lively
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈlaɪv.li/
Forms: form: livelier
form: liveliest
form: lifely
Etymology: From Middle English lyvely, lifly, from Old English līflīċ (“living, lively, long-lived, necessary to life, vital”), from Proto-West Germanic *lībalīk (“living, lively”), equivalent to life + -ly. Cognate with Scots lively, lifely (“of or pertaining to life, vital, living, life-like”), Old High German līblīh (“living, animated”), German leiblich (“bodily, corporeal”). Doublet of lifely and lifelike.
Senses: examples: text: But wherefore comes old Manoa in such haſt, / With youthful ſteps? much livelier then e're while / He ſeems.
ref: 1671, John Milton, “Samson Agonistes, […].”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: […] J[ohn] M[acock] for John Starkey […], →OCLC, page 85, lines 452–455:
text: [...] St. Bede's at this period of its history was perhaps the poorest and most miserable parish in the East End of London. Close-packed, crushed by the buttressed height of railway viaducts, rendered airless by huge walls of factories, it at once banished lively interest from a stranger's mind and left only a dull oppression of the spirit.
ref: 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC, page 77:
text: Since sick people were apt to be present, he could not always depend on a lively young crowd in the same ward with him, and the entertainment was not always good.
ref: 1961 November 10, Joseph Heller, “The Soldier in White”, in Catch-22 […], New York, N.Y.: Simon and Schuster, →OCLC, page 168:
text: But with the lively [Giovani] Dos Santos pulling the strings behind strikers [Roman] Pavlyuchenko and [Jermain] Defoe, Spurs controlled the first half without finding the breakthrough their dominance deserved.
ref: 2011 September 29, Jon Smith, “Tottenham 3 – 1 Shamrock Rovers”, in BBC Sport, archived from the original on 27 Nov 2018:
glosses: Full of life; energetic, vivacious.
examples: text: The colours of the prism are manifestly more full, intense, and lively that those of natural bodies.
ref: 1704, Isaac Newton, Opticks: Or, A Treatise of the Reflections, Refractions, Inflections and Colours of Light:
text: His faith must be not only living, but lively too.
ref: 1688, Robert South, Sacramental Preparation: Set forth in a Sermon on Matthew 5, 12.:
glosses: Bright, glowing, vivid; strong, vigorous.
examples: c. 1600, Philemon Holland
chaplets of gold and silver resembling lively flowers and leaves
glosses: Endowed with or manifesting life; living.
examples: text: I spied the lively picture of my father.
ref: 1632, Philip Massinger, Nathan Field, The Fatal Dowry:
glosses: Representing life; lifelike.
examples: text: From grave to gay, from lively to ſevere, [...]
ref: 1734, [Alexander Pope], An Essay on Man. […], epistle IV, London: […] J[ohn] Wilford, […], →OCLC, page 80, line 775:
glosses: Airy; animated; spirited.
glosses: Fizzy; foamy; tending to produce a large head in the glass.
raw_tags: of beer
Synonyms: sense: full of life
word: high-spirited
word: frisky
word: peppy
word: zestful
word: active
sense: vivid, strong, vigorous
word: intense
sense: endowed with or manifesting life
word: extant
word: live
word: vital
word: alive
sense: representing life
word: lifey
sense: representing life
word: limned
sense: representing life
word: naturalistic
sense: fizzy, foamy
word: frothy
sense: fizzy, foamy
word: spumescent
Derived terms: livelily
liveliness
lively as a grig
look lively
overlively
unlively livened