: The study presents linguistic material which, from a diachronic and synchronic point of view, presents the way the Slovak language names the colour grey, and also the figurative meanings that Slovak colour names denoting the colour of ash are able to express in comparison with other Slavic languages of neighbouring areas, i.e. Czech, Polish and Ukrainian. The conclusions presented in the study are based on the results of a comparative and contrastive analysis of linguistic material obtained by excerpting from collections of folklore, a historical dictionary, a dictionary of Slovak dialects, and textual corpora of contemporary Slovak, Czech, Polish, and Ukrainian, coupled with a quantitative characterization of the use of the given colour names in these genetically related languages. The analysed linguistic material is the basis for conclusions concerning the differences in the use of colour names denoting grey colour in the formation of multi-word names in Slavic languages and in the adoption of international terminology in which these names occur. A comparison with Slavic languages whose areas are located in the geographical neighbourhood of Slovak shows that the richness of lexical meaning of words denoting grey colour and their use in multi-word naming of terminological and non-terminological character may be wider in other languages than in Slovak. Compared to other Slavic languages, in Slovak the competition of two adjectives denoting grey colour can be observed not only in the basic meaning, but also in figurative meanings and in multi-word denotations of terminological and phraseological character.