Blue is the colour of the clear sky and the deep sea.

[2][3] It is located between violet and green on

the optical spectrum.[4]
Surveys in the U.S. and Europe show that blue is the colour most commonly associated with
harmony, faithfulness, confidence, distance, infinity, the imagination, cold, and sometimes with
sadness.[5] In U.S. and European public opinion polls it is overwhelmingly the most popular colour,
chosen by almost half of both men and women as their favourite colour.[5]
Contents
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1 Shades and variations

2 Etymology and linguistic differences
3 History
o 3.1 In the ancient world
o 3.2 In the Byzantine Empire and the Islamic World
o 3.3 During the Middle Ages
o 3.4 In the European Renaissance
o 3.5 Blue and white porcelain
o 3.6 The war of the blues indigo versus woad
o 3.7 The blue uniform
o 3.8 The search for the perfect blue
o 3.9 The Impressionist painters
o 3.10 The blue suit
o 3.11 In the 20th and 21st century
4 In science and industry
o 4.1 Pigments and dyes
o 4.2 Optics
o 4.3 Scientific natural standards
o 4.4 Why the sky and sea appear blue
o 4.5 Atmospheric perspective
o 4.6 Blue eyes
o 4.7 Lasers
5 In nature
o 5.1 Animals
6 In world culture
o 6.1 As a national and international colour
o 6.2 Politics
o 6.3 Religion
o 6.4 Gender
o 6.5 Music
o 6.6 Associations and sayings
7 Sports
o 7.1 The blues of antiquity
o 7.2 Association football
o 7.3 North American sporting leagues
8 See also
9 References

o 9.1 Notes and citations

o 9.2 Bibliography
10 External links

Shades and variations

Main article: Shades of blue

Blue is the colour of light between violet and green on the visible spectrum. Hues of blue include
indigo and ultramarine, closer to violet; pure blue, without any mixture of other colours; Cyan, which
is midway on the spectrum between blue and green, and the other blue-greens turquoise, teal,
and aquamarine.
Blues also vary in shade or tint; darker shades of blue contain black or grey, while lighter tints
contain white. Darker shades of blue include ultramarine, cobalt blue, navy blue, and Prussian blue;
while lighter tints include sky blue, azure, and Egyptian blue. (For a more complete list see the List of
colours).
Blue pigments were originally made from minerals such as lapis lazuli, cobalt and azurite, and blue
dyes were made from plants; usually woad in Europe, and Indigofera tinctoria, or True indigo, in Asia
and Africa. Today most blue pigments and dyes are made by a chemical process.

Earth is sometimes called the blue planet. A photomontage of the Earth seen from space (NASA image).

Blue is the colour of the deep sea and the clear sky. The harbour of Toulon, France, on
the Mediterranean Sea.

Pure blue, also known as high blue, is not mixed with any other colours.

Navy blue, also known as low blue, is the darkest shade of pure blue.

Sky blue or pale azure, mid-way on the RBG colour wheel between blue and cyan.

Extract of natural Indigo, the most popular blue dye before the invention of synthetic dyes. It was the
colour of the first blue jeans.

A block of lapis lazuli, originally used to make ultramarine.

Ultramarine, the most expensive blue during the Renaissance, is a slightly violet-blue.

Cobalt has been used since 2000 BC to colour cobalt glass, Chinese porcelain, and the stained
glasswindows of medieval cathedrals.

The synthetic pigment cobalt blue was invented in 1802, and was popular withVincent van Gogh and
other impressionist painters.

Cyan is made by mixing equal amounts of blue and green light, or removing red from white light.

The colour teal takes its name from the colour around the eyes of thecommon teal duck.

Egyptian blue goblet from Mesopotamia, 15001300 BC. This was the first synthetic blue, first made in
about 2500 BC.

Prussian blue, invented in 1707, was the first modern synthetic blue.

Cerulean blue pigment was invented in 1805 and first marketed in 1860. It was frequently used for
painting skies.

Etymology and linguistic differences

The modern English word blue comes from Middle English bleu or blewe, from the Old French bleu,
a word of Germanic origin, related to the Old High German word blao.[6] In heraldry, the word azure is
used for blue.[7]
In Russian and some other languages, there is no single word for blue, but rather different words for
light blue (, goluboy) and dark blue (, siniy).
Several languages, including Japanese, Thai, Korean, and Lakota Sioux, use the same word to
describe blue and green. For example, in Vietnamese the colour of both tree leaves and the sky
is xanh. In Japanese, the word for blue ( ao) is often used for colours that English speakers would
refer to as green, such as the colour of a traffic signal meaning "go". (For more on this subject,
see Distinguishing blue from green in language)

History
In the ancient world
Blue was a latecomer among colours used in art and decoration, as well as language and
literature.[8] Reds, blacks, browns, and ochres are found in cave paintings from the Upper Pale