Rallied

How to spell rallied

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce rallied

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does rallied mean?

1. verbPast tense of rally: came together for a common purpose, or recovered strength after a setback.

Rallied in a sentence

• The whole team rallied behind their new manager within a week.

• Shares rallied sharply after the company posted strong earnings.

Where does rallied come from?

Language of origin: French

This is the past tense of 'rally', which English borrowed from the French verb rallier in the sixteenth century. Rallier was formed from the prefix re- (meaning 'again') and the verb allier (meaning 'to unite' or 'to bind together'), which itself descends from the Latin alligare, 'to bind to'. The original military sense was to bring scattered troops back together after they had broken ranks, and from that came the broader idea of regrouping, recovering strength, or coming together behind a cause. The same allier root sits inside the everyday word 'ally', a relative worth remembering. The spelling trap lives in two places: the doubled 'l' carried over from the French form, and the ending, where the final 'y' of 'rally' turns into 'ied' rather than staying 'yed'.

How the word is built

• rally (to gather or regroup)
• -ied (past tense, with y changing to i)