"-ly" meaning in English

See -ly in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Suffix

IPA: /li/ Audio: en-us--ly.ogg [US] Forms: -ly
enPR: lē Head templates: {{suffix}} [POS TABLE]
  1. Adding -ly to the end of a noun turns the word into an adjective thus adding further information about the word and the meaning you are giving it. The adjectives now have the extra meaning of "like (the noun), as in something that is characteristic of (the noun)".
    Sense id: simple--ly-en-suffix-kVCq3QLB
  2. Adding the suffix-ly to the end of an adjective turns the word into an adverb. The meaning of the word does not change, and still conveys the same idea. But it is a shorter and, sometimes, more elegant way of saying or writing it.
    Sense id: simple--ly-en-suffix-qdKaIv06
  3. However, this tiny two letter suffix is versatile because it can also be used to change the meaning, most often when it is applied to verbs.
    Sense id: simple--ly-en-suffix-4HshJz3S
{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "-ly",
      "raw_tags": [
        "Suffix"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "expansion": "[POS TABLE]",
      "name": "suffix"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "suffix",
  "senses": [
    {
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "If you say \"He has manly facial features\" you are saying that his facial features are typical facial features for a man."
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Adding -ly to the end of a noun turns the word into an adjective thus adding further information about the word and the meaning you are giving it. The adjectives now have the extra meaning of \"like (the noun), as in something that is characteristic of (the noun)\"."
      ],
      "id": "simple--ly-en-suffix-kVCq3QLB"
    },
    {
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "You can say, \"Those are his usual clothes\" or \"That is how he usually dresses\"."
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Adding the suffix-ly to the end of an adjective turns the word into an adverb. The meaning of the word does not change, and still conveys the same idea. But it is a shorter and, sometimes, more elegant way of saying or writing it."
      ],
      "id": "simple--ly-en-suffix-qdKaIv06"
    },
    {
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "\"Likely\" (\"it looks likely to rain\") does not mean the same thing as when \"like\" is used here (\"It looks more like drizzle than rain\"). So, just through adding two letters to the end of a word, you can convey two totally different meanings."
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "However, this tiny two letter suffix is versatile because it can also be used to change the meaning, most often when it is applied to verbs."
      ],
      "id": "simple--ly-en-suffix-4HshJz3S"
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "enpr": "lē"
    },
    {
      "ipa": "/li/"
    },
    {
      "sampa": "/li/"
    },
    {
      "audio": "en-us--ly.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "US"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "-ly"
}
{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "-ly",
      "raw_tags": [
        "Suffix"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "expansion": "[POS TABLE]",
      "name": "suffix"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "suffix",
  "senses": [
    {
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "If you say \"He has manly facial features\" you are saying that his facial features are typical facial features for a man."
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Adding -ly to the end of a noun turns the word into an adjective thus adding further information about the word and the meaning you are giving it. The adjectives now have the extra meaning of \"like (the noun), as in something that is characteristic of (the noun)\"."
      ]
    },
    {
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "You can say, \"Those are his usual clothes\" or \"That is how he usually dresses\"."
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Adding the suffix-ly to the end of an adjective turns the word into an adverb. The meaning of the word does not change, and still conveys the same idea. But it is a shorter and, sometimes, more elegant way of saying or writing it."
      ]
    },
    {
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "\"Likely\" (\"it looks likely to rain\") does not mean the same thing as when \"like\" is used here (\"It looks more like drizzle than rain\"). So, just through adding two letters to the end of a word, you can convey two totally different meanings."
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "However, this tiny two letter suffix is versatile because it can also be used to change the meaning, most often when it is applied to verbs."
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "enpr": "lē"
    },
    {
      "ipa": "/li/"
    },
    {
      "sampa": "/li/"
    },
    {
      "audio": "en-us--ly.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "US"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "-ly"
}

Download raw JSONL data for -ly meaning in English (1.5kB)


This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-12-03 from the simplewiktionary dump dated 2024-11-21 using wiktextract (94ba7e1 and 5dea2a6). 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.