sickly
/ˈsɪkli/
sickly adjective: frequently ill or in poor health; weakly.
Adjective
sickly (comparative sicklier, superlative sickliest)
- Frequently ill or in poor health; weakly.
- a sickly child
- … the boy is a sickly lad, of a delicate frame, and particularly subject to a malady in his throat, which renders him very unfit for his Majesty’s service.1759, Tobias Smollett, letter dated 16 March, 1759, in James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson, London: Charles Dilly, 1791, Volume 1, p. 190
- Synonyms:
- valetudinarian
- Not in good health; (somewhat) sick.
- Yes, bring me word, boy, if thy lord look well,
For he went sickly forth:1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Iulius Cæsar”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]... - For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep [i.e. have died].1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 1 Corinthians 11:30
- Yes, bring me word, boy, if thy lord look well,
- Characterized by poor or unhealthy growth. (of a plant)
- [...] the good wheat on this land had turned sickly and yellow.1931, Pearl S. Buck, chapter 27, in The Good Earth, New York: Modern Library, published 1944, page 236
- With the aid of the marigolds the roses flourished; in the control beds they were sickly and drooping.1962, Rachel Carson, chapter 6, in Silent Spring, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, page 79
- Appearing ill, infirm or unhealthy; giving the appearance of illness.
- a sickly pallor
- … she exhibited a countenance so wretched, and a complection so sickly, that Cecilia was impressed with horror at the sight.1782, Frances Burney, Cecilia, London: T. Payne and Son, and T. Cadell, Volume 1, Book 1, Chapter 9, p. 121
- Shedding a relatively small amount of light; (of light) not very bright.
- The Moon grows sickly at the sight of day.1665, John Dryden, The Indian Emperour, London: H. Herringman, published 1667, act II, page 17
- Night, and all her sickly dews,
Her Spectres wan, and Birds of boding cry,1757, Thomas Gray, Odes, Dublin: G. Faulkner and J. Rudd, page 5
- Lacking intensity or vigour.
- a sickly smile
- a sickly winter sun
- Associated with poor moral or mental well-being.
- The slightest distress, whether real or fictitious, touched him to the quick, and his soul laboured under a sickly sensibility of the miseries of others.1766, [Oliver Goldsmith], chapter 3, in The Vicar of Wakefield: […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), Salisbury, Wiltshire: […] B. Collins, for F[rancis] Newbery, […], →OCLC, page 27
- These were not the ravings of imbecility, the sickly effusions of distempered brains;1791 (date written), Mary Wollstonecraft, “The Same Subject Continued [The Prevailing Opinion of a Sexual Character Discussed]”, in A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: With Strictures on Political...
- Synonyms:
- unhealthy
- Tending to produce nausea.
- a sickly smell; sickly sentimentality
- ‘Oh, what is that glides quickly where velvet flowers grow thickly,
Their scent comes rich and sickly?’—‘A scaled and hooded worm.’1865, Christina Rossetti, “Amor Mundi”, in Goblin Market; The Prince’s Progress; and Other Poems, London: Macmillan, published 1875, page 286
- Synonyms:
- nauseating, sickening
- Overly sweet.
- […] he was again tasting the sickly welter of melted ice cream on his plate.1922, Sinclair Lewis, chapter IX, in Babbitt, New York, N.Y.: Harcourt, Brace and Company, →OCLC, page 123
- After a meal of bread, bacon, rum and bitter stewed tea sickly with sugar, we went up through the broken trees to the east of the village and up a long trench to battalion headquarters.1929 November, Robert Graves, chapter XII, in Good-bye to All That: An Autobiography, London: Jonathan Cape […], →OCLC, page 132
- Synonyms:
- cloying, saccharine
- Marked by the occurrence of illness or disease (of a period of time).
- This physic but prolongs thy sickly days.c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac...
- a. 1768, Laurence Sterne, undated letter in Original Letters, London: Logographic Press, 1788, pp. 110-111,
… if I thought the sentiments of your last letter were not the sentiments of a sickly moment—if I could be made to believe, for an instant, that they proceeded from you, in a sober...
- Tending to produce disease or poor health.
- a sickly autumn; a sickly climate
- Has some sickly eastern waste
Sent us a wind to parch us at a blast?1782, William Cowper, “The Progress of Error”, in Poems, London: […] J[oseph] Johnson, […], →OCLC, page 54
- Synonyms:
- insalubrious, unhealthy, unwholesome
Verb
sickly (third-person singular simple present sicklies, present participle sicklying, simple past and past participle sicklied)
- To make (something) sickly.
- Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac... - Thy Drudge contrives, and in our full career
Sicklies our hopes with the pale hue of Fear;1763, Charles Churchill, An Epistle to William Hogarth, London: for the author, page 12
- Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
- To become sickly.
- But the seven most prominent Apostles […] still hang together, their hearts tormented with eager yet sad questionings, their hopes fast sicklying over with the pale hues of doubt.1889, Samuel Cox, An Expositor’s Notebook, London: Richard D. Dickinson, 7th edition, Chapter 26, p. 364
Adverb
sickly (comparative more sickly, superlative most sickly)
- In a sick manner; in a way that reflects or causes sickness.
- sickly pale; to cough sickly
- […] he sickly guess’d
How lone he was once more, and sadly press’d
His empty arms together […]1818, John Keats, Endymion, London: Taylor and Hessey, Book 2, lines 859-861, p. 93
sickly meaning in Hindi, Urdu, Malayalam and Kannada
sickly in Hindi
- sickly
- दुर्बल durbal
sickly in Urdu
- sickly, unhealthy, anemic
- پیلا pīlā
- sickly
- دربل durbal, اشکت aśakt
sickly in Malayalam
- മനം പിരട്ടുന്ന, നിത്യരോഗിയായ, രോഗം വരുത്തുന്ന, സുഖക്കേടായ
sickly in Kannada
- ದುರ್ಬಲ, ಬಲಹೀನ, ಶಕ್ತಿಹೀನ ಅನಾರೋಗ್ಯದ, ರೋಗಿಯಾಗಿರುವ, ರೋಗಪ್ರಕೃತಿಯ, ಕಳೆಗುಂದಿದ
More languagesFewer languages
- sickly in Tagalog
- sakitin
- sickly in Arabic
- مِسْقَام misqām
- sickly in Vietnamese
- èo uột
Examples of sickly in a sentence
- She is unfortunately of a sickly constitution, which has prevented her making that progress in many accomplishments which she could not otherwise have failed of;1813 January 27, [Jane Austen], chapter 14, in Pride and Prejudice: […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] [George...
- [...] the sharp-scented bottle of crystals that sickly Cousin Bertha had carried to ward off fainting spells.1982, Anne Tyler, chapter 1, in Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant, New York: Ballantine, published 2008, page 4:
- Miguel’s temperature was normal that day, though he was still sickly and restless.1958, Muriel Spark, chapter 9, in Robinson, New York: New Directions, published 2003, page 128:
- Yossarian [...] could not wipe from his mind the excruciating image of the barefoot boy with sickly cheeks [...]1961, Joseph Heller, chapter 39, in Catch-22, New York: Dell:
Synonyms of sickly
4 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Forms of sickly
| Adjective | |
|---|---|
| comparative | sicklier |
| superlative | sickliest |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | sicklies |
| present participle | sicklying |
| past participle | sicklied |
| past | sicklied |
| Adverb | |
| comparative | more sickly |
| superlative | most sickly |
Origin of sickly
From Middle English seekly, sekely, siklich, sekeliche, equivalent to sick + -ly. Possibly a modification of Old English sīcle (“sickly”) and/or derived from Old Norse sjúkligr (“sickly”). Cognate with Dutch ziekelijk, Middle High German siechlich, Danish sygelig, Swedish sjuklig, Icelandic sjúklegur. The verb is from the adjective.
From sick + -ly.
Words formed from sickly
Words that rhyme with sickly
Questions about sickly
- What does sickly mean?
- Sickly means frequently ill or in poor health; weakly.
- What is sickly in Hindi?
- Sickly in Hindi is दुर्बल (durbal). See Sickly meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use sickly in a sentence?
- She is unfortunately of a sickly constitution, which has prevented her making that progress in many accomplishments which she could not otherwise have failed of;
- What part of speech is sickly?
- Sickly can be an adjective, a verb or an adverb.
- How do you pronounce sickly?
- Sickly is pronounced /ˈsɪkli/.
Words near sickly in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: sickly (page history and authors); दुर्बल (Hindi) (page history and authors); اشکت (Urdu) (page history and authors); sickly (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); sickly (Kannada Wiktionary) (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.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-sickly.wav.
Cite this entry: “sickly.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sickly. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.