Elizabeth McGrath, in her article "The Black Andromeda", discusses the tradition, as promoted by the influential Roman poet Ovid, of Andromeda being a dark-skinned woman of either Ethiopian or Indian origin. In his "Heroides" Ovid has Sappho explain to Phaon: "though I'm not pure white, Cepheus's dark Andromeda/charmed Perseus with her native color./White doves often choose mates of different hue/and the parrot loves the black turtle dove"; the Latin word "fuscae" Ovid uses here for "dark Andromeda" refers to the color black or brown. Elsewhere he says that Perseus brought Andromeda from "darkest" India and declares “Nor was Andromeda’s color any problem/to her wing-footed aerial lover” adding that “White suits dark girls; you looked so attractive in white, Andromeda”. Ovid's account of Andromeda's story follows Euripides' play "Andromeda" in having Perseus initially mistake the chained Andromeda for a statue of marble, which has been taken to mean she was light-skinned; but since statues in Ovid's time were commonly painted to look like living people, her skin tone could have been of any color.