downright
Part of speech: adv
adj
Morphological type: derivation
Etymology: The adverb is derived from Middle English dounright, dounriȝt (“right down, straight down; face down; vertically; used for emphasis: outright, downright”), and then either:
* possibly an aphetic form of adounright (“straight down; directly, immediately (?)”), from adoun (“downward”, adverb) (from Old English adūn, adūne (“down, downward”, adverb), ultimately from dūn (“hill, mountain”), from Proto-West Germanic *dūnā, *dūnu (“hill; sand dune”), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *dʰewh₂- (“haze, mist; smoke”)) + right (“direct; straight; etc.”, adjective) (from Old English riht (“straight; etc.”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₃reǵ- (“to straighten”)); or
* from doun (“down, downward; etc.”, adverb) (from Old English dūne (“down”), ultimately from dūn (“hill, mountain”): see above) + right.
By surface analysis, down (adverb) + right (adjective).
The adjective and noun are derived from the adverb. Noun sense 1 (“low grade of wool”) may be from the obsolete adjective sense 2.2 (“in its most basic form; ordinary”).
Inflected forms:
form: more downright
pos: adj
tags: comparative
form: most downright
pos: adj
tags: superlative
Senses:
gloss: Completely, wholly.
pos: adv
tags: figuratively
not-comparable
examples: He wasn’t just cool to me, he was downright rude.
VVe vvere deſcried, theyle mock vs novv dounright.
VVhat then are thoſe monſtrous Extravagancies in your deportment to all perſons of vvhat quality ſoever? […] VVhich bold and impudent cuſtome, unleſs you vvere dovvn-right mad, you could never have taken up of your ſelves. VVherefore certainly ſome very vvaggiſh Maſter of the Ceremonies has taught you this ill manners, like him that inſtructed the Sheriff to keep on his Hat vvhen he accoſted the King.
Familiar! Madam, in Troth he's dovvn-right rude.
If my friend had not given me the hint, damn me if I ſhou'd not think her dovvn right angry.
The pure Drummond product, the four-cylinder 4-6-0 as built for the London & South Western, was a less successful design, and some of the specimens were downright bad.
gloss: Of acts or speech: directly and unambiguously; clearly, plainly.
pos: adv
tags: archaic
figuratively
not-comparable
examples: Ros[alind]. Not true in loue? / Cel[ia]. Yes, vvhen he is in, but I thinke he is not in. / Ros. You haue heard him ſvveare dovvnright he vvas.
VVell, 'tis not my Buſineſs to quarrel vvith her dovvn[-]right.
Mr. Halkett, […] told him downright that he had assisted at many weddings, but he had never the pleasure of supporting such a thorough "carry-me-out-and-bury-me-decently" looking article before.
gloss: Straight down; perpendicularly.
pos: adv
tags: not-comparable
obsolete
examples: Cedentes capilli, heares [hairs] hanging down ryght.
[Y]et there bee other difficulties that impeach their vvorke: for othervvhiles they meet vvith rocks of flint and rags, as vvell in undermining forvvard, as in ſinking pits dovvne right; vvhich they are driven to pierce and cleave through vvith fire and vinegre.
In removing and tranſplanting young Oakes you muſt be ſure not to cut off or vvound that part of the root, vvhich deſcends dovvn-right (vvhich in ſome Countreys they call the tap-root) but dig it up to the bottome, and prepare your hole deep enough to ſet it: […]
He […] climb'd a ſtranded Lighter's height, / Shot to the black abyſs, and plung'd dovvn-right.
Than sousit dounright like the stern-shot light, / Fra the liftis blue casement driven.
The three mates quailed before his strong, sustained, and mystic aspect. Stubb and Flask looked sideways from him; the honest eye of Starbuck fell downright.
gloss: Immediately at that place and time; without delay; altogether, at once, then and there.
pos: adv
tags: figuratively
not-comparable
obsolete
examples: This is the ſoul that I vvith preſſer quill / Muſt novv purſue and fall upon dovvn-right, […]
The reading of this Paper put Mrs. Bull in ſuch a Paſſion, that ſhe fell dovvnright into a Fit, and they vvere forc’d to give her a good quantity of the Spirit of Hartſhorn before ſhe recover’d.
And, dear Lady G. he dovvnright kiſſed me—My lip; and not my cheek—and in ſo fervent a vvay—I tell you every-thing, my Charlotte—I could have been angry—had I knovvn hovv, from ſurprize.
gloss: Absolute, complete.
pos: adj
tags: figuratively
examples: For although in that ancient and diffuſed adoration of IdolLs, unto the Prieſts and ſubtiler heads, the vvorſhip perhaps might be ſymbolicall, and as thoſe Images ſome vvay related unto their deities, yet vvas the Idolatry direct and dovvne-right in the people, vvhoſe credulity is illimitable, vvho may be made believe that any thing is God, and may be made believe there is no God at all.
'I ſee his Deſign,' ſaid ſhe, 'for he made dovvnright Love to me Yeſterday Morning; but as I am reſolved never to admit it, I beg your Ladyſhip not to leave us alone together any more,[…]'
Ye're a' gait at ance, Annie Anderson. A doonricht rintheroot!
The weather is raw and boisterous in winter, shifty and ungenial in summer, and a downright meteorological purgatory in the spring.
People who are downright bad drivers should not handle a motor these days, when the roads are so crowded and dangerous. They are a menace to other persons as well as to themselves.
gloss: Of a person or their behaviour: direct, plain, straightforward; also, of speech: direct and unambiguous; blunt, to the point.
pos: adj
tags: figuratively
examples: The ſay this Angelo vvas not made by Man and VVoman, after this dovvne-right vvay of Creation: is it true, thinke you?
[Y]our dovvne right Captain ſtill Ile lieve, and ſerve you, […]
And here an Admonition from a dead Author, or a Caveat from an Impartial Pen, vvhoſe Aim neither vvas, nor can be taken, as any particular By-Deſign, vvill prevail more, and have a better Effect, than a dovvn-right Advice; […]
[T]hree Nights together he dreamt that he ſavv a Neighbouring Gentleman kiſſing his Miſtreſs, and in dovvnright Engliſh, lying with her.
I love to pour out all myſelf, as plain / As dovvnright Shippen, or as old Montagne.
It bears the evident marks of having originally been, vvhat the honeſt and dovvnright Doctor Douglaſs aſſures us it vvas, a ſcheme of fraudulent debtors to cheat their creditors.
There is an openness, a quickness, almost a bluntness in Mr. Weston, which every body likes in him because there is so much good humour with it—but that would not do to be copied. Neither would Mr. Knightley's downright, decided, commanding sort of manner—though it suits him very well; his figure, and look, and situation in life seem to allow it; but if any young man were to set about copying him, he would not be sufferable.
Harry is a simple downright fellow, and though I think he is my better in a broil, yet in discourse I can turn him my own way.
Her husband was evidently a sensible man, and he might have given his wife a little more sense than she could have derived from her downright father and her silly mother-in-law, who were really as great a pair of noodles as ever were exhibited in the pages of a modern novel, under the cognomen of "amiable rustics."
There were miners from Klondyke, hunters from the backwoods, troopers from the Northwest Frontier Police, and included were some of the "hardest cases" that the land of the maple leaf ever produced; these were past-masters in the use of unique expletives, and for downright and original profanity it would hardly be possible to find their equal.
Izumi Shikibu's Diary is written with extreme delicacy of treatment. English words and thought seem too downright a medium into which to render these evanescent, half-expressed sentences and poems—vague as the misty mountain scenery of her country, with no pronouns at all, and without verb inflections.
That this paragraph will annoy the typical citizen of Hull, who prides himself upon being a plain and downright fellow, I have no doubt whatever; but he should give it a chance, for he is not so plain and downright as he woud have us believe, and neither is that city of his.
The twisted trees and high tossed driftwood hinted that Skedans could be as thoroughly fierce as she was calm. She was downright about everything.
gloss: Coming straight down; directed vertically.
pos: adj
tags: obsolete
examples: Downeright ſtroke […] taille
Thoſe perſones, […] be auouched to bee like vnto trees, growyng on the edges or brinkes of clieffes and rockes of a downright pitche, or a ſtiepe down fall: the fruites of whiche trees no man could euer geat a taſte of, but theſame were from time to time, deuoured by the crowes and the rauens.
This Hawkweede hath no deepe downeright roote, but ſheweth as though it were gnawen or bitten, lyke to the roote of Deuils bit, […]
Lord Staffords Father, Duke of Buckingham, / Is either ſlaine or vvounded dangerous. / I cleft his Beauer [bevor] vvith a dovvn-right blovv: / That this is true (Father) behold his Blood.
VVe thinke the heauens enioy their Sphericall / Their round proportion embracing all. / But yet their various and perplexed courſe, / Obſeru'd in divers ages doth enforce / Men to finde out ſo many Eccentrique parts, / Such diuers dovvne-right lines, ſuch overthvvarts, / As diſproportion that pure forme.
As his bodie bends / To iump from dovvne-right cliffes, compaſſionate / Apollo, vvith light vvings, preuents his fate: […]
And vvith that he gave him again, a dovvn-right blovv, and brought him upon his Knees.
[S]aving the lack of your hand, a mischance beyond remedy, you ought rather to rejoice than to complain; for no barber-chirurgeon in France or England could have more ably performed the operation than this churl with one downright blow.
gloss: Chiefly in downright money: in its most basic form; ordinary.
pos: adj
tags: figuratively
obsolete
examples: [T]he merchant's wife, next to her who abounds in plenty, is not to have downright money, but the mercenary part of her mind is engaged with a present of plate, and a little ambition.
Derived words: downrightly
downrightness
Translations: