英和和英

語源

From 中期英語 malencolie, from Old French melancolie, from Ancient Greek μελαγχολία (melankholía, “atrabiliousness”) (from μέλας (mélas), μελαν- (melan-, “black, dark, murky”) + χολή (kholḗ, “bile”)), referring to the humour which ancient Hippocratic and later Galenic medicine associated with sadness and despondency. Compare the Latin ātra bīlis (“black bile”). The adjectival use is a 中期英語 innovation, perhaps influenced by the suffixes -y, -ly. Doublet of melancholia.

発音

• (英国発音) IPA: /ˈmɛlənkəli/
• (米国発音) IPA: /ˈmɛl.ənˌkɑ.li/

名詞

melancholy (countable and uncountable, plural melancholies)

1. (historical) Black bile, formerly thought to be one of the four "cardinal humours" of animal bodies.
   • 1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC:
     , Bk.I, New York 2001, p.148:

     Melancholy, cold and dry, thick, black, and sour, […] is a bridle to the other two hot humours, blood and choler, preserving them in the blood, and nourishing the bones.

2. Great sadness or depression, especially of a thoughtful or introspective nature.

   Synonyms: despondency, misery; see also Thesaurus:sadness

   • 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i], line 34:

     My mind was troubled with deep melancholy.

   • c. 1598–1600 (date written), William Shakespeare, “As You Like It”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene i]:

     I have neither the scholar’s melancholy, which is emulation; nor the musician’s, which is fantastical; nor the courtier’s, which is proud; nor the soldier’s, which is ambitious; nor the lawyer’s, which is politic; nor the lady’s, which is nice; nor the lover’s, which is all these; but it is a melancholy of mine own, compounded of many simples, extracted from many objects, and, indeed, the sundry contemplation of my travels; in which my often rumination wraps me in a most humorous sadness.

   • 1831, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter VI, in Romance and Reality. […], volume III, London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC, page 111:

     "The ancients referred melancholy to the mind, the moderns make it matter of digestion—to either case my plan applies," said Lady Mandeville.

   • 1936 Sept. 15, F. Scott Fitzgerald, letter to Beatrice Dance:

     As to Ernest... He is quite as nervously broken down as I am but it manifests itself in different ways. His inclination is towards megalomania and mine towards melancholy.

派生語

形容詞

melancholy (comparative more melancholy, superlative most melancholy)

1. (literary) Affected with great sadness or depression.

   Synonyms: melancholic; see also Thesaurus:sad, Thesaurus:cheerless

   Melancholy people don't talk much.

   • c. 1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Troylus and Cressida”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii]:

     […] he is melancholy without cause, and merry against the hair: […]

   • 1921, Ben Travers, chapter 1, in A Cuckoo in the Nest, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, Page & Company, published 1925, →OCLC:

     “ […] the awfully hearty sort of Christmas cards that people do send to other people that they don't know at all well. […] And then, when you see [the senders], you probably find that they are the most melancholy old folk with malignant diseases. […] ”

2. Suggestive of wistfulness or subdued emotion.
   • 1869, Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, volume I, London: Macmillan and Co., page 356:

     Twice a day she took them out to feed in the marshy places, let them waddle and gobble for an hour or two, and then drove them back and shut them up in a small dark shed to digest their meal, whence they gave forth occasionally a melancholy quack.

   • 1981, Greg Kihn, Steve Wright, “The Breakup Song (They Don't Write 'Em)”, in RocKihnRoll‎, performed by The Greg Kihn Band:

     It was the same old song / With a melancholy sound.

関連する語

• melancholic
• sadness
• melancholia