The essay traces the term's linguistic and cultural history, distinguishing its material origin as bodily fluids from its later spiritual sense tied to temperament and melancholy. It surveys how different languages and periods shape comic sensibility, contrasts genuine comic temperament with satire, caricature, and farce, and critiques popular misuse of the term by journalism. Through close analysis of etymology, critical commentary, and comparisons among writers and national traditions, the work seeks a clearer definition of the quality commonly called humour and to delimit its boundaries relative to irony and other comic modes.