A study of how red is expressed in song CI

摘要

We undertake statistical analysis and find that the character hong (***) has the highest frequency of use at close to 5000 in the Quan Song Ci (complete poems of Song Dynasty). It is often accompanied by cui (***, jade green) or lù (***, green variant), such as in "lu fei hong shou" [thinning red and rich green]. The most commonly used vocabulary are hong chen, hong zhuang, and can hong, which refer to an affluent society, the female image, and flowers.