Speaking of nicknames, "nickname" was "an eke name" (an additional name) so people thought it was "a nickname", similar to how "a napron" became "an apron". That is, it's one of the words that was "a n-" but the n moved because it sounds like "an -"
I almost put that, but I was reading the entry for that in etymonline and it didn't fit what I was saying exactly. i.e. it wasn't "a norange" at any point in English (or was it?), but the process happened in another language that we borrowed "orange" from, and it would have been too much of a tangent to get into that:
> Loss of initial n- probably is due to confusion with the definite article (as in une narange, una narancia), but also perhaps was by influence of French or "gold." https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=orange
