Editing Brown (section)

=== Post-classical history ===
In the Middle Ages brown robes were worn by monks of the [[Franciscan order]], as a sign of their humility and poverty. Each social class was expected to wear a color suitable to their station; and grey and brown were the colors of the poor. [[Russet (cloth)|Russet]] was a coarse homespun cloth made of wool and dyed with [[woad]] and [[Rose madder|madder]] to give it a subdued grey or brown shade. By the statute of 1363, poor English people were required to wear russet. The medieval poem ''[[Piers Plowman]]'' describes the virtuous Christian:<ref>{{Cite book |title=Growth and decline in Colchester, 1300–1525 |author=R. H. Britnell |pages=[https://archive.org/details/growthdeclineinc0000brit/page/55 55–77] |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1986 |isbn=978-0-521-30572-3 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/growthdeclineinc0000brit/page/55 }}</ref> {{blockquote|And is gladde of a goune of a graye russet<br />As of a tunicle of Tarse or of trye scarlet.}}

In the Middle Ages, dark brown pigments were rarely used in art; painters and book illuminators artists of that period preferred bright, distinct colors such as red, blue and green rather than dark colors. The umbers were not widely used in Europe before the end of the fifteenth century; The Renaissance painter and writer [[Giorgio Vasari]] (1511–1574) described them as being rather new in his time.<ref>Daniel V. Thompson, (1956), ''The Materials and Techniques of Medieval Painting'', p. 88-89</ref>

Artists began using far greater use of browns when oil painting arrived in the late fifteenth century. During the Renaissance, artists generally used four different browns; raw umber, the dark brown clay mined from the earth around Umbria, in Italy; raw sienna, a reddish-brown earth mined near [[Siena]], in [[Tuscany]]; burnt umber, the Umbrian clay heated until it turned a darker shade, and burnt sienna, heated until it turned a dark reddish brown. In Northern Europe, [[Jan van Eyck]] featured rich earth browns in his portraits to set off the brighter colors.
<gallery mode="packed" heights="150px">
File:Leonardo da vinci, Drawings of Water Lifting Devices.jpg|Leonardo da Vinci used sepia ink, from cuttlefish, for his writing and drawing
File:Jan van Eyck - Baudouin de Lannoy.jpg|Jan van Eyck, Portrait de Baudoin de Lannoy (1435)
File:Maria Tudor1.jpg|[[Mary I of England]] (1554)
</gallery>