Thursday, August 31, 2017

Warm colors

Warm colors

We English speakers have been using the word red as a noun meaning ruddy or red in color since the 1200s. There are versions of red in Old Norse, Middle Dutch, Old Saxon, and most the Germanic languages. In Old English we mostly spelled it read, which gave us the last names Reid & Read (names based on a color, much like the surnames Black, Brown, Green, & White. In the 1580s, English speakers began using this word to refer to the skin color of native Americans. In 1781 the idiom red-handed came into usage, in 1898 the idiom to see red was born, & the idiom red carpet came about in 1934.

The word orange arrived in English about 1300 through French, Latin, Arabic and Persian from naranga-s, a Sanskrit word meaning orange tree. Interestingly, orange continued to refer to the orange tree until the 1540s, when it finally made its way onto the artist’s palette to label a color. It’s believed the initial n was lost in English due to confusion introduced by the article a/an. The confusion becomes evident by reading this aloud: an orange, a norange. Additionally, in 1795, secret supporters of William of Orange referred to themselves as the Orangemen, in 1961 the US military labeled a toxic pesticide & weapon Agent Orange, 1& in 963 we began referring to orange juice as OJ.

The Proto-Indo-European root *ghel- gave English speakers the word yellow (which appears in slightly different form in Norse, Swedish, Dutch, & German). Originally, *ghel- meant to shine. Middle English speakers appear confused on yellow’s definition, as at different times it meant blue-grey, hazel, & greenish-yellow, though we appear to have landed on the color we now call yellow by 1400 or so. Once we’d landed there, yellow developed any number of negative, inappropriate, or downright corrosive meanings:
-in 1787 English speakers developed the slur yellow to refer to people of Asian descent
-in 1856 yellow began to mean cowardly
-in 1867 we started referring to a mongrel as a yellow dog
-by 1881 yellow dog started meaning contemptible person
-in 1898 yellow journalism referred to sensational chauvinism in the media (inspired by an earlier publicity stunt involving yellow ink)
-in 1924 a new way of saying cowardly was born — yellow-bellied
In the coming week, may all your color-references be positive. 



My thanks go out to this week’s sources Etymonline, Collins Dictionary, Merriam Webster, Wordnik, & the OED.

6 comments:

  1. There's a much older meaning of the expression "yellow-belly" that may or may not have anything to do with the expression meaning cowardly. The inhabitants of Lincolnshire in the UK have been called "yellow-bellies" since at least the 18th century. The army regiments from Lincolnshire wore yellow vests. I don't know if something happened in the American revolution that made the Yanks think the Lincs Yellow Bellies were cowardly, or if the two expressions are unrelated, but it's a funny coincidence.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fascinating -- I'll have to look into that further -- didn't show up on my sources, but there are many sources out there in the world. Thanks.

      Delete
  2. I found the "yellow journalism" story to be intriguing. Someone used yellow ink to make a chauvinistic statement? Do you know the story?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Christine -- it seems the Hearst & Pulitzer journalism machines were at war with one another & discovered that sensational stories & yellow ink pulled in customers. Both parties used the tactic & also wrote honest stories, but somehow the ink stuck to the sensationalism. Thanks for coming by.

      Delete
  3. Interesting. And, by the way, you picked a perfect weekend for a story about WARM colors. Whew!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm with you -- since when did we live in Barbados?

      Delete