Russian Words for blue hues?

Discussion in 'Linguistics' started by Dinosaur, Dec 18, 2011.

  1. Dinosaur Rational Skeptic Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    4,885
    Many years ago somebody told me that Russian included two different words for blue hues. I have been curious about the hues corresponding to these words, but never did any related research.

    Tonight my life partner & I had dinner with friend of hers who is a Russian immigrant. Sophia left Russia circa 20+ years ago & still speaks Russian with other immigrants.

    I asked her about the two Russian words for blue. She was unaware of there being two words for blue hues.

    She might have forgotten, which I doubt. She is from Baku near the Black Sea & might speak a dialect different from that spoken by Russians from the original Russian area which includes Moscow. Perhaps my friend from many years ago was mistaken.

    Does anyone her have knowledge on this subject? Assuming that there are two Russian words for Blue Hues, suppose I was shown two set of blue hues, one relating to one of the Russian words & the other relating to the second word, how might I view the two sets?
    Light blue & dark blue

    Blue & bluish green

    Blue & some purple hue​
     
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  3. Cifo Day destroys the night, Registered Senior Member

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    685
    Two? I'll confuse you with the three that I found:
    • синий (deep blue)
    • голубой (light blue)
    • лазурный (azure blue)

    ... but it's not as though English has only one word for "blue". Consider:
    • aquamarine
    • azure
    • blue
    • cerulean
    • cobalt
    • indigo
    • navy
    • teal
    • turquoise
    • ultramarine

    ... or for red:
    • carmine
    • cerise
    • crimson
    • magenta
    • maroon
    • pink
    • puce
    • rose
    • salmon
    • scarlet
    • vermilion

    ... or for ...
     
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  5. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    24,690
    I always thought of indigio as a shade of purple rather than blue.
    Like most men I think women sometimes call something that's black "navy blue" just to confuse us.
    Looks green to me but the dictionary defines it as "greenish-blue." I've never seen the actual bird.
    Hey, pink is not red, it's pink!
    And vermilion is orange!
     
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  7. Cifo Day destroys the night, Registered Senior Member

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    685
    Yeah, for teal (likewise indigo, vermilion, etc), is the color a greenish blue or a bluish green (likewise a purplish blue or a bluish purple, or orangy red, or a reddish orange)?

    Of the six primary and secondary colors, I was thinking of pink as a shade of red.

    Then again, we call orangy and bluish traffic lights "yellow" and "green" (and I still haven't figured out that one).
     
  8. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

    Messages:
    24,690
    I guess I've spent too much time in the company of women. I see pink as pink. Perhaps it's because purple is my favorite color so I've spent a lot of time looking at various shades of it for paint, wallpaper, clothes and pens. I'm sure I have one of every pair of purple argyle socks ever made. Well wait, I don't mean one sock. How can I make sense out of that sentence anyway??

    But I still think "navy blue" is a scam and there's no such thing.
    Huh. They look perfectly yellow and green to me. I take your point that many "green" lights have a strong bluish component, but I've never seen one with so much blue that I'd waffle on naming the color. They look far more green than blue to me. But I'd never call a yellow light "orangish yellow." I very seldom see that.
     

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