THE CURIOUS CASE OF THE ORANGE

All these countries in Orange colour call the fruit Orange Portugal or a derivative of the word Portugal

Portugal is a country...... no?

During the late 1400s and 1500s, Portuguese maritime traders encountered the sweet orange in East Asia and brought it back to the Mediterranean. Portuguese sailors realized that packing their ships with these sweet, vitamin C-rich fruits kept their crews safe from scurvy during long ocean voyages.

Because Portuguese merchants dominated the distribution of this delicious new variety, people across the trade routes stopped using the old words for bitter citrus and simply started calling the fruit after the people selling it: "the fruit from Portugal."

Arabic: Burtuqāl (برتقาล)
Turkish: Portakal
Persian / Farsi: Porteghāl (پرتقال)
Greek: Portokáli (πορτοקάλι)
Romanian: Portocală
Bulgarian: Portokal (портокал)
Albanian: Portokall
Georgian: Fortokhali (ფორთოხალი)
Amharic (Ethiopia): Birtukan
Somali: Bortoqāl

THE CURIOSITY.........

In Portugal, they don't call the fruit a version of their own name. Instead, they call it "laranja"—a word that traveled all the way from the Sanskrit "Nāraṅga" (नारङ्ग) via old Persian and Arabic.

In fact, old Portuguese texts occasionally refer to it as "laranja da China" ("China orange"), completely acknowledging its true origin while the rest of the world points back at Portugal.

Sanskrit "nāraṅga" came into Hindi and became "Narangi" (नारंगी) which is not Orange but a different citrus. However, as the word "nāraṅga" traveled west along global trade routes, it morphed into the Persian "nārang", the Arabic "nāranj", the Spanish "naranja", and eventually, by dropping the initial "n," the English word "orange".

Orange became "Santra" (संतरा).

So how did the everyday sweet, plump orange get stuck with the name "Santra"? It brings us right back to the Portuguese.

When Portuguese traders introduced the sweet, commercial citrus hybrid (Citrus × sinensis) to the Indian subcontinent in the 16th century, people needed a new word to distinguish this sweet variety from the small, sour, native Narangi.

The Portuguese brought these high-quality fruits from Sintra, a famous resort town and agricultural hub nestled in the hills near Lisbon. The fruit was initially transcribed into courtly Persian and Urdu records as "Sangtarah", which eventually softened and colloquially evolved into "Santra" in Hindi, Marathi, and Nepali.

FINALLY........

The Sanskrit "nāraṅga" itself likely evolved from an even older Dravidian root like "nāru", meaning fragrant!!

India gave the fruit its name "Laranj/Orange", which the Portuguese brought back to us and gave us a Portuguese name "Santra" while a part of the world calls it Portugal or a derivative of the word Portugal.

BUT WAIT, NOT FINISHED YET

How did the Netherlands become orange?

The association between the Netherlands and the color orange dates back to one pivotal historical figure: William of Orange (Willem van Oranje), also known as William the Silent.

In 1544, an 11-year-old German nobleman named William inherited the tiny, independent Principality of Orange located in southern France. Along with the territory, William inherited the title Prince of Orange.

The name of the French principality itself had nothing to do with the citrus fruit; it was derived from an ancient Roman settlement named "Arausio", which over centuries of linguistic shifts in French naturally evolved into "Orange".

William of Orange grew up to become the main leader of the Dutch Revolt (the Eighty Years' War) against the tyrannical Spanish Habsburg rule over the Low Countries. Because of his leadership in uniting the provinces and fighting for Dutch independence, he came to be revered as the Vader des Vaderlands ("Father of the Fatherland").

Even though the Dutch Orange had nothing to do with the fruit, the Dutch national cultural colours came from the Orange colour of the fruit.

While not on the actual flag, orange is the undisputed national color of the Netherlands. It represents the Dutch Royal Family, the House of Orange-Nassau, tracing back to William of Orange, the founding father of the nation.