Hane?

[syredronning]

Does anyone know what color "hane" is? (From an old US passenger list). TIA :)

Comments

[chvickers.livejournal.com]

Can you give some context?

[syredronning.livejournal.com]

In a hair color context, sorry, like "brown/dark/hane".

[chvickers.livejournal.com]

I wondered about context because it's not an English word, not even an obsolete one.

But if the passenger list is old enough that it might have been hand-written...seeing the actual writing might help.

[syredronning.livejournal.com]

The link is
http://www.ellisisland.org/search/shipManifest.asp?MID=02805613730152013760&LNM=SAGLENA&PLNM=SAGLENA&first_kind=1&last_kind=0&RF=11&PID=603289020104

Click on the scanned passenger list. They really seem to write "hane" in the hair column

[chvickers.livejournal.com]

I'm guessing it means "blond", but I can't find a reference for that in any of my dictionaries, including the 19th century ones.

[syredronning.livejournal.com]

Thanks for your research. What a language mystery :)

[chvickers.livejournal.com]

Meh, I don't have much else to do. My roast is taking forever to get to even medium-rare.

[qzee.livejournal.com]

maybe they meant to write henna - a color midway between red-brown and orange-brown.

[syredronning.livejournal.com]

Hm, but blond is less rare than red, and why would they have hane but no blond in the list? I checked another of those lists and they have white and grey in it too, but only hane and never blond. Peculiar :)

[mecurtin.livejournal.com]

This is really peculiar. I've checked French & German as well as English, and I can't find anything. I'm sending the link to a geneology expert I know.

[syredronning.livejournal.com]

Thank you. I'm curious what you find out :)

[mecurtin.livejournal.com]

My parents think it probably means "henna", but I think the person filling out the form thought it meant "blond".

[syredronning.livejournal.com]

This sounds like a good, albeit rather amusing solution *G*

[mecurtin.livejournal.com]

New info has arisen -- see my post.