Sacred Heart Mirror
Black Forest Child's Chair c.1890
The Origin of the Word Love
The word love was once *leubh, a word used by the Proto-Indo-Europeans approximately five thousand years ago to describe care and desire.
When love was incorporated into Old English as lufu, it had turned into both a noun to describe, “deep affection” and its offspring verb, “to be very fond of”.
One of the earliest uses of love, and its biggest influence, was religion.
Love was used to describe the benevolence and affection of God as well as the affectionate devotion due to God.
From this widely recognized meaning, love began to be used to positively describe instances of affection or acts of kindness.
From Middle English onwards, the most popular meaning for love however was to describe a “beloved person” (1255) – especially one’s sweetheart.
The word love was introduced to tennis from 1742 to mean no score- from the notion of playing “for love”, came the notion “playing for nothing”.
What “love” means from person to person, let alone from century to century, is one of the most varied in the English language.
