Critically

How to spell critically

10 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce critically

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does critically mean?

1. adverbIn a way that involves careful analysis or detailed evaluation of merits and faults.
2. adverbTo a serious or decisive degree, often describing danger, importance, or a medical condition.

Critically in a sentence

• The editor read every chapter critically before approving the manuscript.

• After the crash he was critically injured and rushed to intensive care.

• Good researchers examine their own assumptions critically.

• The project is critically short of funding this quarter.

Where does critically come from?

Language of origin: Greek

This word traces back to the Greek kritikos, meaning 'able to discern or judge', which itself grew from krites 'a judge' and the verb krinein 'to separate, decide, or judge'. Latin took the word in as criticus, and from there English formed the adjective 'critical' in the late 1500s, originally in medical use to describe the turning point of an illness, the 'crisis'. The adverb 'critically' followed by attaching the familiar -ly ending to that adjective. The same krinein root sits beneath 'crisis', 'criterion', and 'critic', a family that all share the idea of judging or reaching a decisive moment. The spelling trap is the buried syllable: it is built on the full word 'critical' plus '-ly', so it keeps the double l of 'critical-ly', not a single l.

How the word is built

• critic (from Greek kritikos: able to judge)
• -al (adjective suffix)
• -ly (adverb suffix)