Dictionary

worthly en · ADJ

Etymology

From Middle English worthely, wurthlich, from Old English weorþlīċ (“important, valuable, splendid, worthy, estimable, honorable, distinguished, exalted, fit, becoming”), from Proto-Germanic *werþalīkaz (“worthy”), equivalent to worth + -ly. Cognate with Old Frisian werdelik, Old Saxon werthlīk, Old High German werdlīh.

Meanings

1. Having great worth or value; valuable; important; dignified; stately; excellent; worthy; deserving (of).
   • The enactment and enforcement of laws and the education of advertiser and advertising medium, toward the end that people will have greater confidence in advertising from the fact that advertising will be more worthly of public confidence. 1920, Frank H. Lancaster, Ernest F. Birmingham, The Fourth estate:
   • If they are of equal worth, and that is the basis for equal treatment, then some people should not be considered more worthly simply because they have some trait, such as training, that allows them to make an additional social contribution [...] 2008, Norman Daniels, Just health: meeting health needs fairly:
   • I hope that the few details set down here will induce more worthly contributions along the same line. 1918, American Institute of Mining Engineers, Engineering and mining journal:
   • It is not good to be alone, / to walk here in this worthely wone 15th c., “[The Creation]”, in Wakefield Mystery Plays; Re-edited in George England, Alfred W. Pollard, editors, The Towneley Plays (Early English Text Society Extra Series; LXXI), London: […] Oxford University Press, 1897, →OCLC, page 6, lines 184–185:

Forms

Deriveds

worthliness · unworthly

Relateds

worthy