Hamlet

Meaning

Proper Noun

• A William Shakespeare play about the Danish royal family.
• The eponymous main character of William Shakespeare's play, whose father's ghost, murdered by Hamlet's uncle, exhorts him to seek revenge.

Origin

• From Latin Amlethus, as written by 13th-century Danish historian Saxo Grammaticus, and borrowed into English by way of François de Belleforest's French Hamlet, originally rendered as Hamblet in English. Ultimately from Old Danish Amlethæ, corresponding to Old Norse Amlóði ("fool"), claimed to be suggestive of the way that Hamlet acts in the play.