Color Names

Am sure many of you woke up this morning with the same burning question on your mind, where did the common colors get their names.

Pink - In English, pink used to refer exclusively to a flower called a pink, a dianthus which has pale red petals with fringed edges. Pink, as a verb means to cut or tear jaggedly and has been in use in the English language since the early 14th century.

Orange - When oranges (the fruit) were exported from India, the word for them was exported too. Sanskrit narangah, or "orange tree," was borrowed into Persian as narang, "orange (fruit)," which was borrowed into Arabic as naranj, into Italian as arancia, into French as orange, and eventually into English as orange. The color of the fruit was so striking that English speakers eventually began referring to the color by this word as well. Before oranges were imported in the 1500s, the English word for the color orange was geoluhread (yellow-red).