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| mel·an·chol·y [ méllən kòllee ] |
adjective |
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| Definition: |
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feeling or causing sadness: feeling or making somebody feel a thoughtful or gentle sadness
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noun |
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| Definition: |
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1. pensive sadness: a thoughtful or gentle sadness
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2. gloomy character: the gloomy character of somebody said to have an excess of black bile, one of the four bodily humors that were once thought to determine people's health and emotional state
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3. medicine
(
archaic
)
Same as black bile
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| [14th century. Directly or via French mélancholie< late Latin melancholia< Greek melankholia< melan- "black" + kholē "bile"] |
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 mel·an·chol·i·ly adverb |
 mel·an·chol·i·ness noun |
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