Etymology

headly

H4E1A1D2L1Y4

Today it means: Chief; principal; capital; (of sins) deadly. Full definition →

Middle English hedly ← Old English hēafodlīċ
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

  1. Old English · inherited fromhēafodlīċ“at the top, principal, capital, deadly”
  2. Middle English · inherited fromhedly
  3. English todayheadly

From Middle English hedly, havedlich, from Old English hēafodlīċ (“at the top, principal, capital, deadly”), equivalent to head + -ly. Cognate with West Frisian haadlik, Dutch hoofdelijk, Middle Low German hö̂vetlī̂k, Middle High German houbetlich (archaic German hauptlich). Piecewise doublet of chefly and chiefly.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.