Различие между синим и зеленым в языках мира

Overview of the distinction between the words "green" and "blue" in various languages

In many languages, the colors described in English as "blue" and "green" are colexified, i. e., expressed using a single umbrella term. To render this ambiguous notion in English, linguists use the blend word grue, from green and blue, a term coined by the philosopher Nelson Goodmanwith an unrelated meaningin his 1955 Fact, Fiction, and Forecast to illustrate his "new riddle of induction". The exact definition of "blue" and "green" may be complicated by the speakers not primarily distinguishing the hue, but using terms that describe other color components such as saturation and luminosity, or other properties of the object being described. For example, "blue" and "green" might be distinguished, but a single term might be used for both if the color is dark. Furthermore, green might be associated with yellow, and blue with either black or gray. According to Brent Berlin and Paul Kay's 1969 study Basic Color Terms: Their Universality and Evolution, distinct terms for brown, purple, pink, orange, and gray will not emerge in a language until the language has made a distinction between green and blue. In their account of the development of color terms the first terms to emerge are those for white/black (or light/dark), red and green/yellow.

The word for blue in the Amazigh (Berber) language is azerwal. In some dialects of Amazigh, like Shilha or Kabyle, the word azegzaw is used for both green and blue. It is likely cognate with the English word azure, which represents the colour between blue and cyan.

The color of the sky is sometimes referred to as "the green" in some dialects of Classical Arabic poetry, in which it is al khaḍrā (الخضراء). In Arabic the word for blue is azraq (أزرق). The Arabic word for green is akhḍar (أخضر). In Moroccan Arabic, the word for light blue is šíbi, whereas zraq (زرق) stands for blue and khḍar (خضر) for green. The word zrag (زرڭ) is used to describe the color of a suffocated person, and is also used pejoratively as a synonym to "dumb, stupid".

The ancient Egyptian word wadjet covered the range of blue, blue green, and green. It was the name of a goddess, the patroness of Lower Egypt, represented as a cobra called Wadjet, "the green one", or as the Eye of Horus, also called by the same name. At the same time, wedjet was the word used for Egyptian blue in faience ceramics.

In Hebrew, the word "כחול" (pronounced ) means blue, while "ירוק" (pronounced ) means green and has the same root, י־ר־ק (j r q), as the word for "vegetables" (ירקות, ). However, in classical Hebrew, ירוק can mean both green and yellow, giving rise to such expressions as ירוק כרישה (pronounced ), "leek green", to specify green to the exclusion of yellow. Like Russian and Italian, Hebrew has a separate name for light blue (תכלת, "t'khelet")—the color of the sky and of fringes (tzitzit) on the ritual garment tallit. This color has special symbolic significance in both Judaism and Jewish culture.

The Choctaw language has two words, okchʋko and okchʋmali, which have different meanings depending on the source. In 1852 okchakko is translated variously as pale blue or pale green, okchakko chohmi (somewhat okchakko) is given as swarthy, and okchamali is defined as deep blue, gray, green, or sky blue. In 1880 okchakko and okchʋmali are both given as blue, and green is not specifically listed as a color. In an 1892 dictionary, okchamali is deep blue or green, okchakko is pale blue or bright green, and a third word kili̱koba is bright green (resembling a kili̱kki, a species of parrot). By 1915, the authoritative Byington dictionary gives okchako as blue and okchamali as green, blue, gray, verdant. A current coursebook differentiates based on brightness, giving okchʋko as bright blue/green and okchʋmali as pale or dull blue/green. Modern usage in the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma language school is to use okchʋko for blue and okchʋmali for green, with no distinction for brightness.

The language of the Kanien'kehá:ka Nation at Akwesasne is at Stage VII on the Berlin–Kay Scale, and possesses distinct terms for a broad range of spectral and nonspectral colors such as blue (oruía), green (óhute), black (kahúji), white (karákA), and gray (atakArókwa). According to one researcher, the Kanien'kehá:ka term for purple (arihwawakunéha) translates to 'bishop['s color]', a recent, post Christianization coinage. The way in which purple was categorized and referenced prior to the addition of the latter term is not clear.

In the Lakota Sioux language, the word tȟó is used for both blue and green, though the word tȟózi (a mixture of the words tȟó meaning "blue (green)," and zí meaning "yellow") has become common (zítȟo can also be used). This is in line with common practice of using zíša/šázi for orange (šá meaning "red"), and šátȟo/tȟóša for "purple/violet."

Mapudungun, spoken by indigenous peoples of Chile and Argentina, distinguishes between black (kurü), blue (kallfü) and green (karü, also meaning "raw" or "immature"). The word payne was formerly used to refer to a sky blue, and also refers to the bluish color of stones (Zúñiga, 2006).

Single words for blue/green are also found in Mayan languages; for example, in the Yucatec Maya language blue/green is yax.

Tupian languages did not originally differ between the two colors, though they may now as a result of interference of Spanish (in the case of Guaraní) or Portuguese (in the case of Nheengatu). The Tupi word oby meant both, as does the Guaraní hovy In modern Tupi (Nheengatu) the word suikiri can be used for green and iakira/akira for blue. However, iakira/akira also means immature, as in pakua akira (green banana/immature banana), and suikiri can also mean blue. In modern Guarani, the word hovy is used for blue and hovy'û (which literally means "dark green/blue") is used for green. The word aky, which is cognate with Nheengatu akira, also means 'green/immature.'

The Yebamasa of the Rio Piraparana region in Vaupés Department, southeastern Colombia, use the term sumese for both blue and green. The letter "u" is pronounced like the German "ü".

Speakers of Tagalog most commonly use the Spanish loanwords for blue and green—asul (from Spanish azul) and berde (from Spanish verde), respectively. Although these words are much more common in spoken use, Tagalog has native terms: bugháw for blue and lunti(án) for green, which are seen as archaic and more flowery. These are mostly confined to formal and academic writings, alongside artistic fields such literature, music, and poetry. In Cebuano, another major Philippine language, the native words for "blue" and "green" end in the same syllable: pughaw and lunhaw, respectively. Pughaw means sky blue, while lunhaw is fresh leaf green (i. e. neither brownish nor yellowish). Humor and jokes of a sexual or derogatory nature that would otherwise be described as "blue" in English (e. g. "blue comedy", "blue joke") are called "green" in Philippine English. This is a calque of the Hispanic term chiste verde.

Modern Javanese has distinct words for blue biru and green ijo. These words are derived from Old Javanese birū and hijo. However, in Old Javanese birū could mean pale blue, grayish blue, greenish blue, or even turquoise, while hijo which means green, could also mean the blue green color of clear water. Biru and ijo in Modern Javanese are cognates of Malay/Indonesian biru and hijau which both have the same meaning.

The Kannada language distinguishes between blue (neeli – ನೀಲಿ), green (hasiru – ಹಸಿರು) and yellow (haladi – ಹಳದಿ). The prefix kadu (ಕಡು) would indicate darker colors while the prefix tili (ತಿಳಿ) would indicate light colors. Thus kaduneeli (ಕಡುನೀಲಿ) would mean dark/deep blue, while tilineeli (ತಿಳಿನೀಲಿ) would mean light blue.

The Tamil language distinguishes between the colors பச்சை green (paccai), நீலம் blue (neelam) and கருப்பு black (karuppu). The prefix karu would indicate dark colors while the suffix iḷam would indicate light colors. Thus கரும்பச்சை karumpaccai would be dark green.

The Telugu language uses a single word, pacca, for green and yellow. To differentiate between the two shades, another word is prefixed in some cases. For example, green will be called ఆకుపచ్చ ākupacca "leaf pacca" and yellow పసుపుపచ్చ pasupupacca "turmeric pacca".

In Malayalam there are distinct words for blue (neela – നീല), green (pachcha – പച്ച) and yellow (manja – മഞ്ഞ).

The modern Chinese language has the blue–green distinction (藍 lán for blue and 綠 lǜ for green); however, another word that predates the modern vernacular, qīng , is also used in many contexts. The character depicts the budding of a young plant and it could be understood as "verdant", but the word is used to describe colors ranging from light and yellowish green through deep blue all the way to black, as in xuánqīng For example, the flag of the Republic of China is referred to as qīng tiān, bái rì, mǎn dì hóng (青天，白日，滿地紅, "A Blue Sky, White Sun, and Wholly Red Earth") whereas qīngcài is the Chinese word for "green vegetable", referring to bok choy, and the opposing sides of the game liubo were known as qīng and white in antiquity despite using black and white pieces. Qīng was the traditional designation of both blue and green for much of the history of the Chinese language, while lán originally referred to the dye of the indigo plant. However, lǜ as a particular 'shade' of qīng applied to cloth and clothing has been attested since the Book of Odes (1000600BC), as in the title of Ode 27 "Green Upper Garment") in the Airs of Bei section. After the discarding of Classical Chinese in favor of modern vernacular Chinese, the modern terms for blue and green are now more commonly used than qīng as standalone color terms, although qīng is still part of many common noun phrases. The two forms can also be encountered combined as 青藍 and 青綠, with qīng being used as an intensifier. In modern scientific contexts, qīng refers to cyan as distinguished from both blue and green.

The native Korean word 푸르다 (Revised Romanization: pureu da) may mean either blue or green, or bluish green. These adjectives 푸르다 are used for blue as in 푸른 하늘 (pureu n haneul, blue sky), or for green as in 푸른 숲 (pureu n sup, green forest). 푸른 (pureu n) is a noun modifying form. Another word 파랗다 (para ta) usually means blue, but sometimes it also means green, as in 파란 불 (para n bul, green light of a traffic light). There are Sino Korean expressions that refer to green and blue. 초록/草綠 (chorok adj./n. ), 초록색/草綠色 (choroksaek n. or for short, 녹색/綠色 noksaek n.) is used for green. Cheong 청/靑, another expression borrowed from Chinese (靑), is mostly used for blue, as in 청바지/靑 (cheong baji, blue jeans") and Cheong Wa Dae (청와대 or Hanja: [[wikt:靑), the Blue House, which is the former executive office and official residence of the President of the Republic of Korea, but is also used for green as well, as in 청과물/靑果物 (cheong gwamul, fruits and vegetables) and 청포도/靑葡萄 (cheong podo, green grape).

In Tibetan, སྔོན་པོ། (Wylie sngon po) is the term traditionally given for the color of the sky and of grass. This term also falls into the general pattern of naming colors by appending the suffix "po", as in "mar po" (red); "ser po" (yellow); "nag po" (black); and "dkar po" (white). Conspicuously, the term for "green" is "ljang khu", likely related to "ljang bu", and defined as—"the grue (sngon po) sprout of wheat or barley".

Vietnamese used to colexify green and blue with the word xanh. This is a colloquial rendering of thanh (靑), as with Chinese and Japanese. In modern usage, blue and green are dislexified. Shades of blue are specifically described as xanh da trời (blue skin of sky), or xanh dương, xanh nước biển, (blue of ocean). Green is described as xanh lá cây (green of leaves). Vietnamese occasionally employs the terms xanh lam (blue) and xanh lục (green) in which the second syllables is derived from the Chinese: 藍 and 綠 respectively, sometimes skipping the syllable xanh, for blue and green, respectively, in formal or scientific speech. Xanh can also be used singularly for any color that is the shade in between blue and green inclusively.

In Mongolian, the word for green is ногоон (nogoon). Mongolian distinguishes between dark and light blue. The word for light blue is цэнхэр (tsenher), and the word for dark blue is хөх (höh).

Albanian has two major words for "blue": kaltër refers to a light blue, such as that of the sky, but it is derived from Vulgar Latin calthinus, itself derived from caltha, a loan from Ancient Greek that meant "marigold" a small and in fact yellow flower. The other word, blu, refers to a darker shade of blue, and like many similar words across many European languages, derives ultimately from Germanic (see also: Italian blu). There is a separate word for green, gjelbër, which derives from the Latin galbinus, which originally meant "yellow" (cf. German gelb); the original Latin word for green on the other hand, viridis, is the source of the Albanian word for "yellow", verdhë. Albanian also has a borrowed word for green, jeshil, from Turkish yeşil; it tends to be used for non natural greens (such as traffic signals) in contrast to gjelbër.

There are separate words for green (zaļš) and blue (zils) in Latvian. Both zils and zaļš stem from the same Proto Indo European word for yellow (*ghel). Several other words in Latvian have been derived from these colors, namely grass is called zāle (from zaļš), while the name for iris is zīlīte (from zils). The now archaic word mēļš was used to describe both dark blue and black (probably indicating that previously zils was used only for lighter shades of blue). For instance, blueberries are called mellenes. In Latvian black is "melns" (in some local dialects "mells"). In Lithuanian žalias is green, mėlynas is blue and žilas is gray (hair), grizzled.

The Welsh, Cornish and Breton word glas is usually translated as 'blue'; however, it can also refer, variously, to the color of the sea, of grass, or of silver (cf. Ancient Greek γλαυκός). The word gwyrdd (a borrowing from Latin viridis) is the standard translation for 'green'. In traditional Welsh (and related languages), glas could refer to certain shades of green and gray as well as blue, and llwyd could refer to various shades of gray and brown. Perhaps under the influence of English, Modern Welsh is trending toward the 11 color Western scheme, restricting glas to 'blue' and using gwyrdd for 'green', llwyd for 'gray' and brown for 'brown', respectively. However, the more traditional usage is still heard today in the Welsh word for 'grass' (glaswellt or gwelltglas), and in fossilized expressions such as caseg las 'gray mare', tir glas 'green land', papur llwyd 'brown paper' and even red for 'brown' in siwgwr coch 'brown sugar'. In Modern Irish and Scottish Gaelic the word for 'blue' is gorm (whence the name Cairngorm mountains derives) – a borrowing from the now obsolete Early Welsh word gwrm 'dark blue, dusky'. A relic of the original meaning 'dusky, dark brown' survives in the Irish term daoine gorma 'Black people'. In Old and Middle Irish, like in Welsh, glas was a blanket term for colors ranging from green to blue to various shades of gray (e. g. the glas of a sword, the glas of stone, etc.). In Modern Irish, it has come to mean both various shades of green, with specific reference to plant hues, and gray (like the sea), respectively; other shades of green would be referred to in Modern Irish as uaine or uaithne, while liath is gray proper (like a stone). Scottish Gaelic uses the term uaine for 'green'. However, the dividing line between it and gorm is somewhat different than between the English "green" and "blue", with uaine signifying a light green or yellow green, and gorm extending from dark blue (what in English might be navy blue) to include the dark green or blue green of vegetation. Grass, for instance, is gorm, rather than uaine. In addition, liath covers a range from light blue to light gray. However, the term for a green apple, such as a Granny Smith, would be ubhal glas. The boundary between colors varies much more than the "focal point": e. g. an island known in Breton as Enez c'hlas 'the blue island"' is l'Île Verte 'the green island' in French, in both cases referring to the grayish green color of its bushes, even though both languages distinguish green from blue.

The Romance terms for "green" (Catalan , French , Galician, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian and Spanish verde) are all from Latin The terms for "blue", on the other hand, vary: Catalan , Occitan , French and Italian come from a Germanic root, whereas the Spanish, Galician and Portuguese azul is likely to come from Arabic. French bleu was in turn loaned into many other languages, including English. Latin itself did not have a word covering all shades of blue, which may help explain these borrowings. It did, however, recognise (dark blue, sometimes greenish), and (grayish blue, like lead). French, as most Romance languages, makes roughly the same distinctions as English and has a specific term for each of blue (""), green ("") and gray (""). For all three, different shades can be indicated with different (compound) terms, none of them being considered as basic color terms: "bleu " (light blue), "bleu " (sky blue), "bleu " (Navy blue), "bleu " (royal blue); "vert clair" (light green), "vert " (literally: apple green); "gris " (deep gray), "gris " (literally: "mouse gray"). French also uses "" for the lighter shade of blue of the sunny sky, that was in turn loaned to English as "azure". Catalan distinguishes blue from green and gray Other basic or common colors by its own right are "purple", "yellow", or "orange", "red", "pink", "brown", "gray", "black" and "white". For all these colors except black and white it is possible to indicate different shades using "light" and "dark"; for blue, though, it generally is blau cel "sky blue" and blau marí "sea blue". Other words and compounds are common to indicate more elaborated shades (verd llimona "lemon green", rosa pàl·lid "pale pink", lila "lilac", granat "carmine", ocre "ocher", verd oliva "olive green", etc.). Catalan actually distinguishes two reds with different and common words: while refers to the color of blood, is a red tending towards yellow or the color of clay. Italian distinguishes blue , green and gray There are also common words for light blue (e. g. the color of the cloudless sky): and , and other for darker shades, e. g. , indigo. , the equivalent of the English azure, is usually considered a separate basic color rather than a shade of blu (similar to the distinction in English between red and pink). Some sources even go to the point of defining blu as a darker shade of azzurro. Celeste literally means '(the color) of the sky' and can be used as synonym of azzurro, although it will more often be considered a less saturated hue. (aquamarine) literally "sea water", indicates an even lighter, almost transparent, shade of blue. To indicate a mix of green and blue, Italians might say verde , literally water green. The term , not common in standard Italian and perceived as a literary term, is used in scientific contexts (esp. botany) to indicate a mix of blue, green and gray. Other similar terms are and (turquoise/teal); they are more saturated hues (especially turchese) and differ in context of use: the first is a literary or bureaucratic term (used for example to indicate light green eyes in identity cards); the second is more common in any informal speech, along with the variant turchino (for instance, the fairy of The Adventures of Pinocchio is called fata turchina). In Portuguese, the word "" means blue and the word "" means green. Furthermore, "azul " means light blue, and "azul " means dark blue. More distinctions can be made between several hues of blue. For instance, "azul " means sky blue, "azul " means navy blue and "azul " means turquoise blue. One can also make the distinction between "verde claro" and "verde escuro", meaning light and dark green respectively, and more distinctions between several qualities of green: for instance, "verde " means olive green and "verde " means emerald green. Cyan is usually called "azul celeste" (sky blue) and "verde ", meaning water green. Romanian clearly distinguishes between the colors green and blue It also uses separate words for different hues of the same color, e. g. light blue , blue (albastru), dark blue (bleu or ), along with a word for turquoise and azure ( or ). Similarly to French, Romanian, Italian and Portuguese, Spanish distinguishes blue and green and has an additional term for the tone of blue visible in the sky, namely "", which is nonetheless considered a shade of blue.

In Old Norse, the word blár "blue" (from proto Germanic blēwaz) was also used to describe black (and the common word for people of African descent was thus blámenn 'blue/black men'). In Swedish, blå, the modern word for blue, was used this way until the early 20th century, and it still is to a limited extent in modern Faroese. German and Dutch distinguish blue (respectively blau and blauw) and green (grün and groen) very similarly to English. There are (compound) terms for light blue (hellblau and lichtblauw) and darker shades of blue (dunkelblau and donkerblauw). In addition, adjective forms of most traditional color names are inflected to match the corresponding noun's case and gender.

Chinalbashe (an unclassified Indo Aryan language) & Chambyali (a Western Pahari language) have the same term for blue & green i. e. Takri: 𑚝𑚯𑚥𑚭 ISO: nīlā. Other Indo Aryan languages distinguish blue from green. In Urdu, blue is نیلا (nīlā) and green is سبز (sabz). There are some names of shades of blue as well, like فیروزی (ferozī) "turquoise". In Hindi, blue is नीला (nīlā) and green is हरा (harā). In Marathi, blue is निळा (niḽā) and green is हिरवा (hiravā). In Bengali, blue is নীল (nīl) and green is সবুজ (sabuj).

In Yoruba, there are only three fundamental terms for colors, one of them, the word "dúdú," is used for the word black and colors such as blue, green, purple, and grey. In modern times, unique terms for the colors are formed based on descriptive markers or English loan words, àwọ̀ ewé, (meaning colors of the leaves), is used for green, while búlùú (from English "blue") or àwọ̀ aró (color of dye), is used for blue.

Zulu and Xhosa use the word luhlaza (the prefix changes according to the class of the noun) for blue/green. Speakers of the two mutually intelligible languages can add a descriptive word after the colour term to differentiate between the two colours i. e. "(lu)hlaza okwesibhakabhaka" meaning – 'like the sky' or (lu)hlaza okwotshani meaning 'like grass'.

The Swahili word for blue is buluu, which is derived directly from English and has been in the language for a relatively short time. For other colors, Swahili uses either rangi ya (the color of ) or a shortened version, a For example, green is rangi ya kijani or rangi ya majani, which means the color of grass/leaves. Sky blue is rangi ya samawati, or the color of the sky from the Arabic word for sky. (Note: all of these can be written as a kijani, a majani, a samwati, etc.)

The Himba people use a single word for shades of green and blue: buru. They curiously have only three other color names; thus, their limited color perception has both aroused interest in anthropologists, who have studied this phenomenon.

Tswana uses the same word tala to refer to both blue and green. One has to deduce from the context and prior knowledge, of what is being talked about, to be able to pinpoint exactly the color in question.

In the language Tsakhur, not only are blue and green distinguished, but also turquoise.

In Eastern Arrernte, the words atherrke and atherrke atherrke both can be used to refer to the colour green, including some shades of blue and yellow. Additionally, atherrke can also be used as a noun to refer to grass and other small plants.

The Basque language has three native color words derived from ur (water). Urdin, is nowadays used in most cases for blue. Ubel originally meant "flash flood" and, with respect to colors, refers to bruises. Begi ubela would be translated into English by "a black and blue eye". But in Basque, unlike English, ubel remains in use after the hit skin has lost its purple color and become pale, why this word is used for both "purple" in particular and "pale hue" in general. Uher originally meant "dirty", "still water" or "rusty"; it is used for gray or sienna tones, and more generally for dark colors. Green is usually expressed with the loan word berde from Spanish "verde" / French "vert". The authenticity of the less common Basque terms for green (h)orlegi and musker is disputed.

Finnish makes a distinction between vihreä (green) and sininen (blue). Turquoise or teal (turkoosi or sinivihreä) is considered to be a separate, intermediate color between green and blue, and black (musta) is also differentiated from blue. The name for blue, sininen, is shared with other Finnic languages. Cognates of the root are also found in the Mordvinic languages and it is thus dated even beyond the era of the Proto Finnic language (ca. 2000 years old). It appears similar to a word found in the Slavic languages (Russian синий, siniy), but there is no consensus that there would be a relationship (see Proto Finnic *sini, Proto Slavic *siňь). The word vihreä (viher , archaic viheriä, viheriäinen) is related to vehreä "verdant" and vihanta "green", and viha "hate", originally "poison". It is not shared with Estonian, in which it is roheline, probably related with the Estonian word rohi "grass". However, the form viha does have correspondences in related languages as far as Permic languages, where it means not only "poison" but "bile" or "green or yellow". It has been originally loaned from an Indo Iranian protolanguage and is related to Latin virus "poison". Furthermore, the word musta "black" is also of Finnic origin. The differentiation of several colors by hue is at least Finnic (a major subgroup of Uralic) in origin. Before this, only red (punainen) was clearly distinguished by hue, with other colors described in terms of brightness (valkea vs. musta), using non color adjectives for further specificity. Alternatively, it appears that the distinction between valkea and musta was in fact "clean, shining" vs. "dirty, murky". The original meaning of sini was possibly either "black/dark" or "green". Mauno Koski's theory is that dark colors of high saturation—both blue and green—would be sini, while shades of color with low saturation, such as dark brown or black, would be musta. Although it is theorized that originally vihreä was not a true color name and was used to describe plants only, the occurrence of vihreä or viha as a name of a color in several related languages shows that it was probably polysemic (meaning both "green" and "verdant") already in early Baltic Finnic. However, whatever the case with these theories, differentiation of blue and green must be at least as old as the Baltic Finnic languages. Hungarian makes the distinction between green (zöld) and blue (kék), and also distinguishes black (fekete). Intermediate colors between green and blue are commonly referred to as zöldeskék (literally greenish blue) or kékeszöld (bluish green), but names for specific colors in this continuum—like turquoise (türkiz)—also exist. Particular shades of a color can also have separate names, such as azure (azúr).

The Kazakh language, like many Turkic languages, distinguishes between kök for blue and jasâl for green. In Kazakh, many adjectival variations can be found referring to perceived gradations in saturation level of "blue", such as kögildir, kökshil, and kökboz, which respectively denominate the gradual decrease in the intensity, kökboz being often used as a color referent in its own right. Kök is occasionally used to denote green plants (e. g. 'kök' shöp'), but such usage is mostly confined to poetic utterances or certain localized dialects.

Turkish treats dark or navy blue (lacivert, from the same Persian root as English azure and lapis lazuli) as a separate color from plain or light blue (mavi). Mavi is derived from the Arabic word مائي mā'ī 'like water' (ماء mā being the Arabic word for water) and lacivert is derived from Persian لاجورد lājvard 'lapis lazuli', a semiprecious stone with the color of navy blue. In the pre Islamic religion of the Turks, blue is the color that represented the east, as well as the zodiac sign Aquarius (the Water Bearer). A characteristic tone of blue, turquoise, was much used by the Turks for their traditional decorations and jewelry. In traditional pre Islamic Turkic culture, both blue and green were represented by the same name, gök 'sky'. The name is still in use in many rural areas. For instance, in many regions of Turkey, when mold is formed on cheese, the phenomenon is called göğermek 'turning into the color of sky (gök)'.