View any ancient Egyptian coloured object or tomb wall, and it is evident that the artists used a variety of pigments. The bust of Nefertiti, one of the iconic images of ancient Egypt, displays a range of colours, including red, yellow, green, black, and blue.
Colour played an essential role in the artistic and cultic aspects of ancient Egyptian life. Colour provided symbolic meaning and was integral to representations found on materials including jewellery, painted pottery, and dyed linen. In addition, coloured paints were used on plastered walls, stone sculptures and reliefs, wooden coffins, and papyri.
Colour palette
Based on a number of research studies, symbolic associations have been assigned to the basic colours:
• White: purity/sacredness
• Black: night/death/resurrection/fertility
• Red: life/death/destruction
• Blue: the heavens/the River Nile
• Green: life/resurrection
• Yellow: the sun/the flesh and bones of the gods
Many pigments in ancient Egypt were derived from inorganic substances, such as minerals, or synthetic chemicals, while organic dyes and pigments were used in later Egyptian art. In Predynastic Egypt, Egyptians used pigments that could be found locally, including clay ochres, white calcium carbonate and gypsum, and black carbon in the form of soot. As Egyptian civilisation progressed technically, the new pigment ‘Egyptian blue’ was manufactured in the Early Dynastic Period (c.3150 BC-2686 BC), and huntite, a bright white mined inorganic pigment, was used on funerary objects from the Old Kingdom.
