Chemically

How to spell chemically

10 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce chemically

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does chemically mean?

1. adverbBy means of chemistry or a chemical process; in terms of chemical composition.

Chemically in a sentence

• The two samples are chemically identical despite their different colours.

• The pool water is chemically treated to keep it safe for swimmers.

Where does chemically come from?

Language of origin: Arabic

This adverb is built on the adjective 'chemical', which traces back through the science of chemistry to the older word 'alchemy'. Alchemy itself came into medieval English from Old French and Medieval Latin 'alchimia', and that in turn drew on the Arabic 'al-kimiya', where 'al' is simply the definite article 'the' and 'kimiya' named the art of transmuting metals. The Arabic term is widely thought to descend ultimately from the Greek 'khēmeia', meaning the pouring or fusing of metals, although some scholars link it instead to an old name for Egypt. By the 1600s English had stripped the Arabic article to form 'chemic' and 'chemical', and the adverb 'chemically' followed naturally with the standard '-ly' ending. The spelling trap lies in the quiet stack of suffixes: the word ends '-ically', so the 'al' is fully present even though it is barely sounded.

How the word is built

• chem- (from alchemy/khēmeia: the art of transmuting matter)
• -ic (relating to)
• -al (adjective)
• -ly (adverb suffix)