Puce refers to the color described as dark red; a sort of reddish-purple; a deep red to dark grayish purple; and also purplish-brown to dark brown. Puce is apparently based on the Fr ench word "puce and Old French "pulce" which means "flea".
Moreover, Puce literally means "flea". It is speculated that it refers to the colour of a squashed flea or the colour of a flea full of blood. Another theory is that the colour name comes from the flea's droppings of digested blood, which spread out in deep red stain when water contacts them.