Feeling or showing happiness, joy, or gladness; cheery and light-hearted.
From glad plus -some, a suffix meaning 'full of' or 'characterized by' (as in handsome, wholesome, fearsome). This adjective is archaic or literary in modern English but appears frequently in older texts and poetry.
Shakespeare and his contemporaries loved the word 'gladsome'—it sounds musical and poetic compared to our blunt 'happy.' Languages naturally acquire and lose words as they age, and 'gladsome' is a beautiful ghost of English past, still visible in old literature but no longer on anyone's lips.
Complete word intelligence in one call. Free tier — 50 lookups/day.