View source for Pre-modern conceptions of whiteness


The description of populations as [[White people|white]] in reference to their [[Human skin color|skin colour]] predates and is distinct from the [[Race (human categorization)|race categories]] [[Social constructionism|constructed]] from the 17th century onward.<ref name="Preston2007">{{cite book | first = John | last = Preston | date = 8 August 2007 | title = Whiteness and Class in Education | publisher = Springer Science & Business Media | pages = 86 | isbn = 978-1-4020-6108-0 | oclc = 1111802549 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=T3FcZ8lc1VoC&pg=PA86}}</ref> Coloured terminology is occasionally found in [[Greco-Roman ethnography|Graeco-Roman ethnography]]<ref name="Smith2009">{{cite book |last=Smith |first=Ian |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=way_AAAAQBAJ&pg=PA66 |title=Race and Rhetoric in the Renaissance: Barbarian Errors |date=7 December 2009 |publisher=Springer |isbn=978-0-230-10206-4 |pages=53 |oclc=1125714031}}</ref><ref name="Blum2002">{{cite book | first = Lawrence | last = Blum | date = 3 October 2002 | title = "I'm Not a Racist, But . . .": The Moral Quandary of Race | publisher = Cornell University Press | pages = 109–110 | isbn = 978-0-8014-8815-3 | oclc = 1022602876 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=36nxBjpi4R8C&pg=PA110}}</ref> and other ancient and [[medieval]] sources, but these societies did not have any notion of a white or [[Pan-European identity|pan-European]] race.<ref name="Head2009">{{cite book | first = Tom | last = Head | date = 1 August 2009 | title = Civil Liberties: A Beginner's Guide | publisher = Oneworld Publications | pages = 91 | isbn = 978-1-85168-644-5 | oclc = 271080692 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=J-wbAQAAMAAJ}}</ref> In Graeco-Roman society whiteness was a [[Somatic theory|somatic norm]], although this norm could be rejected and it did not coincide with any system of discrimination or colour prejudice.<ref name="Snowden1983">{{cite book | first = Frank M. | last = Snowden | date = 1983 | title = Before Color Prejudice: The Ancient View of Blacks | publisher = Harvard University Press | pages = 79 | isbn = 978-0-674-06381-5 | oclc = 1000663654 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=KWHMc-jNzlwC&pg=PA79}}</ref><ref name="BowserBowser1995">{{cite book | editor1 = Benjamin Bowser | date = 18 September 1995 | first = Frank M. | last = Snowden Jr. | chapter = chapter 1: Europe's Oldest Chapter in the History of Black-White Relations | title = Racism and Anti-Racism in World Perspective | publisher = SAGE | pages = 21–23 | isbn = 978-0-8039-4954-6 | oclc = 1017227660 | chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=FzELVygy3BQC&pg=PA16}}</ref><ref name="Whitaker2019">{{cite book | first = Cord J. | last = Whitaker | date = 27 September 2019 | title = Black Metaphors: How Modern Racism Emerged from Medieval Race-Thinking | publisher = University of Pennsylvania Press | pages = 27 | isbn = 978-0-8122-9642-6 | oclc = 1128099286 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=HT--DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA27}}</ref> Historically, before the [[late modern period]], cultures outside of [[Europe]] and [[North America]], such as those in the [[Middle East]] and [[China]], employed concepts of whiteness.<ref name="Bonnett2018">{{cite book | first = Alastair | last = Bonnett | date = 8 October 2018 | title = White Identities: An Historical & International Introduction | publisher = Routledge | pages = 7–9 | isbn = 978-1-317-88037-0 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=pCapDwAAQBAJ}}</ref> Eventually these were progressively marginalised and replaced by the European form of racialised whiteness.<ref name="Bonnett2018"></ref> Whiteness has no enduring "true essence", but instead is a social construct that is dependent on differing societal, geographic, and historical meanings.<ref name="Smith2010">{{cite book | author = Susan Smith | date = 2010 | title = The SAGE Handbook of Social Geographies | publisher = SAGE Publications | pages = 62 | isbn = 978-1-4129-3559-3 | oclc = 1051476792 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=xdzECvH5h7YC&pg=PA62}}</ref><ref name="AtayToyosaki2017">{{cite book | editor1 = Ahmet Atay | editor2 = Satoshi Toyosaki | date = 20 December 2017 | chapter = Chapter 8: Obstructing the Process of Becoming: Basal Whiteness and the Challenge to Critical Intercultural Communication Pedagogy | first1 = Gust A. | last1 = Yep | first2 = Ryan M. | last2 = Lawrence | title = Critical Intercultural Communication Pedagogy | publisher = Lexington Books | pages = 117 | isbn = 978-1-4985-3121-4 | oclc = 1013508836 | chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=T9REDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA117}}</ref> Scholarship on race distinguishes the modern concept from pre-modern descriptions, which focused on skin colour, [[complexion]] and other [[Phenotype|physical traits]].<ref>"On both sides of the chronological divide between the modern and the pre-modern (wherever it may lie), there is today a remarkable consensus that the earlier vocabularies of difference are innocent of race." {{Cite book |last=Nirenberg |first=David |title=The Origins of Racism in the West |date=2009 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |editor1-last=Eliav-Feldon |editor1-first=Miriam |location=Cambridge, UK |pages=232–264 |chapter=Was there race before modernity? The example of 'Jewish' blood in late medieval Spain |author-link=David Nirenberg |access-date=16 September 2014 |editor2-last=Isaac |editor2-first=Benjamin H. |editor3-last=Ziegler |editor3-first=Joseph |chapter-url=http://www.langtoninfo.com/web_content/9780521888554_frontmatter.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151227110913/http://www.langtoninfo.com/web_content/9780521888554_frontmatter.pdf |archive-date=27 December 2015 |url-status=dead}}</ref>
== Background ==
Beginning with the rise of [[agriculture|agricultural economies]] and the increasing [[Social stratification|stratification of societies]] around the world approximately 6000 years ago, light skin came to be increasingly associated with higher social status.<ref name="Jablonski2020">{{cite book | editor = Nina G. Jablonski | chapter=Chapter 2: An unlikely turning point: Skin bleaching and the growth of colorism in South Africa | date = 25 February 2020 | title = Persistence of Race | first = Nina G. | last = Jablonski | publisher = African Sun Media | pages = 34–35 | isbn = 978-1-928480-44-0 | oclc = 1164182757 | chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=qm7SDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA34}}</ref> Because lower status individuals were typically required to participate in arduous outdoor toil, dark skin began to be associated with lower social status in agricultural societies around the world. Over time whiteness became associated with happiness, success, freedom from outdoor toil, and even [[Spirituality|spiritual purity]].<ref name="Jablonski2020"></ref> In the ancient and medieval societies of Europe, [[Asia]], and [[North Africa]], light skin, especially among women, came to be a sign of living a privileged lifestyle, having noble ancestry, and also became an indicator of beauty.<ref name="Jablonski2020"></ref><ref name="Goldenberg2009">{{cite book | first = David M. | last = Goldenberg | date = 11 April 2009 | title = The Curse of Ham: Race and Slavery in Early Judaism, Christianity, and Islam | publisher = Princeton University Press | pages = 90–91 | isbn = 978-1-4008-2854-8 | oclc = 1162398032 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=1MS9AiZ74MoC&pg=PA91}}</ref>
== Fertile Crescent ==
=== Mesopotamia ===
In ancient [[Mesopotamia]] healthy skin colours were described as ''sāmu'' ("ruddy" or "reddish") or ''peṣû'' ("white") while ill-health was associated with the skin colour ''arqu'' ("pale-brown" or "yellow"), a reference to [[jaundice]].<ref name="Thavapalan2019">{{cite book | first = Shiyanthi | last = Thavapalan | date = 21 October 2019 | title = The Meaning of Color in Ancient Mesopotamia | publisher = BRILL | pages = 69–70, 74 | isbn = 978-90-04-41541-6 | oclc = 1114270506 | quote = ''Arqu'' can also describe the yellow color of ochre...it is the sallow, unhealthy yellow, pale brown color...healthy faces are described as "ruddy" with ''sāmu'' (2.5.10). |url = https://books.google.com/books?id=MB24DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA70}}</ref>{{sfn|Thavapalan|2019|loc=p. 259: two shades - "reddish" (samu) and "whitish" (pest)}}{{sfn|Thavapalan|2019|loc=p. 139: in the urine scale, at least two shades of white are described: ''peṣû'' meaning "cloudy" and ''kīma šizbi'' "milky"...The example of a woman giving birth to an infant that is "as white as alabaster" quoted above probably refers to a case of albinism. Fair skin caused by severe anemia is described in Akkadian omens as "disfigured with white" (''peṣû'' + ''nakāru''). Aside from these cases, ''peṣû'' seems to refer to the normal, healthy coloration of a person's skin}} ''Peṣû'' was descended from the [[Proto-Semitic language|Proto-Semitic]] word ''f/pṣḥ'', which was related to whiteness and brightness.{{sfn|Thavapalan|2019|p=139}} The word ''sāmu'' would also be used to refer to [[red hair]], either dyed or natural, with natural red hair being associated with the [[Eurasian Steppe]].{{sfn|Thavapalan|2019|p=60}} For [[Akkadian Empire|Akkadians]], ''peṣû'' might also be used to refer to medical conditions such as [[albinism]] or severe [[anaemia]], or a woman's fair complexion.{{sfn|Thavapalan|2019|p=139}}{{sfn|Thavapalan|2019|p=135-135}} In contrast the Akkadian word ''ṣalmu'' ("black") would be used to describe people with [[dark skin]], such as the [[Nubia|Nubian]] pharaoh of Egypt's [[Twenty-fifth Dynasty of Egypt|25th Dynasty]].{{sfn|Thavapalan|2019|p=155-156}} Along with [[Eye color|brown eyes]], blue eyes or ''namru'' ("dazzling(-blue)), are also referred to in Mesopotamian writings.{{sfn|Thavapalan|2019|p=95-96}}  
  
=== Ancient Egypt ===
{{Further|Ancient Egyptian race controversy}}According to anthropologist [[Nina Jablonski]]:
[[File:Races2.jpg|thumb|1820 drawing of a ''[[Book of Gates]]'' fresco of the tomb of [[Seti I]], 1279 BC, depicting (from left) four groups of people: four [[Libyans]], a [[Nubia|Nubian]], an [[Levant|Asiatic]], and an [[Ancient Egypt|Egyptian]].<ref name="Fluehr-Lobban2018">{{cite book | first = Carolyn | last = Fluehr-Lobban | date = 12 April 2018 | title = Race and Racism: An Introduction | edition = 2 | publisher = Rowman & Littlefield | pages = 36 | isbn = 978-1-4422-7460-0 | oclc = 1019838159 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=WYtSDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA36}}</ref>]]{{blockquote|In ancient Egypt as a whole, people were not designated by color terms&nbsp;[...] Egyptian inscriptions and literature only rarely, for instance, mention the dark skin color of the Kushites of Upper Nubia. We know the Egyptians were not oblivious to skin color, however, because artists paid attention to it in their works of art, to the extent that the pigments at the time permitted.<ref>{{Cite book |publisher=University of California Press |isbn=978-0-520-95377-2 |last=Jablonski |first=Nina G. |title=Living Color: The Biological and Social Meaning of Skin Color |location=Berkeley, California |date=27 September 2012 |page=106}}</ref>}}
The [[Writing in Ancient Egypt|Ancient Egyptian]] ([[New Kingdom]]) [[funerary text]] known as the ''[[Book of Gates]]'' distinguishes "four groups" in a procession. These are the "red-brown" [[Egyptians]], the "pale" [[Levant|Levantine]] and [[Canaan|Canaanite]] peoples or "Asiatics", the "black" "[[Nubians]]" and the "fair-skinned [[Ancient Libya|Libyans]]".<ref>"The first are RETH, the second are AAMU, the third are NEHESU, and the fourth are THEMEHU. The RETH are Egyptians, the AAMU are dwellers in the deserts to the east and north-east of Egypt, the NEHESU are the [[Kingdom of Kush|Cushites]], and the THEMEHU are the fair-skinned Libyans" ''Book of Gates'', [http://www.sacred-texts.com/egy/gate/gate20.htm chapter VI] ({{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160310112202/http://www.sacred-texts.com/egy/gate/gate20.htm|date=10 March 2016}}), translated by E. A. Wallis Budge, 1905.</ref>{{sfn|Thavapalan|2019|loc=p. 155-156: As a point of correlation to visual culture, one can observe that in Egyptian art too, Nubians from the south are painted black. Egyptian natives were portrayed with a red-brown complexion, Syrians or Asiatic peoples from the north and east were shown in pale tones and Libyans from the west were represented in white}} The Egyptians are depicted as considerably darker-skinned than the Levantines (persons from what is now [[Lebanon]], [[Israel]], [[State of Palestine|Palestine]] and [[Jordan]]) and Libyans, but considerably lighter than the Nubians (modern [[Sudan]]). [[Sexual dimorphism|Sex differences]] in skin colour were also depicted in Egyptian art, with women being depicted as noticeably lighter skinned than men.<ref name="Eaverly2013">{{cite book |first =Mary Ann | last = Eaverly |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ch9WAgAAQBAJ |title=Tan Men/Pale Women: Color and Gender in Archaic Greece and Egypt, a Comparative Approach |date=10 December 2013 |publisher=University of Michigan Press |isbn=978-0-472-11911-0 |pages=18–20 |oclc=1055877879}}</ref> Men would be painted dark reddish-brown, while women could be painted "white, tan, cream, or yellow".{{sfn|Eaverly|2013|p=29}} Classical archaeologists typically ascribe this divergence to the differing lifestyles of men and women.{{sfn|Eaverly|2013|p=1-2}} According to [[Charles_Freeman_(historian)|Charles Freeman]], depictions of women with light skin suggested a high status, and were a "sign that a woman did not have to work in the sun".<ref name="Freeman2014">{{cite book | author = Charles Freeman | date = 2014 | title = Egypt, Greece, and Rome: Civilizations of the Ancient Mediterranean | publisher = OUP Oxford | pages = 86 | isbn = 978-0-19-965192-4 | oclc = 1001219924 | quote = light skin, a sign that a woman did not have to work in the sun, suggested high status | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=UtMVAwAAQBAJ}}</ref> As with other Mediterranean cultures, light skin came to be the feminine ideal in [[Art of Ancient Egypt|Egyptian art]].<ref name="Rockmore2017">{{cite book | first = Ada | last = Cohen | chapter = What is Art History? | editor = Dan Rockmore | date = 6 June 2017 | title = What Are the Arts and Sciences?: A Guide for the Curious | publisher = Dartmouth College Press | pages = 33–34 | isbn = 978-1-5126-0103-9 | oclc = 1077754984 | chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=I-CaDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA33}}</ref>

=== The Levant ===
Ancient Greeks labeled the [[Phoenicia]]ns, and [[Levant]]ines in general, as ''Phoinike'' ({{lang|el|Φοινίκη}}), a word derived from the Greek work ''Phoinos'', meaning "ruddy", possibly in reference to the skin colour of [[History of the ancient Levant|Ancient Levantines]].<ref name="Chalice Press">{{cite book | title = Eighth Century Prophets: a Social Analysis | publisher = Chalice Press | pages = 73 | isbn = 978-0-8272-0831-5 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=6yWuZDUMICcC&pg=PA73}}</ref><ref name="Godbey1974">{{cite book | author = Allen Howard Godbey | date = 1974 | title = The Lost Tribes a Myth: Suggestions Towards Rewriting Hebrew History | publisher = Ktav | pages = 60 | isbn = 978-0-87068-198-1 | oclc = 1018047360 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=8o4aAAAAIAAJ}}</ref><ref name="Dantzig2006">{{cite book | author = Tobias Dantzig | date = 17 November 2006 | title = Mathematics in Ancient Greece | publisher = Courier Corporation | pages = 21 | isbn = 978-0-486-45347-7 | oclc = 1022689821 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=ZQvmDAAAQBAJ}}</ref> In the [[Hebrew Bible]], figures such as [[Esau]] and [[King David]] are described as "ruddy".<ref name="Harvey2004">{{cite book | author = John E. Harvey | date = 22 June 2004 | title = Retelling the Torah: The Deuternonmistic Historian's Use of Tetrateuchal Narratives | publisher = A&C Black | pages = 64 | isbn = 978-0-567-08095-0 | oclc = 1091803543 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=nj-tAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA64}}</ref><ref name="McKenzie2000">{{cite book | author = Steven L. McKenzie | date = 27 April 2000 | title = King David: A Biography | publisher = Oxford University Press | pages = 65 | isbn = 978-0-19-535101-9 | oclc = 1035651169 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=WHY7q1u8mP4C&pg=PA65}}</ref> According to scholar David M. Goldenberg, the ancient [[Israelites]] and [[Judea]]n peoples preferred women with a "fair complexion".{{sfn|Goldenberg|2009|p=88}} This preference is established in both biblical and post-biblical literature.{{sfn|Goldenberg|2009|p=82-86}} For example, The [[Genesis Apocryphon]] describes [[Sarah]] as being "beautiful" in "her whiteness."{{sfn|Goldenberg|2009|p=82-86}} A later scenario is written about by one of the [[Tannaim]] in which a potential groom refuses to marry a woman who he believes to be "ugly" and "black" (''sḥehorah'') until he finds out she is in fact "beautiful" and "white" (''levanah'').{{sfn|Goldenberg|2009|p=82-86}} In the [[Song of Songs]] a woman praises her lover for being "white and ruddy" while she is described as "clear as the moon".<ref name="Dobbs-Allsopp2015">{{cite book | editor = F. W. Dobbs-Allsopp | author = Delbert R. Hillers | date = 11 February 2015 | title = Poets Before Homer: Collected Essays on Ancient Literature | publisher = Penn State Press | pages = 19 | isbn = 978-1-57506-723-0 | oclc = 1055388179 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=bDULEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA19}}</ref><ref name="Melamed2003">{{cite book | first = Abraham | last = Melamed | date = 2 September 2003 | title = The Image of the Black in Jewish Culture: A History of the Other | publisher = Routledge | pages = 35, 212| isbn = 978-1-135-78983-1 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=GVmQAgAAQBAJ}}</ref>

Goldenberg wrote:
<blockquote>A rabbinic text commenting on the skin diseases mentioned in the Bible (Leviticus, chs. 13–14; Deut 24:8), states: "An intensely bright white spot [baheret] appears faint on the very light-skinned [germani], while a faint spot appears bright on the very dark-skinned [kushi]. Rabbi Ishmael said: 'The Jews—may I be like an expiatory sacrifice for them [an expression of love]—are like the boxwood tree [eshkeroae], neither black nor white, but in between.'"2 This statement records a second-century (R. Ishmael) perception that the skin color of Jews is midway between black and white.3 More precisely it is light brown, the color of the boxwood tree.4 This early perception of the intermediate, light-brown shade of the Jewish complexion is corroborated by a number of papyri from the Ptolemaic period in Egypt that describe the complexion of various Jews as "honey-colored."{{sfn|Goldenberg|2009|p=95}}</blockquote>

== India ==
{{Further|Historical definitions of races in India}}

The nature of skin colour and its role in the [[India]]n [[Caste system in India|caste system]] is strongly contested.<ref name="Keane2016">{{cite book | first = David | last = Keane | date = 8 April 2016 | title = Caste-based Discrimination in International Human Rights Law | publisher = Routledge | pages = 11–13 | isbn = 978-1-317-16951-2 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=yRntCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA12}}</ref> According to the Indian sociologist [[G. S. Ghurye]] the groups mentioned in the [[Vedas]], the ''[[Arya]]'' and ''[[Dasa]]'', were distinguished by their skin colour or "[[Varna (Hinduism)|varna]]" with the ''Arya'' being associated with a fair complexions and the Dasa being associated with dark complexions.<ref name="Ghurye1979">{{cite book | first = Govind Sadashiv | last = Ghurye | date = 1979 | title = Vedic India | publisher = Popular Prakashan | pages = 203–205 | isbn = 978-0-8364-0455-5 | oclc = 1015132717 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=zO9tAAAAMAAJ}}</ref><ref name="Pillai1997">{{cite book | first = S. Devadas | last = Pillai | date = 1997 | title = Indian Sociology Through Ghurye, a Dictionary | publisher = Popular Prakashan | pages = 44 | isbn = 9788171548071 | oclc = 38215769 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=P3uD22Ghqs4C&pg=PA44}}</ref> Similarly, sociologist James Alfred Aho states that skin colour was used as a marker for what eventually became the caste system.<ref name="Aho">{{cite book | author = James Alfred Aho | title = The Orifice As Sacrificial Site: Culture, Organization, and the Body | publisher = Transaction Publishers | pages = 66 | isbn = 978-0-202-36981-5 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=DTO382RjBoAC&pg=PA66}}</ref> Anthropologist Arthur Helweg states that the initial basis for the ''varna'' system was skin colour.<ref name="Skutsch2013">{{cite encyclopedia | editor = Carl Skutsch | date = 7 November 2013 | encyclopedia = Encyclopedia of the World's Minorities | title = India | first = Arthur | last = Helweg | publisher = Routledge | pages = 599 | isbn = 978-1-135-19388-1 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=yXYKAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA599}}</ref> [[Bengalis|Bengali]] scholar [[Jayantanuja Bandyopadhyaya]] records that in the ''[[Rigveda]],'' the god [[Indra]] distributed the lands of the conquered ''Dasa'' to the "white-coloured" ''Arya''.<ref name="Bandyopadhyaya2007">{{cite book | first = Jayantanuja | last = Bandyopadhyaya | author-link = Jayantanuja Bandyopadhyaya  | date = 2007 | title = Class and Religion in Ancient India | publisher = Anthem Press | pages = 16–18 | isbn = 978-1-84331-727-2 | oclc = 1026368691 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=UDEaE4Jf78sC&pg=PA17}}</ref> As such, Bandyopadhyaya characterises the conflict between the "white-skinned" ''Arya'' and "black-skinned" ''Anarya'', or non-Aryans, as having racial overtones.<ref name="Bandyopadhyaya2007"></ref> The Indian [[Marxist historian]] [[Damodar Dharmananda Kosambi|D. D. Kosambi]], wrote that the darker skin of the ''Dasyu'' "contrasted with the lighter skin-colour of the newcomers [''Aryans'']."<ref name="Glenn2009">{{cite book | first = Evelyn | last = Glenn | date = 23 January 2009 | title = Shades of Difference: Why Skin Color Matters | publisher = Stanford University Press | pages = 104 | isbn = 978-0-8047-5998-4 | oclc = 1022710683 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=WewhspE2Q9UC&pg=PA104}}</ref> The ''[[Mahabhashya]]'', ''Ṛgveda'', and [[Gopatha Brahmana]] contain, according to Kenneth A.R. Kennedy, references to [[Brahmin]]s with "white skins and red or yellow hair."<ref name="Erdosy2012 chp2">{{cite book | editor = George Erdosy | first = Kenneth A.R. | last = Kennedy | date = 25 October 2012 | title = The Indo-Aryans of Ancient South Asia: Language, Material Culture and Ethnicity | publisher = Walter de Gruyter | pages = 33 | chapter = chapter 2:Have the Aryans been identified in the prehistoric skeletal record? Biological anthropology and concepts of ancient races |  isbn = 978-3-11-081643-3 | oclc = 1055590401 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=OZ0gAAAAQBAJ}}</ref> Per [[David Lorenzen]], there are some references in later Vedic literature that suggest the Brahmin and [[Vaishya]] castes are referred to as "white or fair".<ref name="Lorenzen2006">{{cite book | author = David N. Lorenzen | date = 2006 | title = Who Invented Hinduism: Essays on Religion in History | publisher = Yoda Press | pages = 159 | isbn = 9788190227261 | oclc = 600915686 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=SO-YmMWpcVEC&pg=PA159}}</ref>  

The Indian scholars Varsha Ayyar and Lalit Khandare assert that [[Discrimination based on skin color|colourism]], or discrimination based on skin pigmentation, has existed in India since pre-colonial times, predating any [[Eurocentric]] concepts of whiteness.<ref name="Kukreja2022">{{cite book | author = Reena Kukreja | date = 15 April 2022 | title = Why Would I Be Married Here?: Marriage Migration and Dispossession in Neoliberal India | publisher = Cornell University Press | pages = 184–185 | isbn = 978-1-5017-6256-7 | oclc = 1258779826 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=F880EAAAQBAJ&pg=PA185}}</ref> Similarly, the scholar Nina Kullrich submits that references to colour in Indian culture predate European colonialism and that although racism and colourism are linked together, they are not equivalent, with a desire for whiteness being a part of Indian culture that is distinguished from European concepts.<ref name="LiebeltBöllingerVierke2018">{{cite book | editor1 = Claudia Liebelt | editor2 = Sarah Böllinger | editor3 = Ulf Vierke | first = Nina | last =  Kullrich | chapter = chapter 11:'In This Country Beauty Is Defined by Fairness of Skin.' Skin Colour Politics and Social Stratification in India | date = 24 August 2018 | title = Beauty and the Norm: Debating Standardization in Bodily Appearance | publisher = Springer | pages = 246–247 | isbn = 978-3-319-91174-8 | oclc = 1050110582 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=MMFqDwAAQBAJ}}</ref>

Others, such as [[Michael Witzel]], state that the ''Rigveda'' uses {{lang|sa|[[krsna tvac]]}} "black skin" as a metaphor for irreligiosity.<ref name="Erdosy2012 chp14">{{cite book | editor = George Erdosy | first = Michael | last = Witzel | date = 25 October 2012 | title = The Indo-Aryans of Ancient South Asia: Language, Material Culture and Ethnicity | publisher = Walter de Gruyter | pages = 325 | chapter = chapter 14:Ṛgvedic history: poets, chieftains, and polities |  isbn = 978-3-11-081643-3 | oclc = 1055590401 | quote = while it would be easy to assume reference to skin color, this would go against the spirit of the hymns: for Vedic poets, black always signifies evil, and any other meaning would be secondary in these contexts | author-link = Michael Witzel | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=OZ0gAAAAQBAJ}}</ref> The Indian historian [[Romila Thapar]] states that skin colour differences are more likely to be symbolic descriptors.<ref name="Thapar2003">{{cite book | author = Romila Thapar | date = 2003 | title = The Penguin History of Early India: From the Origins to AD 1300 | publisher = Penguin Books India | pages = 112 | isbn = 978-0-14-302989-2 | oclc = 1001285480 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=gyiqZKDlSBMC&pg=PA112}}</ref> Kadira Pethiyagoda also states that while ''varna'' does literally mean colour, and was used to classify groups of people and express differences, recent scholarship suggests these terms were symbolic.<ref name="Pethiyagoda2020">{{cite book | author = Kadira Pethiyagoda | date = 5 October 2020 | title = Indian Foreign Policy and Cultural Values | publisher = Springer Nature | pages = 22 | isbn = 978-3-03-054696-0 | oclc = 1199129243 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=T0QBEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA22}}</ref>
  
== Ancient Greece ==
[[File:Alexandermosaic.jpg|thumb|The ''[[Alexander Mosaic]]'', [[Pompeii]], {{Circa|100 BC}}, depicting the [[Ancient Macedonians|Macedonian]] cavalry of [[Alexander the Great]] fighting [[Achaemenid Persia|Persians]] under [[Darius III]] at the [[Battle of Issus]] in 333 BC.<ref name="HeckelTritle2011">{{cite book | editor1 = Waldemar Heckel | editor2 = Lawrence A. Tritle | date = 19 September 2011 | title = Alexander the Great: A New History | publisher = John Wiley & Sons | pages = 287 | isbn = 978-1-4443-6015-8 | oclc = 1042841199 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=7ZPcdr5yYs0C&pg=PA287}}</ref>]]
As with Ancient Egyptians, [[Mycenaean Greeks]] and [[Minoan civilization|Minoans]] generally depicted women with pale or white skin and men with dark brown or tanned skin.{{sfn|Eaverly|2013|p=85}} As a result, men with pale or light skin, ''leukochrōs'' (λευκόχρως, "white-skinned") could be considered weak and effeminate by [[Ancient Greek]] writers such as [[Plato]] and [[Aristotle]].<ref name="WardLott2008chapter1">{{cite book |last=Kamtekar |first=Rachana |title=Philosophers on Race: Critical Essays |date=15 April 2008 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=978-0-470-75204-3 |editor1=Julie K. Ward |pages=15–16 |chapter=Chapter 1 Distinction Without a Difference? Race and ''Genos'' in Plato |oclc=1039168694 |editor2=Tommy L. Lott |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dDg76N2Oz6IC&pg=PA15}}</ref> According to Aristotle, "Those whose skin is too dark are cowardly: witness Egyptians and the Ethiopians. Those whose skin is too light are equally cowardly: witness women. The skin colour typical of the courageous should be halfway between the two."<ref name="Sassi2001">{{cite book |first = Maria Michela | last = Sassi |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ft5QZ9HtvckC |title=The Science of Man in Ancient Greece |date=2001 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |isbn=978-0-226-73530-6 |pages=50 |oclc=1000991167}}</ref> Similarly, [[Xenophon of Athens]] describes [[Achaemenid Persia|Persian]] prisoners of war as "white-skinned because they were never without their clothing, and soft and unused to toil because they always rode in carriages" and states that Greek soldiers as a result believed "that the war would be in no way different from having to fight with women."<ref name="Hunt2002">{{cite book |author=Peter Hunt |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=V_HGeohJIlgC&pg=PA164 |title=Slaves, Warfare, and Ideology in the Greek Historians |date=9 May 2002 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-89390-9 |pages=164 |oclc=248925851}}</ref><ref name="Hutchinson2014">{{cite book |author=Godfrey Hutchinson |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hPm4BwAAQBAJ&pg=PA20 |title=Sparta: Unfit for Empire |date=17 November 2014 |publisher=Frontline Books |isbn=978-1-84832-222-6 |pages=20 |oclc=1026663126}}</ref> 

In [[Greek literature]] women including goddesses such as [[Hera]] and [[Aphrodite]] and mortals such as [[Penelope]], [[Andromache]], and [[Nausicaa]] can be described as ''leukōlenos'' ({{lang|el|λευκώλενος}}, "white-armed").{{sfn|Sassi|2001|p=2}}<ref name="Harlow2018">{{cite book | editor = Mary Harlow | first1 = Glenys | last1 = Davies | first2 = Lloyd | last2 =Llewellyn-Jones | chapter = chapter 3: The Body | date = 1 November 2018 | title = A Cultural History of Dress and Fashion in Antiquity | publisher = Bloomsbury Publishing | pages = 49 | isbn = 978-1-350-11403-6 | oclc = 1083460328 | chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=4RGEDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA49}}</ref> [[Athena]] is described as having golden-hair or ''xanthe'' ({{lang|el|Ξανθή}}) and blue, green, or grey eyes.<ref name="Warner2000">{{cite book | author = Marina Warner | date = 2000 | title = Monuments and Maidens: The Allegory of the Female Form | publisher = University of California Press | pages = 90 | isbn = 978-0-520-22733-0 | oclc = 1016308283 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=KUrd5GqffyEC&pg=PA90}}</ref>{{sfn|Thavapalan|2019|p=86}} Contrarily male warriors like [[Odysseus]] were usually described as having brown or bronzed skin, unless attention was being brought to skin that was vulnerable to injury in battle.{{sfn|Sassi|2001|p=2}}<ref name="Harlow2018"></ref> Greek [[visual art]] usually showed women as white, much lighter than the typical male.<ref name="Borg2019">{{cite book | editor = Barbara E. Borg | first = Mont | last = Allen | chapter = Chapter 8: Technique and Message in Roman Art | date = 4 November 2019 | title = A Companion to Roman Art | publisher = John Wiley & Sons | pages = 160 | isbn = 978-1-119-07789-3 | oclc = 1016078313 | chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=RCOJCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA158}}</ref> As a goddess of beauty, Aphrodite was usually given very white skin in both graphic and textual art.{{sfn|Goldenberg|2009|p=82-86}} Whiteness was generally seen as a desirable part of femininity in Ancient Greek culture.<ref name="DaviesLlewellyn-Jones2007">{{cite book | first1 = Glenys | last1 = Davies | first2 = Lloyd | last2 = Llewellyn-Jones | date = 2007 | title = Greek and Roman Dress from A to Z | publisher = Routledge | pages = 211 | isbn = 978-1-134-58916-6 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=nTaCAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA211}}</ref><ref name="Harlow2018"></ref> 

[[File:Thrace ostrusha woman.jpg|left|thumb|Fresco of a woman in the [[Ostrusha mound]], 4th century BC.<ref name="Research Bulletin – Dedicated to the work of fellows at the Center for Hellenic Studies 2013">{{cite web | title = The Tomb Below the Ostrusha Mound and the Painted Prosopal within the Central Boxes of the Ceiling: Proposal for a New Reading – Research Bulletin| last= Manetta | first= Consuela |website=Research Bulletin – Dedicated to the work of fellows at the Center for Hellenic Studies | date=2013-12-23 | url=https://research-bulletin.chs.harvard.edu/2013/12/23/the-tomb-below-the-ostrusha-mound-and-the-painted-prosopa-within-the-central-boxes-of-the-ceiling-proposal-for-a-new-reading/ | access-date=2022-06-21}}</ref>|160x160px]]
Classicist James H. Dee states "the Greeks do not describe themselves as 'White people'—or as anything else because they had ''no'' regular word in their colour vocabulary for themselves."<ref name="Dee 2004">James H. Dee, "Black Odysseus, White Caesar: When Did 'White People' Become 'White'?" ''The Classical Journal'', Vol. 99, No. 2. (December 2003 – January 2004), pp. 163 ''ff.''</ref> People's skin colour did not carry useful meaning; what mattered is where they lived.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Painter |first=Nell |url=https://archive.org/details/historyofwhitepe00pain/page/1 |title=The History of White People |date=2 February 2016 |publisher=W. W. Norton & Company |isbn=978-0-393-04934-3 |location=New York, NY |page=[https://archive.org/details/historyofwhitepe00pain/page/1 1]}}</ref> 

[[Herodotus]] described the [[Scythians|Scythian]] [[Budini]] as having deep blue eyes and bright red hair<ref>Herodotus: ''[[Histories (Herodotus)|Histories]]'', 4.108.</ref> and the Egyptians – quite like the [[Colchians]] – as {{lang|el|melánchroes}} ({{lang|el|μελάγχροες}}, "dark-skinned") and curly-haired.<ref>Herodotus: ''Histories'', 2.104.2.</ref> He also gives the possibly first reference to the common Greek name of the tribes living south of Egypt, otherwise known as [[Nubian people|Nubians]], which was {{lang|el|Aithíopes}} ({{lang|el|Αἰθίοπες}}).<ref>Herodotus: ''Histories'', 2.17.</ref> Later [[Xenophanes of Colophon]] described the [[Aethiopia|Aethiopians]] as black and snub-nosed and the [[Thracians]] as having red hair and blue eyes.<ref>Xenophanes of Colophon: [https://books.google.com/books?id=LxxJXTviacgC&dq=Xenophanes+thracians&pg=PA90 ''Fragments''], J. H. Lesher, University of Toronto Press, 2001, {{ISBN|0-8020-8508-3}}, p. 90.</ref> In his description of the Scythians, [[Hippocrates]] states that the cold weather "burns their white skin and turns it ruddy."<ref name="JonesPotterSmith1923">{{cite book |author1=Hippocrates |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TlEMAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA125 |title=Hippocrates, Volume 1 |author2=Héraclite d'Éphèse |date=1923 |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-99162-0 |editor1=William Henry Samuel Jones |pages=125–126 |oclc=1004814805 |editor2=Paul Potter |editor3=Wesley D. Smith}}</ref>{{sfn|Painter|2016|p=10}} 

The 2nd century Anatolian Greek sophist [[Polemon of Laodicea]] advocated a view of [[Physiognomy#Ancient|ancient physiognomy]] which attributed variations in skin and hair colour to the actions of the Sun. An anonymous 4th century Latin treatise, based on the work of Polemon, describes several stereotypes, including some related to skin colour, such as the claim that light-skinned "Northern" people are "courageous and bold and so forth". The [[Arabic]] translations of Polemon similarly includes white skin in a list of several traits held by Greeks of Hellenic or Ionian descent.<ref name="Isaac2013">{{cite book |author=Benjamin Isaac |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eem1AQAAQBAJ&pg=PA158 |title=The Invention of Racism in Classical Antiquity |date=31 October 2013 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-1-4008-4956-7 |pages=158 |oclc=1029799329 |quote="They are men sufficiently tall, broad-shouldered, straight, firm, their skin is white, they are fair … they have straight legs, shapely extremities, the size of their head is just right, their neck strong, their hair dark blonde, soft, and nicely thick, their face is square, their lips are thin, nose strait, their eyes melting, bright and vigorous, catching much light."}}</ref>

== Ancient Rome ==
The [[Caribbean]] scholar [[Mervyn C. Alleyne]] states that the Romans used the term ''[[wiktionary:candidus|candidus]]'', a neutral term for white, to refer to themselves.<ref name="Alleyne2002">{{cite book |last=Alleyne |first=Mervyn C. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JvPV3CDrFsYC&pg=PA44 |title=Construction and Representation of Race and Ethnicity in the Caribbean and the World |date=2002 |publisher=University of the West Indies Press |isbn=9789766401146 |pages=43–45 |oclc=1001205856 |quote=''Candidus'' ultimately came to express the neutral colour white...the Romans applied the term ''candidus'' to themselves to distinguish themselves racially from the darker peoples across the Mediterranean...This neutral colour term then came to be used in reference to Caucasian peoples. ''Blancus'' assumed the meanings of ''albus'' and ''candidus''}}</ref> Romans would also use the term ''[[wiktionary:albus|albus]]'', which referred to the physical phenomenon of whiteness, to refer to their skin colour.{{sfn|Alleyne|2002|loc=p. 43:For white, there is in Latin on the one hand, ''albus'', which, in the classical period, tended to refer to the physical phenomenon of whiteness}}<ref name="Tsri2016">{{cite book |author=Kwesi Tsri |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5yEFDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA28 |title=Africans Are Not Black: The case for conceptual liberation |date=20 April 2016 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-317-18409-6 |pages=27–28 |quote=the Romans differentiated between colour hues in their colour terminology in regard to ''albus'' (white), ''candidus'' (shining or glistening white) … "when Romans applied a skin colour descriptor to themselves it was ''albus''}}</ref> [[Vitruvius]] used ''candidus'' in his description for populations of northern Europe that "have huge bodies and are white in colour".{{sfn|Alleyne|2002|p=44|ps=: Vitruvius's description of the Nordic peoples: ''sub septentrionibus nutriuntur gentes, immanibus corporibus, candidus coloribus'' ("there are people living in the northern regions who have huge bodies and are white in colour")}} The Roman writer [[Julius Firmicus Maternus]] would contrast the ''Germaniae candidi'' (white Germans) with Ethiopians, while [[Pliny the Elder|Pliny]] spoke of Northern Europeans having ''candida atque glacialis cutis'' or "white and frosty skins".<ref name="Rix2014">{{cite book |last=Rix |first=Robert |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OTtWBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA133 |title=The Barbarian North in Medieval Imagination: Ethnicity, Legend, and Literature |date=2014 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-317-58969-3 |pages=133–136 |quote=Thus the Ethiopian is contrasted with the ''Germaniae candida'' in the writings of Julius Firmicus Maternus; Pliny also has unnamed northerners with ''candida atque  glacialis cutis'' (white and frosty skins)... the Byzantine scholar Procopius, in his sixth-century ''History of the Wars'' describes the Gothic nations in terms not very different from the characteristics emphasized in the anecdote; these northern tribes have "white bodies and fair hair"}}</ref> According to the Roman geographers [[Pomponius Mela]] and Pliny, a group of [[White Aethiopians|white Ethiopians]] (''leukaethiopes''), possibly a reference to lighter-skinned [[Berbers]], inhabited the North African interior.<ref name="vanWykSmith2009">{{cite book |last=van Wyk Smith |first=Malvern |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wDZjDwAAQBAJ |title=The First Ethiopians: The image of Africa and Africans in the early Mediterranean world |date=1 July 2009 |publisher=NYU Press |isbn=978-1-86814-834-9 |pages=357-359, 371-372 |quote=According to Pliny's older contemporary, Pomponius Mela, the ''leukaethiopes'' or "white Ethiopians" were the more remote Berbers of the North African interior (1. 22-23; translated Romer 1998; Goldenberg, 2003, 123)... ''leukaethiopes'' or "white Ethiopians", were the lighter-skinned Berber nomads of inner North Africa}}</ref>{{sfn|Smith|2009|p=66|ps=:In the ''Natural History'', the corresponding section opens with an excursus on the "interior circuit of Africa," incorporating in its geographical catalogue "the Egyptian Libyans, and then the people called in Greek the White Ethiopians}} The term ''candidus'' was later replaced during the [[Germanic peoples|Germanic]] invasion of Rome by the term [[wiktionary:Reconstruction:Latin/blancus|''blancus'']], which served a similar purpose, and which has survived in modern languages such as [[French language|French]] ''[[wiktionary:blanc|blanc]]'', [[Spanish language|Spanish]] ''[[wiktionary:blanco|blanco]]'', [[Portuguese language|Portuguese]] ''[[wiktionary:branco|branco]]'', and [[Italian language|Italian]] ''[[wiktionary:bianco|bianco]]''.{{sfn|Alleyne|2002|p=45|ps=:after the Germanic invasions of Italy from the north (beginning circa the 3rd century AD), that ''candidus'' and ''albus'' disappeared from spoken usage in favour of the Germanic word blancus (French ''blanc'', Spanish ''blanco'', Portuguese ''branco'', Italian ''bianco''). This neutral term came to be used in reference to Caucasian peoples}} Like ''candidus'', ''blancus'', was a neutral term used for [[Caucasian Race|Caucasian]] peoples.<ref name="Alleyne2002" />[[File:Dido throne MAN Napoli Inv8898.jpg|thumb|1st century AD [[Pompeian Styles|Pompeian fresco]], showing Dido, enthroned, attended by a handmaiden (left), looking towards the personification of Africa (right).<ref name="Balch2008">{{cite book | author = David L. Balch | date = 2008 | title = Roman Domestic Art and Early House Churches | publisher = Mohr Siebeck | pages = 208 | isbn = 978-3-16-149383-6 | oclc = 1001191118 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=e0TwW93_upoC&pg=PA208}}</ref> ]]As with the ancient Greeks, the ancient Romans saw whiteness as an important part of feminine beauty.<ref name="DaviesLlewellyn-Jones2007"></ref> For example, in [[Virgil]]'s ''[[Aeneid]]'', [[Dido]], the [[Phoenicia|Phoenician]] queen of [[Carthage]], and lover of [[Aeneas]], is described as ''candida'' or "white".<ref name="Alleyne2002" /> Virgil also refers to the goddess [[Venus (mythology)|Venus]] as having "snow white arms".{{sfn|Goldenberg|2009|p=85-87}} The Carthaginian poet [[Luxorius (poet)|Luxorius]] wrote disparagingly of the skin colour of Ethiopian women while praising the colour white as the ideal colour for women.{{sfn|Goldenberg|2009|p=85-87}}

References to skin colour appear in [[Roman literature]] beyond references to women. Being unable to tell the difference between a white person and a black person was a common Roman idiom, used metaphorically to establish a state of ignorance.<ref name="Bradley2012">{{cite book |author=Keith R. Bradley |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IpQ1Ndu6ZtUC&pg=PA165 |title=Apuleius and Antonine Rome: Historical Essays |date=1 January 2012 |publisher=University of Toronto Press |isbn=978-1-4426-4420-5 |pages=165 |oclc=1091458234 |quote=To claim you did not know whether someone was white or black in order to express ignorance was proverbial at Rome, as classical textual commentators  have commonly observed: Catullus for example writes to Caesar, ''Nil nimium studeo, Caesar,  tibi uelle placere, nec scere utrum sis albus an ater homo'' (93: I have no very great desire to make myself agreeable to you, Caesar, nor to know whether your complexion is black or white." cf. Quint.''Inst''. 11.1.38) Similarly Cicero addresses Antony in the ''Phillipics'', referring to a man who had left him an inheritance: ''Et quidem uide quam te amarit is  qui albus aterne fuerit ignoras'' (2.41:" He must indeed have loved you dearly, seeing that you do not even know if he was black or white). The terms are forceful suggesting a keen sensitivity to skin colour in Roman culture}}</ref> These idioms are attested in the writings of [[Cicero]] and [[Catullus]].<ref name="Bradley2012"></ref> In the [[Satires (Juvenal)#Satire II: Hypocrites are Intolerable|second]] of his ''Satires,'' the Roman [[Satire|satirist]] [[Juvenal]] writes "let the straight-legged man laugh at the club-footed man, the white man (''albus'') at the black ([[wikt:Aethiops|''aethiops'']])",<ref name="Juvenal1924">{{cite book |author=Juvenal |url=https://www.loebclassics.com/view/juvenal-satires/2004/pb_LCL091.151.xml |title=Juvenal and Persius |date=2004 |publisher=Loeb |pages= |language=Latin, English |oclc= |quote=Satire II line 23 ''<nowiki>'</nowiki>ego te ceventem, Sexte, verebor?' infamis Varillus ait, 'quo deterior te?' loripedem rectus derideat, Aethiopem albus<nowiki>'</nowiki>'' . . . 'Shall I be in awe of you, Sextus, when I see you wiggling your arse?' says the notorious Varillus. 'How am I worse than you? It should be the man who walks upright who mocks the man who limps, the white man who mocks the black.'}}</ref> although many varying translations are possible.<ref name="BraundBraundEasterling1996">{{cite book |author=Juvenal |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DcoqRQ47bBIC&pg=PA126 |title=Juvenal: Satires Book I, Book 1 |date=7 March 1996 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-35667-1 |editor1=Susanna Braund |pages=126 |oclc=1001164729 |editor2=Susanna Morton Braund |editor3=P. E. Easterling}}</ref><ref name="Hood">{{cite book |author=Robert Earl Hood |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=luiUs8ur5fsC&pg=PA40 |title=Begrimed and Black: Christian Traditions on Blacks and Blackness |publisher=Fortress Press |year=1994 |isbn=978-1-4514-1725-8 |pages=40 |quote=Let the straight-legged man laugh at the club-footed, the white man at the Ethiopian}}</ref><ref name="Rogers2012">{{cite book |author=J. A. Rogers |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0T0HBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA46 |title=Nature Knows No Color-Line |date=1 January 2012 |publisher=Wesleyan University Press |isbn=978-0-8195-7551-7 |pages=46 |oclc=1036750773 |quote=Let the straight limbed man mock the bandy-legged, the white man sneer at the Ethiop.}}</ref><ref name="Jerkins2021">{{cite book |author=Marcus Jerkins |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Dn0qEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA104 |title=Black Lives Matter to Jesus: The Salvation of Black Life and All Life in Luke and Acts |date=12 October 2021 |publisher=Fortress Press |isbn=978-1-5064-7463-2 |pages=104 |oclc=1263869024 |quote=It should be the man who walks upright who mocks the man who limps, the white man who mocks the black}}</ref>{{sfn|Melamed|
2003|p=63|ps=: Juvenal provide the loaded proverb: 'Whoever walks straight may mock the cripple, whoever is white-skinned may mock the black'}} In his fictional [[Socratic dialogue|dialogue]] ''Hermotimus'', the [[Hellenization|Hellenised]] [[Syrian]] satirist [[Lucian]] speculates on whether an isolated Ethiopian would assume out of hand that there are no "white or yellow" men on Earth.{{sfn|Snowden|1983|p=87}}<ref>{{cite book |author1=Luciano de Samosata |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oNWFDk5mOvQC&pg=PA102 |title=Lucian: Selected Dialogues |author2=Lucian (of Samosata.) |author3=C. D. N. Costa |date=2005 |publisher=OUP Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-925867-3 |editor1=C. D. N. Costa |pages=102 |oclc=1004617461 |editor2=Desmond Costa}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=Lucian (of Samosata.) |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=j3sQAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA58 |title=The Works of Lucian of Samosata: Complete with Exceptions Specified in the Preface, Volume 2 |date=1905 |publisher=Clarendon Press |pages=58 |oclc=214350793}}</ref>

Several Roman authors, such as [[Tacitus]] and [[Suetonius]], expressed concerns in their writings about Roman "blood purity" as Roman citizens from outside of Roman Italy increased in number. Neither author, however, suggested that the naturalisation of new citizens should stop, only that [[Manumission|manumissions]] (freeing slaves) and grants of citizenship should be less frequent. Their concerns of blood purity did not match modern ideas of [[Race (human categorization)|race]] or ethnicity, and had little to do with features such as skin colour or physical appearance.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Dench |first=Emma |url=https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199211524.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780199211524-e-018 |title=The Oxford Handbook of Roman Studies |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2010 |isbn=978-0-19-921152-4 |editor-last=Barchiesi |editor-first=Alessandro |pages=8 |chapter=Roman Identity |editor-last2=Scheidel |editor-first2=Walter}}</ref> Terms such as [[Aethiopia|Aethiop]], which Romans used for [[Black people in ancient Roman history|black people]], carried no social implications, and though phenotype-related stereotypes certainly existed in Ancient Rome, inherited physical characteristics were typically not relevant to social status;<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Thompson |first=Lloyd |date=1993 |title=Roman Perceptions of Blacks |url=https://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/ElAnt/V1N4/thompson.html |journal=Electronic Antiquity: Communicating the Classics |volume=1 |issue=4}}</ref> people who looked different from the typical Mediterranean populace, such as black people, were not excluded from any profession and there are no records of stigmas or biases against [[Multiracial|mixed race]] relationships.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Snowden |first=Frank M. |date=1997 |title=Misconceptions about African Blacks in the Ancient Mediterranean World: Specialists and Afrocentrists |url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/20163634 |journal=Arion: A Journal of Humanities and the Classics |volume=4 |issue=3 |pages=40–41, 50–51 |jstor=20163634 |via=[[JSTOR]]}}</ref> The main dividing social differences in Ancient Rome were not based on physical features, but rather on differences in class or rank. Romans practised [[Slavery in ancient Rome|slavery]] extensively, but slaves in Ancient Rome were part of various different ethnic groups and were not enslaved because of their ethnic affiliation.<ref name="CurcăRubelSymonds2020">{{cite book | editor1 = Roxana-Gabriela Curcă | editor2 = Alexander Rubel | editor3 = Robin P. Symonds | editor4 = Hans-Ulrich Voß | date = 28 May 2020 | chapter = chapter 1: What the Romans really meant when using the word 'Barbarian'. Some thoughts on 'Romans and Barbarians' | first = Alexander |  last = Rubel | title = Rome and Barbaricum: Contributions to the Archaeology and History of Interaction in European Protohistory | publisher = Archaeopress Publishing Ltd | pages = 11 | isbn = 978-1-78969-104-7 | oclc = 1157271751 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=FfMPEAAAQBAJ}}</ref> According to the English historian [[Emma Dench]], it was "notoriously difficult to detect slaves by their appearance" in Ancient Rome.<ref name=":0" />

== Late antiquity ==
In [[late antiquity]], some early Christian writers began connecting the metaphorical goodness and morality associated in European culture with the colour [[white]] to the physical skin colour itself, while at the same time associating the negative concepts attached to the colour [[black]] with dark skin.{{sfn|Alleyne|2002|p=52-53}}<ref name="Rodriguez2008">{{cite book | first = Ruben Rosario | last = Rodriguez | date = 19 July 2008 | title = Racism and God-talk: A Latino/a Perspective | publisher = NYU Press | pages = 29 | isbn = 978-0-8147-7610-0 | oclc = 182529004 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=yxkUCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA29}}</ref> For example, the writer [[Paulinus of Nola]] claimed that Ethiopians had been turned black due to committing [[Vice|vices]].{{sfn|Alleyne|2002|p=52-53}} Similarly [[Gregory of Nyssa]] believed that "[[Christ]] came into the world to make blacks white … [[Babylonia|Babylonians]] into Jerusalemites, the prostitute into a virgin, Ethiopians radiantly white."{{sfn|Alleyne|2002|p=52-53}} When speaking of baptising an Ethiopian, [[Fulgentius of Ruspe]] said he saw the Ethiopian as one who was "not yet whitened by the grace of Christ."{{sfn|Alleyne|2002|p=52-53}} According to a 7th century [[Liber beatae Gregorii papae|biography]], [[Pope Gregory I]] bemoaned the presence of [[Anglo-Saxon]] child slaves in Rome who were "white of body and have blonde hair".<ref name="Lavezzo2006">{{cite book |author=Kathy Lavezzo |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=g2p5w3Jw41IC&pg=PA39 |title=Angels on the Edge of the World: Geography, Literature, and English Community, 1000-1534 |date=2006 |publisher=Cornell University Press |isbn=978-0-8014-7309-8 |pages=27–28 |oclc=1022618111}}</ref><ref name="Rix2014"></ref> In the 8th century, the English monk [[Bede|The Venerable Bede]], generally associated the black skin of Ethiopians with "spiritual darkness" but at the same time rejected any idea that the colour differences between, as he termed it, "a black Ethiopian and a white [[Saxon]]" would affect their fates during the [[Last Judgement]].<ref name="Rix2014"></ref>

The 6th century [[Byzantium|Byzantine]] scholar [[Procopius]] referred to various invading barbarian tribes as being white, such as the [[Goths|Gothic tribes]] who he claimed had "white bodies and fair hair" and the [[Hephthalites]] or "White Huns" who, according to him, had "white bodies and countenances".<ref name="Howarth1995">{{cite book |author=Patrick Howarth |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0vt_4oJLGzAC&pg=PA26 |title=Attila, King of the Huns: Man and Myth |date=1995 |publisher=Barnes & Noble Publishing |isbn=978-0-7607-0033-4 |pages=26 |oclc=1005499571}}</ref><ref name="Rix2014" /> Indian scholars also referred to the Hephthalites as ''Sveta Huna'' (White Huns).<ref name="Dani1999 chp 7">{{cite book | editor = Ahmad Hasan Dani | date = 1999 | title = History of Civilizations of Central Asia, Volume 3 | chapter = chapter 7: Eastern Kushans, Kidarites in Gandhara and Kashmir, and Later Hephthalites | first1 = A.H. | last1 = Dani | first2 = B.A. | last2 = Litvinsky | first3 = M.H. | last3 = Zamir Safi | publisher = Motilal Banarsidass Publ. | pages = 169 | isbn = 9788120815407 | oclc = 1000137121 | chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=FcKtIPVQ6REC&pg=PA169}}</ref> Hephthalites portrayed in the [[Sogdian art]] of the [[Afrasiab murals|Afrasiab palace]] are shown as having pale or ruddy faces.<ref name="Dani1999 chp 6">{{cite book | editor = Ahmad Hasan Dani | date = 1999 | title = History of Civilizations of Central Asia, Volume 3 | chapter = chapter 6: The Hephthalite Empire |first1 = B.A. | last1 = Litvinsky| publisher = Motilal Banarsidass Publ. | pages = 136 | isbn = 9788120815407 | oclc = 1000137121 | chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=FcKtIPVQ6REC&pg=PA169}}</ref>

== China ==
[[File:UrumqiWarrior (cropped).jpg|left|thumb|150px|A 1st century image of a soldier in a red uniform, part of the [[Sampul tapestry]], found in north-western China. The figure is believed to represent a member of the [[Yuezhi]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Yatsenko |first1=Sergey A. |title=Yuezhi on Bactrian Embroidery from Textiles Found at Noyon uul, Mongolia |journal=The Silk Road |date=2012 |volume=10 |pages=45–46|url=http://www.silkroadfoundation.org/newsletter/vol10/SilkRoad_10_2012_yatsenko.pdf}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Francfort |first1=Henri-Paul|author-link= Henri-Paul Francfort |title=Sur quelques vestiges et indices nouveaux de l'hellénisme dans les arts entre la Bactriane et le Gandhāra (130 av. J.-C.-100 apr. J.-C. environ) |journal=Journal des Savants |date=1 January 2020 |pages=26–27, Fig.9 |url=https://www.academia.edu/45042820 |language=en}}</ref>]]

In pre-modern China, the Han Chinese used whiteness as a non-racial social category that included themselves while excluding many non-Chinese peoples.{{sfn|Bonnett|2018|p=9-11}} While whiteness was used to identify and define Chinese people, Chinese culture did not exclusively apply the term to any single ethnicity, and other ethnic groups, such as [[Manchus]] and [[Europeans]], could be described as white.{{sfn|Bonnett|2018|p=9-11}} Other groups, however, such as [[Indonesians]], and [[Malaysians]], were referred to as "black".{{sfn|Bonnett|2018|p=9-11}} Chinese culture also associated light skin with having a higher [[social status]] due to light complexions signifying "freedom from manual labour".{{sfn|Bonnett|2018|p=9-11}}     

Scholars of Ancient China also describe [[Indo-European languages|Indo-European]]-speaking peoples of north-western China, such as the [[Yuezhi]], as having "white" or "reddish white" skin.<ref name="Barber1999">{{cite book |last=Barber |first=E. J. W. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xH1agYR4w40C |title=The Mummies of Ürümchi |date=1999 |publisher=W. W. Norton & Company |isbn=978-0-393-32019-0 |pages=118–119 |oclc=1036773980 |quote=Other Chinese sources characterized the "Greater Yuezhi" as having "white" or "reddish white skin, another typically Caucasoid feature.}}</ref> Similarly, the [[Wusun]] tribe are said to have had green eyes and red beards.<ref name="BFrancis2009">{{cite book |last=So |first=Francis K. H. |title=At Home in Many Worlds: Reading, Writing and Translating from Chinese and Jewish Cultures: Essays in Honour of Irene Eber |date=2009 |publisher=[[Harrassowitz Verlag|Otto Harrassowitz Verlag]] |isbn=978-3447061353 |editor1-last=Findeisen |editor1-first=Raoul David |pages=134 |chapter=In Search of the Lost Indo-Europeans in Chinese Dynastic History |quote=Among the Barbarians in the Western Regions the look of Wusun is most unusual. Barbarians of today that have green eye and red beard and look like monkeys are the offspring of this people |editor2-last=Isay |editor2-first=Gad C. |editor3-last=Katz-Goehr |editor3-first=Amira |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Esz2vwNkzNMC}}</ref>

== Muslim world ==
{{Further|Medieval Arab attitudes to Black people}}
[[File:4 Gift Bringers of Otto III.jpg|thumb|[[Sclaveni|Sclavinia]], [[Germania (personification)|Germania]], [[French people|Gallia]] and [[Roman people|Roma]] bringing gifts to [[Otto III, Holy Roman Emperor|Otto III]], from [[Gospels of Otto III|Otto's Gospels]], {{Circa|1000}}.<ref name="Raffensperger2012">{{cite book | first = Christian | last = Raffensperger | date = 12 March 2012 | title = Reimagining Europe | publisher = Harvard University Press | pages = 19 | isbn = 978-0-674-06546-8 | oclc = 1037937289 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=1BXlXAkBKs0C&pg=PA19}}</ref>]] During and after the [[middle ages]], the [[Ethnic groups in the Middle East|peoples of the Middle East]] used the term white to distinguish themselves from darker-skinned "[[Other (philosophy)|others]]".{{sfn|Bonnett|2018|p=9-11}} "White", "red", and "black" became ethnic identifiers with "black" signifying inferiority.{{sfn|Bonnett|2018|p=9-11}} These colour terms became fixed after the initial [[Early Muslim conquests|Arab Conquests]].{{sfn|Bonnett|2018|p=12-14}} Whiteness in this era became a valued physical attribute, with a white complexion being associated with the [[Elite|social elite]].{{sfn|Bonnett|2018|p=12-14}}   

Middle Easterners noted that Europeans were "excessively white" with "pale blue" eyes.{{sfn|Bonnett|2018|p=12-14}} Muslim scholars of the [[Islamic Golden Age]], such as [[Avicenna]], described the northern tribes bordering the Muslim world as white; [[Avicenna]] writes: "The Slavs acquire whiteness / Until their Skins turn soft."<ref name="WardLott2008chapter3">{{cite book |last=Hardy |first=Paul-A. |title=Philosophers on Race: Critical Essays |date=15 April 2008 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=978-0-470-75204-3 |editor1=Julie K. Ward |pages=49 |chapter=Chapter 3 Medieval Muslim Scholars on Race |oclc=1039168694 |editor2=Tommy L. Lott |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dDg76N2Oz6IC&pg=PA49}}</ref> The Arab explorer [[Ahmad ibn Fadlan]] during his northern travels detailed the [[Rus' people]] of the [[Viking Age]] as being "blonde and ruddy" and "big men with white bodies."<ref name="Jones2001">{{cite book |last=Jones |first=Gwyn |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lD74bDG3O5oC&pg=PA164 |title=A History of the Vikings |date=2001 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-280134-0 |pages=164 |oclc=1015516902}}</ref><ref name="CosmanJones2009">{{cite book |last1=Cosman |first1=Madeleine Pelner |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-Jf5t1vFw1QC&pg=PA237 |title=Handbook to Life in the Medieval World, 3-Volume Set |last2=Jones |first2=Linda Gale |date=2009 |publisher=Infobase Publishing |isbn=978-1-4381-0907-7 |pages=237 |oclc=1061403313}}</ref> The medieval Muslim sociologist [[Ibn Khaldun]] noted that those north of the Arabic-speaking world typically didn't use the term white:{{sfn|Smith|2009|p=53}}
{{blockquote|The inhabitants of the north are not called by their color, because the people who established the conventional meanings of the words were themselves white. Thus whiteness was something usual and common to them, and they did not see anything sufficiently remarkable in it to cause them to use it as a specific term.|sign=Ibn Khaldun|source=''[[Muqaddimah]]'' (1377)<ref name="Dawood2020">{{cite book | editor = N. J. Dawood | author = Ibn Khaldûn | date = 31 March 2020 | title = The Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History - Abridged Edition | publisher = Princeton University Press | pages = 60–61 | isbn = 978-1-4008-6609-0 | oclc = 1145619966 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=dtjKDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA61}}</ref><ref name="Malcomson2000">{{cite book | author = Scott Malcomson | date = 4 October 2000 | title = One Drop of Blood: The American Misadventure of Race | publisher = Farrar, Straus and Giroux | pages = 143 | isbn = 978-1-4299-3607-1 | oclc = 872599966 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=Q5iOiroK7RYC&pg=PA143}}</ref>}}The medieval Arab world used various terminology for people in reference to their skin colour with terms like ''al-bidan'' and ''al-abyad'' meaning "white people" and ''al-Sudan'' and ''Zanj'' meaning "black people".<ref name="Euben2008">{{cite book |last=Euben |first=Roxanne L. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QfP9OSUfnBsC&pg=PA79 |title=Journeys to the Other Shore: Muslim and Western Travelers in Search of Knowledge |date=1 July 2008 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-1-4008-2749-7 |pages=78–79 |oclc=1162382282}}</ref><ref name="NurseSpear2017">{{cite book |author1=Derek Nurse |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lGwnDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA29 |title=The Swahili: Reconstructing the History and Language of an African Society, 8-15 |author2=Thomas Spear |date=10 June 2017 |publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press |isbn=978-1-5128-2166-6 |pages=29 |oclc=1004881410}}</ref> In general in the Arab world, the term "white" was used to refer to Arabs, Persians, Greeks, [[Turkic peoples|Turks]], Slavs, and other peoples in the north.{{sfn|Lewis|1992|p=26}} According to historian [[Arnold J. Toynbee]], Arab rulers of the [[Umayyad Caliphate]] would sometimes refer to Persians and Turkish subjects as "the ruddy people", implying their racial inferiority.{{sfn|Lewis|1992|p=22}} Despite this, some Islamic [[Hagiography|hagiographies]] record the [[Prophet Muhammad]], as well as other [[Abrahamic]] figures, as having a "white or ruddy colour".{{sfn|Lewis|1992|loc=p. 36. The same association of light with good is shown in the Muslim hagiographic literature, which depicts the Prophet himself as of white or ruddy color. Similar descriptions are given of his wife `A'isha, his son-in-law `Ali and his descendants, and even his predecessors, the prophets Abraham, Moses, and Jesus.}}

The term "white" was also used within [[Koran|Koranic]] [[exegesis]] as part of the "[[Curse of Ham]]". According to the 9th century scholar, [[Ibn Qutaybah]], the religious writer and son of a [[Companions of the Prophet|companion of Muhammad]], [[Wahb ibn Munabbih]], related an interpretation of the story of [[Noah]] that stated Noah's son [[Ham (son of Noah)|Ham]] had been a white man, but was later cursed by [[God]] to have his skin and the skin of his descendants turned black.{{sfn|Lewis|1992|loc=p. 123-125: Wahb ibn Munabbih said: Ham the son of Noah was a white man, with a handsome face and a fine figure, and Almighty God changed his color and the color of his descendants in response to his father's curse....because Shem covered his father's nakedness, his descendants would be prophets and nobles (sharif), while those of Ham would be bondsmen and bondswomen until the Day of Judgment.}} As such Ham became the ancestor of all dark skinned people including Ethiopians, [[Nubians]], [[Copts]], and [[Berbers]] who were, according to other Islamic traditions related to the "[[Curse of Ham#Curse of Canaan|Curse of Cannan]]", now also cursed to be bondsmen or slaves.{{sfn|Lewis|1992|p=123-125}}
=== White slavery ===
{{Main|White slavery}}
[[File:Slaves Zadib Yemen 13th century BNF Paris.jpg|thumb|Slave-market in the town of [[Zabid]] in [[Islamic history of Yemen|Yemen]] offered slaves of multiple races. Illustration from a 13th century book produced in [[Baghdad]] by [[Yahya ibn Mahmud al-Wasiti|al-Wasiti]].<ref name="McKay2003">{{cite book | editor = John P. McKay | author1 = John P. McKay | author2 = John Buckler | author3 = Patricia Buckley Ebrey | author4 = Bennett D. Hill | date = 2003 | title = A History of World Societies | edition = 6 | publisher = Houghton Mifflin | pages = 256 | isbn = 978-0-618-30195-9 | oclc = 1077994664 | quote = Slave Market at Zabid, Yemen During the thirteenth century, this market offered slaves of many races, women and children for domestic purposes and harems, boys to be trained for military and administrative service. | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=fPmM1xv-IcAC}}</ref>]]Different labels were used to categorise slaves in Islamic society, with white slaves being referred to as [[Mamluk|''mamlūk'']] ("owned") and blacks slaves referred to as ''abd'' ("slave") and white [[Eunuch|eunuchs]] referred to as ''jarādiyya'' ("locusts") and black eunuchs referred to as ''ghurābiyya'' ("ravens").<ref name="Lewis19922">{{cite book |last=Lewis |first=Bernard |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WdjvedBeMHYC |title=Race and Slavery in the Middle East: An Historical Enquiry |date=1992 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-505326-5 |pages=56–59 |oclc=1022745387}}</ref> According to the Arab writer [[Al-Jahiz]], the majority of white eunuchs in medieval [[Basra]] were Slavs.<ref name="Gordon1989">{{cite book |author=Murray Gordon |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5l81hwFPvzYC&pg=PA122 |title=Slavery in the Arab World |date=1989 |publisher=Rowman & Littlefield |isbn=978-0-941533-30-0 |pages=107 |oclc=1120917849}}</ref> By the 10th and 11th centuries, white slaves from Spain, Sicily, and the Balkans could be purchased in the Muslim slave markets of Damascus and Baghdad.<ref name="McKayHillBuckler1992">{{cite book | author1 = John P. McKay | author2 = Bennett D. Hill | author3 = John Buckler | date = 1992 | title = A History of World Societies: To 1715 | edition = 3 | publisher = Houghton Mifflin Company | pages = 281 | isbn = 978-0-395-47294-1 | oclc = 1273568072 | quote = In the slave markets of Damascus and Baghdad in the tenth and eleventh centuries, a buyer could select from white slaves from Spain, Sicily, and southeastern Europe... | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=t0vOBlYBJucC}}</ref> The [[Christian Arabs|Christian Arab]] intellectual [[Ibn Butlan]] of Baghdad wrote the first slave ''vade mecum'', or handbook, in the 11th century, which recorded and described different ethnic and racial groups, dividing white slaves from black slaves and suggesting different tasks for each group based on their attributes.{{sfn|Lewis|1992|loc=p. 48: Ibn Butlan, an eleventh-century Christian physician in Baghdad, wrote a sort of slave trader's vade mecum, which is the first of a series of such works.26 He reviews the range of slaves available in the markets of the Middle East, and considers the different kinds, black and white, male and female, classifying them according to their racial, ethnic, and regional origins and indicating which groups are best suited to which tasks. Similar advice on these matters is offered by a number of later writers}} Ibn Butlan suggested that white slaves, such as Turks and Slavs, should be used as soldiers while black slaves should be used as labourers, servants, and eunuchs.{{sfn|Lewis|1992|loc=p. 56: Ibn Butlan, in his handbook, suggests a proper ethnic division of labor for both male and female slaves. As guards of persons and property, he recommends Indians and Nubians; as laborers, servants, and eunuchs, Zanj; as soldiers, Turks and Slavs}} Generally in the Arab world, white slaves came to be used to fill administrative and domestic positions while black slaves were used for rough labour.{{sfn|Lewis|1992|pp=56–59}} According to [[Bernard Lewis]], white slaves could also conceivably become "generals, provincial governors, sovereigns and founders of dynasties", while such positions were rarely bestowed upon black slaves.{{sfn|Lewis|1992|pp=56–59}} Likewise, emancipated white slaves were offered more opportunities for social advancement in Arab society than emancipated black slaves.{{sfn|Lewis|1992|loc=p. 60: The same limitation of opportunity applies to the emancipated slave. The emancipated white slave was free from any kind of restriction; the emancipated black slave was at most times and places rarely able to rise above the lowest levels.}}  

In medieval Southern Europe slaves came to be categorised based on colour with Christians using typical labels for Muslim slaves such as ''sarraceno blanco'' (white [[Saracen]]), ''sarracenno nigrium ''(black Saracen), and ''sarraceno lauram'' (Saracen of intermediate colour).<ref name="Forbes1993">{{cite book |last=Forbes |first=Jack D. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6aLAeB5QiHAC |title=Africans and Native Americans: The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples |date=1993 |publisher=University of Illinois Press |isbn=978-0-252-06321-3 |pages=26–27 |oclc=1013305190}}</ref> In 13th century [[Barcelona]] the majority of Muslim slaves listed were classified as ''blanche'' (white).<ref name="Forbes1993"></ref> In 13th century [[Genoa]] slaves classified as ''albi'' (white) made up nearly half of the total recorded slave population.<ref name="Forbes1993"></ref> Records show [[Provence|Provencal]] [[France]] would also distinguish between ''noir'' (black) and ''blanc'' (white) slaves.<ref name="Forbes1993"></ref> In Islamic controlled Iberia ([[Al-Andalus]]) Muslims could own other Muslims as slaves, a practice usually banned within Islam, if the enslaved Muslims were either black or ''loro'' (of intermediate colour) but not if they were classified as white.<ref name="Forbes1993"></ref>{{sfn|Forbes|1993|loc=p. 107: in a Muslim-controlled village, a newly converted Muslim could possess a Muslim slave provided that the latter was black or loro and not white}} Generally, in medieval [[Iberia]] and [[Italy]], people were described as white, black, or of intermediate colour.{{sfn|Forbes|1993|loc=p. 66: the late medieval period in Italy and the Iberian peninsula saw people being variously classified as ''albo'', ''alvi'', ''bianco'', ''branco'' (white), ''new'', ''nigri'', ''negri'', ''negro'', ''negre'', ''preto'' (black), and as of intermediate colors: ''lauro'', ''loro'', ''llor'', ''berretini'', ''rufo'', ''pardo'', ''olivastre'', etc}}
== Christendom ==
[[File:Richard-Saladin legendaerer Kampf vor Jaffa.jpg|thumb|'The Luttrell Psalter', British Library MS 42130, fol. 82r, {{Circa|1325–35}}.]][[File:Konrad von Limpurg as a knight being armed by his lady, from Codex Manesse, 1305-15 (43356185121).jpg|thumb|303x303px|Konrad von Limpurg as a knight being armed by his lady. [[Codex Manesse]], {{Circa|1304–40}}.]]
Medieval Christians seldom used "race" as a human category; the word emerged in 15th century Romance-language texts on animal husbandry, and writers tended instead to use words like ''gens'' and ''natio'' when classifying human groups. Medieval ideas about skin colour were complex. Dark skin – depicted in art using brown, black, blue, grey and sometimes purple hues – often signified negative moral and spiritual qualities distinct from physical appearance. Thus, the image of [[Saladin]] facing [[Richard I of England|Richard I]] in the 14th century [[Luttrell Psalter]] depicts the [[Saracen]] with dark blue skin and a monstrous expression, even though the Muslims of the Levant at the time of the Third Crusade were predominantly light-skinned [[Mamluk|Mamluks]]. Christian theologians, for whom blackness represented sin and the devil, describe the newly baptised as "whitened" by the washing away of their sins.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Patton |first=Pamela A. |url=https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9780823285594/html |title=Whose Middle Ages?: Teachable Moments for an Ill-Used Past |publisher=Fordham University Press |year=2020 |editor-last=Albin |editor-first=Andrew |location=New York |pages=155–159 |chapter=Blackness, Whiteness, and the Idea of Race in Medieval European Art |doi=10.1515/9780823285594 |isbn=9780823285594 |editor-last2=Erler |editor-first2=Mary C. |editor-last3=O'Donnell |editor-first3=Thomas |editor-last4=Paul |editor-first4=Nicholas L. |editor-last5=Rowe |editor-first5=Nina}}</ref>

=== Female beauty ===
{{See also|Perceptions of the female body in medieval Europe}}

By the [[Late Middle Ages]], the idealised, light-skinned features of high status figures in [[International Gothic|Gothic art]] signalled their moral purity, social rank, and political authority. The princesses of [[Chivalric romance]] and the noble ladies of [[courtly love]] literature similarly combined white skin with other positive social markers: slender proportions, graceful bearing, and expensive dress.{{sfn|Patton|2019|p= 163–164}} 

The ideal of feminine beauty was formalised in the 12th century by [[Matthew of Vendôme]] in the ''Ars Versificatoria'', which includes two descriptions [[Helen of Troy]] as a model. In the first example, her forehead is white as paper, the space between her eyes white and clear (a "milky way"), her colouring white and red (like rose and snow), and her teeth like ivory. In the second portrait, her forehead is like milk, teeth like ivory, neck like snow, legs fleshy (or white).<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Brewer |first=D. S. |date=1955 |title=The Ideal of Feminine Beauty in Medieval Literature, Especially 'Harley Lyrics', Chaucer, and Some Elizabethans |url=https://doi.org/10.2307/3719759 |journal=The Modern Language Review |volume=50 |issue=3 |pages=258 |doi=10.2307/3719759 |jstor=3719759 |via=JSTOR}}</ref>

=== Chaucer ===
According to the medievalist [[Candace Barrington]]:

{{Blockquote|text=White faces fill [[Chaucer]]'s ''[[Canterbury Tales]]''. Their ubiquity can be easy to ignore because they are not labeled as white. Aside from the occasional lady with the fair face—which could refer to her skin tone, her beauty, or both—skin color is noteworthy in Chaucer's tales not as a visible, essential bodily quality but as a changeable trait linked to such external factors as climate, work, and habit.<ref name=":1">{{Cite book |last=Barrington |first=Candace |url=https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/handle/20.500.12657/25597/1/1004498.pdf |title=Dark Chaucer: An Assortment |publisher=Punctum Books |year=2012 |editor-last=Eileen Joy |editor-first=Myra Seaman |location=Brooklyn, NY |pages=3 |chapter=Dark Whiteness: Benjamin Brawley and Chaucer |editor-last2=Masciandaro |editor-first2=Nicola}}</ref>}}

Lower-class labourers ("churls") and drunkards typically have dark or ruddy faces and skin—for example, Perkyn Revelour ("brown and as berye") and the canon's yeoman (with a "leden hewe"). Dark skin is thus a consequence of "sin, sun, damnation, or putrefying flames", not a natural physical condition of certain groups of people. Chaucer's characters are all "by default, unrelentingly but invisibly white."<ref name=":1" />

== See also ==
* [[Caucasian race]]
* [[Color psychology|Colour psychology]]
* [[Color terminology for race|Colour terminology for race]]
* [[Historical race concepts]]
* [[Light skin]]
* [[White people]]

== References ==
<references />

== Further reading ==

* Graves, Robert (1948). ''[[The White Goddess|The White Goddess: a Historical Grammar of Poetic Myth]]''. United Kingdom: Faber & Faber.

{{White people}}
{{Skin colors}}
{{Historical definitions of race}}

{{Authority control}}

[[Category:People of European descent]]
[[Category:Human skin color]]
[[Category:Race (human categorization)]]
[[Category:White (human racial classification)]]