mirth

noun
/mɜɹθ/US/mɜːθ/UK

Etymology

From Middle English merth, myrthe, murhthe, from Old English myrġþ (“mirth, joy”), from Proto-West Germanic *murgiþu (“briefness, brevity”); equivalent to merry + -th (abstract nominal suffix). Cognate with Middle Dutch merchte (“pleasure, joy, delight”).

  1. inherited from *murgīþu — “briefness, brevity
  2. inherited from myrġþ — “mirth, joy
  3. inherited from merth

Definitions

  1. The emotion usually following humor and accompanied by laughter.

    • But sorrow that is couch'd in seeming gladness Is like that mirth fate turns to sudden sadness.
    • And he began to laugh again, and that so heartily, that, though I did not see the joke as he did, I was again obliged to join him in his mirth.
  2. That which causes merriment.

    • Phantasmal mirth, folded away: muskperfumed.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for mirth. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA