Thinly

How to spell thinly

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce thinly

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does thinly mean?

1. adverbIn a way that is slender, sparse, or spread out in a small quantity.

Thinly in a sentence

• The chef sliced the smoked salmon thinly for the canapes.

• Butter the bread thinly so the sandwiches are not too rich.

Where does thinly come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word is built from the adjective 'thin', which comes from the Old English 'thynne', meaning slender, narrow, or sparse, and traces back to a Proto-Germanic root shared with the Dutch 'dun' and the German 'dünn'. The same ancient root is also connected, through Proto-Indo-European, to the Latin 'tenuis', meaning slender, which gives English the borrowed word 'tenuous'. The adverb form was made by adding the native suffix '-ly', from the Old English '-lice', which originally meant 'in the manner of' and is the most common way English turns adjectives into adverbs. Because 'thin' ends in a single consonant after a short vowel, learners sometimes wonder whether to double the 'n', but the rule for adding '-ly' is simply to attach it to the whole word, leaving one 'n'. The result has been in steady use for centuries to describe anything spread, sliced, or scattered in a sparse or slender way.

How the word is built

• thin (from Old English thynne: slender, sparse)
• -ly (adverb suffix)