I was recently asked the following question:

"Theoretically what would be the colours of hellenismos. Something like white and red or blue and marble. It would be useful to know and I would like your opinion on that matter. Thanks and may the Gods bless you."

Interesting notion, the colours of Hellenismos. I think by now we all know that the statues and even the temples we're so used to seeing in a virgin white looked stunningly different in antiquity. They were painted with a palette that displayed a sophisticated understanding of color and shading. They liked their colours bold--yellows, reds, blues and of course gold. We might see these colours as gaudy, but the purer the colour, the more expensive it was to make.

the original colors of ancient Greek and Roman sculptures 4

One might say we should bank on primary colours for the colours of Hellenismos but there is a small complication: there is quite a surprising amount of scientific, literary and archaeological evidence that the ancient Hellenes perceived colour differently than we do today. 

Homéros describes only five 'colours': metallics, black, white, yellow-green, and red). Philosopher Empedocles, centuries later, believed that all colour was limited to four categories: white/light, dark/black, red, and yellow. Xenophanes, another philosopher, described the rainbow as having but three bands of colour: porphyra (dark purple), khloros, and erythros (red). By the way, did you know there is no word for 'blue' in ancient Greek? Not in the Bible either, by the way. I find this especially amusing because modern Greece thrives on blue. It's in the flag, art, architecture, you name it. The ancient Hellenes had blue paint, of course, but it might have looked entirely different to them than it does to us.


So where does the leave us? If we're going for official colours, I would still say we go with the primary colours and add green and gold. Marble is a material, not a colour so that doesn't really count. All in all, I think this is a good pallet to base things off of:

the original colors of ancient Greek and Roman sculptures