Stately Hemp Violet

An adjectival form of state, condition of dignity. Used as a color modifier since the seventeenth century for the deep saturated jewel tones of formal ceremony — the deep blue of a robes-of-state, the deep red of a state-banquet velvet. Sits in the bold-and-formal corner alongside imperial and royal, with slightly less institutional weight.

Old English henep, hemp-plant. As a color modifier, hemp implies a coarse-bast-fiber quality, the visual register of Russian-and-Italian-and-Far-East-hemp hand-retted-and-spun-hemp-fiber bast-fiber rope-and-canvas-and-cordage hemp-textile surfaces under hand-retted-and-spun-hemp working light. Sits at the modifier-and-texture end of the grid, parallel to cord and twine in usage.

Viola odorata, the European sweet violet — small, fragrant, and the original meaning of the color name in English (the Violet of the rainbow). The color refers to a fresh sweet violet blossom in late winter: a saturated, slightly red-shifted deep blue-purple with the matte finish of small five-petaled flower. Cooler than amethyst, warmer than indigo, with the perfumed weight of a flower used in Roman garlands and Victorian eau de toilette.