Sap green has been used since at least the Middle Ages — it appears in medieval manuscripts and Renaissance paintings. Its extreme fugitivity means that many paintings using it have changed dramatically over time. Where Renaissance painters intended vivid green landscapes, we now often see brown or yellow passages — the sap green having completely faded. This makes authentic attribution of landscape colours in old paintings particularly challenging.

Natural, botanical, and characteristically impermanent. Sap green is the colour of living plant material — fresh, growing, and temporary. Its historical fugitivity gives it an association with transience that is almost philosophical: this is the colour that most closely resembles living green, and it fades like living things do.

The fading of sap green in historical paintings is a significant challenge for art conservation. Many Renaissance landscapes that appear brown or yellow today were originally painted green — Constable's early work shows areas that were once sap green. Conservation scientists use multi-spectral imaging to recover the original colour intentions of paintings where fugitive pigments have faded.