For ioyfull thoughts, vse funerall deedes

1794, Ann Radcliffe, The Mysteries of Udolpho, London: G.G. & J. Robinson, Volume 1, Chapter 9, p. 256,
The sun was now set; but, under the dark branches of the almond trees, was seen the saffron glow of the west, spreading beyond the twilight of middle air.

[…] it was half-past four, and the gray day was dying gloriously, its western clouds all broken into narrowing purple strata before a wide-spreading saffron clearness […]

The jacket was brown but had turned saffron where it had been soaked by Lal’s sweat.

The bad thing was she took my son Skiff with her. It's a dumb name I know, but at the time he was born all the kids were being called things like Sky and Saffron and Powie, and I was really sold on sailing.

2009, D. H. Sanaeinejad, S. N. Hosseini, Regression Models for Saffron Yields in Iran, Daoliang Li, Chunjiang Zhao (editors), Computer and Computing Technologies in Agriculture II, Volume 1, page 510,
Usually the maximum temperature for October, November and December in the southern parts of Khorassan–the main saffron growing area of the Iran-does not exceed 20°C, while the minimum temperature reaches 0°C.

1658, Thomas Muffet, The Theatre of Insects, [1634, Insectorum sive Minimorum Animalium Theatrum], quoted in 2008, Anna Suranyi, The Genius of the English Nation: Travel Writing and National Identity in Early Modern England, page 117-118,
The Irish and Ireland people (who are frequently troubled with lice, and such as will fly, as they say, in summer) anoint their shirts with saffron, and to very good purpose, to drive away the lice, but after six months they wash their shirts again, putting fresh saffron into the lye.

Saffron is not included in American and British pharmacopoeias, but some Indian medical formulae still include it.

Saffron is the stigma of the crocus flower, which is harvested by hand, dried, and sold either in strands or ground to powder.[…]Of all the medieval spices, saffron was the most expensive, which is not surprising given that 70,000 flowers only yield one pound of dried stigmas. In the European cookbooks of the late Middle Ages, nearly all of which which reflect refined upper-class dining, saffron is ubiquitous.

Saffron is often called the “golden spice.”

[…] the girls locked up Echo Lodge again and went away in the perfect half hour that follows the rose and saffron of a winter sunset.

These colours might have been expressly designed—by dissonance as much as harmony—for juxtaposition against those pouring down in brilliant rays of light from the Tiepolo; subtle yet penetrating pinks and greys, light blue turning almost to lavender, rich saffrons and cinnamons melting into bronze and gold.

The classical shades of Antiquity were the most prevalent, but along with the Venetian reds and Egyptian blues, the saffrons and ochres and indigos, were more delicate hues: of pink and cream and lilac, like shells littered upon the shore.

Saffrond wyne bryngeth mirthe, and taketh away Melancholines […]

The other part Northern, & ful of mountaines, a very rude and homely kinde of people doth inhabite, which are called the redshankes or wilde Scottes. They be clothed with a mantel and shyrte saffroned, after the Irishe manner, going bare legged to the knée.

Thee next day foloing lustring Aurora lay shymring,

1638, uncredited translator, Historie Naturall and Experimentall, of Life and Death by Francis Bacon, London: William Lee and Humphrey Mosley, p. 244,
The same Irish, use to weare Saffroned Linnen, and Shirts; Which though it were, at first, devised to prevent Vermine, yet, howsoever, I take it, to be very usefull for Lengthening of Life […]

His horse was harnished with leaden chaines, hauing the out-side guilt, or at least saffrond in stead of guilt, to decypher a holie or golden pretence of a couetous purpose […]

And like vile stones lying in saffrond tinne,

Or warts, or wheales, it hangs upon her skinne.

Saffroning the rest of the account are several other regionalisms: agin for against, hit for the expletive it, knowed as a preterite, and no use to say not bin' (a fascinating doubling of the negative).

He saffrons his speech with Latin which he knows all by rote.

The Nun's Priest's rhetorical devices, too numerous to catalogue exhaustively, are of two kinds: first, the heroic-historical, beginning with the setting of the occasion in a time sequence that starts with the Creation, saffroning the high points with apostrophes and epic similes, and culminating with a chase in which Chauntecleer's fall proves to have the "cosmic reverberations" required by epic standards […]

Saffron

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