The colours of awe

The Harmandir Sahib at Amritsar, the holiest Sikh shrine, is sheathed in gold and stands in a pool that doubles its light. It is known as the Golden Temple.

Krishna, Rama and Vishnu are shown with blue skin, widely explained as the colour of the boundless sky and ocean.

The Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon and the great temples of Thailand are covered in gold leaf given by worshippers over centuries.

The mosques and madrasas of Isfahan and Samarkand are faced in blue and turquoise tile, with domes meant to recall the sky.

The twelfth and thirteenth century windows of Chartres cathedral are famous for a deep blue glass often called Chartres blue.

Ancient Egyptians described the flesh of the gods as gold and their hair as lapis lazuli, and buried kings in both.

Uluru, sacred to the Anangu people, turns deep red and orange at sunrise and sunset as the low sun lights the iron-rich rock.

Renaissance painters kept ultramarine, ground from Afghan lapis lazuli and as costly as gold, for the robe of the Virgin Mary.

Lapis lazuli has been mined in the mountains of Badakhshan for more than six thousand years. Ground to powder it gave ultramarine, the costliest blue in European painting.

Red ochre is used in Aboriginal rock art and ceremony, and is traded over long distances. In the Aboriginal flag the red half stands for the earth and for that ochre.

Men wear a long scarf, the kabney, on formal occasions, and its colour shows rank. Saffron yellow is kept for the King and the Je Khenpo, the chief abbot.

Yellow was the emperor's colour. Under the Ming and Qing dynasties bright yellow robes and yellow glazed roof tiles, as on the Forbidden City, were reserved for him.

The Muisca made offerings of gold figures to the gods at Lake Guatavita. The ritual of a new ruler covered in gold dust gave rise to the legend of El Dorado.

Ancient craftsmen made Egyptian blue, one of the first synthetic pigments, and blue-glazed faience for amulets. Blue stood for the sky and the Nile.

The ancient Egyptians held that the flesh of the gods was gold, which never tarnishes. Royal coffins and masks, like Tutankhamun's, were made of it.

A child born to a reigning Byzantine emperor was called porphyrogennetos, born in the purple. The birth took place in a palace room lined with purple stone.

Orthodox icons and church mosaics set their figures against a ground of gold. It stands for the light of heaven, not for any earthly place.

The ancient Maya prized green above all colours. Jade and the long green tail feathers of the quetzal were kept for kings. The quetzal is the national bird and gives the currency its name.

In Bali, a black and white chequered cloth called poleng is wrapped around statues, shrines and large trees. It shows the balance of opposites and marks a place as guarded.

Tekhelet is the blue dye the Torah commands for one thread of the fringes on a prayer shawl. The method was lost for centuries, and some Jews now use a dye made from sea snails.

Krishna, Rama and Vishnu are painted with blue skin, the colour of the sky and the deep sea. The wheel at the centre of the national flag, the Ashoka Chakra, is navy blue.

The Ishtar Gate of Babylon, built under Nebuchadnezzar II, was faced with deep blue glazed bricks set with bulls and dragons. The blue imitated lapis lazuli.