sienna

American  

[see-en-uh] / siˈɛn ə /

noun

1. a ferruginous earth used as a yellowish-brown pigment raw sienna or, after roasting in a furnace, as a reddish-brown pigment burnt sienna.

2. the color of such a pigment.

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sienna British  

/ sɪˈɛnə /

noun

1. a natural earth containing ferric oxide used as a yellowish-brown pigment when untreated ( raw sienna ) or a reddish-brown pigment when roasted ( burnt sienna )

2. the colour of this pigment See also burnt sienna

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Etymology

Origin of sienna

1750–60; < Italian ( terra di ) Sien ( n ) a (earth of ) Siena

Explanation

Sienna is the color of Italian dirt. It’s named after Sienna, Italy, where Renaissance painters first got the earthy pigment. It ranges from the yellowish raw sienna like sand, or the darker brownish red of burnt sienna. You can draw a sienna cow with a reddish-brown crayon, or describe your grandparents' carpet as sienna. Artists also use sienna for the natural pigment that contains iron oxide. Sienna is yellowish-brown, and it takes on a darker, redder tint when it's heated. It's a common pigment in oil paints and has been used since the sixteenth century, when it was produced in the Italian city of Sienna.

Example Sentences

The progression of the façades from warm rose to pink-cream to mauve-green is knit together by the blues and sienna of the windows, anchored by the staccato pink and green water below.

From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 11, 2025

“We chose this beautiful sienna, saffron color that evokes the sunset, because this is the sunset before the golden hour,” Love said.

From Seattle Times • Mar. 10, 2023

“If I if I sell you a tube of ‘burnt sienna,’ that is God’s honest burnt sienna, dug up out of the ground, burned in an oven,” Cole says.

From Washington Post • Dec. 21, 2021

These walls are covered in a lime wash tinted with powdered pigments such as sienna, cadmium and cobalt.

From New York Times • Sep. 7, 2021

He was darker than Mrs. Baylor—darker than a burnt sienna crayon.

From "It All Comes Down to This" by Karen English