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Does anyone know why some European languages (notably German) have different words for the fruit "apfelsine" and the colour "orange"? In German they are mostly

by fy20 6y ago

Does anyone know why some European languages (notably German) have different words for the fruit "apfelsine" and the colour "orange"? In German they are mostly interchangeable (as I understand), but some languages still have the distinction. There is actually a native plant 'sea buckthorn' with fruits that are very orange coloured. It is rather common in some parts of Europe. What colour was this called before 'orange'?

DonaldFisk 6y ago
It derives from "Chinese apple".
htgb 6y ago
In Swedish, apelsin and orange are distinct and not interchangeable. Sibling comment about Chinese apple seems credible to me. I can think of several orange things other than oranges: sea buckthorn as you say, but also cloudberries and carrots (which I don't get why they are dismissed by the article: not vibrant enough? Nor is a fox…?). An older word for orange (ish?) I can think of is brandgul. Brand is a big fire, and gul is yellow, so "big-fire yellow" if you will. Still a variation of yellow, but yet another naturally occurring orange :)
- simtel20 6y ago
  Orange carrots do not have a relatively long history as part of our cuisine. Reading the wikipedia article may satisfy your curiosity - it's more than I can condense at this hour. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrot?wprov=sfla1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrot?wprov=sfla1
  - Tor3 6y ago
    Good point. Carrot with today's colour wouldn't be around before the fruit arrived in Europe. You would be more likely to find white carrots, for example.
- aikinai 6y ago
  I don’t think foxes are orange enough that you would make up a new word if you already had brown and red.
DanBC 6y ago
> What colour was this called before 'orange'? I think they would have said yellow, gold, saffron, or red.
- johncessna 6y ago
  light brown? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wh4aWZRtTwU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wh4aWZRtTwU
lqet 6y ago
In Germany, this is just a regional thing. Where I come from (southern Germany), the word "Apfelsine" is not used at all. If you used it here, people would most likely immediately ask if you mean an orange. As I understand it, it's only used north of the "Speyer Line": https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speyerer_Linie_(Isoglosse) https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speyerer_Linie_(Isoglosse) One explanation would be that southern Germany has more direct contact to France, and therefore uses the French "Orange", whereas northern Germany uses the low German "Apel de Sina" (basically "China-Apple", "sina" as in "Sinology"). French words have always been used in the southern parts of the German-speaking world to appear more educated, most notably "Trottoir" instead of "Bürgersteig" (sidewalk) or "Portemonnaie" instead of "Geldbeutel" (wallet). A best-selling cooking book published in Stuttgart in 1791 made heavy use of french kitchen terms and gave the correct pronounciation in brackets (e.g. ragout ("Raguh")) [0] [0] https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_6f8pAAAAYAAJ/page/n247/mode/2up https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_6f8pAAAAYAAJ/page/n247/mo...
kiliancs 6y ago
Not exactly answering your first question, but in Catalan the name of "pumpkin" is also used to refer to the orange color. Even though technically this color ("carabassa" [1]) may not be exactly the same as "orange" ("taronja" [2]), it is often used interchangeably, though "orange" is, as far as I can tell, increasingly more common. [1] https://ca.wiktionary.org/wiki/carabassa https://ca.wiktionary.org/wiki/carabassa [2] https://ca.wiktionary.org/wiki/taronja https://ca.wiktionary.org/wiki/taronja

by fy20 6y ago

DonaldFisk 6y ago

It derives from "Chinese apple".

htgb 6y ago

In Swedish, apelsin and orange are distinct and not interchangeable. Sibling comment about Chinese apple seems credible to me. I can think of several orange things other than oranges: sea buckthorn as you say, but also cloudberries and carrots (which I don't get why they are dismissed by the article: not vibrant enough? Nor is a fox…?). An older word for orange (ish?) I can think of is brandgul. Brand is a big fire, and gul is yellow, so "big-fire yellow" if you will. Still a variation of yellow, but yet another naturally occurring orange :)

simtel20 6y ago
Orange carrots do not have a relatively long history as part of our cuisine. Reading the wikipedia article may satisfy your curiosity - it's more than I can condense at this hour. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrot?wprov=sfla1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrot?wprov=sfla1
- Tor3 6y ago
  Good point. Carrot with today's colour wouldn't be around before the fruit arrived in Europe. You would be more likely to find white carrots, for example.
aikinai 6y ago
I don’t think foxes are orange enough that you would make up a new word if you already had brown and red.

DanBC 6y ago

> What colour was this called before 'orange'? I think they would have said yellow, gold, saffron, or red.

johncessna 6y ago
light brown? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wh4aWZRtTwU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wh4aWZRtTwU

lqet 6y ago

In Germany, this is just a regional thing. Where I come from (southern Germany), the word "Apfelsine" is not used at all. If you used it here, people would most likely immediately ask if you mean an orange. As I understand it, it's only used north of the "Speyer Line": https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speyerer_Linie_(Isoglosse) https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speyerer_Linie_(Isoglosse) One explanation would be that southern Germany has more direct contact to France, and therefore uses the French "Orange", whereas northern Germany uses the low German "Apel de Sina" (basically "China-Apple", "sina" as in "Sinology"). French words have always been used in the southern parts of the German-speaking world to appear more educated, most notably "Trottoir" instead of "Bürgersteig" (sidewalk) or "Portemonnaie" instead of "Geldbeutel" (wallet). A best-selling cooking book published in Stuttgart in 1791 made heavy use of french kitchen terms and gave the correct pronounciation in brackets (e.g. ragout ("Raguh")) [0] [0] https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_6f8pAAAAYAAJ/page/n247/mode/2up https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_6f8pAAAAYAAJ/page/n247/mo...

kiliancs 6y ago

Not exactly answering your first question, but in Catalan the name of "pumpkin" is also used to refer to the orange color. Even though technically this color ("carabassa" [1]) may not be exactly the same as "orange" ("taronja" [2]), it is often used interchangeably, though "orange" is, as far as I can tell, increasingly more common. [1] https://ca.wiktionary.org/wiki/carabassa https://ca.wiktionary.org/wiki/carabassa [2] https://ca.wiktionary.org/wiki/taronja https://ca.wiktionary.org/wiki/taronja