Etymology of 窶禿岩?昶?吮?堋｢ ?

[Mazin]

Does anybody here know where the term 窶禿岩?昶?吮?堋｢ came from? From reading the kanji it very obviously means something like "white face" ("face" in a "face"/"surface" sense). I asked my Jap TA and he could only throw out the random guess that maybe it came from when they first encountered white people. If somebody here has a definitive or scholarly etymology with source, I would really be interested.
I Googled a bit but didn't find anything and Wiktionary doesn't have the etymology either...

 

[undrentide]

It has nothing to do with white people's face, according to the ﾅ津ｪﾅ陳ｹ窶燃窶藩?ｽﾂｫ窶弋 (Ethymology Dictionary). Following is what is explained in the entry 窶禿岩?昶?吮?堋｢.

窶禿岩?昶?吮?堋｢ omoshiroi (enjoyable, fun, interesting, funny, etc.)
The orignal form of this word is 窶禿岩?昶?吮?堋ｵ (omoshiroshi). This word had been used almost the same meaning as 窶禿岩?昶?吮?堋｢ today since 窶敕ｲ窶卍ｹﾅｽﾅｾ窶佚｣ﾂ・窶愿樞?氾?ｽﾅｾ窶佚｣ Asuka/Nara period (6th century~), and its origin is not clear.
The most compelling theory is that 窶禿 (omo) means "in front of one's eyes", and 窶昶??shiro) means "clear and light". From thesewords, 窶禿岩?昶?吮?堋ｵ (later 窶禿岩?昶?吮?堋｢ﾂ） became a word to express the situation that the light, clear view (in front of one's eyes), which turned into the beauty of the landscape.
It evolved further to "delightful" "pleasant", and was used to express ones positive feeling in general.

面白い／おもしろい - 語源由来辞典

 

[Mazin]

Thanks! From the etymology you referred to, I would have expected 窶禿岩?昶?吮?堋｢ to mean something like "lucid", but it makes sense. I guess it's just one of those mysteries about language that we can only forever guess at.

 

[Sirius2B]

面白い／おもしろい - 語源由来辞典

This coud be incredibly useful for a beginner student of japanese... unfortunatelly to use it, you should allready know Japanese.