The story
- Old English · inherited fromġēarlīċ
- Middle English · inherited fromyeerly
- English todayyearly
From Middle English yeerly, yerely, from Old English ġēarlīċ, ġērlīċ (“yearly, of the year, annual”), equivalent to year + -ly (adjectival suffix) or -ly (adverbial suffix). Cognate with Scots yerelie (“yearly”), Saterland Frisian jierelk (“yearly”), West Frisian jierliks (“yearly”), Dutch jaarlijks (“yearly”), Afrikaans jaarliks (“yearly”), German jährlich (“yearly”), Danish årlig (“yearly”), Norwegian Bokmål årlig (“yearly”), Norwegian Nynorsk årleg (“yearly”), Swedish årlig (“yearly”), Icelandic árlegur (“yearly”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.