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I've noticed there appears to be a class of Japanese colors which are denoted
by -色. Most of these literally translate to "noun-color" (brown = "tea color,"
grey = "ash color," etc.) It makes sense that, when describing the color
brown, I would never simply say 茶 since that doesn't mean brown at all.

The exception, of course, is 黄色, where 黄 itself does mean yellow. In names
such as The Yellow River [黄河] the -色 is dropped. If it was not a proper noun
-- such as a yellow house -- I would instead use the -い form of the color
[黄色い家].

My question is simply when it is appropriate to do this. Is 黄 used alone
_only_ in proper nouns? Or can it be used very informally as 黄い家 or 黄の家 the
same way I would say 赤い家 or 紫の家?
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2013-06-28T00:42:34.830
12246
2013-06-28T01:30:08.650
3609
question
usage kanji
Acceptable use of 黄
This is a longish answer that goes off on a lot of potentially unrelated
tangential points but please stick with me here if only because it's
interesting!

I'm paraphrasing an answer from
[here](http://oshiete.goo.ne.jp/qa/1458504.html) for this first bit. Basically
in ancient Japan there were only four colors in wide use, namely
「あかし」「あおし」「しろし（しるし）」「くろし（くらし）」. From these you can naturally see how they
became the four pure adjectives that we have today, 赤い, 青い, 白い, 黒い. Other
color words were gradually introduced over time, but 黄色 alone is special in
that there were never really any references to "yellow" in really old texts.
The kanji 黄 was used in some words but none that explicitly referred to
yellow. It's possible that they just included "yellow" under another color's
name. It's not until the 10th century that you see the word きいろ in use, and
the only explanation given is that it's "the color's name plus the 色 kanji."

[This site](http://gogen-allguide.com/ki/kiiro.html) offers some explanations
as to where the term itself came from but there doesn't appear to be any solid
evidence. Examples include various types of trees as the root for き or perhaps
a transition from some other words beginning with く, like from くがね or possibly
くそ. It's possible that since 黄色 came relatively late compared to other colors
like 茶色 they just continued the pattern of adding 色. Or maybe it was just too
confusing just saying き. It was originally 黄の色 and shortened to 黄色.

At any rate this explains why you have this weird yellow situation.

Now to answer your real question, in most situations I can think of you would
need to use 黄色 and not just き, at least in normal speech. I can find a few
examples on alc of 黄 by itself, as in 黄がかった or 黄なる.

The issue with things like 黄河 is not that they are proper nouns but that they
are words of Chinese origin. 黄 is not a concept of Japanese origin, and there
are plenty of Chinese words that use it. You'll just be using it with 音読み
instead. Like 緑黄色野菜 or 黄変 or 黄斑 to steal a few from alc.

All said, there may very well be instances of 黄 outside of words of Chinese
origin that don't have 色 after them. But for pretty much any modern purpose
you will always be using the word 黄色. That's just The Way It's Done Now. I
haven't looked up the origins of murasaki yet but I'm sure that has its own
unique story and use patterns as well. For now you might just be better
thinking of it in the same category as 茶色.
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2013-06-28T01:30:08.650
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2013-06-28T01:30:08.650
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answer