fatally

Adverb

fatally (comparative more fatally, superlative most fatally)

1. In a deadly manner; lethally.
   • Witness our too much memorable shame
     When Cressy battle fatally was struck,
     And all our princes captiv'd by the hand
     Of that black name, Edward, Black Prince of Wales;1599, William Shakespeare, The Life of King Henry V
   • He told Peace that he did not believe his statement that he had fired the pistol merely to frighten the constable; had not Robinson guarded his head with his arm he would have been wounded fatally, and Peace condemned to death.1918, H. B. Irving, A Book of Remarkable Criminals
2. Ultimately, with finality or irrevocability, moving towards the demise of something.
   • "They pretend," as I hear, "that the verses of Kabir have four different senses; illusion, spirit, intellect, and the exoteric doctrine of the Vedas;" but in this part of the world it is considered a ground for complaint if a man's writings admit of more than one interpretation. While England...1854, Henry David Thoreau, Walden, or Life in the Woods
   • Chelsea will point to that victory margin as confirmation of their superiority - but Spurs will complain their hopes of turning the game around were damaged fatally by Atkinson's decision.2012 April 15, Phil McNulty, “Tottenham 1-5 Chelsea”, in BBC Sport, archived from the original on 30 Mar 2022
3. Fatedly; according to the dictates of fate or doom.
   • He was a slender young man in hot black clothes; he wore the unfaçaded collar fatally and unanimously adopted by all adam's-apple men of morals; he was washed, fair, flat-skulled, clean-minded, and industrious; and the only noise of any kind he ever made in the world was on Sunday.1913, Booth Tarkington, chapter 9, in The Flirt, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, Page & Company, →OCLC, page 138