Warmly

How to spell warmly

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce warmly

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does warmly mean?

1. adverbIn a friendly, affectionate, or enthusiastic way; also, in a way that keeps one warm.

Warmly in a sentence

• The host greeted every guest warmly at the door.

• She thanked the team warmly for their hard work.

Where does warmly come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

The base word warm descends from the Old English wearm, meaning 'heated' or 'having a moderately high temperature', and it shares deep roots with the German warm and Dutch warm, all tracing back to a Proto-Germanic source for heat. From its earliest use the word carried both a literal sense of physical heat and a figurative sense of emotional friendliness, since human kindness has long been imagined as something warming. The adverb warmly was formed in English by adding the productive suffix -ly, which turns adjectives into adverbs of manner and itself comes from the Old English -lice, meaning 'in the manner of'. By the medieval period warmly was used to describe both being dressed warmly against the cold and greeting someone warmly with affection. The spelling is regular and predictable: keep the full word warm intact and simply add -ly, which guards against accidentally writing 'warmely' or dropping a letter.

How the word is built

• warm (Old English wearm: heated, friendly)
• -ly (adverb suffix)