Chestnut or castaneous is a

colour Color (or colour in Commonwealth English; see spelling differences) is the visual perception based on the electromagnetic spectrum. Though color is not an inherent property of matter, color perception is related to an object's light absorp ...

, a medium

red Red is the color at the long wavelength end of the visible spectrum of light, next to orange and opposite violet. It has a dominant wavelength of approximately 625–750 nanometres. It is a primary color in the RGB color model and a seconda ...

dish shade of

brown Brown is a color. It can be considered a composite color, but it is mainly a darker shade of orange. In the CMYK color model used in printing and painting, brown is usually made by combining the colors Orange (colour), orange and black. In the ...

(displayed right), and is named after the nut of the

chestnut The chestnuts are the deciduous trees and shrubs in the genus ''Castanea'', in the beech family Fagaceae. The name also refers to the edible nuts they produce. They are native to temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere. Description ...

tree In botany, a tree is a perennial plant with an elongated stem, or trunk, usually supporting branches and leaves. In some usages, the definition of a tree may be narrower, e.g., including only woody plants with secondary growth, only ...

. An alternate name for the colour is badious. Indian red is a similar but separate and distinct colour from ''chestnut''. Chestnut is also a very dark tan that almost appears brown.

Etymology

The name ''chestnut'' derives from the color of the nut of the

tree. The first recorded use of ''chestnut'' as a color term in English was in 1555. The color

maroon Maroon ( , ) is a brownish crimson color that takes its name from the French word , meaning chestnut. ''Marron'' is also one of the French translations for "brown". Terms describing interchangeable shades, with overlapping RGB ranges, inc ...

is also named after the chestnut (via French ''marron'').

Variations of chestnut

Deep chestnut

Deep chestnut is the color called ''chestnut'' in

Crayola Crayola LLC, formerly the Binney & Smith Company, is an American manufacturing and retail company specializing in list of art media, art supplies. It is known for its brand ''Crayola'' and best known for its crayons. The company is headquartered ...

crayon A crayon (or wax pastel) is a stick of pigmented wax used for writing or drawing. Wax crayons differ from pastels, in which the pigment is mixed with a dry binder (material), binder such as gum arabic, and from oil pastels, where the binder is a ...

s. This colour was also produced in a special limited edition in which it was called Vermont maple syrup. At the request of educators worried that children (mistakenly) believed the name represented the

skin colour Human skin color ranges from the darkest brown to the lightest hues. Differences in skin color among individuals is caused by variation in pigmentation, which is largely the result of genetics (inherited from one's biological parents), and in ...

of Native Americans, Crayola changed the name of their crayon colour "Indian Red", originally formulated in 1958, to "Chestnut" in 1999. In reality, the colour Indian red has nothing to do with American Indians but is an iron oxide pigment the use of which is popular in

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

Chestnut in nature

* The chestnut-coloured woodpecker * The

chestnut-backed chickadee The chestnut-backed chickadee (''Poecile rufescens'') is a small passerine bird in the tit family, Paridae, native to western North America. Taxonomy In the early 20th century, Joseph Grinnell hypothesized that the chestnut-backed chickadee d ...

* The coat of the bongo

Chestnut in human culture

Animal husbandry *

Chestnut The chestnuts are the deciduous trees and shrubs in the genus ''Castanea'', in the beech family Fagaceae. The name also refers to the edible nuts they produce. They are native to temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere. Description ...

is a coat colour of

horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 mi ...

s. Cosmetology * Brown chestnut hair is a human hair colour.

References