInit.Givenitslackofmeaning,placingitunderProcwouldbeabitmisleadingperhapsand projecting a VAff immediately above A might be a better option78. Theinchoativearoşi(lit.tored-verbalsuffix’)wouldreceivethisrepresentation:

78 Suchaprojectioncanbe represented forEnglishaswell,with theonlydifference that

theaffixisanullmorpheme.

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(22) Proc@*2

‘x’ VAff*-i 2 ‘x’AroşuLinearizedasx[AVAffProc]

A verb such as a îngălbeni (lit. to en-yellow-verbal suffix’) would berepresentedas:(23) (a)inchoative

Proc@*în-2

‘x’ VAff*-i 2 ‘x’A@galben yellow’Linearizedasx[[Proc][AVaff]]

(b)causative(i)Init* 2 ‘x’Proc@*în- 2 ‘y’VAff*-i 2 ‘y’A@galbenyellow’Linearizedasx[[ProcInit][AVaff]]y (ii)Init@*în- 2 ‘x’Proc* 2 ‘y’VAff*-i 2‘y’A@galbenyellow’Linearizedasx[[ProcInit][AVaff]]y

158

JustasinEnglish,onecaneitherconsiderîn-asaninchoativemarkerbothintheinchoativestructureandinthecausativeone,oronecanoptfortwodifferentlexicalentries.Anothervariantofanalysiswouldbetoascribe-enaspatialmeaning.A reason for this is the fact that there are verbs which do not need this affix toexpressinchoativemeaningorcausativemeaningforthatmatter(liketoblueortogreen). Another reason would be the similarity between the affix en and theprepositionin(inRomaniantheaffixhasanidenticalformtotheprepositionîn).Inthisway,onewouldtreattheverbtoreddenasaspecialcaseofchangeoflocation/state(toreddenas topassintoastateofred’or tocausesmthtopassintoastateofred’(insuchananalysis,thecolournameistreatedasanoun):

(24)Init* 2 ‘x’Proc* 2 ‘y’Goal@*en 2 ‘y’Place* 2 ‘y’N red Linearizedasx[[N-Place-Goal][Init-Proc]]y

AsimilaranalysiscanbeprovidedforRomanian(@wouldalsoappearnexttotheNtogetthe[GoalPlaceN]ordering):(25)Init* 2 ‘x’Proc* 2 ‘y’Vaff*-i2 ‘y’ Goal@*în- 2 ‘y’Place* 2 ‘y’N@ roşu Linearizedasx[[Goal-Place]-[N]-Vaff-Init-Proc]]y

Such a representationwould be verymuch in linewith theories of localismwhich consider that spatialmovement operatesnot only in the field of (physical)

159

location,butalsoinamoremetaphoricalway(Gruber1965),changeofstateverbsbeinginasensechangeoflocationverbs.

Conclusion

In conclusion, in the spanning account, the lexicon does not need to storewhethertheaffix isaprefixorasuffix.Spanningsimplyderivestherightorderofthemorphemesbylinearizingthestructureaccordingtoadirectlinearization(DL)mechanism.Bygivingupheadmovement,onecanveryelegantly account for theorderingofmorphemesincolourverbs.EnglishandRomanianprovideinterestingexampleswhere the affix-rootordering is theotherway round, and spanning cancapturethiscontrast inasensibleway.As fortheexactreasonwhycertaincolourverbshaveaffixesandothersdonot,Ibelievethiscanbeexplainedbyatheoryofcolour hierarchy (Berlin & Kay (1969, 1973), arguing that certain colours/ colournames aremore fundamental than others, and/ or by the history of language(s),registering older and newer colour terms. It seems to be that, in the case of theaffixed colour verbs, the affixes have combined with the names of morefundamentalcolours,whichalsoenteredthelanguagesearlier.References

Adger, D. (2010). Variability and grammatical architecture. Available online:http://ling.auf.net/lingBuzz/001176[Accessed12April2015]

Berlin,B.andKay,P.(1969).BasicColorTerms.Berkeley:UniversityofCaliforniaPressBerlin, B. and Kay, P. (1973). "Basic Color Terms: Their Universality and Evolution".

Language49(1).245-248Brody, M. (2000). "Mirror theory: Syntactic representation in perfect syntax". Linguistic

Inquiry31(1).29-56.Dowty, D. (1979).Word Meaning and Montague Grammar. The Semantics of Verbs and

TimesinGenerativeSemanticsandinMontague’sPTQ.Dordrecht:Reidel.Gruber,J.S.(1965).Studiesinlexicalsemantics.Cambridge:MIT.Hale, K. and S. J. Keyser. (2002). Prolegomenon to a Theory of Argument Structure.

Cambridge:MIT.Hay J., Kennedy, C. and Levin, B. (1999). "Scalar Structure Underlies Telicity in Degree

Achievements". In Mathews T. and Strolovitch , D. (eds). SALT IX. Ithaca: CLCPublications.127-144.

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Svenonius,G.(2012).Spanning.Ms.UniversityofTromsøSvenonius,G.(2014).SpansandWords.Ms.UniversityofTromsøDictionariesThe ConciseOxford dictionary of English etymology. (1986). Ed. by Hoad, T. F. New

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