Sylvia Gabriel
Difference between "Lila" and "Violett" (as many answers as possible, please) I have heard many different explanations to this question. At German camp, I was told to use "Lilia". Growing up learning German, by German teacher always taught me "Violett" and never "Lila". She is older; maybe there is a generational/formality difference? My German teacher says to use "Violett". She also thinks that "Violett" has a more red-purple connotation and that "Lila" has a more blue-purple connotation. My bilingual dictionary translates both "Lila" and "Violett" to "purple" but when you look up purple, it only translates it to "Lila". Maybe "Lila" just means "purple" and "Violett" just means "Violett"? Or maybe there is no simple answer to this question. I know it's slightly irrelevant, but it's bugging me! Thank you for your answers. I'd love to have as many as possible to hear all the different opinions!
Apr 19, 2017 2:22 AM
Answers · 4
You're probably right in that it's a generational thing. When I was a child, I was taught to say "lila", and that was used interchangeably for both purple and violet. I think - although it seems unlikely - my father (who was an educated man) actually didn't know what purple looked like. Because after I'd come across the information about the snails and asked what "Purpur" was, he told me that it was a kind of dark red. And when I found the word "violett" somewhere, I was told that it was a synonym for "lila".
April 19, 2017
Wenn schon, dann Mauve.
April 19, 2017
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April 19, 2017
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Sylvia Gabriel
Language Skills
Arabic (Levantine), Arabic (Maghrebi), Bengali, English, German, American Sign Language (ASL), Tamil, Thai, Urdu
Learning Language
Arabic (Levantine), Arabic (Maghrebi), Bengali, German, American Sign Language (ASL), Tamil, Thai, Urdu