Purple reigns
FASCINATING FACTS ABOUT THE COLOUR
★ “LITTLE green men” might actually turn out to be purple, according to boffins!
As we reported on Friday, eggheads think E.T.’s home planet might be a plum shade, due to hardy purple bacteria that can survive under all sorts of harsh conditions.
★ But how much do hue know about the colour? Here JAMES MOORE mauves it on up with some surprising pigment pointers…
1 In ancient times purple dye was made only from sea snail mucus, which eventually turned purple in the sun. Hard to make, it was more expensive than gold, so often favoured by royalty.
2 It was known as Tyrian purple after the city of Tyre in modern-day Lebanon where it was made from 1600BC.
3 Roman emperors decreed that only they could wear purple and clothes in the colour were also the preserve of other rulers like Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. Queen Cleopatra’s ship had purple sails.
4 Rulers of the Byzantine empire signed their laws in purple ink. The phrase “purple patch” is reckoned to come from Byzantine bishops who wore one.
5 One of the oldest texts of the Bible’s New Testament is decorated in purple and the colour is the second most mentioned in the King James Bible after red.
6 Scientifically purple is similar but not the same as violet, one of seven colours on the light spectrum. Purple is made from combining red and blue. Research reckons that early life on Earth may have been largely purple.
7 Purple has also been revered in countries like China and Japan. In Thailand widows in mourning wear the colour.
8 Most carrots – originally found in Persia – used to be purple, until Dutch growers developed orange versions in the 17th century.
9 It’s reckoned there are only two words that truly rhyme with purple – hurple, which means walking with a limp, and curple, referring to the rump of a horse.
10 Queen Victoria was a big fan of the colour, which led chocolate firm Cadbury to adopt it for its wrappers, right. It was also the favourite of artist Gustav Klimt and the Suffragettes.
11 A fear of purple is called porphyrophobia. Pink Panther star Peter Sellers was so terrified, he used to scream when he saw it.
12 Greek writer Ctesias, writing in the 5th century, maintained that unicorns have purple heads. A few animals like types of sea urchin and frog are purple.
13 Dominica is the only nation to feature it prominently on its flag, with a purple parrot at its centre. In the US Purple Heart military medals are awarded to the killed or wounded.
14 Deep Purple were named after the favourite song of a band member’s granny. Jimi Hendrix’s Purple Haze is said to have been inspired by psychedelic drugs, while Prince said Purple Rain was about the end of the world.
15 The Steven Spielberg coming of age movie The Color Purple was a box office hit, while Samuel L Jackson insisted his Jedi character Mace Windu had a purple lightsaber in the Star Wars films.