The good luck of making
fortunate discoveries by
accident;
as, Her sound decisions come not from
serendipity but from hard work.
Arab traders called Sri Lanka (meaning splendid land) Serendip. Later Portuguese invaders called it Ceilao which Dutch colonists spelled Ceylan, and the imperial British turned this into Ceylon.
Serendipity was coined by Horace Walpole in 1754 from a Persian fairy tale, The Three Princes of Serendip. According to Walpole, the three princes of this story "were always making discoveries, by accidents and sagacity, of things they were not in quest of". Thus serendipity is "the faculty of making happy and unexpected discoveries by accident."