Nicely

How to spell nicely

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce nicely

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does nicely mean?

1. adverbIn a pleasing, satisfactory, or skilful manner.

Nicely in a sentence

• The new manager handled the complaint very nicely.

• The flat was nicely furnished when they moved in.

Where does nicely come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word is built on the adjective 'nice', which has one of the most colourful journeys in English. It came through Old French 'nice', meaning 'foolish' or 'simple', from the Latin 'nescius', literally 'not knowing' or 'ignorant', formed from 'ne' (not) and 'scire' (to know). When it entered English in the 1300s it still carried that dismissive sense of foolish or silly, but over the following centuries the meaning drifted remarkably: through 'fussy' and 'precise' it eventually softened into the modern 'pleasant' and 'agreeable'. The adverb 'nicely' simply adds the native English '-ly' ending, and because 'nice' already ends in a silent 'e', the 'e' is kept before '-ly', giving the predictable but occasionally doubted 'nicely'.

How the word is built

• nice (pleasant, agreeable)
• -ly (adverb suffix)