The word is not found in Continental French, but is well-attested in English from the late fourteenth century onwards. The Anglo-Norman Man Pechez citation is more than a century earlier (c.1260). The etymology of the word remains unknown, with the OED on the one hand suggesting a possible link with Old English prass (i.e. ‘pomp, proud array’), but on the other not excluding an association with Anglo-Norman or¹ (‘gold’).

Unfortunately, the variant spelling oriprance, listed in AND¹, has not been traceable in the course of writing AND².