brown
See also: Brown
EnglishEdit
EtymologyEdit
From Middle English broun, from Old English brūn (“brown; dark; dusky”), from Proto-West Germanic *brūn, from Proto-Germanic *brūnaz, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰerH-. Doublet of bruin.
cognates
- Dutch bruin
- German braun
- Ancient Greek φρύνη (phrúnē), φρῦνος (phrûnos, “toad”)
- Latin brunneus (“brown”)
- Lithuanian bė́ras (“brown”)
- Sanskrit बभ्रु (babhrú, “reddish-brown”)
- West Frisian brún
PronunciationEdit
NounEdit
brown (countable and uncountable, plural browns)
- (countable and uncountable) A colour like that of chocolate or coffee.
- The browns and greens in this painting give it a nice woodsy feel.
- brown:
- (snooker, countable) One of the colour balls used in snooker, with a value of 4 points.
- (uncountable) Black tar heroin.
- (slang, archaic, countable) A copper coin.
- 1853, Charles John Chetwynd Talbot, Meliora, Or, Better Times to Come (page 247)
- I know there are many persons — some who are themselves poor — who 'never turn a beggar from their door,' but always give them a few browns (halfpence) or some scran (broken victuals).
- 1883, “The Omnibus”, in London Town[1]:
- "We've not had any breakfast,—won't you toss us down a brown?"—
That's what they call a penny in the streets of London Town.
- 1853, Charles John Chetwynd Talbot, Meliora, Or, Better Times to Come (page 247)
- A brown horse or other animal.
- 1877, George Nevile, Horses and Riding, page 105:
- […] browns are the soberest, bays are the worst tempered, and chestnuts are the most foolish.
- (sometimes capitalised, countable, informal) A person of Latino, Middle Eastern or South Asian descent; a brown-skinned person; someone of mulatto or biracial appearance.
- 2005, Kristen A. Myers, Racetalk: Racism Hiding in Plain Sight
- Many browns and blacks are immigrants — some of whom have not yet become naturalized citizens of the United States.
- 2005, Kristen A. Myers, Racetalk: Racism Hiding in Plain Sight
- (entomology) Any of various nymphalid butterflies of subfamily Satyrinae (formerly the family Satyridae).
- (entomology) Any of certain species of nymphalid butterflies of subfamily Satyrinae, such as those of the genera Heteronympha and Melanitis.
- (informal) A brown trout (Salmo trutta).
- (hunting, as "the brown") A mass of birds or animals that may be indiscriminately fired at.
- 1928, R. Pigot, Twenty-five Years Big Game Hunting (page 166)
- The temptation to have a shot into the brown was great. There was not a head there which was not a big one and the one by himself was not too easy a shot since it is always difficult to shoot when lying in soft snow.
- 1979, Kevin Andrews, Athens Alive (page 223)
- My anger mounted at this, I opened the courtyard door and raised my musket to fire into the brown; I had loaded it with small shot, and if it had gone off that would have been the death of us and the ruin of all of us in the house.
- 1928, R. Pigot, Twenty-five Years Big Game Hunting (page 166)
![[1]](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:16_London_Town,_page_12.png){kind=link}
Derived termsEdit
DescendantsEdit
TranslationsEdit
colour
|
black tar heroin — see black tar
copper coin
|
brown-skinned person
|
nymphalid butterfliy of subfamily Satyrinae
|
Salmo trutta — see brown trout
hunting: mass of birds or animals
AdjectiveEdit
brown (comparative browner or more brown, superlative brownest or most brown)
- Having a brown colour.
- (obsolete) Gloomy.
- (sometimes capitalized) Of or relating to any of various ethnic groups having dark pigmentation of the skin.
- (US) Latino
- (of Asians) South Asian
- (of East Asians) Southeast Asian
DescendantsEdit
TranslationsEdit
having a brown colour
|
VerbEdit
brown (third-person singular simple present browns, present participle browning, simple past and past participle browned)
- (intransitive) To become brown.
- 2006, Michael Pollan, The Omnivore's Dilemma, The Penguin Press, →ISBN, page 269:
- The chicken was browning nicely, the skin beginning to crisp and take on the toasty tones of oiled wood.
- (cooking, transitive) To cook something until it becomes brown.
- 1887, Indian Cookery "Local" for Young Housekeepers: Second Edition (page 67)
- Pound an onion, warm a spoonful of ghee and throw in the onion, brown it slightly, add your curry stuff, brown this till it smells pleasantly, […]
- 1887, Indian Cookery "Local" for Young Housekeepers: Second Edition (page 67)
- (intransitive, transitive) To tan.
- Light-skinned people tend to brown when exposed to the sun.
- (transitive) To make brown or dusky.
- Synonym: (chiefly literary and poetic) embrown
- 1807, Joel Barlow, The Columbiad:
- A trembling twilight o'er the welkin moves, / Browns the dim void and darkens deep the groves.
- (transitive) To give a bright brown colour to, as to gun barrels, by forming a thin coating of oxide on their surface.
- 1860, Andrew Ure, Ure’s Dictionary of Arts, Manufactures, and Mines[2], page 463:
- It is mixed uniformly with olive oil, and rubbed upon the iron slightly heated, which is afterwards exposed to the air, till the wished-for degree of browning is produced.
- (demography, transitive, intransitive, slang, ethnic slur, usually derogatory, offensive) To turn progressively more Hispanic or Latino, in the context of the population of a geographic region.
- the browning of America
Derived termsEdit
- anti-brown
- Asian brown flycatcher
- Bismarck brown
- brown adipose tissue
- brown ale
- brown alga
- brown anole
- brown argus
- brown as a berry
- brown bag
- brown bag test
- brown bagging
- brown bar
- brown bastard
- brown bear
- brown bent
- Brown Bess
- Brown Betty
- brown bill
- brown bits
- brown bomber
- brown bottle flu
- brown box
- brown box crab
- brown bread
- brown bullhead
- brown butter
- brown cheese
- brown cloud
- brown coal
- brown coati
- brown crab
- brown creeper
- brown dwarf
- brown earth
- brown envelope journalism
- brown envelope syndrome
- brown eye
- brown falcon
- brown fat
- brown George
- brown goods
- brown goshawk
- brown hairstreak
- brown hare
- brown hawk
- brown holland
- brown honeyeater
- brown hyena
- brown inca
- brown job
- brown jolly
- brown king crab
- brown kingfisher
- brown lacewing
- brown leaf
- brown leaf spot
- brown lung
- brown marmorated stink bug
- brown mustard
- brown noser
- brown note
- brown onion
- brown oriole
- brown out
- brown owl
- brown paper
- brown paper bag party
- brown paper bag test
- brown patch
- brown pelican
- brown pound
- brown power
- brown rat
- brown recluse
- brown recluse spider
- brown rice
- brown rot
- brown sauce
- brown shark
- brown shirt
- Brown Shirt
- brown shoe
- brown shower
- brown shrike
- brown snake
- brown spar
- brown spot
- brown stew
- brown stew chicken
- brown sticker
- brown study
- brown sugar
- Brown Swiss
- brown tang
- brown teal
- brown thrasher
- brown thumb
- brown tinamou
- brown trout
- brown Windsor soup
- brown woolly monkey
- brown-bag
- brown-bagger
- brown-bill
- brown-billed scythebill
- brown-brown
- brown-eyed
- brown-eyed soul
- brown-eyed Susan
- brown-haired
- brown-nose
- brown-noser
- brown-out
- brown-rumped minivet
- brown-water navy
- browned off
- brownfield
- brownie
- brownie point
- brownish
- brownnose
- brownout
- brownprint
- brownstone
- bush brown
- Cappagh brown
- Cappah brown
- Cassel brown
- code brown
- Colorado brown stain
- common brown cup
- common brown earwig
- do it brown
- do it up brown
- do someone brown
- done brown
- embrown
- golden brown
- great brown kingfisher
- hair-brown
- hash brown
- hash browns
- hash-brown
- hashed brown
- hot brown
- indigo brown
- king brown
- King Island brown thornbill
- little brown fucking machine
- little brown job
- little brown jug
- Mars brown
- meadow brown
- Mexican brown
- mono-brown
- nigger-brown
- North Island brown kiwi
- northern brown argus
- nut-brown
- nut-brown butter
- Okarito brown kiwi
- plain brown wrapper
- Pullman brown
- red-brown
- red-green-brown alliance
- saddle brown
- shit-brown
- small brown crow
- Spanish brown
- stately bush brown
- sub-brown dwarf
- the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog
- tree brown
- Vandyke brown
- wall brown
- wood brown
Related termsEdit
TranslationsEdit
to become brown
|
to cook until brown
|
to tan — see tan
- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
See alsoEdit
| white | gray, grey | black |
| red; crimson | orange; brown | yellow; cream |
| lime, lime green | green | mint |
| cyan; teal | azure, sky blue | blue |
| violet; indigo | magenta; purple | pink |
WelshEdit
EtymologyEdit
PronunciationEdit
AdjectiveEdit
brown (feminine singular brown, plural brown, equative browned, comparative brownach, superlative brownaf)
See alsoEdit
| gwyn | llwyd | du |
| coch; rhudd | oren, melyngoch; brown | melyn; melynwyn |
| gwyrdd leim | gwyrdd | |
| gwyrddlas; glaswyrdd | asur, gwynlas | glas |
| fioled; indigo | majenta; porffor | pinc |
MutationEdit
| Welsh mutation | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| radical | soft | nasal | aspirate |
| brown | frown | mrown | unchanged |
| Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs. | |||