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).