The first episode of Lost Words: The Forgotten Language of Humanity introduces “Saudade,” the untranslatable Portuguese word that captures the deep, nostalgic longing for something or someone absent — a feeling that blends love, loss, and memory.
The episode explores the origins of the word during Portugal’s Age of Exploration, when sailors left home for distant seas and families were left behind, waiting and hoping. From this separation, saudade was born — an emotion of love enduring beyond distance and time.
Listeners are guided through the cultural and poetic layers of saudade, how it became the emotional soul of Portuguese identity, expressed most beautifully through Fado music — songs filled with tender melancholy, sung not with despair but with grace.
The narrative also draws universal connections to similar concepts like hiraeth (Welsh), sehnsucht (German), and dor (Romanian), showing that the human heart, across cultures, shares the same longing for what once was.
Philosophically, saudade becomes a reflection on memory, imagination, and identity — a bridge between who we were and who we’ve become. It teaches that love doesn’t disappear with loss; it transforms into remembrance.
The episode closes with a message of acceptance: saudade is not emptiness, but the soft echo of love that remains. Through remembering, we keep the past alive — and through longing, we remain human.
