[The adj. used absol.]
1. Brown color.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts, 435. The mingling together of black and white colours doth … produce a swart and brown, and neither of both doth appear in the brown.
1850. Tennyson, In Mem., ci. 3. That beech will gather brown.
1873. Black, Pr. Thule, i. 3. Amid the browns and greens of the heather.
b. Duskiness, gloom.
1729. M. Browne, Piscat. Eclog., VIII. (1773), 111. The scatt’ring brown of night.
c. A pigment of a brown color.
1549. in Rogers, Agric. & Prices, III. 573/2. 1 lb. Spanish brown.
1611. Markham, Countr. Content., I. x. A little Capons grease, and broun of Spain, mixt together.
1855. J. Edwards, Paint. Oil Colours, 25. Vandyke Brown. (Bituminous Earth.) This is a rich transparent pigment.
2. techn. Brown or unbleached state.
1882. Standard, 11 Sept., 6/6. Medium and fine bobbin nets in the brown.
3. Elliptically, for various things or parts of things of a brown color: e.g., a brown butterfly, a brown fly used in angling; brown clothing, etc.
a. 1300. K. Horn, 1122. Hure horn heo leide adun, And fulde him of a brun [Gloss. a brown jar].
1621. Burton, Anat. Mel., II. ii. I. i. (1651), 232. The burned and scorched superficies [of roast meat], the brown we call it.
1681. Chetham, Angler’s Vade-m., xxxiv. § 26. Angle with the smallest Gnats, Browns and Duns.
1712. Act 10 Anne, in Lond. Gaz., No. 5018/3. Paper called … small ordinary Brown.
1823. J. Badcock, Dom. Amusem., 163. Flour or bread … as seconds, thirds, and browns.
1851. Kingsley, Lett., in Life, ix. One pounder I caught to-day on the ‘March brown.’
1860. Gosse, Rom. Nat. Hist., 4. Here, too, are the butterflies … the tawny ‘browns’ are dancing along the hedge-rows.
b. slang. A copper coin, a ‘copper.’
1812. J. H. Vaux, Flash Dict., Browns and whistlers, bad halfpence and farthings.
1842. T. Martin, My Namesake, in Fraser’s Mag., Dec., 650/2. ‘More browns than guineas goin’ vith us any day.’
1865. Look before You Leap, I. 239. ‘There isn’t a respectable boy ’ull give me browns for a sixpence.’
† c. A person of brown complexion; a brunette.
c. 1450. Merlin, xxi. 373. This feire broun is sone to the kynge Belinans.
