brunette

Etymology

It is borrowed from French brunette,^[2][3][4][5] the feminine of brunet (“brownish, brown-haired”),^[2][3][4][6] which in Old French, from the 12th century, was both a noun for a dark-complexioned or brown-haired girl or woman and an adjective describing her.^[2] The French word is a diminutive of brun (“brown”),^[2][5][7][6] formed with the suffix -et,^[2][8] and brun is of Germanic origin,^[3][4][7] from Proto-Germanic *brūnaz,^[6][9] the source also of brūn^[8][10] and of brown.^[7][6] The metathesized Old French form burnete is the source of the surname Burnett and of the name of a fine woollen cloth.^[6] Brünette was borrowed from French in the mid 17th century.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

A girl or woman with a dark complexion or brown hair: 1709, in John Lawson's New Voyage to Carolina, in the OED's revised entry.^[2] Etymonline dates the adjective to the 1660s and the noun to 1710,^[6] Barnhart dates the word to 1669,^[8] and Dictionary.com to 1705–15;^[11] the OED records the earlier forms brownetta and brunet separately.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The word at first described the complexion, a brownish tone of skin and hair, and only later chiefly the hair colour.^[6][2][12] In 1724 it was also used as a noun for a light brown skin colour and as an adjective for brown complexions, senses now rare; dark brown hair is called brunette from 1863.^[2] Though French brunette is feminine, English sometimes applied it to boys and men.^[2] About 1867 pigeon fanciers named a light brown variety of the satinette pigeon a brunette, a sense the OED considers an English development.^[2] In American slang of the late 19th century the word was used jocularly of Native American and Black people.^[13]

Timeline

• 1669 – first record, according to Barnhart.^[8]
• 1709 – noun, a woman with a dark complexion or brown hair.^[2][10]
• 1724 – adjective, dark-complexioned or brown-haired; a light brown skin colour.^[2]
• 1863 – of hair, dark brown.^[2]
• 1867 – a variety of satinette pigeon.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A girl or woman with brown or dark hair: The twins are both brunettes.^[3][4][10]
2. A dark brown hair colour.^[2][4]

Adjective

1. Of hair, dark brown.^[4][2][10]
2. Having brown or dark hair.^[3][10][2]

Word family

• brunetteness

Related words

• brunet
• brown
• bruin
• burnet

Usage notes

The word long referred to a dark complexion but now refers mainly to hair colour.^[12][2] By the usual practice brunette is used of women and the less common brunet of men or of mixed groups.^[12][10]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
4. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
5. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
9. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Germanisches Wörterbuch, 5th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
10. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
11. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
12. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
13. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com