Ill

How to spell ill

3 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce ill

What does ill mean?

1. adjectiveIn poor health; sick or not well.
2. nounHarm, misfortune, or something bad or hostile.

Ill in a sentence

• adjective

  She felt too ill to go into the office today.

• noun

  She bore him no ill despite the argument.

• adjective

  He was seriously ill for several weeks before recovering.

• noun

  The new policy did more ill than good in the long run.

Where does ill come from?

Language of origin: Old Norse

Ill came into English from Old Norse illr, which meant 'bad', 'evil' or 'difficult', brought by Scandinavian settlers during the Viking age and well established by the 1200s. Its earliest English uses leaned on that broad sense of badness, so something done 'ill' was done wrongly or harmfully, and an 'ill deed' was a wicked one. The narrower modern meaning of 'unwell' or 'in poor health' grew later, becoming common by the 1400s, probably as a polite way of saying someone was in a bad way. The older 'bad' sense still survives in fixed phrases such as 'ill will', 'ill at ease' and 'speak ill of', which is worth remembering because it explains why the word covers both sickness and harm. The spelling is mercifully short, the only real trap being the double l, which it shares with its relatives 'illness' and 'ail'.

How the word is built

• ill (from Old Norse illr: bad, evil); a single root with no prefix or suffix