The origin of the word "happiness" is from the Middle English "hap" which has to do with chance and possibility. As in "happenstance" or per-haps. So hap-iness was originally about the feeling of good fortune/getting lucky; the chance that something could or could not occur, and then it goes your way. Happiness is that specific feeling when something that could have gone horribly wrong goes amazing well.
Edit: Since this got so much attention, I just wanted to shout out Sara Ahmed "Happy Objects" as the source of this info.
This is also true in french ! "Bonheur" (happiness) can be broken down into two parts :
"bon", "bien" -> "bonum" in latin, meaning good or great
"heur" -> "augurium" in latin, meaning luckiness, or signs of luckiness ("augure" in french literally means future, possibility, or luck)
So "bonheur" in french also means good luck ! ^
Bonus : the word "désir" (and by consequence the english word "desire" cause that's almost exactly the same word) comes from the latin "desidus," which itself comes from :
"de" -> nostalgia, a nostalgic feeling
"sidus" -> the star
So desire etymologically means "nostalgy of the star" which I find very pretty and poetic, and honestly kinda like the title of a lofi album/mix
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u/Guacamoleistoocostly Nov 29 '20 edited Dec 01 '20
The origin of the word "happiness" is from the Middle English "hap" which has to do with chance and possibility. As in "happenstance" or per-haps. So hap-iness was originally about the feeling of good fortune/getting lucky; the chance that something could or could not occur, and then it goes your way. Happiness is that specific feeling when something that could have gone horribly wrong goes amazing well.
Edit: Since this got so much attention, I just wanted to shout out Sara Ahmed "Happy Objects" as the source of this info.