sparsely

English

Etymology

Etymology tree

Latin sparsusbor.

English sparse

Proto-Indo-European *leyg-der.

Proto-Germanic *līkąder.

Proto-Germanic *-līkaz

Proto-Germanic *-ê

Proto-Germanic *-līkê

Proto-West Germanic *-līkē

Old English -līċe

Middle English -ly

English -ly

English sparsely

From sparse + -ly.

Pronunciation

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Adverb

sparsely (comparative more sparsely, superlative most sparsely)

1. In a scattered or sparse manner; widely apart; thinly.

   Synonym: scantily

   a sparsely populated region

   • 1951 October, “Notes and News: The Harmonium at Troutbeck”, in Railway Magazine, page 709:

     Troutbeck is a tiny village midway between Penrith and Keswick in a very sparsely populated part of Cumberland, and it used to be said by facetious travellers that the reason why it ever had a station at all was to give the engine a rest after it had struggled up the long and trying incline from Threlkeld.

Translations

in a scattered or sparse manner

• Bulgarian: разпръснато (bg) (razprăsnato), нарядко (bg) (narjadko)
• Catalan: escassament (ca), esparsament (ca)
• Czech: řídce, spoře (cs)
• Estonian: hõredalt
• Finnish: harvasti, harvaan (fi)
• Hungarian: szórványosan (hu)
• Spanish: escasamente (es)

References

• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin Eli Smith, editors (1895–1910), “sparsely”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
• “sparsely”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

Anagrams

• Parsleys, parsleys