Serendipity refers to discoveries made by accident or sagacity. Thus these are accidental discoveries. Horace Walpole, an English writer in 1754 wrote a letter to his friend Horace Mann, a historian, man of letters and politician. Here he narrates the story of the Three Princes of Serendip, which is an English translation of the Persian tale in Amir Khusro’s Hasht Bihisht (1302). The story is of three princes from Serendip of Sinhaladweep or Sri Lanka. They are sent by the king to travel around the world to make them wise and worthy of royal positions on return. All the princes make interesting discoveries by accident and make astonishing deductions using their brilliant mental faculties. Walpole coined the world ‘serendipity’ to refer to the making discoveries by accident and sagacity of things they were not in quest of

The word was not much in use for a century or more. It reappeared in 1870s. It still could not be popular till the early 20th century. It made its first appearance in Webster’s New International Dictionary in 1909. Later Oxford too included it. It become highly popular in the middle of the 20th century.