The gallbladder is a small organ under the liver that stores bile, a digestive fluid that helps break down fats in food. It releases bile into the small intestine when needed.
“Gallbladder” joins “gall,” an old word for bile, with “bladder,” meaning a sac or pouch. “Gall” comes from Old English “galla,” related to bitter fluids and sometimes bitterness in character.
You can live without your gallbladder; if it’s removed, your liver still makes bile, it just drips directly into your intestine instead of being stored. The word “gall” also came to mean bold rudeness, as if bitterness in the body could turn into bitterness in personality.
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