Healthsome

/ˈhɛlθsəm/ adjective

Definition

Promoting or conducive to health; wholesome and beneficial for wellbeing.

Etymology

From 'health' (Old English 'hælth') plus '-some', a suffix meaning 'characterized by' or 'full of', creating an older or archaic form similar to 'wholesome'.

Kelly Says

'Healthsome' is a rarer cousin of 'wholesome'—both use the '-some' suffix to mean 'full of' or 'promoting'—and it shows how English had multiple competing words for similar concepts before settling on the most economical ones!

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