Etymology

hilarious

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Today it means: Very funny; causing great merriment and laughter. Full definition →

Latin hilaris ← Ancient Greek ἱλαρός
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The story

  1. Ancient Greek · derived fromἱλαρός“cheerful, merry”
  2. Latin · learned borrowing fromhilaris“cheerful”
  3. English todayhilarious

Learned borrowing from Latin hilaris (“cheerful”) + -ious, from Ancient Greek ἱλαρός (hilarós, “cheerful, merry”).

Words from the same roots

Ancient Greekἱλαρός all →

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.