Darkness
The absence of visible light, a condition of low illumination that affects perception and carries deep cultural symbolism.
Darkness is the condition resulting from a lack of illumination, or an absence of visible light. Under low light conditions, human vision becomes monochrome, a phenomenon termed scotopic vision, due to inactivity of cone cells. The emotional response to darkness has led to metaphorical usages in many cultures, often to convey feelings of unhappiness or foreboding. Darkness may also refer to night, which occurs when the Sun is more than 18° below the horizon.
- Role
- Primary Antagonist
- Affiliation
- None / Corrupting Force
- First Appears
- Opening Sequence (Prologue)
- Status
- Defeated / Sealed
- Nature
- Sentient Void Energy
- Location
- The Blind Forest
Lore & Background
In scientific terms, an object is said to be dark when it absorbs photons, causing it to appear dim compared to other objects. For example, matte black paint does not reflect much visible light and appears dark, whereas white paint reflects much light and appears bright. A dark area has limited light sources, making things hard to see. Exposure to alternating light and darkness (night and day) has caused several evolutionary adaptations to darkness. When a vertebrate, like a human, enters a dark area, its pupils dilate, allowing more light to enter the eye and improving night vision. Also, the light detecting cells in the human eye (rods and cones) will regenerate more unbleached rhodopsin when adapting to darkness. One scientific measure of darkness is the Bortle scale, which indicates the night sky's and stars' brightness at a particular location, and the observability of celestial objects at that location. The material known as Vantablack is one of the darkest substances known, absorbing up to 99.965% of visible light (at 663 nm if the light is perpendicular to the material), and was developed by Surrey NanoSystems in the United Kingdom. The name is a compound of the acronym VANTA (vertically aligned nanotube arrays) and the word black.
In Their Own Story
The perception of darkness differs from the mere absence of light that sometimes leads to afterimages. In perceiving, the eye is active, and the part of the retina that is unstimulated produces a complementary afterimage. Artists use darkness to emphasize and contrast the presence of light. Darkness can be used as a counterpoint to areas of lightness to create leading lines and voids. Such shapes draw the eye around areas of the painting. Shadows add depth and perspective to a painting. Color paints are mixed together to create darkness, because each color absorbs certain frequencies of light. Theoretically, mixing together the three primary colors, or the three secondary colors, will absorb all visible light and create black. In practice, it is difficult to prevent the mixture from taking on a brown tint.
Reader's Guide
As a poetic term in the Western world, darkness is used to connote the presence of shadows, evil, and foreboding, or in modern parlance, to connote that a story is grim, heavy, and/or depressing. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, the first creation narrative begins with a void, described as 'formless and empty,' over which 'darkness was over the surface of the deep' (Genesis 1:2). Into this void, God introduces light, declaring, 'Let there be light' (Genesis 1:3), and separates this light from the darkness. In Islam, light (nūr) and darkness (ẓulumāt) are frequently invoked in both physical and spiritual contexts. The Quran begins its account of creation with Allah (or God) making the heavens and the earth and then creating 'the darknesses and the light' (Quran 6:1). In ancient Greek mythology, Erebus was a primordial deity representing the personification of darkness, particularly associated with the shadowy realm of death and the underworld. In Chinese philosophy, yin is the complementary feminine part of the taijitu and is represented by a dark lobe. The use of darkness as a rhetorical device has a long-standing tradition. William Shakespeare, working in the 16th and 17th centuries, made a character called the 'prince of darkness' (King Lear: III, iv) and gave darkness jaws with which to devour love (A Midsummer Night's Dream: I, i). Geoffrey Chaucer, a 14th-century Middle English writer of The Canterbury Tales, wrote that knights must cast away the 'workes of darkness'. In Divine Comedy, Dante described hell as 'solid darkness stain'd'. In Old English there were three words that could mean darkness: heolstor, genip, and sceadu. Heolstor also meant 'hiding-place' and became holster. Genip meant 'mist' and fell out of use like many strong verbs. It is however still used in the Dutch saying 'in het geniep' which means secretly. Sceadu meant 'shadow' and remained in use. The word dark eventually evolved from the word deorc.
Did You Know?
- The material known as Vantablack absorbs up to 99.965% of visible light (at 663 nm if the light is perpendicular to the material).
- One scientific measure of darkness is the Bortle scale, which indicates the night sky's and stars' brightness at a particular location.
- In Old English there were three words that could mean darkness: heolstor, genip, and sceadu.
- The word dark eventually evolved from the word deorc.
- In the Judeo-Christian tradition, the first creation narrative begins with a void described as 'formless and empty,' over which 'darkness was over the surface of the deep' (Genesis 1:2).