In the Treatise De Igne, by Theophrastus, we find the same notion thus expressed: "Brightness (τὸ λευκὸν) seen through a dark coloured medium (διὰ του μέλανος) appears red; as the sun seen through smoke or soot: hence the coal is redder than the flame." Scarmiglione, from whom Kircher seems to have copied, observes:—"Itaque color realis est lux opaca; licet id e plurimis apparentiis colligere. Luna enim in magn solis eclipsi rubra conspicitur, quia tenebris lux præpeditur ac veluti tegitur."—De Coloribus.

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Τὰ ἂνθη: translated flores by Calcagnini and the rest, by Goethe, die Blüthe, the bloom. That the word sometimes signified pigments is sufficiently apparent from the following passage of Suidas (quoted by Emeric David, "Discours Historiques sur la Peinture Moderne") ἂνθεσι κεκοσμημέναι, οἶον ψιμμιωίῳ φύκει καὶ τοῖς ὸμοίοις. Variis pigmentis ornatæ, ut ceruss, fuco, et aliis similibus. (Suid. in voc. Ἐξμηθισμένας.) A panel prepared for painting, with a white ground consolidated with wax, and perhaps mastic, was found in Herculaneum.

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