"earnestly" meaning in English

See earnestly in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Adverb

IPA: /ˈɝnɪstli/ [General-American], /ˈɜːnɪstli/ [Received-Pronunciation] Audio: en-us-earnestly.ogg Forms: more earnestly [comparative], most earnestly [superlative]
Etymology: From Middle English ernestly, from Old English eornostlīċe (“earnestly, strictly”), equivalent to earnest + -ly. Etymology templates: {{inh|en|enm|ernestly}} Middle English ernestly, {{inh|en|ang|eornostlīċe|t=earnestly, strictly}} Old English eornostlīċe (“earnestly, strictly”), {{af|en|earnest|-ly|id2=adverbial}} earnest + -ly Head templates: {{en-adv}} earnestly (comparative more earnestly, superlative most earnestly)
  1. In an earnest manner; being very sincere; putting forth genuine effort. Synonyms: for real, honestly Translations (in an earnest manner): hartaasti (Finnish), vakavasti (Finnish), sérieusement (French), seriamente (Galician), ernsthaft (German), certātim (Latin), în mod serios (Romanian), cu seriozitate (Romanian)

Inflected forms

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          "ref": "1900 May 17, L[yman] Frank Baum, “The Good Witch Grants Dorothy’s Wish”, in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Chicago, Ill.; New York, N.Y.: Geo[rge] M[elvin] Hill Co., →OCLC, page 256:",
          "text": "The Scarecrow and the Tin Woodman and the Lion now thanked the Good Witch earnestly for her kindness, […]",
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          "ref": "1954, Plato, translated by Hugh Tredennick, “Socrates on Trial: The Apology”, in The Last Days of Socrates (Penguin Classics), Harmondsworth, Middlesex: Penguin Books, →OCLC, page 19:",
          "text": "One thing, however, I do most earnestly beg and entreat of you: […]",
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          "text": "Before long, the unsuspecting salesman was earnestly pitching him \"the quietest noisemaker on the market.\"",
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          "ref": "2025 February 11, Patrick Reilly, “500-pound rapper suing Lyft over ride denial asks for couch over chair at ‘Breakfast Club’ interview: ‘This is accommodation’”, in New York Post, New York, N.Y.: News Corp, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 12 Feb 2025:",
          "text": "“This the only seat y’all got?” [Dank] Demoss, who also goes by Dajua Blanding, asks earnestly.",
          "type": "quotation"
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        "In an earnest manner; being very sincere; putting forth genuine effort."
      ],
      "id": "en-earnestly-en-adv-PhGKjz71",
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          "earnest",
          "earnest"
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        {
          "word": "for real"
        },
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          "word": "honestly"
        }
      ],
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        {
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "lang_code": "fi",
          "sense": "in an earnest manner",
          "word": "hartaasti"
        },
        {
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "lang_code": "fi",
          "sense": "in an earnest manner",
          "word": "vakavasti"
        },
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          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "lang_code": "fr",
          "sense": "in an earnest manner",
          "word": "sérieusement"
        },
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          "lang": "Galician",
          "lang_code": "gl",
          "sense": "in an earnest manner",
          "word": "seriamente"
        },
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          "code": "de",
          "lang": "German",
          "lang_code": "de",
          "sense": "in an earnest manner",
          "word": "ernsthaft"
        },
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          "code": "la",
          "lang": "Latin",
          "lang_code": "la",
          "sense": "in an earnest manner",
          "word": "certātim"
        },
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          "lang": "Romanian",
          "lang_code": "ro",
          "sense": "in an earnest manner",
          "word": "în mod serios"
        },
        {
          "code": "ro",
          "lang": "Romanian",
          "lang_code": "ro",
          "sense": "in an earnest manner",
          "word": "cu seriozitate"
        }
      ]
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  "word": "earnestly"
}
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          "text": "The Scarecrow and the Tin Woodman and the Lion now thanked the Good Witch earnestly for her kindness, […]",
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              30,
              39
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          "ref": "1954, Plato, translated by Hugh Tredennick, “Socrates on Trial: The Apology”, in The Last Days of Socrates (Penguin Classics), Harmondsworth, Middlesex: Penguin Books, →OCLC, page 19:",
          "text": "One thing, however, I do most earnestly beg and entreat of you: […]",
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          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              43,
              52
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "1999 April 5, William Safire, “Essay; The Quiet Noisemaker”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 14 Sep 2017:",
          "text": "Before long, the unsuspecting salesman was earnestly pitching him \"the quietest noisemaker on the market.\"",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              85,
              94
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          "ref": "2025 February 11, Patrick Reilly, “500-pound rapper suing Lyft over ride denial asks for couch over chair at ‘Breakfast Club’ interview: ‘This is accommodation’”, in New York Post, New York, N.Y.: News Corp, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 12 Feb 2025:",
          "text": "“This the only seat y’all got?” [Dank] Demoss, who also goes by Dajua Blanding, asks earnestly.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
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        "In an earnest manner; being very sincere; putting forth genuine effort."
      ],
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          "earnest",
          "earnest"
        ]
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      "ipa": "/ˈɝnɪstli/",
      "tags": [
        "General-American"
      ]
    },
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      "ipa": "/ˈɜːnɪstli/",
      "tags": [
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      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e7/En-us-earnestly.ogg"
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  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "for real"
    },
    {
      "word": "honestly"
    }
  ],
  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "lang_code": "fi",
      "sense": "in an earnest manner",
      "word": "hartaasti"
    },
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "lang_code": "fi",
      "sense": "in an earnest manner",
      "word": "vakavasti"
    },
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "lang_code": "fr",
      "sense": "in an earnest manner",
      "word": "sérieusement"
    },
    {
      "code": "gl",
      "lang": "Galician",
      "lang_code": "gl",
      "sense": "in an earnest manner",
      "word": "seriamente"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
      "lang_code": "de",
      "sense": "in an earnest manner",
      "word": "ernsthaft"
    },
    {
      "code": "la",
      "lang": "Latin",
      "lang_code": "la",
      "sense": "in an earnest manner",
      "word": "certātim"
    },
    {
      "code": "ro",
      "lang": "Romanian",
      "lang_code": "ro",
      "sense": "in an earnest manner",
      "word": "în mod serios"
    },
    {
      "code": "ro",
      "lang": "Romanian",
      "lang_code": "ro",
      "sense": "in an earnest manner",
      "word": "cu seriozitate"
    }
  ],
  "word": "earnestly"
}

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This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2026-02-14 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2026-02-01 using wiktextract (f492ef9 and 59dc20b). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.