"The memory is a happy (and likely idealized) one, but still tinged with the bittersweet knowledge that you can never go back. It's a complex emotion we know as nostalgia. People experience it for their lost youth, first love and some even pine for a time they never experienced. That feeling is especially potent this time of year, as the holidays creep in."
"Many of those Swiss soldiers, far from home in unfamiliar lands, experienced an odd set of symptoms such as anxiety, irregular heartbeat, stomach pain, and melancholy first described in 1688 by the Alsatian medical student Johannes Hofer. Jess Zafarris, the author of Useless Etymology, says Hofer attributed those symptoms to the soldiers' longing for the Swiss Alps, labeling the condition heimwehe or "home-woe.""
Nostalgia began as a medical diagnosis describing homesickness among 17th-century Swiss mercenaries who showed anxiety, irregular heartbeat, stomach pain, and melancholy. Johannes Hofer coined the term from the Latin forms of Greek words nostos ("homecoming") and algos ("pain") to label heimwehe, or "home-woe." The condition likely included what would now be identified as Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome. Over time nostalgia shifted from a place-based longing to a broader temporal yearning for lost youth, first love, or eras never personally experienced. The emotion intensifies around holidays and has been repurposed as a modern marketing strategy.
Read at www.npr.org
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