Word.ws English Dictionary

askingly

askingly adverb: in an asking manner; so as to ask.

Adverb

askingly (comparative more askingly, superlative most askingly)

  1. In an asking manner; so as to ask.
    • How askingly It’s footsteps t’ward me bend?
      It seems to say, “And have I then one Friend?”1796, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “To a Young Ass”, in Poems on Various Subjects, London: G.G. and J. Robinsons, page 92
    • “I don’t know whether this is something your wife ever knew about or not?” he began askingly.1890, William Dean Howells, The Shadow of a Dream, New York: Harper, Part 2, Chapter 2, p. 87

Examples of askingly in a sentence

  • Aspiration is looking askingly; to reach a desirable result one must look askingly toward that which can fulfill.1916, Arthur Adolphus Lindsay, Scientific Man Building Through Thought Force, Detroit: A. A. Lindsay Publishing Company, page 12:
  • But he looks at me so sadly, askingly, across his desk—1983, Joyce Johnson, chapter 9, in Minor Characters, New York: Pocket Books, published 1984, page 150:

Synonyms of askingly

Forms of askingly

comparativemore askingly
superlativemost askingly

Origin of askingly

From Middle English askingli, axingly, equivalent to asking + -ly.

Questions about askingly

What does askingly mean?
Askingly means in an asking manner; so as to ask.
How do you use askingly in a sentence?
Aspiration is looking askingly; to reach a desirable result one must look askingly toward that which can fulfill.
What part of speech is askingly?
Askingly is an adverb.

Words near askingly in the dictionary

  1. asking rate
  2. asking rates
  3. asking round
  4. asking the impossible
  5. asking the question
  6. askingly
  7. askings
  8. Askins
  9. askip
  10. asklepian
  11. asklepians

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: askingly (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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