Middle English orenge, orange, from Old French pome orenge 'Persian orange', literally 'orange apple', influenced by Old Provençal auranja and calqued from Old Italian melarancio, melarancia, compound of mela 'apple' and (n)arancia 'orange', from Arabic نارنج (nāranj), from Persian نارنگ (nārang), from Sanskrit नारङ्ग (nāraá¹…ga, “orange tree"), from Dravidian (compare Tamil nartankāy, compound of நரந்தம் (narantam, “fragrance") and காய் (kāy, “fruit"); also Telugu నారంగము (nāraá¹…gamu), Malayalam നാരങ്ങ (nāraá¹…ga), Kannada ನಾರಂಗಿ (nāraá¹…gi)).
From Wiktionary
Middle English from Old French pume orenge translation and alteration (influenced by Orenge , Orange, a town in France) of Old Italian melarancio mela apple arancio orange tree (alteration of Arabic nāranj) (from Persian nārang) (from Sanskrit nāraṅgaḥ) (possibly of Dravidian origin)
From American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition
From French Orange, from Old French Orenge, from Medieval Latin Aurasica, from Latin Aurasiō, from Gaulish *arausi 'temple (head), cheek' (cf. Old Irish ara, arae 'temples', Irish placename Arai Chiach).
From Wiktionary
For the color sense, replaced Old English geoluread (“yellow-red"); compare Modern English blue-green.
From Wiktionary
