Hilarious

How to spell hilarious

9 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce hilarious

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does hilarious mean?

1. adjectiveExtremely funny, causing great amusement or laughter.

Hilarious in a sentence

• The comedian's closing routine was absolutely hilarious.

• She shared a hilarious story about her first day at the office.

Where does hilarious come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin adjective hilaris, meaning 'cheerful', 'merry', or 'in good spirits', which Latin itself had borrowed from the Greek hilaros, carrying the same sense of gladness and good cheer. From hilaris the Romans formed the noun hilaritas, the ancestor of the English word 'hilarity', and English picked up 'hilarious' in the seventeenth century to describe someone who was cheerful or merry. Over time the meaning intensified: what once simply meant good-humoured came to mean wildly funny, provoking helpless laughter, which is how we use it today. The same Latin root surfaces in the personal name Hilary, originally given to a child born in a season of joy, and in the old Roman festival Hilaria, a day of public rejoicing. The spelling trap is real for adults: there is only one 'l', the stress falls on the second syllable, and the ending is the soft '-ious' rather than '-ous'.

How the word is built

• hilar- (from Latin hilaris: cheerful, merry)
• -i- (connecting vowel)
• -ous (adjective suffix: full of)