tree-colour

Updated: May 12, 2025

Trees they sometimes call yellow, as do some ancient writers; but more generally "half-black" or "tree-colour." A beech in full leaf has been described to me as black. "Rosso" does not mean red, but rather dun or dingy; earth is rosso. When our red is to be signified, they will use the word "turco," which came in with the well-known dye-stuff of which the Turks once monopolized the secret.

Norman Douglas - Old Calabria