Gaudy Neptune Malachite

Middle English gaude, trick / showy ornament — adjectival suffix -y. As a color modifier, gaudy implies a saturated-and-cheaply-bright-and-overdone quality, the bright color of carnival-and-fairground novelty-attraction painted-and-lit decoration. Sits at the bright-and-flamboyant end of the grid, parallel to garish and lurid in usage.

Latin Neptunus, Roman-god-of-sea-and-eighth-planet. As a color modifier, neptune implies a Roman-god-of-sea-and-deep-blue-eighth-planet quality, the visual register of Roman-Neptune-and-Voyager-2-deep-blue hand-Roman-god-of-sea-and-deep-blue-eighth-planet Roman-Neptune-and-Voyager-2-deep-blue-and-Trevi-Fountain neptune-and-Roman-god-of-sea surfaces under Roman-Neptune-and-Voyager-2-deep-blue-and-Trevi-Fountain Voyager-2-flyby-and-Trevi-Fountain deep-blue-planet-light. Sits at the modifier-and-zodiac end of the grid, parallel to uranus and saturn in usage.

A copper carbonate mineral — Cu₂CO₃(OH)₂ — that crystallizes as concentric green bands in oxidized copper deposits. Mined for ornamental stone since ancient Egypt, ground into pigment for medieval European painting, polished into the malachite columns of the Russian Hermitage. The color refers to a polished cabochon: a saturated, slightly muted green with the high shine of stone and the visible banding of growth rings.