melancholy

/ˈme-lən-ˌkä-lē/

Middle English malencolie, melancolie "black bile, preponderance or excess of black bile, state (as anger or sorrow) produced by excessive black bile," borrowed from Anglo-French & Late Latin; Anglo-French malencolie, melencolie, borrowed from Late Latin melancholia (Medieval Latin malencolia, by association with the prefix mal- mal-melancholía, from melan-, athematic variant of melano- melano-cholḗ "bile" + -ia

noun

  1. depression of spirits : dejection

  2. a pensive mood

  3. melancholia

great outbursts of creativity alternate with feelings of extreme melancholy

a fine romantic kind of a melancholy on the fading of the year

adjective

  1. suggestive or expressive of sadness or depression of mind or spirit

  2. causing or tending to cause sadness or depression of mind or spirit : dismal

  3. depressed in spirits : dejected, sad

sang in a melancholy voice

a melancholy thought