10th September '17: A new discovery!

Hello from Colour File HQ.
When I was at school, I was fascinated by things named after the scientists who discovered them (the islets of Langerhans was one of my favourites – who’d have thought that such an unglamorous body part could have such a poetic-sounding name?). I love the origins of words, especially – and no surprise here – colour names. Imagine my joy last night at discovering a colour whose name I’d never come across before AND with an interesting reason behind it. I was reading about two fashionable pink aniline dyes discovered in the mid-19th century. One was Magenta, a colour you’ve no doubt heard of, and the other was Solferino, which is totally new to me. Battles were successfully fought in both places in 1859 during Italy’s fight for independence and the colours were named in their honour. Not only is the story captivating (body part or colour named after you? No competition) but it also provided me with the exact colour I was looking for to describe today’s montage. Initially, I thought that magenta was the winner but I’m now convinced that solferino has come out victorious this time. Do you know of any other colours named after places
Martha, The Colour File x

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