villainly
villainly adjective: characteristic of a villain.
Adjective
villainly (comparative more villainly, superlative most villainly)
- Characteristic of a villain.
- By the ox of St. Luke, thou idle, cogging knave—thou rascally, miscreant spy, if ever I catch thee dogging my footsteps, by day or night, or concerning thyself in any way about act of mine, I will think no more of drawing my dagger across thy villainly throat, than I would of slicing a melon or...1853, Robert Bigsby, Ombo. A Dramatic Romance, in Twelve Acts., London: Edward T. Whitfield; Derby: Richard Keene, act IV, scene 4, page 93
- And though he has paid the penalty of his crime with his worthless life, yet many of his compeers in villainly adventure still live, and his daring and sworn associates are scattered throughout the northern portion of this land;1860 January 19, John Herbert Claiborne, “Politics of the Ante-Bellum Period”, in Seventy-Five Years in Old Virginia with Some Account of the Life of the Author and Some History of the People Amongst...
- Synonyms:
- villainous, villainy
Adverb
villainly (comparative more villainly, superlative most villainly)
- In the manner of a villain.
- And whan they vnderstode this they walked fast, & cam nigħ to the bridge, and sawe thre cristen that were 28 ouerthrawen on the bridge by strokkes of speerys. ‘Fourth,’ said then one of them, ‘we tary to longe
perceyue you not how this Dogges oppressen vylaynly these valyaunt & worthy...c. 1500, “How Uryan & Guyon tooke leue of theire moder Melusyne and entred theire ship”, in A. K. Donald, editor, Melusine. Compiled (1382-1394 A.D.) by Jean d’Arras; Englisht about 1500. Edited from... - My fortune them withstands, and I lykewyse may destnies vouche
To kyl that cursyd brood, and for my spouse vproote them quyte.
Nor not alone this grief doth Agamemnons kindred byte:
Nor Greeks haue onely cause for wedlock spoyle them selfs to arme. Yet had it bin ynough to stroy them ones, if but...a. 1560, Virgill, Thomas Phaër, transl., “The Ninth Booke of the Aeneidos of Uirgil”, in The Whole .xii. Bookes of the Æneidos of Virgill, London: […] Wyllyam How, for Abraham Veale, published 1573
- Synonyms:
- villainously
- And whan they vnderstode this they walked fast, & cam nigħ to the bridge, and sawe thre cristen that were 28 ouerthrawen on the bridge by strokkes of speerys. ‘Fourth,’ said then one of them, ‘we tary to longe
Examples of villainly in a sentence
- Strikingly effective performance as the villainly Vitellia…1969 October, The Telegraph, quotee, Musical America, published 1970, page 166:
- During the hours the villainly Mandel Pukur fellows kept us standing I became exceedingly thirsty, and also hungry, but gradually the need to urinate became of even more pressing urgency.1987, Sara Banerji, chapter 14, in The Wedding of Jayanthi Mandel, Bloomsbury Reader, published 2012, →ISBN:
- Her pastiche of a villainly adventure is far more exciting than most originals in the genre.1989, Julia Eccleshare, Children’s Books of the Year, London: Andersen Press, →ISBN, page 48:
- Strubel, 2097 ff: “See to it that you will not use these dirty and vulgar words, and also see to it that you don’t open your mouth to utter villainly things.2001, Ulf Malm, Dolssor Conina: Lust, the Bawdy, and Obscenity in Medieval Occitan and Galician-Portuguese Troubadour Poetry and Latin...
Synonyms of villainly
Forms of villainly
| Adjective | |
|---|---|
| comparative | more villainly |
| superlative | most villainly |
| Adverb | |
| comparative | more villainly |
| superlative | most villainly |
Origin of villainly
From villain + -ly.
From Middle English vilenly; equivalent to villain + -ly.
Questions about villainly
- What does villainly mean?
- Villainly means characteristic of a villain.
- How do you use villainly in a sentence?
- Strikingly effective performance as the villainly Vitellia…
- What part of speech is villainly?
- Villainly can be an adjective or an adverb.
Words near villainly in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: villainly (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:
Cite this entry: “villainly.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/villainly. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.