In the literary realm the term “mercury” sometimes transcends its scientific or mythological associations to evoke a distinctive, liquid metallic hue—a cool, silvery glow that seems to capture both transience and transformation. Although most references to mercury tend to be technical or emblematic of the messenger god’s mutable character, a few writers have harnessed its chromatic qualities to great poetic effect. For instance, the evocative image of a “mercury vapour light” creates an otherworldly, ghostly gleam that not only illuminates a scene but also hints at an elusive, shifting beauty [1]. This selective use of mercury as a color underscores its capacity to merge the precise with the poetic, lending a tangible shimmer to abstract moods and ephemeral moments.
This tab, the new OneLook "color thesaurus", is a work in progress.
It draws from a data set of more than 2000 color names gathered from sources around the Web,
and an analysis of how they are referenced in English texts.
- Enter any color to explore similar colors, as well as objects and concepts associated with the color
in English texts.
Examples: lime green,
lavender.
- Enter any object or concept to see the colors associated with the object or concept in English texts,
as well as words that have a similar color profile. Examples: rage,
sun,
jeans,
royalty.
Some words, like "
peach", function as both a color name and an object; when you do a search for words like these, you will see both of the above sections.