In heraldry, tenné is a "stain", or non-standard tincture, of orange, light brown or orange-tawny colour. Tenné, however, is not to be confused with Brunâtre of French and German blazons. Tenné is used for the depiction of leather color, while the much darker Brunâtre is used for the depiction of bear hide colour.
Etymology
In the Oxford English Dictionary, tenné is described as "orange-brown, as a stain used in blazoning", and as a mid-16th-century variant of Old Frenchtané. The origin of both tenné and tawny is the Medieval Latin word tannare, meaning "to tan leather". As such, in French heraldry, tenné is the light-brownish colour that leather is supposed to have once tanned. Used primarily for depicting wood and skin in proper charges, it then slowly became its own tincture.
Hatchings
Perhaps as a symptom of the theoretical nature of heraldic stains, the hatchings assigned to these have been inconsistent among sources. The hatching for tenné has been given variously as a combination of vertical lines and dexter to sinister lines, or as a combination of horizontal lines and sinister to dexter lines, though both these sources provide the same hatching of alternating vertical dots and dashes for "orange".
In theory and in practice
While tenné is frequently mentioned in books about heraldry, it is not among the basic heraldic colours and its appearance in practice is quite rare. Arthur Charles Fox-Davies, in his Complete Guide to Heraldry, asserted that both tenné and murrey were probably inventions of the theoretical system of abatements, further commenting that he knew of only one instance of tenné to date, and that was in an estate livery rather than coat armory. The Oxford Guide to Heraldry cites a late-14th century English treatise as stating that in addition to the two metals and five colours, a colour called tawny was "borne only in the Empire and France," the Oxford Guide also citing Gerard Leigh's The Accendance of Armory as rejecting tenné or tawny as non-existent and sanguine or murrey as mistaken purpure.
In Britain
Despite its role in the system of theoretical abatements of honour introduced in the 16th century, tenné is quite rare in British armory, appearing only occasionally in liveries and never as a colour upon the escutcheon. The Oxford Guide to Heraldry notes that the "stains" "occur occasionally in the twentieth century but have never been spotted in a Visitation record." Fox-Davies named the estate livery of Lord Fitzhardinge, worn by the lord's hunt servants, as the only known occurrence of "orange-tawny" in British armory. To this, Woodward was able to add the standards of both the Earl of Derby, bearing the Stanley crest upon a field of tawny and vert, and the Earl of Northumberland, bearing "four horizontal bands, the upper being russet, the two central ones yellow, and the lowest tawny." The Coat of arms of West Yorkshire was supported on the sinister side by a lion per fess tenne and vert, with a lion per fess gules and tenne in crest. According to the Heraldry Society of Scotland, the team colours of the Dundee United Football Club should be called "tenny and argent". Dundee United calls the colours tangerine and white, and the team is referred to as "the tangerines."
In continental Europe
According to the Oxford Guide to Heraldry, a late-14th century English treatise on heraldry stated that a colour called tawny was "borne only in the Empire and France." Fox-Davies suggested that orange, as it appears in German heraldry, may be a different colour than tenné, noting that a different hatching is associated with German orange than that of British tenné. German heraldic author Ottfried Neubecker also noted a distinction between orange and brown or tenné, showing the usual hatching for tenné but a distinctive hatching of alternating vertical dots and dashes for orange. Orangé, tanné and tenné appear in the civic arms of several communes in the Department of Oise in France. In French heraldry, tanné is traditionally a light brown. It is to be a light brown color, bright enough to be distinguished from the darkest heraldic colour, sable, as well as the darker brown color brunâtre, used for bear hide fur. It should also be a distinctive brown, and be clearly different than both flesh-color carnation and orangé, used per example as the field color for the arms of the French commune of Lamorlaye. Tenné takes its name from the colour of tanned leather, and occurs in the field of the arms of a few French communes, including Maruéjols-lès-Gardon. Tanné colour also occurs in the dexter chief quarter of the arms of La Neuville-Roy, where it notably replaces azure as the field for a semy of fleurs-de-lys very reminiscent of the ancient arms of France. In English heraldry, all these colours are sometimes—yet mistakenly—confused as tenné.
Tenné is found in the arms and colours of some U.S. military units, particularly in the Signal Corps, where the colour is shown as a bright shade of orange, and the Cavalry, where tenné is sometimes called "dragoon yellow". The coat of arms of the 1st Signal Battalion, designed in 1932 by the U.S. Army Heraldic Program Office is per bend argent and tenné, since orange and white are the traditional colours of the Signal Corps. These colours are repeated in the arms of virtually every battalion in the Signal Corps. The 1st Cavalry Regiment was assigned a coat of arms by the Heraldic Program Office in 1921 featuring a gold dragon on a field of tenné. The 1st Cavalry was founded as the Regiment of United States Dragoons in 1833, and at the time the dragoon units wore a cord of tenné and Or. These are also the colours of the torse in the coat of arms of the unit.
In popular culture
The Star Trek Star Fleet Technical Manual describes the official tunic color of Star Fleet Command Section standard issue uniforms, such as those worn by James Kirk and Hikaru Sulu, as "tenne." These are the tunics depicted on as yellow-gold fabric. Separate from this, officers of Captain's rank or higher may optionally wear tunics and dress uniforms greenish in hue; the Manual specifies this color as "olive."
