From Old English wāclīċe (“weakly”), equivalent to weak + -ly (adjectival suffix); compare Old English wāclīċ (“weak; ignoble; mean”), and Old Norse veikligr (“weakly; sick”); both ultimately from Proto-Germanic *waikalīkaz (“weakly; weak”).
Meanings
Frail, sickly or of a delicate constitution; weak.
"Oh, a huge crab," Jacob murmured—and begins his journey on weakly legs on the sandy bottom. 1922, Virginia Woolf, chapter 1, in Jacob's Room:
I'd always been but weakly, / And my baby was just born; / A neighbour minded her by day, / I minded her till morn. 1889, WB Yeats, The Ballad of Moll Magee:
I lay in weakly case and confined to my bed for four months before I was able to rise and health returned to me. 1885, Sir Richard Burton, The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Night 18:
From Middle English weykly, equivalent to weak + -ly (adverbial suffix). Compare Old High German weihlīcho (“weakly”), Middle English wocliche, wokli, wacliche (both from Proto-Germanic *waikalīkō).
Meanings
With little strength or force.
The basitemporal platform is flat in posterior view because the mamillar tuberosities are very weakly developed. 2002, T. H. Worthy, The Lost World of the Moa: Prehistoric Life of New Zealand, page 128:
pt debilmente (with little strength or force) · ca dèbilment (with little strength or force) · es débilmente (with little strength or force) · ru сла́бо (with little strength or force) · mi māioio (with little strength or force) · pl słabo (with little strength or force) · hu gyengén (with little strength or force) · es caducamente (with little strength or force) · fr faiblement (with little strength or force) · ca feblement (with little strength or force)