[Sca-cooks] Lemons in Middle English

[Phlip]

Ene bichizh ogsen baina shuu...

> All right, I'm tired of this thread, but-
>
> This is NOT proof of the use of lemons (or indeed any citrus fruit) _IN
> CUISINE_ in England, but is of interest in a literary sense.
>
> The word 'citryn' appears in the Canterbury Tales, as the description of a
> yellow color.
>
> It is in the description of Arcite, in the Knight's Tale. Lines 2165-2167
say:
>
> "His crispe heer lyk ringes was yronne,
> And that was yelow, and glytered as the sonne.
> His nose was heigh, his eyen bright citryn,"
>
> All of my glosses have 'citryn' as 'lemon colored', but there is also the
> possibility that a green-yellow or yellow-green is indicated- after all-
> humans do not generally have yellow eyes, but some do have green eyes.
>
> The word 'lemon' in any spelling does not appear in Chaucer's works.
>
> 'Lainie

Be interested here, to see which came first, the color or the fruit? Was the
fruit named for the color, or vice versa? Same with oranges- can anagram
orange, but can't rhyme it, unless I'm being silly in a limerick ;-) But,
where do the words derive from? Any of you folks with access to an OED have
a clue?

Saint Phlip,
CoD

"When in doubt, heat it up and hit it with a hammer."
 Blacksmith's credo.

 If it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it is probably not a
cat.

Never a horse that cain't be rode,
And never a rider who cain't be throwed....



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