It’s Big Orange Country! Our very popular color is orange, of course. Also, one of the most popular fruits in the entire country is the orange.

What we recognize as the sweet orange today was first referenced in literature in 314 BC in China. It is a hybrid of a pomelo and a mandarin and was cultivated across South East Asia. Bitter oranges were introduced to Europe by the Arabs in the ninth century. They were primarily used medicinally. Sweet oranges were not introduced until the late 15th century.

Orange is the only common color word in the English language to be named for an object.

Even though orange, the color, was named after orange, the fruit, they were commonly green, before the fruit arrived in the cooler European climates. Even today ripe oranges remain green in tropical climates. The green color comes from chlorophyll in the peel. When oranges are exposed to colder weather, the chlorophyll breaks down, allowing the orange pigments in the skin to shine through. This is similar to how leaves change color in the fall. When the chlorophyll breaks down, the other pigments in the leaf dominate giving us the beautiful array of fall foliage.

Oranges growing in Europe experienced cooler nights than oranges growing in South East Asia, meaning Europeans far more frequently saw the ripe fruit with the yellow-red hue. By the late 16th century, the fruit had lent its name to the color. Prior to this there was no word to refer to that particular hue. While the color obviously existed and was recognizable, it was referred to a “yellow-red” or between yellow and red or perhaps “saffron.”

Since that time the color and the fruit have become inextricably linked. Even though a green orange can be perfectly ripe, perhaps even sweeter than an orange one, who wants to buy an orange that isn’t orange? To combat this, fruit sellers will break down the green color of oranges with ethylene, expose them to cold, or sometimes dye them orange to make them more palatable to customers. So, if you happen to encounter a green orange at the store this week, know that it is not a sign of being under ripe but rather that the fruit was grown in a warmer climate, and green is a perfectly normal color for an orange.

Crystal Kelly is a feature writer for Bizarre Bytes with those unusual facts that you only need to know for Trivial Pursuit or Jeopardy or to stump your in-laws.

Follow KnoxTNToday on Facebook and Instagram.   Get all KnoxTNToday articles in one place with our Free Newsletter.