brun

Forms

brūn^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-West Germanic *brūn,^[1] from Proto-Germanic *brūnaz (“brown”).^[2][3] The adjective is shared by the other old Germanic languages: Old Norse brúnn, Old Frisian brūn, Old High German brūn (“reddish-brown, blackish”) and Old Saxon brūnrōd (“sparkling red”), a compound.^[2][4][3]

Orel takes the Germanic adjective to have the same formation as Ancient Greek φρῦνος (phrûnos, “frog, toad”), named for its brown colour, and refers it further to an Indo-European root Proto-Indo-European *bʰreu-, also seen in the Sanskrit word for "reddish-brown".^[2] Holthausen gives the same Greek comparison and relates the word to bera "bear" and beofor "beaver".^[4] Köbler sets up Proto-Indo-European *bʰrouno- "brown", from a root Proto-Indo-European *bʰer- (“shining, light brown”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first securely dated record is in Bald's Leechbook, in a manuscript of the mid-tenth century: a salve for wounds is made with þa brunan wyrt bradleafan sio weaxeþ on wuda “the broad-leaved brown plant that grows in the wood”.^[5][6] An earlier charter of 940 names a ford brunes forda, but the genitive there is the personal name Brūn and does not date the adjective.^[7][6]

Semantic evolution

Bosworth and Toller give the word as “brown, dark, dusky”, glossing Latin fuscus, furvus and rufus; the poets speak of brune yða “the dark waves” and call the Ethiopians brune leode “the brown people”.^[8][9] In the glosses it also renders burrus, badius and fulvus, and the colour of a spike of grain is brunes heowes.^[10][3]

Said of weapons and helmets the word has another sense: in Beowulf the sword's edge is brun, which Klaeber reads as “bright, reflective”, and Judith speaks of brune helmas.^[11][10] Etymonline holds that this sense of shining was later kept only in burnish, a word that came through French.^[12][11]

The adjective lived on as Middle English broun, “dark, dull”, now English brown, and the Germanic word was taken into Romance as Medieval Latin brunus, Italian bruno and French brun.^[13][12]

Timeline

• s. x med. – þa brunan wyrt “the brown plant” in Bald's Leechbook.^[5][6]
• s. x² – brunum beadowæpnum “with dark battle-weapons” in a riddle of the Exeter Book.^[14][6]
• s. x² – brune yða “the dark waves” in Andreas, in the Vercelli Book.^[15][9]
• s. x/xi – brune helmas in Judith and the bright sword edge of Beowulf, in the Beowulf manuscript.^[16][11]
• a1375 – Middle English broun “dark”, contrasted with “brighter”.^[13]

Meanings

Adjective

1. brown; dark, dusky.^[8][3][17]
2. (poetic) of metal: bright, with a metallic lustre, said of a sword's edge and of helmets.^[11][10]

Word family

• sealobrūn
• brūnecg
• brūnbasu
• brūnwyrt

Descendants

• Middle English broun (→ English brown; English broon; Scots broon)^[1]

Usage notes

Wiktionary also records Brūn as a man's name.^[1] It appears in place-names of the charters, such as brunes forda.^[7]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill, p. 60
3. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Altenglisches Wörterbuch, 4th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling, p. s.v. brūn
4. ^ a b Holthausen, Ferdinand (1934), Altenglisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 36
5. ^ a b Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 412
6. ^ a b c d Healey, Antonette diPaolo; Price Wilkin, John; Xiang, Xin, eds. (2009), Dictionary of Old English Web Corpus, Toronto: Dictionary of Old English Project
7. ^ a b The Electronic Sawyer: Online Catalogue of Anglo-Saxon Charters, revised ed. by S. E. Kelly and R. Rushforth, King's College London / University of Cambridge, esawyer.lib.cam.ac.uk, p. S 464
8. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. 128
9. ^ a b North, Richard; Bintley, Michael D. J., eds. (2016), Andreas: An Edition, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press (glossary), p. s.v. brūn
10. ^ a b c Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. Suppl. 108
11. ^ a b c d Fulk, R. D.; Bjork, Robert E.; Niles, John D., eds. (2008), Klaeber's Beowulf and The Fight at Finnsburg, 4th ed., Toronto: University of Toronto Press (glossary), p. s.v. brūn
12. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
13. ^ a b Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
14. ^ Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 223
15. ^ Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 704
16. ^ Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 344
17. ^ Sweet, Henry (1896), The Student's Dictionary of Anglo-Saxon, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. 51