Difficulty
late Middle English (in the senses ‘requiring effort or skill’ and ‘something difficult’): from Latin difficultas, from dis- (expressing reversal) + facultas ‘ability, opportunity’.
wiktionary
From Middle English difficultee, from Old French difficulté, from Latin difficultas, from difficul, older form of difficilis(“hard to do, difficult”), from dis- + facilis(“easy”); see difficile and difficult. Equivalent to dis- + facile + -ty. Also analysable as difficult + -y, though the adjective is historically a backformation from the noun.
etymonline
difficulty (n.)
late 14c., "want of easiness, that quality which makes something laborious or perplexing," from Anglo-French difficulté and directly from Latin difficultatem (nominative difficultas) "difficulty, distress, poverty," from difficilis "hard," from dis- "not, away from" (see dis-) + facilis "easy to do," from facere "to do" (from PIE root *dhe- "to set, put"). From 1610s as "that which is difficult." Related: Difficulties.
