Black (Ancient Egyptian name 'kem') was the color of the life-giving silt left by the Nile inundation, which gave rise to the Ancient Egyptian name for the country: 'kemet' – the black land. Black symbolized fertility, new life, and resurrection as seen through the yearly agricultural cycle. It was also the color of Osiris ('the black one'), the resurrected god of the dead, and was considered the color of the underworld where the sun was said to regenerate every night. Black was often used on statues and coffins to invoke the process of regeneration ascribed to the god Osiris. Black was also used as a standard color for hair and to represent the skin colour of people from the south – Nubians and Kushites.
White (Ancient Egyptian name 'hedj') was the color of purity, sacredness, cleanliness, and simplicity. Tools, sacred objects, and even priest's sandals were white for this reason. Sacred animals were also depicted as white. Clothing, which was often just undyed linen, was usually depicted as white.
Silver (also known by the name 'hedj', but written with the determinative for precious metal) represented the color of the sun at dawn, and the moon, and stars. Silver was a rarer metal than gold in Ancient Egypt and held a greater value.
