Extremely sad or disappointing, causing deep emotional pain as if your heart were actually being broken.
Combination of 'heart' (Old English 'heorte') and 'breaking' (Old English 'brecan'), creating a metaphor where emotional pain is described as physical injury.
Humans use physical injury words for emotions because our brains actually process heartbreak in the same regions that handle physical pain—when you're heartbroken, your brain literally registers it like a wound.
Complete word intelligence in one call. Free tier — 50 lookups/day.