Wrongly

How to spell wrongly

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce wrongly

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does wrongly mean?

1. adverbIn an incorrect, mistaken, or unjust manner.

Wrongly in a sentence

• The parcel was wrongly addressed and ended up in another city.

• He was wrongly accused of taking money from the till.

Where does wrongly come from?

Language of origin: Old Norse

This adverb is built from the adjective 'wrong' plus the everyday adverb-forming ending '-ly'. The root 'wrong' came into late Old English as 'wrang', borrowed from Old Norse 'rangr', which literally meant 'crooked', 'awry', or 'bent', and only later took on the moral sense of 'unjust' or 'incorrect'. That older physical meaning of something twisted out of true is a neat reminder of why a 'wrong' answer is one that has gone off the straight path. The silent initial 'w' is a fossil from the Old English spelling, when the letter was actually pronounced before the 'r'; English kept the 'w' in writing long after the sound itself disappeared. The suffix '-ly' descends from Old English '-lice', meaning 'in the manner of', so 'wrongly' simply means 'in a wrong manner'.

How the word is built

• wrong (from Old Norse rangr: crooked, awry, unjust)
• -ly (adverb suffix)