Word.ws English Dictionary

sidely

sidely adjective: of or relating to the side (of something); lateral.

Adjective

sidely (comparative more sidely, superlative most sidely)

  1. (nonstandard, rare) Of or relating to the side (of something); lateral.
    • “[…] The evidence of that philosophy is found in its perennial focus on a 'this-sidely' world and an 'other-sidely' world.”2001, Torben Riise, The Eyes of The Sphinx

Adverb

sidely (not comparable)

  1. (nonstandard, rare) To the side; sideways; laterally; sideling; obliquely; indirectly.
    • […] satisfying her homosexuality with the keeping of a secret scrapbook of pictures of favorite male actors or athletes or by supervising the activities of young boys or visiting turkish^([sic]) baths or mens^([sic]) locker rooms, leering sidely while seeking protection behind a carefully guarded...1964, Hubert Selby Jr., Last Exit to Brooklyn, New York: Grove Press

Forms of sidely

comparativemore sidely
superlativemost sidely

Origin of sidely

From Middle English *sideli (adjective), sideli (adverb), equivalent to side + -ly. Cognate with German seitlich (“lateral”). Compare also sideling.

Questions about sidely

What does sidely mean?
Sidely means of or relating to the side (of something); lateral.
What part of speech is sidely?
Sidely can be an adjective or an adverb.

Words near sidely in the dictionary

  1. sidelock
  2. sidelocks
  3. sidelong
  4. sidelot
  5. sidelots
  6. sidely
  7. sideman
  8. sidemeat
  9. sidemeats
  10. sidemen
  11. sidemode

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: sidely (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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Cite this entry: “sidely.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sidely. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.