Heartbreaking

How to spell heartbreaking

13 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce heartbreaking

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does heartbreaking mean?

1. adjectiveCausing intense sorrow, grief, or distress.

Heartbreaking in a sentence

• The documentary about the famine was utterly heartbreaking to watch.

• The ending of the novel was the most heartbreaking part of the story.

Where does heartbreaking come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is a native English compound, built from two of the oldest words in the language. 'Heart' descends from the Old English 'heorte', which named the physical organ but also stood, as it still does, for the seat of feeling and courage; it shares Germanic roots with the Dutch 'hart' and the German 'Herz'. 'Break' comes from the Old English 'brecan', meaning to shatter or burst apart, again with close Germanic cousins. The vivid image of grief literally cracking the heart is very old, and the verb phrase 'to break one's heart' was common long before the single fused adjective appeared in the 1500s. The spelling trap is purely in the joins: the silent 'ea' of 'heart' and the 'ea' of 'break' both sound nothing like they look, and the word is one solid piece, not 'heart breaking' or 'heartbraking'.

How the word is built

• heart (the organ, seat of emotion)
• break (to shatter)
• -ing (adjective/present-participle suffix)