What do you think of when you hear the word ‘orange’?
Do you think of the colour, or the fruit?
Do you imagine the vivid, sweet citrusy fragrance and tangy taste of the fruit, or do you see the colour and its myriad shades?
Don’t you think its fun to eat a colour? No, you aren’t really eating the colour!
Origin of the word orange
The word orange did not exist in the English dictionary till 1300s. So what did people refer to when they wanted to refer to the colour orange? They called it geoluhread or yellow – red. Till some one decided to call the colour orange, ORANGE colour!
Wow! Wonder how he did that? Do you think he saw the exotic fruit and thought, hmm, it reminds him of the colour yellow – red.
But first, let’s see where the fruit’s name originally came from.
What was the colour orange called before oranges?
The fruit’s homeland is in India. The Indians referred to it as narange or naranga, which may have its root in the word for smell in Dravidian languages. The fruit travelled to Europe with Indian, European and Arab traders. The Arabs refer to it as burtakal, which originates from the word for Portugal and the Persians refer to it as naranje.
The word naranje probably worked its way to into the English dictionary from the French, who called it pomme d’orange. The english simplified the word to simply call it orange, in the 1500s.
In 1600s, someone decided to adopt the name of the fruit to the colour, they have previously referred to as yellow – red.
Did the colour orange come before the fruit?
So, now you know, what came first. The fruit ofcourse, and the colour is named after the fruit.
The fruit came first.