Red is the color at the long wavelength end of the
visible spectrum
The visible spectrum is the portion of the electromagnetic spectrum that is visible to the human eye. Electromagnetic radiation in this range of wavelengths is called ''visible light'' or simply light. A typical human eye will respond to wa ...
of light, next to
orange
Orange most often refers to:
*Orange (fruit), the fruit of the tree species '' Citrus'' × ''sinensis''
** Orange blossom, its fragrant flower
*Orange (colour), from the color of an orange, occurs between red and yellow in the visible spectrum
* ...
and opposite
violet
Violet may refer to:
Common meanings
* Violet (color), a spectral color with wavelengths shorter than blue
* One of a list of plants known as violet, particularly:
** ''Viola'' (plant), a genus of flowering plants
Places United States
* Viol ...
. It has a
dominant wavelength
In color science, the dominant wavelength is a method of characterizing a color's hue. Along with purity, it makes up one half of the Helmholtz coordinates. A color's dominant wavelength is the wavelength of monochromatic spectral light that evo ...
of approximately 625–740
nanometres.
It is a primary color in the
RGB color model and a secondary color (made from magenta and yellow) in the
CMYK color model
The CMYK color model (also known as process color, or four color) is a subtractive color model, based on the CMY color model, used in color printing, and is also used to describe the printing process itself. The abbreviation ''CMYK'' refers ...
, and is the
complementary color
Complementary colors are pairs of colors which, when combined or mixed, cancel each other out (lose hue) by producing a grayscale color like white or black. When placed next to each other, they create the strongest contrast for those two co ...
of
cyan. Reds range from the brilliant
yellow
Yellow is the color between green and orange on the spectrum of light. It is evoked by light with a dominant wavelength of roughly 575585 nm. It is a primary color in subtractive color systems, used in painting or color printing. In the ...
-tinged
scarlet and
vermillion
Vermilion (sometimes vermillion) is a color, color family, and pigment most often made, since antiquity until the 19th century, from the powdered mineral cinnabar (a form of mercury sulfide, which is toxic) and its corresponding color. It is v ...
to bluish-red
crimson, and vary in shade from the pale red
pink
Pink is the color of a namesake flower that is a pale tint of red. It was first used as a color name in the late 17th century. According to surveys in Europe and the United States, pink is the color most often associated with charm, politeness, ...
to the dark red
burgundy.
Red pigment made from
ochre was one of the first colors used in
prehistoric art
In the history of art, prehistoric art is all art produced in preliterate, prehistorical cultures beginning somewhere in very late geological history, and generally continuing until that culture either develops writing or other methods of rec ...
. The
Ancient Egyptians and
Mayans
The Maya peoples () are an ethnolinguistic group of indigenous peoples of Mesoamerica. The ancient Maya civilization was formed by members of this group, and today's Maya are generally descended from people who lived within that historical reg ...
colored their faces red in ceremonies;
Roman
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
*Rome, the capital city of Italy
*Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
*Roman people, the people of ancient Rome
*'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...
generals had their bodies colored red to celebrate victories. It was also an important color in
China, where it was used to color early pottery and later the gates and walls of palaces.
In the
Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history
The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD ...
, the brilliant red costumes for the nobility and wealthy were dyed with
kermes and
cochineal
The cochineal ( , ; ''Dactylopius coccus'') is a scale insect in the suborder Sternorrhyncha, from which the natural dye carmine is derived. A primarily sessile parasite native to tropical and subtropical South America through North Americ ...
. The 19th century brought the introduction of the first synthetic red dyes, which replaced the traditional dyes. Red became a symbolic color of
communism
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a ...
and
socialism
Socialism is a left-wing Economic ideology, economic philosophy and Political movement, movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to Private prop ...
;
Soviet Russia
The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, Russian SFSR or RSFSR ( rus, Российская Советская Федеративная Социалистическая Республика, Rossíyskaya Sovétskaya Federatívnaya Soci ...
adopted a red flag following the
Bolshevik Revolution
The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key moment ...
in 1917, until the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. Communist China adopted the red flag following the
Chinese Revolution of 1949. It was adopted by North
Vietnam
Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...
in 1954, and by all of Vietnam in 1975.
Since red is the color of
blood
Blood is a body fluid in the circulatory system of humans and other vertebrates that delivers necessary substances such as nutrients and oxygen to the cells, and transports metabolic waste products away from those same cells. Blood in the cir ...
, it has historically been associated with sacrifice, danger, and courage. Modern surveys in
Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirel ...
and the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
show red is also the color most commonly associated with heat, activity, passion, sexuality, anger, love, and joy. In China,
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
, and many other Asian countries it is the color symbolizing happiness and good fortune.
Shades and variations
Varieties of the color red may differ in
hue
In color theory, hue is one of the main properties (called color appearance parameters) of a color, defined technically in the CIECAM02 model as "the degree to which a stimulus can be described as similar to or different from stimuli that ...
,
chroma (also called saturation, intensity, or colorfulness), or
lightness (or value, tone, or
brightness
Brightness is an attribute of visual perception in which a source appears to be radiating or reflecting light. In other words, brightness is the perception elicited by the luminance of a visual target. The perception is not linear to luminan ...
), or in two or three of these qualities. Variations in value are also called
tints and shades
In color theory, a tint is a mixture of a color with white, which increases lightness, while a shade is a mixture with black, which increases darkness. Both processes affect the resulting color mixture's relative saturation. A tone is produc ...
, a tint being a red or other hue mixed with white, a shade being mixed with black. Four examples are shown below.
File:Cardinal.jpg, The cardinal takes its name from the color worn by Catholic cardinals
Cardinal or The Cardinal may refer to:
Animals
* Cardinal (bird) or Cardinalidae, a family of North and South American birds
**''Cardinalis'', genus of cardinal in the family Cardinalidae
**''Cardinalis cardinalis'', or northern cardinal, the ...
.
File:Cherry blossoms in the Tsutsujigaoka Park.jpg, Pink
Pink is the color of a namesake flower that is a pale tint of red. It was first used as a color name in the late 17th century. According to surveys in Europe and the United States, pink is the color most often associated with charm, politeness, ...
is a pale shade of red. Cherry blossoms in the Tsutsujigaoka Park, Sendai, Miyagi Miyagi may refer to:
Places
* Miyagi Prefecture, one of the 47 major divisions of Japan
* Miyagi, Gunma, a village in Japan, merged into Maebashi in 2004
*Miyagi District, Miyagi, a district in Miyagi Prefecture, Japan
Other uses
* Miyagi (surna ...
, Japan.
File:Red tikka powder.jpg, Vermilion
Vermilion (sometimes vermillion) is a color, color family, and pigment most often made, since antiquity until the 19th century, from the powdered mineral cinnabar (a form of mercury sulfide, which is toxic) and its corresponding color. It i ...
is similar to scarlet, but slightly more orange. This is sindoor
Sindooram is a traditional vermilion red or orange-red coloured cosmetic powder from the Indian subcontinent, usually worn by married women along the part of their hairline. In Hindu communities the sindoor is a visual marker of marital stat ...
, a red cosmetic powder used in India; some Hindu
Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...
women put a stripe of sindoor in their hair to show they are married.
File:Ruby gem.JPG, Ruby
A ruby is a pinkish red to blood-red colored gemstone, a variety of the mineral corundum ( aluminium oxide). Ruby is one of the most popular traditional jewelry gems and is very durable. Other varieties of gem-quality corundum are called ...
is the color of a cut and polished ruby
A ruby is a pinkish red to blood-red colored gemstone, a variety of the mineral corundum ( aluminium oxide). Ruby is one of the most popular traditional jewelry gems and is very durable. Other varieties of gem-quality corundum are called ...
gemstone.
In science and nature
Seeing red
![Madrid Bullfight](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6f/Madrid_Bullfight.JPG)
The human eye sees red when it looks at light with a wavelength between approximately 625 and 740
nanometers
330px, Different lengths as in respect to the molecular scale.
The nanometre (international spelling as used by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures; SI symbol: nm) or nanometer (American and British English spelling differences#-re ...
.
It is a primary color in the
RGB color model and the light just past this range is called infrared, or below red, and cannot be seen by human eyes, although it can be sensed as heat. In the language of optics, red is the color evoked by light that stimulates neither the S or the M (short and medium wavelength) cone cells of the retina, combined with a fading stimulation of the L (long-wavelength) cone cells.
Primate
Primates are a diverse order of mammals. They are divided into the strepsirrhines, which include the lemurs, galagos, and lorisids, and the haplorhines, which include the tarsiers and the simians ( monkeys and apes, the latter including ...
s can distinguish the full range of the colors of the spectrum visible to humans, but many kinds of mammals, such as dogs and cattle, have
dichromacy
Dichromacy (from Greek ''di'', meaning "two" and ''chromo'', meaning "color") is the state of having two types of functioning photoreceptors, called cone cells, in the eyes. Organisms with dichromacy are called dichromats. Dichromats requir ...
, which means they can see blues and yellows, but cannot distinguish red and green (both are seen as gray). Bulls, for instance, cannot see the red color of the cape of a bullfighter, but they are agitated by its movement.
(See
color vision).
One theory for why primates developed sensitivity to red is that it allowed ripe fruit to be distinguished from unripe fruit and inedible vegetation. This may have driven further adaptations by species taking advantage of this new ability, such as the emergence of red faces.
Red light is used to help adapt
night vision in low-light or night time, as the
rod cells in the human eye are not sensitive to red.
In color theory and on a computer screen
On the
color wheel
A color wheel or color circle is an abstract illustrative organization of color hues around a circle, which shows the relationships between primary colors, secondary colors, tertiary colors etc.
Some sources use the terms ''color wheel'' ...
long used by painters, and in traditional color theory, red is one of the three
primary color
A set of primary colors or primary colours (see spelling differences) consists of colorants or colored lights that can be mixed in varying amounts to produce a gamut of colors. This is the essential method used to create the perception of a ...
s, along with blue and yellow. Painters in the Renaissance mixed red and blue to make violet:
Cennino Cennini
Cennino d'Andrea Cennini (c. 1360 – before 1427) was an Italian painter influenced by Giotto. He was a student of Agnolo Gaddi in Florence. Gaddi trained under his father, called Taddeo Gaddi, who trained with Giotto.
Cennini was born in ...
, in his 15th-century manual on painting, wrote, "If you want to make a lovely violet colour, take fine lac
ed lake
Ed, ed or ED may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* ''Ed'' (film), a 1996 film starring Matt LeBlanc
* Ed (''Fullmetal Alchemist'') or Edward Elric, a character in ''Fullmetal Alchemist'' media
* ''Ed'' (TV series), a TV series that ran fro ...
ultramarine blue (the same amount of the one as of the other) with a binder"; he noted that it could also be made by mixing blue
indigo
Indigo is a deep color close to the color wheel blue (a primary color in the RGB color space), as well as to some variants of ultramarine, based on the ancient dye of the same name. The word "indigo" comes from the Latin word ''indicum'', m ...
and red
hematite.
In modern color theory, also known as the
RGB color model, red, green and blue are
additive primary colors
A set of primary colors or primary colours (see spelling differences) consists of colorants or colored lights that can be mixed in varying amounts to produce a gamut of colors. This is the essential method used to create the perception of a b ...
. Red, green and blue light combined makes white light, and these three colors, combined in different mixtures, can produce nearly any other color. This principle is used to generate colors on such as computer monitors and televisions. For example, magenta on a computer screen is made by a similar formula to that used by Cennino Cennini in the Renaissance to make violet, but using
additive color
Additive color or additive mixing is a property of a color model that predicts the appearance of colors made by coincident component lights, i.e. the perceived color can be predicted by summing the numeric representations of the component colo ...
s and light instead of pigment: it is created by combining red and blue light at equal intensity on a black screen. Violet is made on a computer screen in a similar way, but with a greater amount of blue light and less red light.
(See
Web colors
Web colors are colors used in displaying web pages on the World Wide Web, and the methods for describing and specifying those colors. Colors may be specified as an RGB triplet or in hexadecimal format (a ''hex triplet'') or according to their ...
and
RGB color model)
File:Boutet 1708 color circles.jpg, In a traditional color wheel
A color wheel or color circle is an abstract illustrative organization of color hues around a circle, which shows the relationships between primary colors, secondary colors, tertiary colors etc.
Some sources use the terms ''color wheel'' ...
from 1708, red, yellow and blue are primary colors. Red and yellow make orange; red and blue make violet.
File:RGB illumination.jpg, In modern color theory, red, green and blue are the additive primary colors, and together they make white. A combination of red, green and blue light in varying proportions makes all the colors on your computer screen and television screen.
File:RGB pixels.jpg, Tiny Red, green and blue sub-pixels (enlarged on left side of image) create the colors you see on your computer screen and TV.
Color of sunset
![Crimson sunset](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e4/Crimson_sunset.jpg)
As a ray of white sunlight travels through the atmosphere to the eye, some of the colors are scattered out of the beam by air molecules and
airborne particles
Particulates – also known as atmospheric aerosol particles, atmospheric particulate matter, particulate matter (PM) or suspended particulate matter (SPM) – are microscopic particles of solid or liquid matter suspended in the air. The te ...
due to
Rayleigh scattering
Rayleigh scattering ( ), named after the 19th-century British physicist Lord Rayleigh (John William Strutt), is the predominantly elastic scattering of light or other electromagnetic radiation by particles much smaller than the wavelength of th ...
, changing the final color of the beam that is seen. Colors with a shorter wavelength, such as blue and green, scatter more strongly, and are removed from the light that finally reaches the eye.
At
sunrise
Sunrise (or sunup) is the moment when the upper rim of the Sun appears on the horizon in the morning. The term can also refer to the entire process of the solar disk crossing the horizon and its accompanying atmospheric effects.
Terminology
A ...
and
sunset, when the path of the sunlight through the atmosphere to the eye is longest, the blue and green components are removed almost completely, leaving the longer wavelength orange and red light. The remaining reddened sunlight can also be scattered by cloud droplets and other relatively large particles, which give the sky above the horizon its red glow.
Lasers
Laser
A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation. The word "laser" is an acronym for "light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation". The fi ...
s emitting in the red region of the spectrum have been available since the invention of the
ruby laser
A ruby laser is a solid-state laser that uses a synthetic ruby crystal as its gain medium. The first working laser was a ruby laser made by Theodore H. "Ted" Maiman at Hughes Research Laboratories on May 16, 1960.
Ruby lasers produce pulses of c ...
in 1960. In 1962 the red
helium–neon laser
A helium–neon laser or He-Ne laser, is a type of gas laser whose high energetic medium gain medium consists of a mixture of 10:1 ratio of helium and neon at a total pressure of about 1 torr inside of a small electrical discharge. The bes ...
was invented, and these two types of lasers were widely used in many scientific applications including
holography
Holography is a technique that enables a wavefront to be recorded and later re-constructed. Holography is best known as a method of generating real three-dimensional images, but it also has a wide range of other applications. In principle, i ...
, and in education. Red helium–neon lasers were used commercially in
LaserDisc players. The use of red
laser diode
The laser diode chip removed and placed on the eye of a needle for scale
A laser diode (LD, also injection laser diode or ILD, or diode laser) is a semiconductor device similar to a light-emitting diode in which a diode pumped directly with e ...
s became widespread with the commercial success of modern
DVD
The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...
players, which use a 660 nm laser diode technology. Today, red and red-orange laser diodes are widely available to the public in the form of extremely inexpensive
laser pointer
A laser pointer or laser pen is a small handheld device with a power source (usually a battery) and a laser diode emitting a very narrow coherent low-powered laser beam of visible light, intended to be used to highlight something of interest by ...
s. Portable, high-powered versions are also available for various applications.
More recently, 671 nm diode-pumped solid state (
DPSS) lasers have been introduced to the market for all-DPSS laser display systems,
particle image velocimetry,
Raman spectroscopy, and holography.
Red's wavelength has been an important factor in laser technologies; red lasers, used in early
compact disc
The compact disc (CD) is a digital optical disc data storage format that was co-developed by Philips and Sony to store and play digital audio recordings. In August 1982, the first compact disc was manufactured. It was then released in Oc ...
technologies, are being replaced by blue lasers, as red's longer wavelength causes the laser's recordings to take up more space on the disc than would blue-laser recordings.
Astronomy
*
Mars
Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Roman god of war. Mars is a terrestrial planet with a thin at ...
is called the Red Planet because of the reddish color imparted to its surface by the abundant
iron oxide present there.
* Astronomical objects that are moving away from the observer exhibit a Doppler
red shift.
*
Jupiter
Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but slightly less than one-thousandth t ...
's surface displays a
Great Red Spot caused by an oval-shaped mega storm south of the planet's
equator.
*
Red giants are stars that have exhausted the supply of
hydrogen
Hydrogen is the chemical element with the symbol H and atomic number 1. Hydrogen is the lightest element. At standard conditions hydrogen is a gas of diatomic molecules having the formula . It is colorless, odorless, tasteless, non-toxic ...
in their cores and switched to
thermonuclear fusion
Thermonuclear fusion is the process of atomic nuclei combining or “fusing” using high temperatures to drive them close enough together for this to become possible. There are two forms of thermonuclear fusion: ''uncontrolled'', in which the re ...
of hydrogen in a shell that surrounds its core. They have radii tens to hundreds of times larger than that of the
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...
. However, their outer envelope is much lower in temperature, giving them an orange hue. Despite the lower energy density of their envelope, red giants are many times more luminous than the Sun due to their large size.
*
Red supergiants
Red supergiants (RSGs) are stars with a supergiant luminosity class ( Yerkes class I) of spectral type K or M. They are the largest stars in the universe in terms of volume, although they are not the most massive or luminous. Betelgeuse and Anta ...
like
Antares
Antares is the brightest star in the constellation of Scorpius. It has the Bayer designation α Scorpii, which is Latinised to Alpha Scorpii. Often referred to as "the heart of the scorpion", Antares is flanked by σ Scorpii and τ ...
,
Betelgeuse,
VY Canis Majoris
VY Canis Majoris (abbreviated to VY CMa) is an extreme oxygen-rich (O-rich) red hypergiant (RHG) or red supergiant (RSG) and pulsating variable star from the Solar System in the slightly southern constellation of Canis Major. It is o ...
and
UY Scuti
UY Scuti (BD-12°5055) is an extreme red hypergiant or red supergiant star in the constellation Scutum. It is considered one of the largest known stars by radius and is also a pulsating variable star, with a maximum brightness of ...
, one of the
biggest stars in the
Universe
The universe is all of space and time and their contents, including planets, stars, galaxies, and all other forms of matter and energy. The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological description of the development of the universe. ...
, are the biggest variety of red giants. They are huge in size, with radii 200 to 2600 times greater than our Sun, but relatively cool in temperature (3000–4500 K), causing their distinct red tint. Because they are shrinking rapidly in size, they are surrounded by an envelope or skin much bigger than the star itself. The envelope of Betelgeuse is 250 times bigger than the star inside.
* A
red dwarf is a small and relatively
cool star, which has a mass of less than half that of the
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...
and a surface temperature of less than 4,000
K. Red dwarfs are by far the most common type of star in the Galaxy, but due to their low luminosity, from Earth, none are visible to the naked eye.
*
Interstellar reddening
In astronomy, extinction is the absorption and scattering of electromagnetic radiation by dust and gas between an emitting astronomical object and the observer. Interstellar extinction was first documented as such in 1930 by Robert Julius Trumple ...
is caused by the extinction of radiation by dust and gas
Mars atmosphere 2.jpg, Mars
Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Roman god of war. Mars is a terrestrial planet with a thin at ...
appears to be red because of iron oxide on its surface.
Mira 1997.jpg, Mira
Mira (), designation Omicron Ceti (ο Ceti, abbreviated Omicron Cet, ο Cet), is a red-giant star estimated to be 200–400 light-years from the Sun in the constellation Cetus.
ο Ceti is a binary stellar system, consisting of a vari ...
, a red giant
File:RedDwarfNASA.jpg, Artist's impression of a red dwarf, a small, relatively cool star that appears red due to its temperature
Pigments and dyes
Roussillon sentier des ocres2.JPG, Red ochre cliffs near Roussillon in France. Red ochre is composed of clay tinted with hematite. Ochre was the first pigment used by man in prehistoric cave paintings.
Vermillon pigment.jpg, Vermilion pigment, made from cinnabar. This was the pigment used in the murals of Pompeii and to color Chinese lacquerware
Lacquerware are objects decoratively covered with lacquer. Lacquerware includes small or large containers, tableware, a variety of small objects carried by people, and larger objects such as furniture and even coffins painted with lacquer. Befor ...
beginning in the Song dynasty
The Song dynasty (; ; 960–1279) was an imperial dynasty of China that began in 960 and lasted until 1279. The dynasty was founded by Emperor Taizu of Song following his usurpation of the throne of the Later Zhou. The Song conquered the rest ...
.
Rubia tinctorum - Köhler–s Medizinal-Pflanzen-123.jpg, Despite its yellow greenish flower, the roots of the '' Rubia tinctorum'', or madder plant, produced the most common red dye used from ancient times until the 19th century.
Red lead.jpg, Red lead
Red is the color at the long wavelength end of the visible spectrum of light, next to orange and opposite violet. It has a dominant wavelength of approximately 625–740 nanometres. It is a primary color in the RGB color model and a secondar ...
, also known as minium
''Minium'' is a genus of thalloid alga
Algae (; singular alga ) is an informal term for a large and diverse group of photosynthetic eukaryotic organisms. It is a polyphyletic grouping that includes species from multiple distinct clades. I ...
, has been used since the time of the ancient Greeks. Chemically it is known as lead tetroxide. The Romans prepared it by the roasting of lead white pigment. It was commonly used in the Middle Ages for the headings and decoration of illuminated manuscripts.
Alizarin-sample.jpg, Alizarin
Alizarin (also known as 1,2-dihydroxyanthraquinone, Mordant Red 11, C.I. 58000, and Turkey Red) is an organic compound with formula that has been used throughout history as a prominent red dye, principally for dyeing textile fabrics. Historic ...
was the first synthetic red dye, created by German chemists in 1868. It duplicated the colorant in the madder plant, but was cheaper and longer lasting. After its introduction, the production of natural dyes from the madder plant virtually ceased.
Food coloring
The most common synthetic food coloring today is
Allura Red AC
Allura Red AC is a red azo dye that goes by several names, including FD&C Red 40. It is used as a food dye and has the E number E129.
It is usually supplied as its red sodium salt, but can also be used as the calcium and potassium salts. These ...
, a red
azo dye that goes by several names including: Allura Red, Food Red 17, C.I. 16035, FD&C Red 40,
It was originally manufactured from coal tar, but now is mostly made from petroleum.
In Europe, Allura Red AC is not recommended for consumption by children. It is banned in Denmark, Belgium, France and Switzerland, and was also banned in Sweden until the country joined the European Union in 1994. The
European Union
The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been de ...
approves Allura Red AC as a food colorant, but EU countries' local laws banning food colorants are preserved.
In the United States, Allura Red AC is approved by the
Food and Drug Administration
The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA or US FDA) is a List of United States federal agencies, federal agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Health and Human Services. The FDA is respon ...
(FDA) for use in
cosmetics
Cosmetics are constituted mixtures of chemical compounds derived from either natural sources, or synthetically created ones. Cosmetics have various purposes. Those designed for personal care and skin care can be used to cleanse or protect ...
,
drugs, and food. It is used in some tattoo inks and is used in many products, such as
soft drinks, children's medications, and
cotton candy
Cotton candy, also known as fairy floss and candy floss, is a spun sugar confection that resembles cotton. It usually contains small amounts of flavoring or food coloring.
It is made by heating and liquefying sugar, and spinning it centrifu ...
. On June 30, 2010, the
Center for Science in the Public Interest
The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) is a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit watchdog and consumer advocacy group that advocates for safer and healthier foods.
History and funding
CSPI is a consumer advocacy organization. Its ...
(CSPI) called for the FDA to ban Red 40.
Because of public concerns about possible health risks associated with synthetic dyes, many companies have switched to using natural pigments such as
carmine, made from crushing the tiny female
cochineal
The cochineal ( , ; ''Dactylopius coccus'') is a scale insect in the suborder Sternorrhyncha, from which the natural dye carmine is derived. A primarily sessile parasite native to tropical and subtropical South America through North Americ ...
insect. This insect, originating in Mexico and Central America, was used to make the brilliant
scarlet dyes of the European Renaissance.
Autumn leaves
The red of autumn leaves is produced by pigments called
anthocyanins. They are not present in the leaf throughout the growing season, but are actively produced towards the end of summer.
They develop in late summer in the
sap
Sap is a fluid transported in xylem cells (vessel elements or tracheids) or phloem sieve tube elements of a plant. These cells transport water and nutrients throughout the plant.
Sap is distinct from latex, resin, or cell sap; it is a separ ...
of the cells of the leaf, and this development is the result of complex interactions of many influences—both inside and outside the plant. Their formation depends on the breakdown of sugars in the presence of bright light as the level of
phosphate
In chemistry, a phosphate is an anion, salt, functional group or ester derived from a phosphoric acid. It most commonly means orthophosphate, a derivative of orthophosphoric acid .
The phosphate or orthophosphate ion is derived from phosph ...
in the leaf is reduced.
During the summer growing season, phosphate is at a high level. It has a vital role in the breakdown of the
sugars manufactured by chlorophyll. But in the fall, phosphate, along with the other chemicals and nutrients, moves out of the leaf into the
stem of the plant. When this happens, the sugar-breakdown process changes, leading to the production of anthocyanin pigments. The brighter the light during this period, the greater the production of anthocyanins and the more brilliant the resulting color display. When the days of autumn are bright and cool, and the nights are chilly but not freezing, the brightest colorations usually develop.
Anthocyanins temporarily color the edges of some of the very young
leaves as they unfold from the
bud
In botany, a bud is an undeveloped or embryonic shoot and normally occurs in the axil of a leaf or at the tip of a stem. Once formed, a bud may remain for some time in a dormant condition, or it may form a shoot immediately. Buds may be spec ...
s in early spring. They also give the familiar color to such common fruits as
cranberries
Cranberries are a group of evergreen dwarf shrubs or trailing vines in the subgenus ''Oxycoccus'' of the genus ''Vaccinium''. In Britain, cranberry may refer to the native species ''Vaccinium oxycoccos'', while in North America, cranberry ...
,
red apples,
blueberries,
cherries,
raspberries
The raspberry is the edible fruit of a multitude of plant species in the genus ''Rubus'' of the rose family, most of which are in the subgenus '' Idaeobatus''. The name also applies to these plants themselves. Raspberries are perennial with ...
, and
plums.
Anthocyanins are present in about 10% of tree species in temperate regions, although in certain areas—a
famous example being New England—up to 70% of tree species may produce the pigment.
In autumn forests they appear vivid in the
maple
''Acer'' () is a genus of trees and shrubs commonly known as maples. The genus is placed in the family Sapindaceae.Stevens, P. F. (2001 onwards). Angiosperm Phylogeny Website. Version 9, June 2008 nd more or less continuously updated since http ...
s,
oak
An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' (; Latin "oak tree") of the beech family, Fagaceae. There are approximately 500 extant species of oaks. The common name "oak" also appears in the names of species in related genera, notably ''L ...
s,
sourwood
''Oxydendrum arboreum'', the sourwood or sorrel tree, is the sole species in the genus ''Oxydendrum'', in the family Ericaceae. It is native to eastern North America, from southern Pennsylvania south to northwest Florida and west to southern I ...
,
sweetgums,
dogwood
''Cornus'' is a genus of about 30–60 species of woody plants in the family Cornaceae, commonly known as dogwoods, which can generally be distinguished by their blossoms, berries, and distinctive bark. Most are deciduous trees or shru ...
s,
tupelo
Tupelo , genus ''Nyssa'' , is a small genus of deciduous trees with alternate, simple leaves. It is sometimes included in the subfamily Nyssoideae of the dogwood family, Cornaceae, but is placed by other authorities in the family Nyssaceae. In ...
s,
cherry trees and
persimmon
The persimmon is the edible fruit of a number of species of trees in the genus '' Diospyros''. The most widely cultivated of these is the Oriental persimmon, ''Diospyros kaki'' ''Diospyros'' is in the family Ebenaceae, and a number of non-per ...
s. These same pigments often combine with the carotenoids' colors to create the deeper orange, fiery reds, and bronzes typical of many hardwood species. (See
Autumn leaf color
Autumn leaf color is a phenomenon that affects the normal green leaves of many deciduous trees and shrubs by which they take on, during a few weeks in the autumn season, various shades of yellow, orange, red, purple, and brown. The phenomenon i ...
).
Blood and other reds in nature
Oxygenated blood is red due to the presence of oxygenated
hemoglobin
Hemoglobin (haemoglobin BrE) (from the Greek word αἷμα, ''haîma'' 'blood' + Latin ''globus'' 'ball, sphere' + ''-in'') (), abbreviated Hb or Hgb, is the iron-containing oxygen-transport metalloprotein present in red blood cells (erythrocyt ...
that contains iron molecules, with the iron components reflecting red light.
Red meat gets its color from the iron found in the
myoglobin and hemoglobin in the muscles and residual blood.
Plants like
apple
An apple is an edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus domestica''). Apple trees are cultivated worldwide and are the most widely grown species in the genus ''Malus''. The tree originated in Central Asia, where its wild ancestor, ' ...
s,
strawberries,
cherries,
tomato
The tomato is the edible berry of the plant ''Solanum lycopersicum'', commonly known as the tomato plant. The species originated in western South America, Mexico, and Central America. The Mexican Nahuatl word gave rise to the Spanish word ...
es,
peppers
Pepper or peppers may refer to:
Food and spice
* Piperaceae or the pepper family, a large family of flowering plant
** Black pepper
* ''Capsicum'' or pepper, a genus of flowering plants in the nightshade family Solanaceae
** Bell pepper
** Chili ...
, and
pomegranate
The pomegranate (''Punica granatum'') is a fruit-bearing deciduous shrub in the family Lythraceae, subfamily Punicoideae, that grows between tall.
The pomegranate was originally described throughout the Mediterranean Basin, Mediterranean re ...
s are often colored by forms of
carotenoids
Carotenoids (), also called tetraterpenoids, are yellow, orange, and red organic pigments that are produced by plants and algae, as well as several bacteria, and fungi. Carotenoids give the characteristic color to pumpkins, carrots, parsnips, co ...
, red pigments that also assist
photosynthesis
Photosynthesis is a process used by plants and other organisms to convert light energy into chemical energy that, through cellular respiration, can later be released to fuel the organism's activities. Some of this chemical energy is stored i ...
.
Agarplate redbloodcells edit.jpg, Red blood cell agar. Blood appears red due to the iron molecules in blood cells.
Can Setter dog GFDL.jpg, A red setter or Irish setter
Red Fox (Vulpes vulpes) -British Wildlife Centre-8.jpg, A pair of European red foxes.
Erithacus-rubecula-melophilus Dublin-Ireland.jpg, The European robin
The European robin (''Erithacus rubecula''), known simply as the robin or robin redbreast in Great Britain & Ireland, is a small insectivorous passerine bird that belongs to the chat subfamily of the Old World flycatcher family. About in len ...
or robin redbreast
Hair color
![Woman redhead natural portrait 1](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/03/Woman_redhead_natural_portrait_1.jpg)
Red hair occurs naturally on approximately 1–2% of the human population. It occurs more frequently (2–6%) in people of northern or western European ancestry, and less frequently in other populations. Red hair appears in people with two copies of a
recessive gene on
chromosome 16
Chromosome 16 is one of the 23 pairs of chromosomes in humans. People normally have two copies of this chromosome. Chromosome 16 spans about 90 million base pairs (the building material of DNA) and represents just under 3% of the total DNA in cell ...
which causes a mutation in the
MC1R
The melanocortin 1 receptor (MC1R), also known as melanocyte-stimulating hormone receptor (MSHR), melanin-activating peptide receptor, or melanotropin receptor, is a G protein–coupled receptor that binds to a class of pituitary peptide hormones ...
protein.
Red hair varies from a deep
burgundy through
burnt orange
In optics, orange has a wavelength between approximately 585 and 620 nm and a hue of 30° in HSV color space. In the RGB color space it is a secondary color numerically halfway between gamma-compressed red and yellow, as can be seen in ...
to bright
copper
Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu (from la, cuprum) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkis ...
. It is characterized by high levels of the reddish pigment
pheomelanin
Melanin (; from el, μέλας, melas, black, dark) is a broad term for a group of natural pigments found in most organisms. Eumelanin is produced through a multistage chemical process known as melanogenesis, where the oxidation of the a ...
(which also accounts for the red color of the lips) and relatively low levels of the dark pigment
eumelanin. The term redhead (originally ''redd hede'') has been in use since at least 1510.
In animal and human behavior
Red is associated with
dominance in a number of animal species.
For example, in
mandrills, red coloration of the face is greatest in
alpha males, increasingly less prominent in lower ranking subordinates, and directly correlated with levels of
testosterone
Testosterone is the primary sex hormone and anabolic steroid in males. In humans, testosterone plays a key role in the development of male reproductive tissues such as testes and prostate, as well as promoting secondary sexual characteristi ...
. Red can also affect the perception of dominance by others, leading to significant differences in mortality,
reproductive success
Reproductive success is an individual's production of offspring per breeding event or lifetime. This is not limited by the number of offspring produced by one individual, but also the reproductive success of these offspring themselves.
Reproduct ...
and
parental investment between individuals displaying red and those not. In humans, wearing red has been linked with increased performance in competitions, including professional sport and
multiplayer video games. Controlled tests have demonstrated that wearing red does not increase performance or levels of testosterone during exercise, so the effect is likely to be produced by perceived rather than actual performance. Judges of
tae kwon do
''Taekwondo'', ''Tae Kwon Do'' or ''Taekwon-Do'' (; ko, 태권도/跆拳道 ) is a Korean martial arts, Korean form of martial arts involving punching and kicking techniques, with emphasis on head-height kicks, spinning jump kicks, and fast k ...
have been shown to favor competitors wearing red protective gear over blue, and, when asked, a significant majority of people say that red abstract shapes are more "dominant", "aggressive", and "likely to win a physical competition" than blue shapes.
In contrast to its positive effect in physical competition and dominance behavior, exposure to red decreases performance in cognitive tasks and elicits aversion in psychological tests where subjects are placed in an "achievement" context (e.g. taking an
IQ test
An intelligence quotient (IQ) is a total score derived from a set of standardized tests or subtests designed to assess human intelligence. The abbreviation "IQ" was coined by the psychologist William Stern (psychologist), William Stern for th ...
).
History and art
In prehistory and the ancient world
File:9 Bisonte Magdaleniense polícromo.jpg, Bison in red ochre in the Cave of Altamira
The Cave of Altamira (; es, Cueva de Altamira ) is a cave complex, located near the historic town of Santillana del Mar in Cantabria, Spain. It is renowned for prehistoric cave art featuring charcoal drawings and polychrome paintings of contem ...
, Spain, from upper Paleolithic era (36,000 BC)
Pech Merle main.jpg, Image of a human hand created with red ochre in Pech Merle
Pech Merle is a cave which opens onto a hillside at Cabrerets in the Lot département of the Occitania region in France, about 32 km by road east of Cahors. It is one of the few prehistoric cave painting sites in France that remain open t ...
cave, France (Gravettian
The Gravettian was an archaeological industry of the European Upper Paleolithic that succeeded the Aurignacian circa 33,000 years BP. It is archaeologically the last European culture many consider unified, and had mostly disappeared by ...
era, 25,000 BC).
KnossosFrescoRepro06827.jpg, ''The Prince of Lilies'', from the Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second prin ...
Palace of Minos at Knossos
Knossos (also Cnossos, both pronounced ; grc, Κνωσός, Knōsós, ; Linear B: ''Ko-no-so'') is the largest Bronze Age archaeological site on Crete and has been called Europe's oldest city.
Settled as early as the Neolithic period, the na ...
on Crete
Crete ( el, Κρήτη, translit=, Modern: , Ancient: ) is the largest and most populous of the Greek islands, the 88th largest island in the world and the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, Sardinia, Cyprus, ...
Pompeii - Fullonica of Veranius Hypsaeus 2 - MAN.jpg, Roman wall painting showing a dye shop, Pompeii (40 BC).
Inside cave 13B at
Pinnacle Point
Pinnacle Point a small promontory immediately south of Mossel Bay, a town on the southern coast of South Africa. Excavations since the year 2000 of a series of caves at Pinnacle Point have revealed occupation by Middle Stone Age people between ...
, an archeological site found on the coast of South Africa,
paleoanthropologists
Paleoanthropology or paleo-anthropology is a branch of paleontology and anthropology which seeks to understand the early development of anatomically modern humans, a process known as hominization, through the reconstruction of evolutionary kinship ...
in 2000 found evidence that, between 170,000 and 40,000 years ago,
Late Stone Age people were scraping and grinding
ochre, a clay colored red by
iron oxide, probably with the intention of using it to color their bodies.
Red
hematite powder was also found scattered around the remains at a grave site in a
Zhoukoudian
Zhoukoudian Area () is a town and an area located on the east Fangshan District, Beijing, China. It borders Nanjiao and Fozizhuang Townships to its north, Xiangyang, Chengguan and Yingfeng Subdistricts to its east, Shilou and Hangcunhe Towns t ...
cave complex near
Beijing
}
Beijing ( ; ; ), alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the capital of the People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's most populous national capital city, with over 21 ...
. The site has evidence of habitation as early as 700,000 years ago. The hematite might have been used to symbolize blood in an offering to the dead.
Red, black and white were the first colors used by artists in the
Upper Paleolithic
The Upper Paleolithic (or Upper Palaeolithic) is the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. Very broadly, it dates to between 50,000 and 12,000 years ago (the beginning of the Holocene), according to some theories coin ...
age, probably because natural pigments such as red ochre and iron oxide were readily available where early people lived.
Madder
''Rubia'' is the type genus of the Rubiaceae family of flowering plants, which also contains coffee. It contains around 80 species of perennial scrambling or climbing herbs and subshrubs native to the Old World. The genus and its best-known ...
, a plant whose root could be made into a red dye, grew widely in Europe, Africa and Asia. The
cave of Altamira
The Cave of Altamira (; es, Cueva de Altamira ) is a cave complex, located near the historic town of Santillana del Mar in Cantabria, Spain. It is renowned for prehistoric cave art featuring charcoal drawings and polychrome paintings of contem ...
in Spain has a painting of a bison colored with red ochre that dates to between 15,000 and 16,500 BC.
A red dye called
Kermes was made beginning in the
Neolithic Period
The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several parts ...
by drying and then crushing the bodies of the females of a tiny
scale insect in the genus ''
Kermes'', primarily ''
Kermes vermilio
''Kermes vermilio'' is a species of '' Kermes'' so which feeds on trees. Some of the species are used by humans to make vermilion; though an at-similar-time-of-discovery mineral form in many cultures is cinnabar (HgS, Mercury Sulphide, crystalli ...
''. The insects live on the sap of certain trees, especially
Kermes oak
''Quercus coccifera'', the kermes oak, is an oak bush in the '' Ilex'' section of the genus. It is native to the Mediterranean region and Northern African Maghreb, south to north from Morocco to France and west to east from Portugal to Cyprus ...
trees near the Mediterranean region. Jars of kermes have been found in a Neolithic cave-burial at Adaoutse,
Bouches-du-Rhône
Bouches-du-Rhône ( , , ; oc, Bocas de Ròse ; "Mouths of the Rhône") is a department in Southern France. It borders Vaucluse to the north, Gard to the west and Var to the east. The Mediterranean Sea lies to the south. Its prefecture and ...
. Kermes from oak trees was later used by Romans, who imported it from Spain. A different variety of dye was made from
''Porphyrophora hamelii'' (Armenian cochineal) scale insects that lived on the roots and stems of certain herbs. It was mentioned in texts as early as the 8th century BC, and it was used by the ancient Assyrians and Persians.
Red
hematite powder was also found scattered around the remains at a grave site in a
Zhoukoudian
Zhoukoudian Area () is a town and an area located on the east Fangshan District, Beijing, China. It borders Nanjiao and Fozizhuang Townships to its north, Xiangyang, Chengguan and Yingfeng Subdistricts to its east, Shilou and Hangcunhe Towns t ...
cave complex near
Beijing
}
Beijing ( ; ; ), alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the capital of the People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's most populous national capital city, with over 21 ...
. The site has evidence of habitation as early as 700,000 years ago. The hematite might have been used to symbolize blood in an offering to the dead.
In ancient Egypt, red was associated with life, health, and victory. Egyptians would color themselves with red ochre during celebrations. Egyptian women used red ochre as a
cosmetic to redden cheeks and lips and also used
henna to color their hair and paint their nails.
The ancient Romans wore
togas
The toga (, ), a distinctive garment of ancient Rome, was a roughly semicircular cloth, between in length, draped over the shoulders and around the body. It was usually woven from white wool, and was worn over a tunic. In Roman historical tra ...
with red stripes on holidays, and the bride at a wedding wore a red shawl, called a ''flammeum''.
Red was used to color statues and the skin of gladiators. Red was also the color associated with army; Roman soldiers wore red tunics, and officers wore a cloak called a
paludamentum
In Republican and Imperial Rome, the ''paludamentum'' () was a cloak or cape fastened at one shoulder, worn by military commanders (e.g., the ''legatus'') and rather less often by their troops. As supreme commander of the whole Roman army, Roman e ...
which, depending upon the quality of the dye, could be crimson,
scarlet or purple. In
Roman mythology
Roman mythology is the body of myths of ancient Rome as represented in the literature and visual arts of the Romans. One of a wide variety of genres of Roman folklore, ''Roman mythology'' may also refer to the modern study of these representa ...
red is associated with the god of war,
Mars
Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Roman god of war. Mars is a terrestrial planet with a thin at ...
.
The
vexilloid
A vexilloid is any flag-like (vexillary) object used by countries, organisations, or individuals as a form of representation other than flags. American vexillologist Whitney Smith coined the term ''vexilloid'' in 1958, defining it as
This in ...
of the
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post- Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediter ...
had a red background with the letters
SPQR
SPQR, an abbreviation for (; en, "The Roman Senate and People"; or more freely "The Senate and People of Rome"), is an emblematic abbreviated phrase referring to the government of the ancient Roman Republic. It appears on Roman currency, at t ...
in
gold
Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile me ...
. A Roman general receiving a
triumph
The Roman triumph (Latin triumphus) was a celebration for a victorious military commander in ancient Rome. For later imitations, in life or in art, see Trionfo. Numerous later uses of the term, up to the present, are derived directly or indirectl ...
had his entire body painted red in honor of his achievement.
The Romans liked bright colors, and many
Roman villas were decorated with vivid red murals. The pigment used for many of the murals was called
vermilion
Vermilion (sometimes vermillion) is a color, color family, and pigment most often made, since antiquity until the 19th century, from the powdered mineral cinnabar (a form of mercury sulfide, which is toxic) and its corresponding color. It i ...
, and it came from the mineral
cinnabar
Cinnabar (), or cinnabarite (), from the grc, κιννάβαρι (), is the bright scarlet to brick-red form of mercury(II) sulfide (HgS). It is the most common source ore for refining elemental mercury and is the historic source for the bri ...
, a common ore of
mercury. It was one of the finest reds of ancient times – the paintings have retained their brightness for more than twenty centuries. The source of cinnabar for the Romans was a group of mines near
Almadén
Almadén () is a town and municipality in the Spanish province of Ciudad Real, within the autonomous community of Castile-La Mancha. The town is located at 4° 49' W and 38° 46' N and is 589 meters above sea level. Almadén is approximately 3 ...
, southwest of
Madrid
Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the Largest cities of the Europ ...
, in Spain. Working in the mines was extremely dangerous, since mercury is highly toxic; the miners were slaves or prisoners, and being sent to the cinnabar mines was a virtual death sentence.
The Middle Ages
Innozenz3.jpg, Roman Catholic Popes wear red as the symbol of the blood of Christ. This is Pope Innocent III
Pope Innocent III ( la, Innocentius III; 1160 or 1161 – 16 July 1216), born Lotario dei Conti di Segni (anglicized as Lothar of Segni), was the head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 8 January 1198 to his death in 16 ...
, in about 1219.
File:S.George (Novgorod, mid. 14 c, GTG).jpg, Red was the traditional color of martyrs
A martyr (, ''mártys'', "witness", or , ''marturia'', stem , ''martyr-'') is someone who suffers persecution and death for advocating, renouncing, or refusing to renounce or advocate, a religious belief or other cause as demanded by an external ...
. A Russian icon of Saint George
Saint George (Greek: Γεώργιος (Geórgios), Latin: Georgius, Arabic: القديس جرجس; died 23 April 303), also George of Lydda, was a Christian who is venerated as a saint in Christianity. According to tradition he was a soldie ...
. (14th c.)
File:Domschatz Halberstadt Karlsteppich.png, THe colour of majesty - Portrait of Charlemagne
Charlemagne ( , ) or Charles the Great ( la, Carolus Magnus; german: Karl der Große; 2 April 747 – 28 January 814), a member of the Carolingian dynasty, was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and the first ...
,King of the Franks and Holy Roman Emperor, Netherlands,(14th c.)
After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, red was adopted as a color of majesty and authority by the
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...
, and the princes of Europe. It also played an important part in the rituals of the
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
, symbolizing the blood of Christ and the Christian martyrs.
In Western Europe, Emperor
Charlemagne
Charlemagne ( , ) or Charles the Great ( la, Carolus Magnus; german: Karl der Große; 2 April 747 – 28 January 814), a member of the Carolingian dynasty, was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and the first ...
painted his palace red as a very visible symbol of his authority, and wore red shoes at his coronation.
Kings, princes and, beginning in 1295, Roman Catholic cardinals began to wear red colored
habitus. When
Abbe Suger
Suger (; la, Sugerius; 1081 – 13 January 1151) was a French abbot, statesman, and historian. He once lived at the court of Pope Calixtus II in Maguelonne, France. He later became abbot of St-Denis, and became a close confidant to King Lou ...
rebuilt
Saint Denis Basilica
The Basilica of Saint-Denis (french: Basilique royale de Saint-Denis, links=no, now formally known as the ) is a large former medieval abbey church and present cathedral in the commune of Saint-Denis, a northern suburb of Paris. The building ...
outside Paris in the early 12th century, he added
stained glass windows colored blue cobalt glass and red glass tinted with copper. Together they flooded the basilica with a mystical light. Soon stained glass windows were being added to cathedrals all across France, England and Germany. In medieval painting red was used to attract attention to the most important figures; both
Christ
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
and the
Virgin Mary
Mary; arc, ܡܪܝܡ, translit=Mariam; ar, مريم, translit=Maryam; grc, Μαρία, translit=María; la, Maria; cop, Ⲙⲁⲣⲓⲁ, translit=Maria was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Joseph and the mother of ...
were commonly painted wearing red mantles.
In western countries red is a symbol of martyrs and sacrifice, particularly because of its association with blood.
Beginning in the Middle Ages, the Pope and Cardinals of the
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
wore red to symbolize the blood of Christ and the Christian martyrs. The banner of the Christian soldiers in the
First Crusade
The First Crusade (1096–1099) was the first of a series of religious wars, or Crusades, initiated, supported and at times directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The objective was the recovery of the Holy Land from Islamic r ...
was a red cross on a white field, the
St. George's Cross. According to Christian tradition,
Saint George
Saint George (Greek: Γεώργιος (Geórgios), Latin: Georgius, Arabic: القديس جرجس; died 23 April 303), also George of Lydda, was a Christian who is venerated as a saint in Christianity. According to tradition he was a soldie ...
was a Roman soldier who was a member of the guards of the Emperor
Diocletian, who refused to renounce his Christian faith and was martyred. The Saint George's Cross became the
Flag of England
The flag of England is the national flag of England, a constituent country of the United Kingdom. It is derived from Saint George's Cross (heraldic blazon: ''Argent, a cross gules''). The association of the red cross as an emblem of England ...
in the 16th century, and now is part of the
Union Flag
The Union Jack, or Union Flag, is the ''de facto'' national flag of the United Kingdom. Although no law has been passed making the Union Flag the official national flag of the United Kingdom, it has effectively become such through precedent. ...
of the United Kingdom, as well as the Flag of the Republic of
Georgia
Georgia most commonly refers to:
* Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States
Georgia may also refer to:
Places
Historical states and entities
* Related to the ...
.
Renaissance
Elizabeth I Steven Van Der Meulen.jpg, The young Queen Elizabeth I
Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was List of English monarchs, Queen of England and List of Irish monarchs, Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is ...
(here in about 1563)
File:Pieter Bruegel the Elder - The Wedding Dance - 30.374 - Detroit Institute of Arts.jpg, ''The Wedding Dance'' (1566), by Pieter Bruegel the Elder.
Jan Vermeer van Delft 006.jpg, ''The Girl with the Wine Glass'', by Johannes Vermeer
Johannes Vermeer ( , , see below; also known as Jan Vermeer; October 1632 – 15 December 1675) was a Dutch Baroque Period painter who specialized in domestic interior scenes of middle-class life. During his lifetime, he was a moderately succe ...
(1659–60).
In
Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history
The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD ...
painting, red was used to draw the attention of the viewer; it was often used as the color of the cloak or costume of
Christ
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
, the
Virgin Mary
Mary; arc, ܡܪܝܡ, translit=Mariam; ar, مريم, translit=Maryam; grc, Μαρία, translit=María; la, Maria; cop, Ⲙⲁⲣⲓⲁ, translit=Maria was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Joseph and the mother of ...
, or another central figure.
In
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 bridges. The isla ...
,
Titian
Tiziano Vecelli or Vecellio (; 27 August 1576), known in English as Titian ( ), was an Italian (Venetian) painter of the Renaissance, considered the most important member of the 16th-century Venetian school. He was born in Pieve di Cadore, nea ...
was the master of fine reds, particularly
vermilion
Vermilion (sometimes vermillion) is a color, color family, and pigment most often made, since antiquity until the 19th century, from the powdered mineral cinnabar (a form of mercury sulfide, which is toxic) and its corresponding color. It i ...
; he used many layers of pigment mixed with a semi-transparent glaze, which let the light pass through, to create a more luminous color. The figures of God, the Virgin Mary and two apostles are highlighted by their vermilion red costumes.
Queen
Elizabeth I
Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was List of English monarchs, Queen of England and List of Irish monarchs, Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is ...
of England liked to wear bright reds, before she adopted the more sober image of the "Virgin Queen".
Red costumes were not limited to the upper classes. In Renaissance
Flanders
Flanders (, ; Dutch: ''Vlaanderen'' ) is the Flemish-speaking northern portion of Belgium and one of the communities, regions and language areas of Belgium. However, there are several overlapping definitions, including ones related to cultu ...
, people of all social classes wore red at celebrations. One such celebration was captured in ''
The Wedding Dance
''The Wedding Dance'' (sometimes known as ''The Village Dance'') is a 1566 oil-on-panel painting by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Owned by the museum of the Detroit Institute of Arts in Detroit, Michigan, the work was discovered by its director in Eng ...
'' (1566) by
Pieter Bruegel the Elder.
The painter
Johannes Vermeer
Johannes Vermeer ( , , see below; also known as Jan Vermeer; October 1632 – 15 December 1675) was a Dutch Baroque Period painter who specialized in domestic interior scenes of middle-class life. During his lifetime, he was a moderately succe ...
skilfully used different shades and tints of vermilion to paint the red skirt in ''
The Girl with the Wine Glass
''The Girl with the Wine Glass'' (''Dame en twee heren'') is an oil on canvas painting by Johannes Vermeer, created ''c.'' 1659–1660, now in the Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum, in Braunschweig.
Painting materials
The pigment analysis done by Herman ...
'', then glazed it with madder lake to make a more luminous color.
Reds from the New World
Paracas textile, British Museum.jpg, Textiles dyed red from the Paracas culture
The Paracas culture was an Andean society existing between approximately 800 BCE and 100 BCE, with an extensive knowledge of irrigation and water management and that made significant contributions in the textile arts. It was located in what tod ...
of Peru
, image_flag = Flag of Peru.svg
, image_coat = Escudo nacional del Perú.svg
, other_symbol = Great Seal of the State
, other_symbol_type = National seal
, national_motto = "Firm and Happy f ...
(about 200 BC), in the British Museum
The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...
Aztecheaddress.jpg, Feather headdress from the Aztec
The Aztecs () were a Mesoamerican culture that flourished in central Mexico in the post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl ...
people of Mexico and Central America. dyed with cochineal
The cochineal ( , ; ''Dactylopius coccus'') is a scale insect in the suborder Sternorrhyncha, from which the natural dye carmine is derived. A primarily sessile parasite native to tropical and subtropical South America through North Americ ...
Indian collecting cochineal.jpg, A native of Central America
Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...
collecting cochineal insects from a cactus
A cactus (, or less commonly, cactus) is a member of the plant family Cactaceae, a family comprising about 127 genera with some 1750 known species of the order Caryophyllales. The word ''cactus'' derives, through Latin, from the Ancient Gree ...
to make red dye (1777).
In Latin America, the
Aztec people
The Aztecs () were a Mesoamerican culture that flourished in central Mexico in the post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl l ...
, the
Paracas culture
The Paracas culture was an Andean society existing between approximately 800 BCE and 100 BCE, with an extensive knowledge of irrigation and water management and that made significant contributions in the textile arts. It was located in what tod ...
and other societies used
cochineal
The cochineal ( , ; ''Dactylopius coccus'') is a scale insect in the suborder Sternorrhyncha, from which the natural dye carmine is derived. A primarily sessile parasite native to tropical and subtropical South America through North Americ ...
, a vivid scarlet dye made from insects. From the 16th until the 19th century, cochineal became a highly profitable export from
Spanish Mexico to Europe.
18th to 20th century
File:Sansculottes.jpg, The "bonnet rouge" or red cap worn by the sans-culottes
The (, 'without breeches') were the common people of the lower classes in late 18th-century France, a great many of whom became radical and militant partisans of the French Revolution in response to their poor quality of life under the . T ...
in the French Revolution
File:François-René Moreaux - O imperador D. Pedro II, sua esposa Teresa Cristina e suas filhas, princesas Isabel e Leopoldina, 1857.JPG, The Brazilian imperial family (1857)
File:Kustodiev The Bolshevik.jpg, Red flag of the Bolsheviks, by Boris Kustodiev
Boris Mikhaylovich Kustodiev (russian: Бори́с Миха́йлович Кусто́диев; – 28 May 1927) was a Russian and Soviet painter and stage designer.
Early life
Boris Kustodiev was born in Astrakhan into the family of a profe ...
(1920)
File:Chinese honor guard in column 070322-F-0193C-014.JPEG, Chinese Honour Guard, Beijing, 2007
In the 18th century, red began to take on a new identity as the colour of resistance and revolution. It was already associated with blood, and with danger; a red flag hoisted before a battle meant that no prisoners would be taken. In 1793-94, red became the colour of the
French Revolution
The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in coup of 18 Brumaire, November 1799. Many of its ...
. A red
Phrygian cap, or "liberty cap", was part of the uniform of the
sans-culottes
The (, 'without breeches') were the common people of the lower classes in late 18th-century France, a great many of whom became radical and militant partisans of the French Revolution in response to their poor quality of life under the . T ...
, the most militant faction of the revolutionaries. King Louis XVI was forced to wear a red Phrygian cap after his arrest.
In the late 18th century, during a strike English dock workers carried red flags, and it thereafter became closely associated with the new labour movement, and later with the
Labour Party in The United Kingdom, founded in 1900.
In Paris in 1832, a red flag was carried by working-class demonstrators in the failed
June Rebellion
The June Rebellion, or the Paris Uprising of 1832 (french: Insurrection républicaine à Paris en juin 1832), was an anti-monarchist insurrection of Parisian republicans on 5 and 6 June 1832.
The rebellion originated in an attempt by republ ...
, an event immortalised in ''
Les Misérables
''Les Misérables'' ( , ) is a French historical novel by Victor Hugo, first published in 1862, that is considered one of the greatest novels of the 19th century.
In the English-speaking world, the novel is usually referred to by its origin ...
''), and later in the
1848 French Revolution
The French Revolution of 1848 (french: Révolution française de 1848), also known as the February Revolution (), was a brief period of civil unrest in France, in February 1848, that led to the collapse of the July Monarchy and the foundation ...
.
The red flag was proposed as the new national French flag during the 1848 revolution, but was rejected by at the urging of the poet and statesman
Alphonse Lamartine in favour of the tricolour flag. It appeared again as the flag of the short-lived
Paris Commune
The Paris Commune (french: Commune de Paris, ) was a revolutionary government that seized power in Paris, the capital of France, from 18 March to 28 May 1871.
During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71, the French National Guard had defended ...
in 1871. It was then adopted by
Karl Marx
Karl Heinrich Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist, journalist, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary. His best-known titles are the 1848 ...
and the new European movements of
socialism
Socialism is a left-wing Economic ideology, economic philosophy and Political movement, movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to Private prop ...
and
communism
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a ...
.
Soviet Russia
The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, Russian SFSR or RSFSR ( rus, Российская Советская Федеративная Социалистическая Республика, Rossíyskaya Sovétskaya Federatívnaya Soci ...
adopted a red flag following the
Bolshevik Revolution
The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key moment ...
in 1917. Communist China adopted the red flag following the
Chinese Revolution of 1949. It was adopted by North
Vietnam
Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...
in 1954, and by all of Vietnam in 1975.
Symbolism
Courage and sacrifice
Surveys show that red is the color most associated with courage.
In western countries red is a symbol of martyrs and sacrifice, particularly because of its association with blood.
Beginning in the Middle Ages, the Pope and Cardinals of the
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
wore red to symbolize the blood of Christ and the Christian martyrs. The banner of the Christian soldiers in the
First Crusade
The First Crusade (1096–1099) was the first of a series of religious wars, or Crusades, initiated, supported and at times directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The objective was the recovery of the Holy Land from Islamic r ...
was a red cross on a white field, the
St. George's Cross. According to Christian tradition,
Saint George
Saint George (Greek: Γεώργιος (Geórgios), Latin: Georgius, Arabic: القديس جرجس; died 23 April 303), also George of Lydda, was a Christian who is venerated as a saint in Christianity. According to tradition he was a soldie ...
was a Roman soldier who was a member of the guards of the Emperor
Diocletian, who refused to renounce his Christian faith and was martyred. The Saint George's Cross became the
Flag of England
The flag of England is the national flag of England, a constituent country of the United Kingdom. It is derived from Saint George's Cross (heraldic blazon: ''Argent, a cross gules''). The association of the red cross as an emblem of England ...
in the 16th century, and now is part of the
Union Flag
The Union Jack, or Union Flag, is the ''de facto'' national flag of the United Kingdom. Although no law has been passed making the Union Flag the official national flag of the United Kingdom, it has effectively become such through precedent. ...
of the United Kingdom, as well as the Flag of the Republic of
Georgia
Georgia most commonly refers to:
* Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States
Georgia may also refer to:
Places
Historical states and entities
* Related to the ...
.
Robert Gibb - The Thin Red Line.jpg, Robert Gibb's 1881 painting, '' The Thin Red Line'', depicting The Thin Red Line at the Battle of Balaclava (1854), when a line of the Scottish Highland infantry repulsed a Russian cavalry charge. The name was given by the British press as a symbol of courage against the odds.
Poppies in the Sunset on Lake Geneva.jpg, The red poppy flower is worn on Remembrance Day in Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth countries to honor soldiers who died in the First World War.
Hatred, anger, aggression, passion, heat and war
While red is the color most associated with love, it also the color most frequently associated with hatred, anger, aggression and war. People who are angry are said to "." Red is the color most commonly associated with passion and heat. In ancient Rome, red was the color of Mars (mythology), Mars, the god of war—the planet
Mars
Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Roman god of war. Mars is a terrestrial planet with a thin at ...
was named for him because of its red color.
Warning and danger
Red is the traditional color of warning and danger, and is therefore often used on flags. In the Middle Ages up through the
French Revolution
The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in coup of 18 Brumaire, November 1799. Many of its ...
, a Red flag (signal), red flag shown in warfare indicated the intent to take no prisoners. Similarly, a red flag hoisted by a pirate ship meant no mercy would be shown to their target. In Britain, in the early days of motoring, motor cars had to follow a man with a red flag who would warn horse-drawn vehicles, before the Locomotives on Highways Act 1896 abolished this law. In automobile races, the red flag is raised if there is danger to the drivers. In international football, a player who has made a serious violation of the rules is shown a red penalty card and ejected from the game.
Several studies have indicated that red carries the strongest reaction of all the colors, with the level of reaction decreasing gradually with the colors orange, yellow, and white, respectively. For this reason, red is generally used as the highest level of warning, such as threat level of terrorist attack in the United States. In fact, teachers at a primary school in the UK have been told not to mark children's work in red ink because it encourages a "negative approach".
Red is the international color of stop signs and stop lights on highways and intersections. It was standardized as the international color at the Vienna Convention on Road Signs and Signals of 1968. It was chosen partly because red is the brightest color in daytime (next to orange), though it is less visible at twilight, when green is the most visible color. Red also stands out more clearly against a cool natural backdrop of blue sky, green trees or gray buildings. But it was mostly chosen as the color for stoplights and stop signs because of its universal association with danger and warning.
The 1968 Vienna Convention on Road Signs and Signals of 1968 uses red color also for the margin of danger warning sign, give way signs and prohibitory signs, following the previous German-type signage (established by Verordnung über Warnungstafeln für den Kraftfahrzeugverkehr in 1927).
Vienna Convention road sign B2a.svg, The standard international stop sign, following the Vienna Convention on Road Signs and Signals of 1968
File:SM-PAOK (18).jpg, A footballer is shown a red card and ejected from a soccer match
Red typhoon alert.png, A red Chinese typhoon alert sign
Hsas-chart with header.svg, Red is the color of a severe terrorist threat level in the United States, under the Homeland Security Advisory System.
AU Fire Danger Indicator.jpg, Red is the color of a severe fire danger in Australia; new black/red stripes are an even more catastrophic hazard.
The color that attracts attention
![Magdalena Frackowiak](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3d/Magdalena_Frackowiak.jpg)
Red is the color that most attracts attention. Surveys show it is the color most frequently associated with visibility, proximity, and extroverts. It is also the color most associated with dynamism and activity.
Red is used in modern fashion much as it was used in Medieval painting; to attract the eyes of the viewer to the person who is supposed to be the center of attention. People wearing red seem to be closer than those dressed in other colors, even if they are actually the same distance away.
Monarchs, wives of presidential candidates and other celebrities often wear red to be visible from a distance in a crowd. It is also commonly worn by lifeguards and others whose job requires them to be easily found.
Because red attracts attention, it is frequently used in advertising, though studies show that people are less likely to read something printed in red because they know it is advertising, and because it is more difficult visually to read than black and white text.
Seduction, sexuality and sin
Red by a large margin is the color most commonly associated with seduction, sexuality, eroticism and immorality, possibly because of its close connection with passion and with danger.
Red was long seen as having a dark side, particularly in Christianity, Christian theology. It was associated with sexual passion, anger, sin, and the devil.
In the Old Testament of the Bible, the Book of Isaiah said: "Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow." In the New Testament, in the Book of Revelation, the Antichrist appears as a red monster, ridden by a woman dressed in scarlet, known as the Whore of Babylon.
Satan is often depicted as colored red and/or wearing a red costume in both iconography and popular culture.
By the 20th century, the devil in red had become a folk character in legends and stories. The devil in red appears more often in cartoons and movies than in religious art.
In 17th-century New England, red was associated with adultery. In the 1850 novel by Nathaniel Hawthorne, ''The Scarlet Letter'', set in a Puritan New England community, a woman is punished for adultery with ostracism, her sin represented by a red letter 'A' sewn onto her clothes.
Red is still commonly associated with prostitution. At various points in history, prostitutes were required to wear red to announce their profession.
Houses of prostitution displayed a red light. Beginning in the early 20th century, houses of prostitution were allowed only in certain specified neighborhoods, which became known as red-light districts. Large red-light districts are found today in Bangkok and Amsterdam.
In both Christian and Hebrew tradition, red is also sometimes associated with murder or guilt, with "having blood on one's hands", or "being caught red-handed.
Whore of Babylon (XIV).jpg, The Whore of Babylon, depicted in a 14th-century French illuminated manuscript. The woman appears attractive, but is wearing red under her blue garment.
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec 057.jpg, ''Reine de joie'', (''Queen of Joy''), a book cover illustration by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1892) about a Paris prostitute
At the Devil's Ball 1.jpg, Sheet music for "At the Devil's Ball", by Irving Berlin, United States, 1915.
Amsterdam red light district 24-7-2003.JPG, The red-light district in Amsterdam (2003). Red is the sex industry's preferred color in many cultures, due to being strongly associated with passion, love and sexuality.
Red lipstick (photo by weglet).jpg, Red lipstick has been worn by women as a cosmetic since ancient times. It was worn by Cleopatra, Queen Elizabeth I
Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was List of English monarchs, Queen of England and List of Irish monarchs, Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is ...
, and film stars such as Elizabeth Taylor and Marilyn Monroe.
In religion
* In Christianity, red is associated with the blood of Christ and the sacrifice of
martyrs
A martyr (, ''mártys'', "witness", or , ''marturia'', stem , ''martyr-'') is someone who suffers persecution and death for advocating, renouncing, or refusing to renounce or advocate, a religious belief or other cause as demanded by an external ...
. In the
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
it is also associated with pentecost and the Holy Spirit. Since 1295, it is the color worn by Cardinals, the senior clergy of the Roman Catholic Church. Red is the liturgical color for the feasts of martyrs, representing the blood of those who suffered death for their faith. It is sometimes used as the liturgical color for Holy Week, including Palm Sunday and Good Friday, although this is a modern (20th-century) development. In Catholic practice, it is also the liturgical color used to commemorate the Holy Spirit (for this reason it is worn at Pentecost and during Confirmation masses). Because of its association with martyrdom and the Spirit, it is also the color used to commemorate saints who were martyred, such as St. George and all the Apostles (except for the Apostle St. John, who was not martyred, where white is used). As such, it is used to commemorate bishops, who are the successors of the Apostles (for this reason, when funeral masses are held for bishops, cardinals, or popes, red is used instead of the white that would ordinarily be used).
* In Buddhism, red is one of the five colors which are said to have emanated from the Buddha when he attained enlightenment, or nirvana. It is particularly associated with the benefits of the practice of Buddhism; achievement, wisdom, virtue, fortune and dignity. It was also believed to have the power to resist evil. In China red was commonly used for the walls, pillars, and gates of temples.
* In the Shinto religion of Japan, the gateways of temples, called torii, are traditionally painted vermilion red and black. The torii symbolizes the passage from the profane world to a sacred place. The bridges in the gardens of Japanese temples are also painted red (and usually only temple bridges are red, not bridges in ordinary gardens), since they are also passages to sacred places. Red was also considered a color which could expel evil and disease.
Itsukushima torii angle.jpg, A Shinto torii at Itsukushima, Japan
John Paul II funeral long shot.jpg, Cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church at the funeral of Pope John Paul II
Debating Monks.JPG, Buddhist monks in Tibet
Ravi Varma-Lakshmi.jpg, In Hinduism, red is associated with Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth and embodiment of beauty.
Muharram in cities and villages of Iran-342 16 (160).jpg, Red flags in a celebration of Muharram in Iran.
Military uses
The red uniform
The red military uniform was adopted by the English Parliament's New Model Army in 1645, and was still worn as a dress uniform by the British Army until the outbreak of the First World War in August 1914. Ordinary soldiers wore red coats dyed with Rubia, madder, while officers wore scarlet coats dyed with the more expensive
cochineal
The cochineal ( , ; ''Dactylopius coccus'') is a scale insect in the suborder Sternorrhyncha, from which the natural dye carmine is derived. A primarily sessile parasite native to tropical and subtropical South America through North Americ ...
.
This led to British soldiers being known as Red coat (British army), red coats.
In the modern British army, scarlet is still worn by the Foot Guards#British Army, Foot Guards, the Life Guards (British Army), Life Guards, and by some regimental bands or drummers for ceremonial purposes. Commissioned Officer, Officers and Non-Commissioned Officer, NCOs of those regiments which previously wore red retain scarlet as the color of their "mess" or formal evening jackets. The Royal Gibraltar Regiment has a scarlet tunic in its winter dress.
Scarlet is worn for some full dress, military band or mess uniforms in the modern armies of a number of the countries that made up the former British Empire. These include the Australian, Jamaican, New Zealand, Fijian, Canadian, Kenyan, Ghanaian, Indian, Singaporean, Sri Lankan and Pakistani armies.
The musicians of the United States Marine Corps Band wear red, following an 18th-century military tradition that the uniforms of band members are the reverse of the uniforms of the other soldiers in their unit. Since the US Marine uniform is blue with red facings, the band wears the reverse.
Red Serge is the uniform of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, created in 1873 as the North-West Mounted Police, and given its present name in 1920. The uniform was adapted from the tunic of the British Army. Cadets at the Royal Military College of Canada also wear red dress uniforms.
The Brazilian Marine Corps wears a red dress uniform.
Officer and Private, 40th Foot, 1815.jpg, Officer and soldier of the British Army, 1815.
Garde nationale bulgare.jpg, The scarlet uniform of the National Guards Unit of Bulgaria
PlateVII Band.jpg, Musicians of the United States Marine Corps Band
RCMP officer on a horse.JPG, Officer of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police
Forma-2g.jpg, The Brazilian Marine Corps wears a dress uniform called ''A Garança''.
Indian Army-Rajput regiment.jpeg, Soldiers of the Rajput Regiment of the Indian Army
NATO Military Symbols for Land Based Systems uses red to denote hostile forces, hence the terms "red team" and "Red Cell" to denote challengers during exercises.
In sports
The first known team sport to feature red uniforms was chariot racing during the late
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post- Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediter ...
. The earliest races were between two chariots, one driver wearing red, the other white. Later, the number of teams was increased to four, including drivers in light green and sky blue. Twenty-five races were run in a day, with a total of one hundred chariots participating.
Today many sports teams throughout the world feature red on their uniforms. Along with blue, red is the most commonly used non-white color in sports. Numerous national sports teams wear red, often through association with their national flags. A few of these teams feature the color as part of their nickname such as Spain (with their association football (soccer) national team nicknamed ''La Furia Roja'' or "The Red Fury") and Belgium (whose Belgium national football team, football team bears the nickname ''Rode Duivels'' or "Red Devils").
In club association football (soccer), red is a commonly used color throughout the world. A number of teams' nicknames feature the color. A red penalty card is issued to a player who commits a serious infraction: the player is immediately disqualified from further play and his team must continue with one fewer player for the game's duration.
Rosso Corsa is the red international motor racing color of cars entered by teams from Italy. Since the 1920s Italian race cars of Alfa Romeo, Maserati, Lancia, and later Ferrari and Abarth have been painted with a color known as ''rosso corsa'' ("racing red"). National colors were mostly replaced in Formula One by commercial sponsor liveries in 1968, but unlike most other teams, Ferrari always kept the traditional red, although the shade of the color varies.
The color is commonly used for professional sports teams in Canada and the United States with eleven Major League Baseball teams, eleven National Hockey League teams, seven National Football League teams and eleven National Basketball Association teams prominently featuring some shade of the color. The color is also featured in the league logos of Major League Baseball, the National Football League and the National Basketball Association. In the National Football League, a red flag is thrown by the head coach to challenge a referee's decision during the game. During the 1950s when red was strongly associated with
communism
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a ...
in the United States, the modern Cincinnati Reds team was known as the "Redlegs" and the term was used on baseball cards. After the red scare faded, the team was known as the "Reds" again.
In boxing, red is often the color used on a fighter's gloves. George Foreman wore the same red trunks he used during his loss to Muhammad Ali when he defeated Michael Moorer 20 years later to regain the title he lost. Boxers named or nicknamed "red" include Red Burman, Ernie Lopez, Ernie "Red" Lopez, and his brother Danny Lopez (boxer), Danny "Little Red" Lopez.
Winner of a Roman chariot race.jpg, Ancient Roman mosaic of the winner of a chariot race, wearing the colors of the red team.
RS Redz.png, Both the Cleveland Indians and the Boston Red Sox wear red.
Tamashiro-kata-Tampere-2006.jpg, In martial arts, a red belt (martial arts), red belt shows a high degree of proficiency, second only, in some schools, to the black belt.
Alfa Romeo 33 SC 12 Sovralimentata 1977 red vr TCE.jpg, An Alfa Romeo Sports Racing car in 1977, painted Rosso Corsa, ("racing red"), the traditional racing color of Italy from the 1920s until the late 1960s.
On flags
Red is the most common color found in national flags, found on the flags of 77 percent of the 210 countries listed as independent in 2016; far ahead of white (58 percent); green (40 percent) and blue (37 percent). The Union Flag, British flag bears the colors red, white and blue; it includes the cross (heraldry), cross of
Saint George
Saint George (Greek: Γεώργιος (Geórgios), Latin: Georgius, Arabic: القديس جرجس; died 23 April 303), also George of Lydda, was a Christian who is venerated as a saint in Christianity. According to tradition he was a soldie ...
, patron saint of England, and the saltire of Saint Patrick's Flag, Saint Patrick, patron saint of Ireland, both of which are red on white.
The flag of the United States bears the colors of Britain, the colors of the French Flag of France, tricolore include red as part of the old Paris coat of arms, and other countries' flags, such as those of Flag of Australia, Australia, Flag of New Zealand, New Zealand, and Flag of Fiji, Fiji, carry a small inset of the British flag in memory of their ties to that country.
Many former colonies of Spain, such as Mexico, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Ecuador, Panama,
Peru
, image_flag = Flag of Peru.svg
, image_coat = Escudo nacional del Perú.svg
, other_symbol = Great Seal of the State
, other_symbol_type = National seal
, national_motto = "Firm and Happy f ...
, Puerto Rico and Venezuela, also feature red-one of the colors of the Spanish flag-on their own banners. Red flags are also used to symbolize storms, bad water conditions, and many other dangers.
The red on the flag of Nepal represents the floral emblem of the country, the rhododendron.
Red, blue, and white are also the Pan-Slavic colors adopted by the Slavic solidarity movement of the late nineteenth century. Initially these were the colors of the Russian flag; as the Slavic movement grew, they were adopted by other Slavic peoples including Slovaks, Slovenes, and Serbs. The flags of the Flag of the Czech Republic, Czech Republic and Flag of Poland, Poland use red for historic heraldic reasons (see Coat of arms of Poland and Coat of arms of the Czech Republic) & not due to Pan-Slavic connotations. In 2004
Georgia
Georgia most commonly refers to:
* Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States
Georgia may also refer to:
Places
Historical states and entities
* Related to the ...
adopted a new white flag of Georgia (country), flag, which consists of four small and one big red cross in the middle touching all four sides.
Red, white, and black were the colors of the German Empire from 1870 to 1918, and as such they came to be associated with German nationalism. In the 1920s they were adopted as the colors of the Nazi Party, Nazi flag. In ''Mein Kampf'', Hitler explained that they were "revered colors expressive of our homage to the glorious past." The red part of the flag was also chosen to attract attention – Hitler wrote: "the new flag ... should prove effective as a large poster" because "in hundreds of thousands of cases a really striking emblem may be the first cause of awakening interest in a movement." The red also symbolized the social program of the Nazis, aimed at German workers. Several designs by a number of different authors were considered, but the one adopted in the end was Hitler's personal design.
Red, white, green and black are the colors of Pan-Arabism and are used by many Arab countries.
Red, gold, green, and black are the colors of Pan-Africanism. Several African countries thus use the color on their flags, including South Africa, Ghana, Senegal, Mali, Ethiopia, Togo, Guinea, Benin, and Zimbabwe. The Pan-African colours, Pan-African colors are borrowed from the flag of Ethiopia, one of the oldest independent African countries.
Rwanda, notably, removed red from Flag of Rwanda, its flag after the Rwandan genocide because of red's association with blood.
The flags of Japan and Bangladesh both have a red circle in the middle of different colored backgrounds. The flag of the Philippines has a red trapezoid on the bottom signifying blood, courage, and valor (also, if the flag is inverted so that the red trapezoid is on top and the blue at the bottom, it indicates a state of war). The flag of Singapore has a red rectangle on the top. The field of the flag of Portugal is green and red. The Ottoman Empire adopted several different red flags during the six centuries of its rule, with the successor Turkey, Republic of Turkey continuing the 1844 Ottoman Flag of Turkey, flag.
Flag of Palaeologus Dynasty.svg, The flag of the Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...
from 1260 to its fall in 1453
Flag of England.svg, The St George's cross was the banner of the First Crusade
The First Crusade (1096–1099) was the first of a series of religious wars, or Crusades, initiated, supported and at times directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The objective was the recovery of the Holy Land from Islamic r ...
, then, beginning in the 13th century, the flag of England. It is the red color (along with that of the Cross of Saint Patrick) in the flag of the United Kingdom, and, by adoption, of the red in the flag of the United States.
Grand Union Flag.svg, The red stripes in the flag of the United States were adapted from the flag of the British East Indies Company. This is the Grand Union Flag, the first U.S. flag established by the Continental Congress.
Flag of Georgia.svg, The Flag of Georgia (country), Flag of Georgia also features the Saint George's Cross. It dates back to the banner of Medieval Georgia in the 5th century.
Flag of Canada.svg, The maple leaf flag of Canada, adopted in 1965. The red color comes from the Saint George's Cross of England.
In politics
![Red state, blue state](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/27/Red_state%2C_blue_state.svg)
In 18th-century Europe, red was usually associated with the monarchy and with those in power. The Pope wore red, as did the Swiss Guards of the Kings of France, the soldiers of the British Army and the Danish Army.
The
French Revolution
The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in coup of 18 Brumaire, November 1799. Many of its ...
saw red used by the Jacobins as a symbol of the martyrs of the Revolution. In the nineteenth century, with the Industrial Revolution and the rise of worker's movements, it became the color of
socialism
Socialism is a left-wing Economic ideology, economic philosophy and Political movement, movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to Private prop ...
(especially the Marxism, Marxist Socialism (Marxism), variant), and, with the
Paris Commune
The Paris Commune (french: Commune de Paris, ) was a revolutionary government that seized power in Paris, the capital of France, from 18 March to 28 May 1871.
During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71, the French National Guard had defended ...
of 1871, of revolution.
In the 20th century, red was the color first of the Russian Bolsheviks and then, after the success of the Russian Revolution of 1917, of communist parties around the world. However, after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia went back to the pre-revolutionary blue, white and red flag.
Red also became the color of many Social democracy, social democratic parties in Europe, including the
Labour Party in Britain (founded 1900); the Social Democratic Party of Germany (whose roots went back to 1863) and the Socialist Party (France), French Socialist Party, which dated back under different names, to 1879. The Socialist Party of America (1901–72) and the Communist Party USA (1919) both also chose red as their color.
Members of the Christian-Social People's Party (Liechtenstein), Christian-Social People's Party in Liechtenstein (founded 1918) advocated an expansion of democracy and progressive social policies, and were often referred to disparagingly as "Reds" for their social liberal leanings and party colors.
The Chinese Communist Party, founded in 1920, adopted the red flag and hammer and sickle emblem of the Soviet Union, which became the national symbols when the Party took power in China in 1949. Under Party leader Mao Zedong, the Party anthem became "The East Is Red (song), The East Is Red", and Mao Zedong himself was sometimes referred to as a "red sun". During the Cultural Revolution in China, Party ideology was enforced by the Red Guards, and the Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, sayings of Mao Zedong were published as a little red book in hundreds of millions of copies. Today the Chinese Communist Party claims to be the largest political party in the world, with eighty million members.
Beginning in the 1960s and the 1970s, paramilitary extremist groups such as the Red Army Faction in Germany, the Japanese Red Army and the Shining Path Maoist movement in
Peru
, image_flag = Flag of Peru.svg
, image_coat = Escudo nacional del Perú.svg
, other_symbol = Great Seal of the State
, other_symbol_type = National seal
, national_motto = "Firm and Happy f ...
used red as their color. But in the 1980s, some European socialist and social democratic parties, such as the Labour Party in Britain and the Socialist Party in France, moved away from the symbolism of the far left, keeping the red color but changing their symbol to a less-threatening red rose.
Red is used around the world by political parties of the left or center-left. In the United States, it is the color of the Communist Party USA, of the Social Democrats, USA, and in Puerto Rico, of the Popular Democratic Party (Puerto Rico), Popular Democratic Party.
In the United States, political commentators often refer to the "red states", which voted for Republican candidates in the last four presidential elections, and "blue states", which voted for Democrats. This convention is relatively recent: before the 2000 United States presidential election, 2000 presidential election, media outlets assigned red and blue to both parties, sometimes alternating the allocation for each election. Fixed usage was established during the 39-day recount following the 2000 election, when the media began to discuss the contest in terms of Red states and blue states, "red states" versus "blue states". States which voted for different parties in two of the last four presidential elections are called "Swing States", and are usually coloured purple, a mix of red and blue.
Social and special interest groups
Such names as Red Club (a bar), Red Carpet (a discothèque) or Red Cottbus and Club Red (event locations) suggest liveliness and excitement. The Red Hat Society is a social group founded in 1998 for women 50 and over. Use of the color red to call attention to an emergency situation is evident in the names of such organizations as the Red Cross (humanitarian aid), Red Hot Organization (AIDS support), and the Red List of Threatened Species (of IUCN). In reference to humans, term "red" is often used in the West to describe the indigenous peoples of the Americas.
Idioms
Many idiomatic expressions exploit the various connotations of red:
; Expressing emotion
* "to see red" (to be angry or aggressive)
* "to have red ears / a red face" (to be embarrassed)
* "to paint the town red" (to have an enjoyable evening, usually with a generous amount of eating, drinking, dancing)
; Giving warning
* "to raise a red flag" (to signal that something is problematic)
* "like a red rag to a bull" (to cause someone to be enraged)
* "to be in the red" (to be losing money, from the accounting convention of writing deficits and losses in red ink)
; Calling attention
* "a red letter day" (a special or important event, from the medieval custom of printing the dates of saints' days and holy days in red ink.)
* "to print in red ink" (for emphasis or easy identification), more formally "to rubricate"
* "to lay out the red carpet" or "give red-carpet treatment" (to treat someone royally as a very special person)
* "to catch someone red-handed" (in the act of doing something wrong, such with blood on his hands after a murder or poaching game)
; Other idioms
* "to tie up in red tape". In England red tape was used by lawyers and government officials to identify important documents. It became a term for excessive bureaucratic regulation. It was popularized in the 19th century by the writer Thomas Carlyle, who complained about "red-tapism".
* "red herring". A false clue that leads investigators off the track. Refers to the practice of using a fragrant smoked fish to distract hunting or tracking dogs from the track they are meant to follow.
See also
* Blushing
* Lists of colors
* Little Red Riding Hood
* Red flag (politics)
* Red pigments
References
Notes and citations
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Primary colors
Secondary colors
Optical spectrum
Shades of red,
Rainbow colors
Web colors