Green is the colour of vegetation, and therefore of the cycle that is reborn after winter. This obvious association has made it, in many traditions, the colour of hope and of returning life. But green also has a mysterious and untamed side: it is the colour of the forest, of what escapes human order, of the beings who live at the edges of the known world.
Green Osiris
In ancient Egypt Osiris, the god killed by his brother Seth and brought back to life by Isis, is often depicted with green skin. The colour recalls the vegetation that sprouts after the Nile flood and the grain that, buried in the earth, is reborn as an ear of wheat.
There were even so-called «Osiris beds» or «corn mummies»: figures of the god modelled with earth and seeds which, when watered, sprouted. Green was the visible sign of resurrection.
The green of Islam
In the Islamic tradition green enjoys particular prestige. It is associated with the Prophet, with paradise and with blessing. The Qur'an describes the inhabitants of the garden of paradise dressed in green silk and reclining on green cushions. For peoples who often lived in arid lands, green was the colour of the oasis, of water, of rare and precious life.
Many flags of Muslim-majority countries contain green, and domes and decorations of holy places use it as a sign of sacredness.
Green in the European Middle Ages
In Europe green had a more ambivalent history. In the system of liturgical colours it is the colour of Ordinary Time, of patient growth. In heraldry it is one of the five colours, associated with hope and abundance.
But green was also the colour of youth, of fickle love and of chance. Historians note that green pigments and dyes were often unstable, hard to fix, and this practical instability was reflected on the symbolic level: green was the colour of what changes, of shifting fortune.
The Green Knight
One of the most fascinating texts of medieval English literature is the poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, composed in the fourteenth century by an anonymous author. During a Christmas feast at King Arthur's court a gigantic knight appears, entirely green, with a green horse and a branch of holly in his hand. He proposes a challenge: anyone may strike him with his axe, on condition of receiving the same blow a year later.
Gawain accepts and cuts off his head. The knight picks up his head, which speaks, and rides away, reminding him of the appointment. The story then unfolds as a test of loyalty, courage and chastity.
The Green Knight has been interpreted in many ways: as a figure of nature that dies and is reborn, as a trial sent from the otherworld, as a mirror of the knight's limits. His colour places him outside the order of the court, in the territory of the wild and the sacred.
The green man
In medieval churches, especially English and French ones, a human face often appears surrounded by or made of leaves, sometimes with branches issuing from its mouth. It is known today as the green man, a modern name. Its original meaning is uncertain, but the image evokes the fusion of the human and the vegetal, life renewing itself through nature.
Green and the emerald tablet
In the Hermetic tradition the legend circulated of the Emerald Tablet, the famous text attributed to Hermes Trismegistus which, according to the story, was engraved on a slab of emerald. The green of the stone here becomes the colour of secret wisdom, of the knowledge that unites heaven and earth.
A symbolic reading
| Context | Value of green |
|---|---|
| Egypt | rebirth of Osiris |
| Islam | paradise, blessing |
| Liturgy | patient growth |
| Arthurian literature | trial, the wild world |
| Hermeticism | secret wisdom |
Green is the colour of the middle: it stands between the yellow of light and the blue of depth, between warm and cold. For this reason many traditions consider it a colour of balance. But it is a living balance, not a static one: that of the plant that grows, bends in the wind and begins again every spring. In inner reflection green can remind us that every rebirth requires time, patience and a willingness to let oneself be transformed.
In short
- Green-skinned Osiris embodies the rebirth of vegetation.
- In Islam green is associated with the Prophet and with paradise.
- In the European Middle Ages green was the colour of hope but also of instability.
- The Green Knight represents the trial that comes from the wild and sacred world.
- The Emerald Tablet links green to Hermetic wisdom.
