Melancholy, or melancholia, literally means “[condition of] black gall” (from Greek mélas; “black”; cholḗ, “gall”). It long denoted merely the natural condition of the melancholic human type, in the context of the ancient idea that each of the four temperaments (sanguine, choleric, melancholic, phlegmatic) was categorically ruled by one of the four bodily humors (black and yellow gall, blood, and phlegm; Humoralism). The proportions of humors, whi…