Works of grant allen, p.698
Works of Grant Allen, page 698
With regard to the Pacific Islanders, my fullest information comes from the Rev. S. J. Whitmee, a missionary in Samoa, whose name is already well known to philologists and students of folk-lore, as that of a careful and strictly scientific observer. Mr. Whitmee considers that the Samoans can “distinguish all the prismatic colours, and many of the mixed shades.” They have separate names for blue and green, and others for the minor modifications of these hues. They have also a separate name for violet. They discriminate such intermediate or mixed colours as mauve, lilac, orange, and purple; they use distinct terms for varieties of red (crimson and brick red); and they have a name for chocolate-brown. On the whole, their nomenclature seems somewhat awkward and confused, but their perception perfect: and as to taste, “they like bright colours,” says Mr. Whitmee, “such as mauve, bright blue, purple, magenta, &c.; but they do not mix these in a grotesque manner in their dress to any great extent. . . . Large showy patterns in prints, &c., they will not look at. Bright red is not used to any great extent, and yellow is not at all in favour.” The Hawaiians are equally discriminative of colour distinctions, and one whom I had the opportunity of questioning showed quite as acute sensibility as any European. Mrs. Bird mentions dresses of pure white, crimson, yellow, orange, scarlet, blue, or light green as worn by the women; and throughout her book she bears constant testimony to the universal feeling for colour harmony. I specially note that she mentions the use of green for decorative purposes in embroidery. Lord G. Campbell remarks that the Admiralty Islanders who came on board the Challenger to be painted were equally pleased with daubs of red or of green pigment. In New Guinea, blue lines are employed for tattooing, and the natives paint their bodies with red, yellow, and black. The petticoats worn by the women on gala days are dyed red and green, with intermediate bands of straw-colour. The New Zealanders stain themselves with red ochre; but I find ear-drops of green jade mentioned among their favourite ornaments. Their blue tattoo marks are too well known to require special mention. As regards the Malay Archipelago generally, Mr. Wallace’s vocabularies contain words for black, white, red, and blue in thirty-three Malayan languages. Mr. W. Gifford Palgrave mentions white, yellow, red, green, and blue among the dyes used by the Philippine Islanders. For Australia, I find in a vocabulary of the Wailwun language separate words for black, red, yellow, green, and brown, and several accompanying lists of other dialects, collected by different authorities, show similar results. I may add that whenever I have had the opportunity of consulting intelligent travellers upon this subject, they have always at once given their opinion that the savages with whom they were conversant distinguished all colours perfectly.
Finally, even the wretched Andaman Islanders, probably the lowest known specimens of the human race, daub their faces with red and white.
Such are a few selected instances from the mass of evidence which might be adduced in favour of the belief that all existing races possess a fully-developed colour-sense. I think they will probably suffice to show the general truth of our proposition. And if savages so low as some of these actually enjoy such high powers of discrimination, can we consistently deny the like to the early Hebrews and Akhaians? I have not so high an opinion as Mr. Gladstone of the rude Homeric warriors or the fierce conquerors of Lower Syria, but at least I cannot believe that they were less advanced in simple sensuous perceptions than the naked Todas or the wild half-human Andamanese.
And now let us go on to inquire whether we cannot find abundant proofs of a highly evolved colour-sense long before the period to which the criticisms of Geiger and Magnus refer.
First, in our backward view we will take the case of Nineveh. Of the enamelled bricks dug up in this city Sir A. H. Layard says, “The colors (sic) have faded, but were probably once as bright as the enamels of Khorsabad. The outlines are white, and the ground a pale blue and olive green. The only other color used is a dull yellow.” In many of these cases blue figures occur on a green ground, which clearly shows that the two colours were accurately discriminated. The pigments consist of an antimoniate of lead for the yellow; an oxide of tin for the white; a copper for the blue; and a sub-oxide of copper for the red. Of Babylonian bricks the same authority observes, “The principal colours are a brilliant blue, red, a deep yellow, white, and black.” The Rev. A. H. Sayce, the distinguished Assyriologist, writes to me as follows:— “The Assyrian language seems to have had no word for ‘green.’ Sometimes ‘green’ is represented by arku, ‘yellow,’ but more commonly by ‘samu or ‘sihmu ‘blue’ (like the Welsh glas). But the enamelled bricks show that both the colours blue and green were known and used.” An inspection of the existing remains in the Louvre and the British Museum will sufficiently prove to the most sceptical that the colour-sense of the Assyrians was essentially identical with our own.
As to the Egyptians, proof seems almost unnecessary; yet, for the sake of formality, it must be given. “Their colours,” says Sir Gardner Wilkinson, “were principally blue, red, green, black, yellow, and white. The red was an earthy bole; the yellow an iron ochre; the green was a mixture of a little ochre with a pulverulent glass, made by vitrifying the oxides of copper and iron with sand and soda; the blue was a glass of like composition without the ochreous addition; the black was a bone or ivory black; and the white a very pure chalk.” Here the words which I have italicised clearly prove that the difference between blue and green was perfectly perceived, and that pigments were specially prepared to show the two colours. Again, Sir Gardner observes, “With the Egyptians the favourite combination of colour was red, blue, and green; when black was introduced, yellow was added to harmonise with it.” Nor is this all; for though they had few mixed colours, yet “purple, pink, orange, and brown are met with.” A modern author, speaking of their ceramic art, uses language of even a more decided kind.
“One finds in the rich series of the Louvre,” says Jacquemart, “pieces with white glaze, heightened with patterns incrusted or painted in black, blue, dark violet, green, and even red; the green and the copper blue blend with cobalt blue, black, brown, violet of manganese, white, and yellow. What proves, beside, with what certainty the potters operated these combinations is, that we meet with Egyptian porcelains where the diverse tints occupy very confined spaces, and contrast strongly the one with the other; a blue statuette has the face coloured with golden yellow; dark blue bracelets bear upon their surface hieroglyphics in sky blue, or vice versa.” “Here, then, is complete science, consummate experience, and precision of execution.”
But a few hours spent at the British Museum, especially amongst the mummy-cases, will do more to convince the reader of the Egyptian colour-sense than pages of quotation. Among the wall-paintings, too, I would call particular attention to those numbered 170, 177, 180, 181, and many neighbouring specimens of the eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties.
As regards the date of these coloured remains, I made inquiries of Dr. Birch, who kindly informed me that the system of colouring culminated under the two dynasties above-mentioned, and grew gradually debased thenceforward. Accordingly, the finest specimens of Egyptian colouration are far anterior to the earliest conjectural date ever proposed for the Homeric poems.
Can we go still further back, to the prehistoric age, and show by the evidence of existing remains that even then man possessed a developed colour-perception? I believe that we can, to some slight extent at least.
Of course, in dealing with the art-products of the most primitive period, we must not expect to find such unmistakable proofs as those of pigments and paintings which we meet with in Egypt and Assyria. If the savage races of the present day were to die out and leave no traces but those of their scanty implements, we could hardly hope to discover many marks of their now undeniable use of colour. The tattooing, the body-paints, the strips of coloured cloth, the flowers and feathers, all would be lost by decay. Even the rude decorations of the pottery would probably fade by long exposure to earth, rain, and air. The only remains which could convey to us some faint idea of that love for colour which distinguishes the real savage would be the few permanently-coloured implements of stone or metal. I was standing with a friend one day by the glass cases in the Oxford Museum which contain the modern savage utensils, when he called my attention to a stone hatchet (I think from the Admiralty Islands), bound to its wooden handle by a coil of red and yellow cord, arranged so as to form a pretty pattern. We had been talking upon this very subject, and he rightly pointed out at once that if the hatchet were buried in the earth for a very short period, the red and yellow cord would decay, and no mark of the original æsthetic intention would be left. Similarly, if we did not learn from the actual words of Cæsar, and the constant allusions of the Roman poets, that the ancient Welsh stained their bodies blue, we should know almost nothing about their sense of colour. The conditions under which we find prehistoric remains — buried in barrows, covered up in alluvium, sunk in lakes, or hidden in the damp floor of caves — necessarily preclude the possibility of obtaining any very definite information on this head. Still the evidence, such as it is, distinctly favours the belief in a normal colour-sense amongst these most primitive men.
To begin with the highest stratum of the prehistoric period, we may put in the evidence of Dr. Schliemann, who gives plates of red and yellow Mycenæan pottery, with colours distinctly brilliant and fairly well demarcated. It is true, no greens or blues appear upon these vessels, but the reason for this, as we shall hereafter see, was much more probably due to the lack of a proper pigment than to a deficiency of the colour-sense. Among the gems of Mycenæ, agate, porphyry, and greenstone occur, and we can hardly doubt that their colour was their chief recommendation in the eyes of the early chieftains in whose graves they are discovered. Amber and lapis lazuli are also found, showing a probable knowledge of yellow and blue. Indeed, the mere fact that gold and silver vessels are used, proves a certain amount of colour perception, for gold only differs from silver in its colour, and could not be discriminated in any other way, except by chemical tests.
But that some at least of the Bronze Age savages possessed a taste for blue, and employed it in their arts, is conclusively shown by a bracelet from the Swiss lake dwellings, which has a red ground, distinctly and prettily enamelled with yellow and blue bands in a regular pattern. Blue and white glass beads also form part of the treasure recovered from the débris of these primæval villages.
Going back to the Stone Age, we find similar evidence, though of a scanty sort. “Stones remarkable either for their colour or shape,” says Dr. Evans, “appear at all times to have attracted the attention of mankind, and frequently to have served as personal ornaments.” Among the ordinary materials of stone weapons Damour mentions, “quartz, agate, flint, jasper, obsidian, fibrolite, jade, chloromelanite, amphibolite, aphanite, diorite, saussurite, and staurotide;” and we can hardly fail to notice that many of these minerals are remarkable for their beauty of colour. “In the Christy collection,” says Dr. Evans elsewhere, “is a bola formed of a polished spherical red stone, mounted in such a manner as to show a considerable portion of its surface, which has evidently been regarded as too handsome to be entirely concealed by the leather.” Canon Greenwell found beads of bluish-green glass in barrows in Wiltshire. Amber was also found in similar situations; and beads of rose-quartz, belonging to the Stone Age, are recorded at Argenteuil. Pebbles, selected apparently for their beauty, are constant accompaniments of the dead, some of them being described as “sea-green,” “pink,” and “red.” How far back in time these deposits may reach I cannot say; but in one case at least, that of the Dardanelles remains, I find it distinctly stated that they are of palæolithic age, “and the most common material is red or other coloured jasper.” The Christy collection also includes axes from Barbadoes of “greenstone, mottled jade, green jasper, and a hard light green slate.” I may add that the stone implements in Dr. Schliemann’s Trojan collection at South Kensington from all depths, though much begrimed by age, show traces of deep colour in many different shades. The most conclusive of all proofs, however, is the occurrence of ochre in barrows. And Dr. Rollestone informs me that he has constantly found lumps of ruddle, doubtless for personal ornamentation, laid by the side of the dead. He thinks the general character of prehistoric remains can leave no doubt on the mind of an expert that primitive man possessed a considerable perception of colour.
Few and inconclusive as these facts undoubtedly are, they yet afford a reasonable presumption in favour of a colour-sense in the earliest members of the human race. However, it will not be necessary to base any part of our argument, as against Mr. Gladstone and Dr. Magnus, upon so insecure a foundation. We may rest content with the cases of the Egyptians and the modern savages, having the post-historic theory here on the horns of a dilemma which it cannot easily escape. If, on the one hand, we put forward only the case of Egypt, it might be answered that the development of a colour-sense is a question of relative culture, not of mere chronological order; and if, on the other hand, we put forward only the case of modern savages, it might be answered that the development of a colour-sense is a question of chronological order, not of relative culture; but if we put forward the two cases together, it will hardly be possible for any one to shirk the first difficulty by answering us in one way, and then to shirk the second difficulty by answering us in the other.
When we examine the extraneous arguments by which the theory is supported, we find they have very little real weight. Thus it has been suggested that colour-blindness may be a survival from this earliest type of vision; but when we look a little deeper into the question we recollect that the commonest form of colour-blindness is that which cannot discriminate red from green — whereas red ought, according to the theory, to be the most universally discriminable of all — while it is yet quite able to discriminate green from blue. Furthermore, there is good reason for believing that colour-blindness is far commoner in civilised communities than amongst savage tribes. According to M. Favre, no less than 3,000,000 persons in France are afflicted with this defect, while Stilling places the proportion in Western Europe generally at 5 per cent. On the other hand, the abnormality appears to be infrequent or unknown amongst the lower races; so that it must be regarded rather as a disease of civilisation than as a survival from the primitive state. Again, Dr. Magnus quotes Geiger’s remarks about the dog and the flower to prove that quantitative consciousness of intensity has nothing to do with qualitative consciousness of kind; or, as Mr. Gladstone puts it, “that the dog, with his wonderful faculty of scent, has no power of distinction between smells which are agreeable and smells which are offensive.” Really, as we have already seen, there is no reason under the sun why a dog should find the smell of flowers affect him distinctively in any way; while if we set him to track a scent, crossed and recrossed from step to step by a hundred varying trails, we shall see that he does possess a qualitative sensibility of the very highest order. Accordingly the supposed analogy breaks down immediately. Or, once more, to take a third instance, Mr. Gladstone speaks of the difficulty experienced in distinguishing blue from green by candle-light as a trace of the undifferentiated stage; but really violet is quite easily discriminated under such circumstances, while it ought, if the theory be true, to be the least discriminable of all colours; and as to the confusion itself, it is in fact objective, not subjective, depending upon the peculiar constitution of certain lights which do not contain all the prismatic colours in the normal proportions of sunlight. One might almost as well argue that as blue Bengal fires make everything look blue, therefore blue is probably the original colour discriminated by the eye.
Indeed, the whole hypothesis has only one weak set of facts to support it, namely, the supposed testimony of language. Setting aside for the present the possibility that this testimony has been misinterpreted (which I hope to show in the sequel), it must at least be granted that the negative evidence of language by itself forms the most untrustworthy ground for such a superstructure, especially if contradicted by other positive proofs. I look in vain through the pages of Geiger, of Magnus, and of Mr. Gladstone, for any indication that pictures, sculpture, pottery, or other art products have been taken into consideration at all. Every one of these students seems to have sat down in his library, consulting the frail linguistic authority of the Vedas, the Homeric poems, and the Hebrew prophets; but never to have tested the truth of the philological conclusion by reference to museums and art collections, or even to the works of antiquaries and explorers. Dr. Magnus argues a priori as to what the sensations of the savage must be like; but he has taken no pains to inform himself, either by observation, inquiry, or reading, what they actually are like. I cannot help believing that a little more care and a little more extended search would have led him to abandon his theory, based as it is upon the shifting sands of half-forgotten languages. It may seem hardly worth while to combat an opinion apparently so harmless; but every error is necessarily productive of evil, because it retards the progress of discovery; and so I shall not apologise for the time which I have taken in endeavouring to overthrow this misleading doctrine.
Leaving aside, then, for the present the doubtful evidence of language, what is the general conclusion to which we are forced? Man is the descendant of an arboreal quadrumanous animal, of frugivorous habits, who shared the common vertebrate faculty of colour-perception, and the common frugivorous taste for bright hues. From the earliest period of his separate development he exhibited the ancestral liking by his fondness for red, green, and yellow pebbles; for ochreous earths and other pigments; and probably for flowers, feathers, and like natural objects. Long before the dawn of history we find him surrounding himself with these æsthetic adjuncts; and wherever we see him still in the same early stage of development, we meet with the self-same coloured ornaments. The earliest historical nations discriminated and employed in decoration every chief prismatic hue, at an age long anterior to that in which we are asked to believe that the colour-sense was unknown. Throughout all historical time, in Egypt, Assyria, China, India, Peru, Mexico, and Western Europe, colour has been distinguished and used just as it is at the present day. And over the whole known world, among the most civilised and the most savage races alike, the perception of colour now appears to all competent observers exactly identical.
