brune
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Etymology: From French brune.
Senses: examples: text: By-the-way, we haven’t yet described our favorite Nettie. We will leave details to the reader’s imagination, and only say that she was neither blonde or brune, but a dangerous mixture of both, and able to wear pink or blue with impunity, and look bewitching in either.
ref: 1867 January, Daisy Ventnor [pseudonym; Jeanie Gould], “‘Only a Private’”, in Peterson’s Magazine, volume LI, number 1, Philadelphia, Pa., page 67, column 1:
text: When I read of Helen and Cleopatra and Lucretia, and all the beauties of old times, it was always with the notion that each one, blonde or brune, must have looked like Katie Stuart.
ref: 1873, W[illiam] C[owper] Prime, “Sunday Morning and Evening”, in I Go A-Fishing, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, page 100:
text: “[…] Lord Quallinghame, how do you think I should look as Cleopatra? Only fancy what gorgeous colouring you could get out of such a costume! Was Cleopatra blonde or brune, by the way? Not that it matters”—[…]
ref: 1877 April 14, “Edged Tools”, in Family Herald: A Domestic Magazine of Useful Information and Amusement, volume XXXVIII, number 1773, chapter XXV, page 378, column 1:
text: The worker with “silken thread and needle fine,” the lover of deep rich colors, the one who adores the glowing tone of the scarlets and yellows, the golden browns and the emerald greens, the woman who can spend all the golden ducats she may wish and still have plenty left, as well as she who must think of how she can arrange so that all of last season’s stuffs can be utilized and everything look as it should, each woman, rich or poor, blonde or brune, old or young, ought surely be satisfied with the store of delights offered to her by la Mode this year. […] Seal and mode are seen well developed in a walking costume to be worn by a pretty woman, who is neither blonde or brune, but has dark brown hair, blue eyes and a clear complexion.
ref: 1884 November, “Dress Materials”, in The Delineator: A Monthly Magazine, Illustrating Metropolitan Fashions, volume XXIV, number 5, London; New York, N.Y.: The Butterick Publishing Co., Limited, pages 373–374:
text: Not that Marie had ever starred in any such tragedy. She belonged to neither the one sort of Van Steynes nor the other. She was neither blonde nor brune. A dash of romance in her temperament was counterbalanced by a saving sense of the ridiculous, that kept her from ever quite making a fool of herself.
ref: 1894 December, Calista Halsey Patchin, “Marechal Niel. Romance of a Christmas Ball.”, in The Midland Monthly, volume II, number 6, page 450, column 1:
text: The pose is necessarily graceful; the costume may be, and often is, so devised as to heighten the effect. Miss Morgan and Miss Boxall are as famous for this as for their playing. Whether the player be blonde or brune, the golden framework of the instrument is sure to blend; while the flashing ivory of the harpist’s arms, sweeping back and forth against the glistening strings, keeps time to the delicate harmonies woven by her fingers.
ref: 1896 December, Frederic Reddall, “American Woman Harpists”, in Godey’s Magazine, volume CXXXIII, number 798, New York, N.Y.: The Godey Company, page 567, column 1:
text: “[…] It is from Lucille, a charming girl, with a most fascinating disregard for the first elements of orthography. We quarrelled, alas! six months ago.” / “Blonde or brune?” anxiously inquired the man of law. / “Blonde, of course,” I replied firmly—I am proud of my taste.
ref: 1896 December, Alfred Slade, “[The Editor’s Scrap-Book.] My Poetry and the Police.”, in The Windsor Magazine: An Illustrated Monthly for Men and Women, volume V, London: Ward, Lock & Company, […], published 1897, page 161, column 2:
text: I had never seen you then, not even your picture. I didn’t know whether you were tall or short, blonde or brune.
ref: 1900 June, Elmore Elliott Peake, “The Captain of the ‘Aphrodite’”, in George Newnes, editor, The Strand Magazine: An Illustrated Monthly, volume XIX, number 114, London: George Newnes, Ltd., […], page 660, column 2:
text: After the show had trouped I met an awfully nice girl-⁠-she was neither blonde nor brune, rather betwixt and between, but a corking looker.
ref: 1907 June, George V[ere] Hobart, Ikey’s Letters to His Father, New York, N.Y.: G. W. Dillingham Company, page 44:
text: “She’s a blonde,” decided de Fougueres. He was thinking of Eugenie, and Jeffries answered the unspoken words. / “Blonde or brune, she can keep a man true; and two years in the quarter, and Eugenie Latour![…]”
ref: 1908 November, Ednah Aiken, “Bill’s Wife”, in The Pacific Monthly, volume XX, number 5, Portland, Ore.: The Pacific Monthly Company, page 539, column 1:
text: O’ER the footlights catch her glance, / Is she not most wondrous fair? / Mayhap blonde, or brune perchance? / Best of all—peroxide hair, / Then the belladonna stare.
ref: 1910, “Illusion”, in The Harvard Lampoon, page 183, column 2:
text: Whitaker’s thin brown hand gesticulated vaguely. “She was tall, slender, pale, at the awkward age . . .” / “Blonde or brune?” / “I swear I don’t know. She wore one of those funny knitted caps, tight down over her hair, all the time.”
ref: 1912 October, Louis Joseph Vance, “Wilful Missing”, in The Destroying Angel, New York, N.Y.: A[lbert] L[evi] Burt Company, page 61:
text: Of course the eternal question is, who will he be interested in? Does he like ’em tall or short, or blonde or brune?
ref: 1919, The Independent, page 3:
text: We discussed solemnly whether the Queen should be blonde or brune. But though there is much to be said in favour of the dark-haired beauty, it was really settled long ago that the true type of Parisienne beauty is fair.
ref: 1919, The Sketch, page 346, column 1:
text: The delicate features were mignonne, except for the delicious, warm, lusciously cut mouth— Was she blonde or brune? he wondered. She died at forty-five. To David Lindsay at twenty-two, forty-five had seemed a respectable old age. To David Lindsay at twentyeight, it seemed almost young. She was dead, of course, when he began to read her. Oh, if he could only have met her!
ref: 1921, Inez Haynes Irwin, chapter III, in Out of the Air, New York, N.Y.: Harcourt, Brace and Company, page 94:
text: For there was nothing madonna-like about the women. They differed in being blonde or brune, of various contours, and of all ages, but some subtle quality of spirit bound them together in a common sisterhood.
ref: 1922, Burton E[gbert] Stevenson, “The Countess Rémond”, in The Kingmakers, New York, N.Y.: Dodd, Mead and Company, page 3:
text: The rest is an attempt at persuasion. Richardson tells us scarcely so much, yet he persuades us so much the more. Is Clarissa blonde or brune? She is snow white and rose red, has “shining” hair, and wears blue and silver. Most of us would image a blonde, but black hair may shine, and set off a skin of lily and driven snow. […] If Athena was wise, she was a fool to compete, for who cares whether a learned lady is blonde or brune? One of the things every woman knows is that if she has charm it matters little what else she has, and if she hasn’t, nothing else will help.
ref: 1936 November, Robert Palfrey Utter, Gwendolyn Bridges Needham, “The Lass with the Delicate Air”, in Pamela’s Daughters, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company, pages 179 and 194:
glosses: Brunette.