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# Color red

🏷 Adam Semitic pun · symbol — by Gerry · Sep 2020 · 254 words

The color red is אדם ˀdm adam in Hebrew. It also means “man”, as in the first man Adam. But that name also puns with “disguise”. The color red therefore also puns with “disguise”.

I personally think that all Adam puns are etymologically related: In archaic language, the word adam perhaps originally stood for the hard-to-define color of humans & earth: a reddish brown with many variations. It’s so hard to define that we still call it “skin-color”. All other meanings are derived from that:

- Man, because human skin is reddish-brownish.
- The earth, because earth is reddish-brownish, more reddish if it’s clay.
- Blood, because blood is red and gives humans their skin color, together with the skin pigmentation.
- Stopping & dumbness, perhaps because humans & animals stop movement after they bleed too much.
- Likeness & resemblance, perhaps because with clay you can create model shapes that resemble real things, but are not the real things.
- Disguise, because a disguise is to make oneself resemble another person.

#### Hebrew ˀdm, dm = red, blood

אדם ˀdm adam : to be red; reddened, blushed — Hebrew (Klein)

דם dm dam : blood; bloodshed; blood-guilt — Hebrew (Klein)

#### Hebrew, Aramaic dm = like, likeness, make like, in disguise of

דמה dmh : to be like, to resemble; liken, make myself like, plan, devise — Old Hebrew (Strong)

דמא dmˀ dema : to resemble — Hebrew (Jastrow)

דמי dmy demei : to imagine, suspect, consider; suspected, considered; resembling, like; to compare; to imagine, speculate; to be like, to take an example; to appear in the disguise of — Hebrew (Jastrow)

🏷 Adam Semitic pun · symbol