Where does “unhappy” come from?
Unhappy derives from English un- (negation prefix) plus happy, which comes from Middle English happi, from Old Norse happ meaning chance or fortune.
unhappy (English): Not happy; sad; Not satisfied; unsatisfied; Not...
Definitions
- Not happy; sad; Not satisfied; unsatisfied; Not...
Ancestry of “unhappy”, step by step
| Step | Language | Word | Meaning |
|---|
| 1 | English | happy | Having a feeling arising from a consciousness of... |
| 2 | Middle English | happy | fortunate, happy |
| 3 | Middle English | -y | Designates an adjective, in many cases formed by... |
| 4 | Old English | -iġ | -y, -ic |
| 5 | Proto-West Germanic | -g | Forms adjectives from nouns and verbs with a... |
| 6 | Proto-Germanic | -gaz | -y |
| 7 | Proto-Indo-European | -ḱos | -y, -ic |
Words derived from “unhappy”