Sincerely

How to spell sincerely

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce sincerely

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does sincerely mean?

1. adverbIn a genuine, heartfelt way, without pretence or false feeling.

Sincerely in a sentence

• She sincerely apologised for missing the meeting.

• He thanked the volunteers sincerely for their long hours.

Where does sincerely come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word traces back to the Latin sincerus, an adjective meaning 'clean, pure, sound, or whole', and by extension 'genuine and unspoiled'. English adopted the adjective sincere in the early 1500s, partly through French, and then formed the adverb sincerely by adding the native English ending -ly. There is a charming but false old story that sincerus came from sine cera, meaning 'without wax', supposedly describing honest sculptors who did not patch flaws in their marble with wax; scholars regard this as folk etymology rather than the true source. The genuine root simply carried the idea of something pure and unmixed, which is exactly how 'sincere' feeling came to mean heartfelt and unfeigned emotion. The spelling trap lives in the middle and end: the soft c before e gives an s sound, and the silent e of sincere is kept before -ly, so the word is sin-cere-ly, not 'sincerly'.

How the word is built

• sincere (from Latin sincerus: clean, pure, genuine)
• -ly (adverb suffix)