Thankful

How to spell thankful

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce thankful

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does thankful mean?

1. adjectiveFeeling or showing gratitude and relief for something.

Thankful in a sentence

• She was thankful for the unexpected refund on her train fare.

• After the long recovery, he felt deeply thankful to the nursing staff.

Where does thankful come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word grew entirely on native English soil rather than being borrowed from abroad. The root is the Old English noun thanc, which in early use meant not only 'thanks' but also 'a thought' or 'a kindly thought', since gratitude was understood as holding someone in friendly mind. That root is closely tied to the verb thencan, 'to think', so to thank someone was once almost to think well of them, and 'thankful' literally described a person full of such grateful thoughts. The adjective is recorded from the Old English period as thancful and has carried its core sense of feeling and showing gratitude ever since. Because both halves are plain English, the spelling is regular: keep the silent connection to 'thank' in mind and remember the suffix is a single -ful, not the freestanding word 'full'.

How the word is built

• thank (from Old English thanc: grateful thought, gratitude)
• -ful (full of)