Douceness

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The quality of being pleasantly soft, mild, or gentle to the touch, taste, or manner
2. A tender, gentle sweetness felt in a texture, a flavor, or a person's disposition
3. The state of being soothingly soft, sweet, or kindly in feel, taste, or temperament

Etymology: "Douceness" is a plain formation: the adjective "douce," borrowed from Old French, with the English suffix "-ness" attached to turn a quality into a noun. "Douce" itself came into English from French and carries the same sense of sweetness, softness and mildness that the noun now expresses. The more interesting connection is to "dulceness," a word that shares the same Latin source, "dulcis" meaning "sweet." English received that Latin root twice, once through French as "douce" and once directly from Latin as "dulce" and its relatives. Words that arrive by two routes like this are called doublets, and "douceness" and "dulceness" are a pair of them, each carrying the sweetness of the original word by a different path.