Talk:Schadenfreude/Temp

Schadenfreude is enjoyment taken from the misfortune of someone else. The word has been borrowed from German by the English language and is sometimes also used as a loanword by other languages.

Spelling, etymology, and English equivalents
In German, Schadenfreude is always capitalized. However, when used as a loanword in English, it is usually not. The corresponding German adjective is schadenfroh, sometimes anglicized as schadenfreudy. The word derives from Schaden (damage, harm) and Freude (joy); Schaden derives from the Middle High German schade, from the Old High German scado. Freude comes from the Middle High German vreude, from the Old High German frewida, from frō, (happy). In German, the word always has a negative connotation. A distinction exists between "secret schadenfreude" (a private feeling) and "open schadenfreude" (Hohn, a German word roughly translated as "scorn") which is outright public derision. A synonym of schadenfreude is the rare English word epicaricacy, derived from the Greek word ἐπιχαιρεκακία, epikairekakia.

Epicaricacy does not appear in most modern dictionaries, but does appear in Nathan Bailey's 18th century Universal Etymological English Dictionary under a slightly different spelling (epicharikaky), which gives its etymology as a compound of epi (upon), chara (joy), and kakon (evil).

A more common English expression with a similar meaning is 'Roman holiday', a metaphor taken from the poem "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" by George Gordon, Lord Byron, where a gladiator in Ancient Rome expects to be "butcher'd to make a Roman holiday" while the audience would take pleasure from watching his suffering.