PRIMITIVE COLOR VISION. 53 



applying the conclusions arrived at in the case of Murray Island to 

 all existing races whose color nomenclature is defective, and still less 

 so in applying them directly to the races of the past. ISTeverthelesSj 

 the fact remains that, in the only race which has been investigated with 

 any degree of completeness,* the characteristic defect in color language 

 has been found to be associated with a corresponding defect in color 

 sense. 



There are other sources from which evidence on the evolution of 

 the color sense in man may be derived. It has already been mentioned 

 that at an early stage in the controversy the evidence of ancient monu- 

 ments was brought forward against the views of Gladstone and Geiger. 

 It was pointed out that, long before the time of Homer, green and 

 blue pigments were used in Egjrptian sculpture and decorations. In the 

 Berlin Museum there is a palette with seven depressions, which appear 

 to have been used for seven colors, white, black, red, yellow, green, a 

 bright blue and a dark color which may have been either blue or 

 brown. Indeed, blue appears to have been the predominant color of 

 Egyptian pottery, and blue and green beads have been found in the 

 graves of the prehistoric Egyptian race. Green and blue appear also 

 to have been used in the decoration of the ancient Assyrians and 

 Chaldeans. Greek architecture has also been foimd in Thera, Tiryns 

 and Mycenae of a date earlier than that of Homer, in which the colors 

 used include blue. 



Mr. Benaky, of Smyrna, has recently collectedt the evidence de- 

 rived from the coloration of ancient monuments, and believes that it 

 decisively disproves the existence of any defect of color vision of the 

 ancient Egyptians and Greeks. Two considerations must, however, be 

 borne in mind when dealing with evidence of this kind. In the first 

 place, it may be conceded that the monuments of the Egyptians show 

 that these people had a perfectly developed color sense, and yet the color 

 sense of the Greeks one thousand years or more later may have been 

 defective. Just as we find different races at the present day in different 

 stages of evolution as regards color, so it may have been three or four 

 thousand years ago. The state of the color sense of the Egyptians has 

 no direct bearing on that of the Greeks. It is a point of interest that 

 the high development of the color sense in the ancient Egyptians, as 

 shown by their decorations, appears to have been accompanied by a 

 corresponding development of language, for it is statedt that in the 

 ancient Egyptian language there were two words for green and one for 

 blue. 



• A full account of these investigations will be given in the reports of the Cam- 

 bridge Expedition. 



1 'Du sens chromatique dans I'antiquite.' Paris, 1897. 

 t See 'Kosmos,' Bd. I., s. 430; 1877. 



