Why are Orcs associated with the colors red, yellow, and black in Tolkien's Lord of the Rings?

Question

In Tolkien's *The Lord of the Rings* series, Sauron, and characters allied with Sauron, are frequently associated with the colors red, yellow, and black. For example, here is a description of the Haradim -- a group of men allied with Sauron -- from *The Two Towers*. > They the are fierce. They have **black** eyes, and long **black** hair, and **gold** rings in their ears; yes, lots of beautiful **gold**. And some have **red** paint on their cheeks, and **red** cloaks; and their flags are **red**, and the tips of their spears; and they have round shields, **yellow** and **black** with big spikes. Not nice; very cruel wicked Men they look. Almost as bad as Orcs, and much bigger. Sméagol thinks they have come out of the South beyond the Great River’s end. Another example: the eye of Sauron is described in *The Fellowship of the Ring* as "rimmed with **fire**, but was itself glazed, **yellow** as a cat’s, watchful and intent, and the **black** slit of its pupil opened on a pit, a window into nothingness." I could list more examples of this, but suffice it to say, the more you read the story, the more obvious this pattern becomes. Is there a reason behind this?

Answer 1

It could be related to how Tolkien personally views those colors. He was terrified of spiders due to an incident as a child, and some spiders have black and red colorings. However, he was also a soldier in WWI. Much of Lord of the Rings is a reflection on his time in the war, as well as the industrial age. There could be significance to those colors stemming from nations involved in WWI. There are other potential readings of why those colors are significant, such as their possible place in some of the Norse, Celtic, and Germanic cultures and mythologies that Tolkien drew from.