Nostalgia

Etymology

New Latin, from Greek nostos return home + New Latin -algia; akin to Greek neisthai to return, Old English genesan to survive, Sanskrit nasate he approaches

• Date: 1729

Definitions

• 1 : the state of being homesick : homesickness
• 2 : a wistful or excessively sentimental yearning for return to or of some past period or irrecoverable condition; also : something that evokes nostalgia

Description

The term nostalgia describes a yearning for the past, often in idealized form.[1] The word is a learned formation of a Greek compound, consisting of νόστος, nóstos, "returning home", a Homeric word, and ἄλγος, álgos, "pain" or "ache". It was described as a medical condition, a form of melancholy, in the Early Modern period, and came to be an important topic in Romanticism.[1]

In common, less clinical usage, nostalgia sometimes includes a general interest in past eras and their personalities and events, especially the "good old days" of a few generations back recast in an idyllic light, such as the Belle Époque, Merry England, Neo-Victorian aesthetics, the US "Antebellum" Old South, etc. Sometimes it is brought on by a sudden image, or remembrance of something from one's childhood.