Slightly

How to spell slightly

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce slightly

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does slightly mean?

1. adverbTo a small degree; a little.

Slightly in a sentence

• The second invoice was slightly higher than the first.

• She felt slightly nervous before the interview.

Where does slightly come from?

Language of origin: Old Norse

The word slightly is built from the adjective 'slight' plus the common adverb-forming ending '-ly'. 'Slight' itself reaches back to Old Norse 'slettr', meaning 'smooth, level, or even', and to a closely related Old English and Germanic family of words describing things that were plain, flat, or slender. In Middle English the sense drifted from 'smooth and slender' toward 'small in degree, flimsy, or trifling', which is the meaning that survives today. By adding '-ly', a suffix from Old English '-lice' that turns adjectives into adverbs of manner or degree, English produced 'slightly' to mean 'to a small extent'. The spelling keeps the silent 'gh' of 'slight', a fossil of an old guttural sound long since lost from pronunciation, and that buried, unpronounced cluster is the main trap when writing the word.

How the word is built

• slight (small, slender)
• -ly (adverb suffix)