Sorely

How to spell sorely

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce sorely

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does sorely mean?

1. adverbTo a severe or acute degree; greatly and painfully.

Sorely in a sentence

• The old clinic was sorely in need of new equipment.

• Her steady guidance will be sorely missed by the whole team.

Where does sorely come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word grows from the Old English adjective 'sar', which meant painful, grievous, or causing distress, and the related noun 'sar' for a physical wound. By attaching the adverb-forming ending '-lice', later worn down to '-ly', speakers built 'sarlice', meaning in a manner that hurts or grieves. Over the centuries the literal sense of bodily pain softened into a figurative one, so that 'sorely' came to mean 'severely', 'acutely', or 'greatly', as in being sorely tempted or sorely missed. The adjective 'sore' still keeps the original aching meaning, and German cousins like 'sehr' (meaning 'very'), which descend from the same Germanic root, show how a word for pain naturally drifted toward simply marking intensity. The spelling trap is the silent final 'e' of 'sore' surviving inside the adverb, giving 'sorely' rather than the wrongly simplified 'sorly'.

How the word is built

• sore (from Old English sar: painful, grievous)
• -ly (adverb suffix)