Revelation 6:5

a black horse
Black is μέλας [melas] which is used “Of clothing used in mourning . . . as the color of evil.”¹

a pair of scales
Here the black speaks of judgment and famine, for the rider carries a pair of scales (balances) used to weigh food and indicating its scarcity.

Notes

¹ Frederick William Danker and Walter Bauer, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2000), 499.