gingerly

comparative more gingerly · superlative most gingerly

1. In a cautious and delicate manner; (very) carefully or cautiously.

   He placed the glass jar gingerly on the concrete step.

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   In an other corner, Mistris Minx, a marchants wife, that will eate no cherries, forsooth, but when they are at twentie shillings a pound, that lookes as simperingly as if she were besmeard, and iets it as gingerly as if she were dancing the canaries, […]

   1592, Thomas Nash[e], Pierce Penilesse His Supplication to the Deuill. […], London: […] [John Charlewood for] Richard Ihones, […], →OCLC

   [E]nter you the chambers peaceably, locke the dores gingerly, looke vpon your vviues wofully, but vpon the euill-doers, moſt vvickedly.

   1604 (first performance), Tho[mas] Dekker; Iohn Webster [i.e., John Webster], West-ward Hoe. […], London: […] [William Jaggard], and to be sold by Iohn Hodgets […], published 1607, →OCLC, Act V

   Prithee, gentle officer, / Handle me gingerly, or I fall to pieces, / Before I can plead mine.

   1624 November 3 (first performance), Philip Massinger, “The Parliament of Love”, in W[illiam] Gifford, editor, The Plays of Philip Massinger, […], volume II, London: […] G[eorge] and W[illiam] Nicol; […] by W[illiam] Bulmer and Co. […], published 1805, →OCLC, Act V, scene i, page 307

   […] Sir W. Pen made a formal speech in answer to a question of the King's, whether the lying of the sunk ships in the river would spoil the river. But, Lord! how gingerly he answered it, and with a deal of do that he did not know whether it would be safe as to the enemy to have them taken up, but that doubtless it would be better for the river to have them taken up.

   1667 July 12 (date written; Gregorian calendar), Samuel Pepys, Mynors Bright, transcriber, “July 3rd, 1667”, in Henry B[enjamin] Wheatley, editor, The Diary of Samuel Pepys […], volume VII, London: George Bell & Sons […]; Cambridge: Deighton Bell & Co., published 1896, →OCLC, page 5

   My mother was going very gingerly in the dark along the paſſage which led to the parlour, as my uncle Toby pronounced the word wife.

   1762, [Laurence Sterne], chapter V, in The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, volume V, London: […] T. Becket and P. A. Dehondt, […], →OCLC, page 37

   Synonyms: ginger, tentatively, warily

2. obsoleteChiefly of dancing or walking: done with small, dainty steps; daintily; also, with excessive delicacy; affectedly, mincingly.

   Oh! ſhe lookes ſo ſugredly, ſo ſimpringly, ſo gingerly, ſo amarouſly, ſo amiably. […] [She] is ſuch an intycing ſhee-vvitch, carrying the charmes of your Ievvels about her. Oh!

   1604 (first performance), Tho[mas] Dekker; Iohn Webster [i.e., John Webster], West-ward Hoe. […], London: […] [William Jaggard], and to be sold by Iohn Hodgets […], published 1607, →OCLC, Act II

comparative more gingerly · comparative proscribed rare gingerlier · superlative most gingerly · proscribed rare superlative gingerliest

1. Often of movements: very careful, cautious, or delicate.

   Several gingerly taps on her console fired clusters of modified probes into the maelstrom of the gas giant’s atmosphere.

   2012, David [Alan] Mack, chapter 28, in Persistence of Memory (Star Trek: The Next Generation; Cold Equations; book 1), New York, N.Y.: Pocket Books, →ISBN, part 3 (Elegy)

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   We can honestly commend the Atlantic Monthly as the most able and spirited of American periodicals, at the present time, and we like it, moreover, because it dares have opinions and to express them in unmistakable terms, on subjects which when referred to at all, by most of the current magazines, are mentioned in the gingerliest namby-pamby style of common place neutrality.

   1857 November 30, “The Atlantic Monthly”, in Wisconsin Daily State Journal, volume VI, number 366, Madison, Wis., →OCLC, page [2], column 3

   But, ther's somethin' in the very look and voice of Jeems Strebling, even in his gingerly walk, that riles all the black drop in me.

   1867, R[ebecca] H[arding] Davis, “The Valley of the Shadow”, in Waiting for the Verdict, New York, N.Y.: Sheldon & Company, published 1868, →OCLC, page 174

   [P]enetrating cautiously into dark cellars, sallying with gingerly tread to the garden, now leaf-strewn by the autumn winds, […]

   1886 May, Thomas Hardy, chapter XXII, in The Mayor of Casterbridge: The Life and Death of a Man of Character. […], volume II, London: Smith, Elder & Co., […], →OCLC, page 301

   During the extra session there were few crimes in the decalogue of which we were not accused, and all because of our old-fashioned tariff views and our quaint, blunt way of expressing them. While this treatment had its toughening effects, none the less did the Landmark’s icy rebuke mortify and silence us. We return to the painful subject in the gingerliest way imaginable, our mood far from affirmative, but interrogatory from first to last.

   1909 October 18, “Querying ‘Worse’”, in The Times-Dispatch, number 18,047, Richmond, Va., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 4, column 2

   The down "Atlantic Coast Express", headed by Pacific No. 35020 Bibby Line, passes the scene of operations at a gingerly 10 m.p.h.

   1961 March, Trains Illustrated, London: Ian Allan Publishing, →ISSN, →OCLC, image caption, page 185

   Synonyms: ginger, gingerish, tentative, wary

2. obsoleteOften of a person or the way they move: dainty, delicate; also, excessively delicate; affected, mincing.

   All yᵉ rest of my trimmest, tricksiest, gingerliest ioyes, / But very tædious and most odious toyes?

   1573 September, Gabriel Harvey, “The Schollars Loove, or Reconcilement of Contraryes”, in Edward John Long Scott, editor, Letter-Book of Gabriel Harvey, A.D. 1573–1580. […] ([Camden Society Publications] New Series; XXXIII), Westminster: […] [F]or the Camden Society […] by Nichols and Sons, […], →OCLC, page 115