13. 22 DESCRIPTIVE KAPAMPANGAN WORDS FOR COLORS, SHADES AND HUES

History is often presented in black and white, or in sepia tones, but our ancestors probably had more color sense than we do today—judging from the riot of colors that characterized their costumes, food and fiestas—and a palette of words to describe many shades, tones and hues. Fray Diego Bergaño, who compiled Kapampangan words into a dictionary, provides further notes and examples of word usage, which are include here.

1.      ALUNTIAN. Adj., “green texture, green fabric”

2.      BALANTAN. “stain on a badly dyed object”. Thus, mabalantan, are “clothes dyed in this manner”

3.      BULANGGO or BULANGGAO, Adj. “reddish, ruddy”. Blond hair of a Dutchman is described as “bulanggo a buac”, but curiously “bulanggo a mata” refers to the blue eyes of a cat.

4.      BULIC. “stained with white and red”. In Tagalog, “bulik” is white and black spots, used to describe a rooster’s speckles.

5.      CALICAM. “flesh-colored”. Bergaño notes that it’s a rarely-used word.

6.      CAYUMANGGUI. Adj., “Brownish”, more brown (moreno) than fair-skinned. Sometimes spelled as “komanggi”

7.      CULIMLIM. “badly tinted or dyed” . Dusky.  Brownish face of skin.

8.      GALATGAT. “Mix colors to produce another color”.

9.      IRO or IRAO. “Blue”, or “that which is given a blue dye”, or “the cock with blackish and white feathers”. Tayum is “the bush of a small tree from which the blue dye is produced. The verb  tayum, is “to dye something in blue”; teyuman is “dyed in blue”; and the figurative expression meguing tayum, means “bruised black and white”.

10.  LACÀ. “dyed with colors that are not so bright”.

11.  LARÉ or LARAY. “the ruddiness or color of health”. It is also the color or blush that appears on the face because of fear, shame or embarrassment. A synonym is diua (‘ruddiness”), mariua (“one who has the healthy glow), alang diua na (“he is pallid”) 

12.  LILÂ. “different kind of blue”.

13.  LUTU. Noun. “The color red”.  The color is achieved through dyes derived from bangcuro, a tree bark or lino, a root that gives a deep red color. Lumpi is the bright red color caused by buyo or betel leaf. Adj. “malutu”

14.  PAPAS. Noun. “the color yellow”. The color is achieved through ángè, a root similar to saffron, that is used to color food like bringhe.

15.  PUTI. “Whiteness”. Caputian, intense whiteness. Miti, “to bleach, to whitewash”. Manimuti, “to become pallid”. Busilac, means “the whitest”.

16.  PUTLA.”paleness”. Manimutla, “to become pale”, maputla,”pale”.

17.  PUYASIO or PUYASIAO. “discolored”. Manimuyasiao, ‘to become discolored”.

18.  SUGÂ. “blazing color”. Adj. “masuga”, in living color.

19.  SULBANG. Noun. “a tree and its red flowers.”Meguinsulbang”,  to appear red as in the sky or clouds, or a thing that causes one to blush.

20.  TINÂ. Adj., “dyed in dark color or in black”. The verb “tinâ,” means “to dye”.

21.  TUGAGAS. “a thing becomes clean because the color has faded”, or the stain has disappeared.

22.  TULING. “blackness”. Matuling, “black”; manuling-nuling,”somewhat black”; ”pantis”, means ”the blackest”.

SOURCE:
Adapted from Robby P. Tantingco's article previously published in Singsing Magazine.