Color words

Yet another useful group of words that are best learned as a set are the words to describe colors.

Now the general term for color is:

颜色 (Yánsè)

I can use it in a sentence like this:

那是什么颜色? (Nà shì shénme yánsè?) is basically “what is that color?” or better “what color is that?”

To answer it, here are some common colors:

红色 (Hóng sè) is red

蓝色 (Lán sè) is blue

黄色 (Huáng sè) is yellow

绿色 (Lǜsè) is green

黑色 (Hēi sè) is black

白色 (Bái sè) is white

褐色 (Hé sè) is brown

灰色 (Huī sè) is gray

粉色 (Fěn sè) is pink (although my mother in law says 粉红色 (Fěnhóng sè) which is like “pinkish red”)

金 色 (Jīn sè) is gold

银色 (Yín sè) is silver

紫色 (Zǐ sè) is purple

橙色 (Chéng sè) is orange

This is a good general set to get started with. And of course, as we do in English, there are entire families of colors and shades associated with each of these.

For example, 深 (Shēn) is deep and so it’s no surprise that

深绿色 (Shēn lǜsè) is deep green or dark green.

2019-03-08